or gipsy. I've not been here so very much, and yet I always
think of coming here as of going home."

"God never made any other country just like it, I reckon," Boone
answered gravely. "It's fierce and lawless, but it's honest and
generous, too. Men kill here, but they don't steal. They are poor, but
they never turn the stranger away. It's strange, though, that you should
love it so. It's very different from all you've known down there."

"I guess there's a wild streak in me, too," she laughed. "Those virtues
you speak of are the ones I like best. When I go home I feel like a
canary hopping back into its cage, after a little freedom."

CHAPTER XXV

When he went back to Louisville, early in September, Boone found the
office of Colonel Wallifarro humming with a suppressed excitement,
tinctured with indignation. A municipal campaign was on, and on the day
of his arrival General Prince and Colonel Wallifarro were deep in its
discussion. Seeing the earnest gleam in their eyes, Boone wondered a
little at the contrasting indifference in Morgan's manner whenever the
political topic was broached. He fancied that the Colonel himself was
disappointed, and one morning that gentleman said with a tone as nearly
bordering on rebuke as Boone had ever heard him employ with his son,
"Morgan, I don't understand how you can remain so unmoved by a situation
which makes an imperative demand upon a man's sense of citizenship."

Morgan laughed. "Father," he said easily, "it is law that interests
me--not politics. Take it all in all, I don't think it's a very clean
business."

The elder man studied his son thoughtfully for a space, and then he said
quietly, "General Prince and myself take a different view. We think that
at certain times--like the present--citizenship may mean a call to the
colours.... A failure to respond to such a summons seems to me a
surrender of civil affairs into the hands of avowed despoilers--it seems
almost desertion."

"And yet, sir," smiled the unruffled Morgan, "we rarely see permanent
reforms result from crusading patriots. The ward heelers are usually the
victors, because professionals have the advantage of amateurs."

That same evening Boone stood in a small downtown hall, crowded to the
doors, and heard Colonel Wallifarro lay the stinging lash of
denunciation across the shoulders of the city hall oligarchy. He heard
him charge the police and the fire departments with fostering a
perpetuation of ma