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any person. He turned and walked slowly back into the light.

"I guess you fellers have made a mistake," he said in a different tone. "I'm Ab Teeftaller. I run a dirt scoop at the railroad camp. I don't guess I'm the man you're lookin' for."

"We know who ye air all right an' what ye done," returned the flat voice. "Jest come on an' git in this automobile with us."

"Well, by God," said Abner, pausing, "if you know what I done, I want to know it too; so spit her out. What you fellers got agin me?"

A third voice answered, "Damn you, we're goin' to take you back to Arntown an' marry ye to that Sutton gal!"

Such a surprise flooded Abner that he felt weak.

"What in the hell!" he ejaculated blankly; then a terrifying possibility smote him. "You-all ain't a passel o' her relations, air ye?"

"That's all right what we air," returned the voice. "You ruint that gal, an' now you got to marry her."

As Abner stared at this amazing mission, all his ardour to have Nessie for a wife vanished and he recalled with gratitude that she had gone away on the train. He moistened his dry mouth.

"Why—er—gentlemen," he stammered in a frightened voice, "they ain't no use takin' me back to Arntown. I jest been down there on purpose to marry her, an' she left on the northbound about an hour ago."

"That's a damn lie," returned a snarling voice, "for she didn't buy no ticket. Come on, you kain't lie out of it. You got to marry her an' then both of ye got to git out o' this country."

This was a strange view for Nessie's kinsmen to take. A moment later, when Abner stepped out of the glare of light, he made out, with a still deeper sinking of the heart, that all the men in the motor wore masks. Then they were not Nessie's kinsmen. If they had been, they would not have