nces, with no refreshments stronger than coffee and lemonade!--and
she would sell tickets, and invite every one she knew, and beg them to
come and help to pay for the school piano.

Even her mother approved that plan, though she did not approve dances.
"But the folk are that sinfu' they canna bide wi' any pleasure save
the hoppin' aboot wi' their arms around the waist of a woman," she
sighed. "A church social wad be far more tae my liking, Hope--if we
had only a church!"

"Well, since there isn't any church, and people won't go to anything
but a dance, I shall have to get the money with dances," Mary Hope
replied with some asperity. The subject was beginning to wear her
nerves. "Pay for it I shall, if it takes all my teacher's salary for
five years! I wish the Lorrigans had minded their own business. I've
heard nothing but piano ever since it came there. I hate the
Lorrigans! Sometimes I almost hate the piano."

"Ye shud hae thought on all that before ye accepit a ride home wi'
young Lance, wi' a coat ye didna own on your back, and disobedience in
your heart. 'Tis the worst of them a' ye chose to escort ye, Hope, and
if he thought he could safely presume to gi' ye a present like yon
piano, ye hae but yersel' tae blame for it."

"He didn't give it!" cried Mary Hope, her eyes ablaze with resentment.
"He wasna here when it came. I havena heard from him and I dinna want
to hear from him. It was Belle Lorrigan gave the piano, as I've said a
million times. And I shall pay for it--"

"Not from your ain pocket will ye pay. Ye can give the dance--and if
ye make it the Fourth of July, with a picnic in the grove, and a dance
in the schoolhouse afterwards, 'tis possible Jeanie may come up from
Pocatello wi' friends--and twa dollars wad no be too much to ask for a
day and a night of entertainment."

"Well, mother! When you do--" Mary Hope bit her tongue upon the
remainder of the sentence. She had very nearly told her mother that
when she did choose to be human she had a great head for business.

It was a fine, practical idea, and Mary Hope went energetically about
its development. She consulted Mrs. Kennedy. Mrs. Kennedy also had
friends in Pocatello, and she obligingly gave the names of them all.
She strongly advised written invitations, with a ticket enclosed and
the price marked plainly. She said it was a crying shame the way the
Lorrigans had conducted their dance, and that Mary Hope ought to be
very careful and not incl