Page:Triangles of life, and other stories.djvu/175

 it was his horse he had lent Andy the week before, and had been stoking himself and boiling-over all the way, and, as is usual in such cases, he was not mollified to find that he had worked himself up for nothing.

"Look here, Andy Page!" he said, "send back my horse to-morrow. I can't breed horses to burst themselves for other people, and be let loose to fall down a shaft any night."

"But it isn't your horse, Mr. Leonard," said Andy.

"Don't you mind whose horse it is. You send it back to-night. You won't want it now, anyway, by the look of things."

"Well, Mr. Leonard," said Andy, plucking up, " I only borrowed it to help your own sister, anyway. You might think of that." "Well, if that's the way you're going to talk to me, Andy Page," snarled Billy, "you can get your horse out yourself. An' look here, before you begin to talk to me, you can let me have the rest of that fiver I lent you. Send back my horse to-night, that's all!" and he rode off.

It struck Andy's face stoney, for he knew why the "fiver" had been borrowed, and where it went. But there was no help for it. I had to tell him about Bob.

Then Andy gave his head a despairing jerk, and his arm a great, impatient swing—the first time I remember him showing a sign of impatience, and he said to me, as if struck with a sudden idea—

"Look here, Harry! That family's gettin' redicklus!"

Then, as though momentarily stunned by the