h.
"A crowd of fifteen men came here and registered at opening time,"
announced one herald. "Forty-five minutes later the same gang came back
and registered again. The protest of our challenger was ignored."

There were not enough telephones to carry the traffic of lamentation and
complaint. "Our camera men are being assaulted and their instruments
smashed...." "The Chief of Police has just been here and left
instructions that snapshotting is an invasion of private rights. He has
ordered his men to lock up all photographers...." "Our judge in this
precinct challenged a man when he tried to register, the second time,
and a crowd of thugs with blackjacks rushed the place and beat him
unconscious. The police said they saw no difficulty."

So came the burden of chorused indignation, and the automobiles began
cruising outward on tours of investigation and protest. The "boys" had
been assured that they were to have "all the protection in the world,"
and they were "going to it."

From this and that section of the city arrived news of men who had been
blackjacked, crowd-handled and arrested, but out of the whole rapidly
developing reign of terror certain precincts stood forth conspicuous.
Seated beside Colonel Wallifarro in the dust-covered car that raced from
ward to ward, while the Colonel's face streamed sweat from the hurried
tempo of his exertions, Boone marvelled at the fashion in which these
men combined indomitable perseverance with self-contained patience.
Often he himself burned with an angry impulse to jump down from his seat
and punish the insolent effrontery of some ruffian in uniform.

"I reckon you don't know who these gentlemen are," he protested at one
time to a police sergeant, whose manner had passed beyond impertinence
and become abuse.

"No and I don't give a damn who they are," retorted the guardian of
peace. "I know what this business means to me. It's four years with a
job or four years without one."

Twice during the morning they were called to a building that had once
been a shoemaker's shop. The erstwhile showcase was dimmed by the dust
of a dry summer and the grimy smears of a rainy autumn. There the tide
of bulldozing had run to flood, and the Fusion judge of registration, an
undersized chap with an oversized courage, had wrangled and fought
against overweening odds until they took him away with both eyes closed
beyond usefulness. A challenger with less stomach for punishment had
borne the br