e, and that her fingers had probably
strayed into the rhythm of it while she was thinking of something
totally different.

The next day she played a little at noontime for the children, and
when school was over she played for two hours. And the next day after
that slipped away--she really had meant to ride over to the AJ, or
send a note by the children, asking Jim Boyle if he could please
remove the piano and saying that she felt it was too expensive a gift
for the school to accept from the Lorrigans.

On the third day she really did send a prim little note to Jim Boyle,
and she received a laconic reply, wholly characteristic of the Black
Rim's attitude toward the Devil's Tooth outfit.

"Take all you can git and git all you can without going to jale.
That's what the Lorrigans are doing, Yrs truly,

"J. A. Boyle."

It was useless to ask her father. She had known that all along. When
Alexander Douglas slipped the collars up on the necks of his horses,
he must see where money would be gained from the labor. And there was
no money for the Douglas pocket in hauling a piano down the Devil's
Tooth Ridge.

But the whole Black Rim was talking about it. Mary Hope felt sure that
they were saying ill-natured things behind her back. Never did she
meet man or woman but the piano was mentioned. Sometimes she was
asked, with meaning smiles, how she had come to stand in so well with
the Devil's Tooth. She knew that they were all gossiping of how Lance
Lorrigan had taken her home from the dance, with Belle Lorrigan's
bronco team. She had been obliged to return a torn coat to Mrs.
Miller, and to receive her own and a long lecture on the wisdom of
choosing one's company with some care. She had been obliged to beg
Mrs. Miller not to mention the matter to her parents, and the word had
gone round, and had reached Mother Douglas--and you can imagine how
pleasant that made home for Mary Hope.

Because she was lonely, and no one seemed willing to take it away, she
kept the piano. She played it, and while she played she wept because
the Rim folk simply would not understand how little she wanted the
Lorrigans to do things for her. And then, one day, she hit upon a plan
of redeeming herself, for regaining the self-respect she felt was
slipping from her with every day that the piano stood in the
schoolhouse.

She would give a series of dances--they would be orderly, well-behaved
da