saws wood. Only
Britisher I ever liked. Plays cards like a goat."

"He played a mighty good game on the steamer," said Cooley warmly.

"I don't care what he did on the steamer, he played like a goat the
only time _I_ ever played with him. You know he did. I reckon you was
_there!_"

"Should say I _was_ there! He played mighty well--"

"Like a goat," reiterated the fat man firmly.

"Nothing of the sort. You had a run of hands, that was all. Nobody can
go against the kind of luck you had that night; and you took it away
from Sneyd and me in rolls. But we'll land you pretty soon, won't we,
ole Sneydie?"

"We sh'll have a shawt at him, at least," said the Englishman.

"Perhaps he won't want us to try," young Cooley pursued derisively.
"Perhaps he thinks I play like a goat, too!"

Mr. Pedlow threw back his head and roared. "Give me somep'n easy! You
don't know no more how to play a hand of cards than a giraffe does. I'll
throw in all of my Blue Gulch gold-stock--and it's worth eight hundred
thousand dollars if it's worth a cent--I'll put it up against that tin
automobile of yours, divide chips even and play you freeze-out for it.
You play cards? Go learn hop-scotch!"

"You wait!" exclaimed the other indignantly. "Next time we play we'll
make you look so small you'll think you're back in Congress!"

At this Mr. Pedlow again threw back his head and roared, his vast body
so shaken with mirth that the glass he held in his hand dropped to the
floor.

"There," said Cooley, "that's the second Martini you've spilled. You're
two behind the rest of us."

"What of it?" bellowed the fat man. "There's plenty comin', ain't there?
Four more, Tommy, and bring cigars. Don't take a cent from none of these
Indians. Gentlemen, your money ain't good here. I own this bar, and this
is my night."

Mellin had begun to feel at ease, and after a time--as they continued to
sit--he realized that his repugnance to Mr. Pedlow was wearing off; he
felt that there must be good in any one whom Madame de Vaurigard liked.
She had spoken of Pedlow often on their drives; he was an "eccentric,"
she said, an "original." Why not accept her verdict? Besides, Pedlow
was a man of distinction and force; he had been in Congress; he was a
millionaire; and, as became evident in the course of a long recital of
the principal events of his career, most of the great men of the time
were his friends and proteges.

"'Well, Mack,' says I one day when we were in