urned away with the
irritating jauntiness of one who has scored.

But that evening, at the Horse Show, Boone suffered the embarrassment of
that flare-up of publicity which he felt was purely adventitious. Chance
had made him a scrap in a pattern of ephemeral interest, and to him it
seemed that one man in three carried an afternoon paper in his pocket
with his own hasty albeit recognizable portrait starkly displayed to the
public gaze. On faces which he did not know he caught smiles of amused
recognition, and on one which he did know a glower of hate. That was
the face of the policeman who had arrested him.

Some of the women in the boxes had him dragged before them for
introduction, and he responded with a shyness that was cloaked under the
reserve of his half-barbaric dignity.

Anne smiled, and a proprietary pride lurked in her expression.

"Anne looks as docile and amiable as a sweet child," sighed Mrs. Masters
to Colonel Wallifarro, as he bade her good night that same evening, "but
she's got Larry's British stubbornness in every fibre."

"Added," suggested the Colonel with a truant twinkle, "to the admirable
resoluteness of our own family."

"She's absolutely set on having this young protege of yours at her debut
ball, and I suppose you know what that signifies. It means that through
her whole social career he'll be dangling along frightening off really
eligible men!" The lady gave a well-bred little snort of disdain. "He's
about as possible as a pet toad!"

The Colonel laughed.

"I'm afraid, my dear, that I like Anne the better for it. We've agreed
that Morgan is your choice, and mine--and I don't think Morgan is going
to be scared off. Besides, this young man is in my office."

"So is your office cat--if you have one," sniffed the anxious mother.
"We're not sending the cat an invitation, you know."

"I have no cat," observed the lawyer with perfect gravity, and Mrs.
Masters shrugged her shoulders with unconvinced resignation.

When the telephone on Boone's desk rang one afternoon he was quite alone
there, and he took up the receiver, to hear Anne's voice. The
conversation at first indicated no definite objective, but after a
little the girl demanded:

"Boone, you _are_ coming to my party--aren't you?"

For a moment the young man hung hesitantly on the question; then he
said: "Anne, I'd go anywhere for the chance of seeing you, but you know
'I hain't nuver run a set in my life. My folks they don't hol