lim, "that you are not in Venice for her
antiquities. No more am I. I arrived this mornin' and I've been all over
the place already. I was just thinkin' that time might hang. Twice a day
I've to go out to the yacht to propose to Nora. Durin' the intervals we
might have a crack at piquet."

The earl was embarrassed. He was not accustomed to such frankness. He
was embarrassed also by the six feet three of Phelim. He himself was
only six feet.

"I do not know piquet," he said.

"Ah," said Phelim, "it cost me much to learn what I know of it, and I
will gladly impart that little for the pleasure of your companionship. I
will play you for love."

The earl took counsel with himself--"So long as he is playing piquet
with me," he said to himself, "so long he cannot be making love to
Nora."

"How long will it take me to learn the game?" he asked.

"As long," answered Phelim, "as you have ready money. When you begin to
give due bills you have begun to grasp the rudiments of the game."

"Then," said the earl, "I shall be an apt pupil, for I shall give an IOU
the first time I lose"

"In piquet," said Phelim, squaring himself, and placing the index finger
of his right hand in his left hand, after the manner of the didactic,
"the great thing is the discard, and your discard should be governed by
two considerations--first, to better your own hand, and second, to
cripple your opponent's. Your moderate player never thinks of this
latter consideration. His only thought is to better his own hand. He
never discards an ace. The mere size of it dazzles him, and he will keep
aces and discard tens, forgetting that you cannot have a sequence of
more than four without a ten, and that you can have one of seven without
the ace, and that a king is as good as an ace, if the latter is in the
discard. I am speakin' now," continued Phelim, "of the beginner. Let us
suppose one who has spent one thousand pounds on the game, and is
presumed to have learned somethin' for his money. His fault is apt to be
that he sacrifices too much that he may count cards. I grant you that
you cannot count sixty or ninety if your opponent has cards, but you
may, if cards are tied. When I was a beginner I used to see Colonel
Mellish make discards, on the mere chance of tyin' the cards, that
seemed to me simply reckless. I soon discovered, however, that they were
simply scientific. One more thing--always remember that there is no
average card in a piquet pack. The a