It was of no use. Lance found he could not listen to that man talking about Mary Hope. To strike the man on his fish-like, hard-lipped mouth would only make matters worse, so he once more left the compartment and stood in the open doorway of the vestibule just beyond. The train, slowing to a stop at a tank station, jarred to a standstill. In the compartment behind him the man's voice sounded loud and raucous now that the mechanical noises had ceased. "Well, I never knew it to fail--what's in the blood will come out. They've lived there for three generations now. They're killers, thieves at heart--human birds of prey, and it don't matter if it is all under the surface. I say it's _there_." At that moment, Lance had the hunger to kill, to stop forever the harsh voice that talked on and on of the Lorrigans and their ingrained badness. He stepped outside, slamming the door shut behind him. The voice, fainter now, could still be heard. He swung down to the cinders, stood there staring ahead at the long train, counting the cars, watching the fireman run with his oil can and climb into the engine cab. He could no longer hear the voice, but he felt that he must forget it or go back and kill the man who owned it. In the car ahead a little girl leaned out of the window, her curls whipping across her face. Jubilantly she waved her hand at him, shrilled a sweet, "Hello-oh. Where _you_ goin'? I'm goin' to my grandma's house!" The rigor left Lance's jaw. He smiled, showing his teeth, saw that a brakeman was down inspecting a hot box on the forward truck of that car, and walked along to the window where the little girl leaned and waited, waving two sticky hands at him to hurry. "Hello, baby. I know a grandma that's going to be mighty happy, before long," he said, standing just under the window and looking up at her. "D'you know my gran'ma? S'e lives in a green house an' s'e's got five--hundred baby kittens for me to see! An' I'm goin' to bring one home wis me--but I _do'no_ which one. D'you like yellow kittens, or litty gray kittens, or black ones?" Gravely Lance studied the matter, his eyebrows pulled together, his mouth wearing the expression which had disturbed Mary Hope when he came to mend the lock on her door. "I'd take--now, if your grandma has one that's all spotted, you might take that, couldn't you? Then some days you'd love the yellow spots, and some days you'd love the black spots, and some days--" "Ooh! And I could call it _all_ the nice names I want to call it!" The little girl pressed her hands together rapturously. "When my kitty's got its yellow-spotty day, I'll call him Goldy, and when--" The engine bell clanged warning, the wheels began slowly to turn. "Ooh! You'll get left and have to walk!" cried the little girl, in big-eyed alarm. "All right, baby--you take the spotted one!" Lance called over his shoulder as he ran. He was smiling when he swung up the steps. No longer did he feel that he must kill the harsh-voiced man.