s
for a minute and turned abruptly away into his own room. He closed the
door and stood absent-mindedly feeling his swollen hand. "I've got to
go," he repeated under his breath. "I might get foolish if I stayed.
Darned if I'll make a fool of myself over any girl!"

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

ABOUT A PIANO

In the lazy hour just after a satisfying dinner, Lance stood leaning
over an end of the piano, watching Belle while she played--he listened
and smoked a cigarette and looked as though he hadn't a thing on his
mind.

"I remember you used to sing that a lot for the little Douglas girl,"
he observed idly. "She used to sit and look at you--my word, but her
eyes were the bluest, the lonesomest eyes I ever saw! She seemed to
think you were next to angels when you sang. I saw it in her face, but
I was too much of a kid then to know what it was." He lighted a fresh
cigarette, placed it between Belle's lips so that she need not stop
playing while she smoked, and laughed as if he were remembering
something funny.

"She always looked so horrified when she saw you smoking," he said.
"And so adoring when you sang, and so lonesome when she had to ride
away. She was a queer kid--and she's just as unexpected now--just as
Scotch. Didn't you find her that way, dad?"

"She was Scotch enough," Tom mumbled from his chair by the fire.
"Humpin' hyenas! She was like handlin' a wildcat!"

"The poor kid never did have a chance to be human," said Belle, and
ceased playing for a moment. "Good heavens, how she did enjoy the two
hours I gave her at the piano! She's got the makings of a musician, if
she could keep at it."

"We-ell--" Having artfully led Belle to this point, Lance quite as
artfully edged away from it. "You gave her all the chance you could.
And she ought to be able to go on, if she wants to. I suppose old
Scotty's human enough to get her something to play on."

"Him? _Human!_" Tom shifted in his chair. "If pianos could breed and
increase into a herd, and he could ship a carload every fall, Scotty
might spend a few dollars on one."

"It's a darned shame," Belle exclaimed, dropping her fingers to the
keys again. "Mary Hope just _starves_ for everything that makes life
worth living. And that old devil--"

"Say--don't make me feel like a great, overgrown money-hog," Lance
protested. "A girl starving for music, because she hasn't a piano to
play on. And a piano costs, say, three or four hundred dollars. Of
course, we've got