she
wished nervously that she had done as Lance Lorrigan had done, and
brought musicians from Lava. Of course, there had been no piano when
Lance gave his party, which was different. She herself meant to play,
and Art Miller had brought his fiddle, and Jennie had volunteered to
"chord" with him. But, Mary Hope felt much nervous apprehension lest
these Pocatello and Lava people should think it was just Scotch
stinginess on her part.

Late in the afternoon a few of the ranchers rode hastily homeward to
"do the chores," but the Lava and Pocatello crowd remained, and began
to drift up to the schoolhouse and drum on the piano that was actually
going to pay for itself and free Mary Hope's pride from its burden.

By sundown a dozen energetic couples were waltzing while a
Pocatello dentist with a stiff, sandy pompadour chewed gum and played
loudly, with much arm movement and very little rhythm; so very
little rhythm that the shuffling feet frequently ceased shuffling,
and expostulations rose high above his thunderous chords.

By dusk the overworked ranch women had fed the last hungry mouth and
put away the fragments of home-baked cakes and thick sandwiches, and
were forming a solid line of light shirtwaists and dark skirts along
the wall. The dance was really beginning.

As before, groups of men stood around outside and smoked and slapped
at mosquitoes--except that at Lance's party there had been no
mosquitoes to slap--and talked in undertones the gossip of the ranges.
If now and then the name of Lorrigan was mentioned, there was no
Lorrigan present to hear. At intervals the "floor manager" would come
to the door and call out numbers: "Number one, and up to and including
sixteen, git your pardners fer a two-step!" Whereupon certain men
would pinch out the glow of their cigarettes and grind the stubs into
the sod under their heels, and go in to find partners. With that
crowd, not all could dance at once; Mary Hope remembered pridefully
that there had been no dancing by numbers at the party Lance Lorrigan
gave.

What a terrible dance that had been! A regular rowdy affair. And this
crowd, big as it was, had as yet shown no disposition to rowdyism. It
surely did make a difference, thought Mary Hope, what kind of people
sponsored an entertainment. With the Devil's Tooth outfit as the
leaders, who could expect anything but trouble?

Then she caught herself thinking, with a vague heaviness in her heart,
how Lance had taken he