just what was necessary had he known Janice
was in the room. The young engineer had not been bossing a
construction gang of lusty, "two-fisted" fellows for six months without
many rude experiences.

"So, you won't let go, eh?" he gritted between his teeth to the smiling
foreigner.

With his left hand in his collar, Frank jerked the man toward him,
thrust his own leg forward, and then pitched the fellow backward over
his knee. This act broke the man's hold upon Drugg's violin and he
crashed to the floor, striking the back of his head soundly.

"All right, Mr. Drugg," panted Frank. "Get out."

But it was Janice, still confronting Bodley, that actually freed the
storekeeper from his enemies. Her eyes blazed with indignation into
the bartender's own. His fat, white hand dropped from Hopewell's arm.

"Oh, if the young lady's really come to take you home to the missus, I
s'pose we'll have to let you go," he said, with a nasty laugh. "But no
play, no pay, you understand."

Janice drew the bewildered Hopewell out of the door, and Frank quickly
followed. Few in the room had noted the incident at all.

The three stood a minute on the porch, the mist drifting in from the
lake and wetting them. The engineer finally took the umbrella from
Janice and raised it to shelter her.

"They--they broke two of the strings," muttered Hopewell, with thought
for nothing but his precious violin.

"You'd better cover it up, or it will be wet; and that won't do any
fiddle any good," growled Frank, rather disgusted with the storekeeper.

But there was something queer about Hopewell's condition that both
puzzled Janice and made her pity him.

"He is not intoxicated--not as other men are," she whispered to the
engineer.

"I don't know that he is," said Frank. "But he's made us trouble
enough. Come on; let's get him home."

Drugg was trying to shelter the precious violin under his coat.

"He has no hat and the fiddle bag is gone," said Janice.

"I'm not going back in there," said the civil engineer decidedly. And
then he chuckled, adding:

"That fellow I tipped over will be just about ready to fight by now. I
reckon he thinks differently now about the 'white-headed kid,' as he
called me. You see," Frank went on modestly, "I was something of a
boxer at the Tech school, and I've had to keep my wits about me with
those 'muckers' of the railroad construction gang."

"Oh, dear, me! I think there must be something very tige