Gathering his men John closed in on the house. As he expected they had put out no pickets, never dreaming that they would be molested. They had bound Nickaroshinski, beaten him unmercifully and tortured him until they had secured his money and, not satisfied, had begun to smash things to pieces. Looking through the window John saw that their costumes were exactly like his own and that the six men had scattered through the house bent on plundering every nook and corner. Knowing that it would be impossible for them to distinguish their own men from his, he made at once his plan to capture the crowd without a struggle. Stationing his own six men at the front door, he took Dan Wiley and boldly entered the room where the leader stood covering the Jew with his revolver. Without a word they walked toward him in the dim light. Merely glancing at them the leader growled: “Finish up and let’s get away from here!” “All right,” John answered coming closer, “I’m getting in a hurry myself.” Before he knew what they meant, Dan pounced on him and pinioned his arms while John quickly covered his mouth and fixed the gag. It was but the work of a moment to tie the wretch and pass him out the door to the grim figures waiting. They repeated this performance in each room until all but two had been taken. These two were together. John suddenly blew his whistle giving the Klan signal “Follow me.” When they entered the room two revolvers were suddenly thrust under their noses. They surrendered without a struggle. John quickly released the old man, bound his wounds, restored his money and left with his prisoners. Each of them were given forty lashes and the next morning when Steve Hoyle woke he found six stripe-marked half-naked men gagged and bleeding dangling by their arms from the limbs of the trees on his lawn. Around the neck of each hung a placard: “A warning to the scoundrels who are disgracing the uniform of the Ku Klux Klan in this county.” CHAPTER X--THE STRENGTH OF THE WEAK STEVE HOYLE had cut down his men and hustled them out of town before eight o’clock, but the news rapidly spread and had thrown the people into a tremor of wonder as to the meaning of the events of the night. Evidently there had been a clash of forces within the ranks of the Invisible Empire. What did it mean? Steve had lost no time in explaining to the desperadoes from the hills what they wished to know, and they had left with deep muttered curses against their former Commander-in-chief. The outrage on Nickaroshinski had aroused the fiercest passions between the friends of John Graham and Steve Hoyle. Excited groups stood on every corner and it was with the utmost difficulty that John succeeded finally in dispersing them without a clash. At one o’clock Larkin called at the old Graham mansion and announced to Aunt Julie Ann his desire to see the Judge. “Ye can’t see ’im,” was her contemptuous answer.