sit and listen with watering mouths and eyes goggling. I've been
a hero, months on end, just for the things that my grandad did in the
seventies. Of course," he pulled his lips into their whimsical smile,
"I've touched up the family biography here and there and made heroes
of us all. But the fact remains there are degrees and differences in
badness. I've a notion that the Black Rim, taken by and large, is a
damn sight worse than the Devil's Tooth outfit. I'd like to try the
experiment of making the AJ and old Scotty ashamed of themselves. I'd
like to try a schoolhouse on 'em, and see if they're human enough to
appreciate it."

Duke, turning his head slowly, glanced at Al, and from him to Tom.
Without moving a muscle of their faces the two returned his look. Al
slid his cigarette stub thoughtfully into his coffee cup and let his
breath out carefully in a long sigh that was scarcely audible. Tom
took a corner of his lower lip between his teeth, matching Lance, who
had the same trick.

"Honey, that's fine of you! There aren't many that realize what a lot
of satisfaction there is in doing something big and generous and
making the other fellow ashamed of himself. And it would be a God's
mercy to Mary Hope, poor child. Leave it to the AJ and whatever other
outfit there is to send pupils, and Mary Hope could teach in the
Whipple shack till it rattled down on top of them. I know what the
place is. I put up there once in a hailstorm. It isn't fit for cattle,
as Tom says, unless they've fixed it a lot. I'll donate the furniture;
I'll make out the order right this evening for seats and blackboard
and a globe and everything, and make it a rush order!" Belle pushed
back her chair and came around to Lance, slipped her arms around his
neck and tousled his wavy mop of hair with her chin. "If the rest
won't come through you and I'll do it, honey--"

"Who said we wouldn't?" Tom got up, stretching his arms high above his
head,--which was very bad manners, but showed how supple he still was,
and how well-muscled. "No one ever called me a piker--and let me hear
about it. Sure, we'll build a schoolhouse for 'em, seeing they're too
cussed stingy to build one themselves. There's the lumber I had hauled
out for a new chicken house; to-morrow I'll have it hauled up to some
good building spot, and we'll have it done before the AJ wakes up to
the fact that anything's going on."

"I'll chip in enough to make her big enough for dances," voluntee