her husband's life.
She made it hers.

Kildare's boon companions found to their relief that a young wife was no
restraint upon their pleasures; was indeed an addition to them. No sport
was too rough for her to share, no riding too hard, no gambling too
heavy. Despite her town breeding, this was no hothouse plant, this
daughter of a horse-racing, whisky-drinking, card-playing gentry.
Kildare took a vast delight in her prowess, particularly at the
card-table; swearing joyously when she won, paying her losses, which
were considerable, with an amused indifference equal to her own. One
quality, and one alone, had power to move him in man, woman, or beast.
It was the quality he called Spirit.

In that Kate was not lacking. Rumors of the wild Kildares, always rife
in a countryside they had made famous for generations with their
amusements, did not abate after the coming of a new mistress to Storm.
Of the society of her own sex, she had little or nothing. The few women
of her class within driving distance were careful to call once--Kildare
was not a man to antagonize. But they did not come again. Kate was not
sorry. She found them less interesting than their men-folk. Their
manners were provincial, their outlook narrow, and--they did not fall in
love with her. In this they were unlike their husbands, their brothers,
their sons, and fathers.

The guest-house was rarely empty. The bride and groom were never alone.
Storm had long been a gathering place for sportsmen of every type, from
the neighboring towns, from the city, from other States. Nor were their
guests always gentlemen. Kate, indeed, grew to prefer certain of the
rough and simple farmers who came there to the more polished visitors.
Their admiration was humbler, less troublesome.

Gentlemen or not, Kate numbered her admirers among her husband's friends
by the score. She grew as adept in handling them as in handling colts;
and her prowess in this, too, amused Basil Kildare enormously. He
rallied her on each new victim with chuckles of delight. Too confident
of himself for jealousy, he knew, if he thought of it at all, that his
honor was safer in her hands than it had ever been in his own.

That the girl came to no harm in that wild year was owing to no
watchfulness of her husband's. The Kildare motto was "Liberty For All."
Nor was it owing to any love of her husband's, Kate soon knew this.

Her beauty was a matter of great pride to him. He flaunted it, his
propert