"Sure. But if I had a headache--like that--I'd certainly burn the earth
getting outa town to-night. _Shivarees_"--he stuck stubbornly to his own
way of saying it--"are bad for the head. They aren't what you could call
silent--not out here in this uncivilized section of the country. They're
plumb--" He hesitated for just a fraction of a second, and his resentment
of her tone melted into a twinkle of the eyes. "They've got fifty coal-oil
cans strung with irons on a rope, and there'll be about ninety-five
six-shooters popping, and eight or ten horse-fiddles, and they'll all be
yelling to beat four of a kind. They're going," he said quite gravely, "to
play the full orchestra. And I don't believe," he added ironically, "it's
going to help Mr. Fleetwood's head any."

Valeria looked at him doubtingly with steady, amber-colored eyes before she
turned solicitously to readjust the lace-edged handkerchief. Kent seized
the opportunity to stare fixedly at Fleetwood and jerk his head meaningly
backward, but when, warned by Manley's changing expression, she glanced
suspiciously over her shoulder, Kent was standing quietly by the door with
his hat in his hand, gazing absently at Walt in his gilt-edged frame upon
the gilt easel, and waiting, evidently, for their decision.

"I shall tell them that Mr. Fleetwood is sick--that he has a horrible
headache, and mustn't be disturbed."

Kent forgot himself so far as to cough slightly behind his hand. Valeria's
eyes sparkled.

"Even out here," she went on cuttingly, "there must be some men who are
gentlemen!"