“I do! He’s a treacherous leopard, the——” Molly’s cheeks were the color of chalk. With clenched fists held to her breasts she threw back her head and hurled her defiance at the old man. “No!” she cried, her head thrown back. “No one, father, not even you, can speak like that to me. Johnny Dice is my friend! I’d trust him with my life!” CHAPTER XIV FOR THE HEART OF A GIRL Something sang in the heart of Johnny Dice. The one being in the world who mattered had faith in him. The impulse to take her into his arms at this moment almost overcame him. He had seen Molly Kent under varied circumstances, but never so superb as now. She was all woman; mature where Johnny had believed her mere girl. The sight of her so aroused, so alive, thrilled him in a manner quite new. Whatever had gone before was as nothing now. Life began here. Down through the years his memories of Molly Kent would date from this moment, so utterly did his spirit bend to worship her. It had needed a moment as dramatic as this to awaken the boy to the enormity of his loss should he lose her. And, although he was enraged, Jackson Kent’s eyes had been opened, too. He saw the abyss yawning at his feet, and an abyss it was, indeed—the losing of his girl! Death was trivial beside it. Old age was upon him and it frightened Jackson Kent to the very marrow to consider the future, robbed of Molly’s great love. And it would get to that if this man came between them. In his day Kent had held himself a hard man, cold, unemotional; asking affection of none. But, as so often happens with men of his type, he gave when he least suspected it, and now that the tide had set the other way he knew his need. Often he had fooled himself into worshiping his money. His false god mocked him. His hungry heart needed Molly, not money! And he swore that he would have her; that Johnny Dice should never see her again. Had the fool bewitched the girl? Wait until she heard how he had been caught skulking in her room. Yes, and his insolence at the Rock; she’d resent that. There was good steel in Molly. This Dice person would find that the Kents stuck together! And, oh, how he hated Johnny! Anger surged through his brain in blinding waves until his withered old body trembled. Had he been at all apoplectic, Jackson Kent would have been stricken dead. Poor Molly winced as she regarded him. She had insisted on fair play, but without intending to wound her father. What had got into folks lately to make them fly at each others’ throats in this fashion? Thoroughly distressed, she said: “Father, I’m sorry I hurt you. I didn’t mean to be impertinent.” The old man unbent readily enough.