course of
events might have been altered. Her presence, a good breakfast, and
occupation might have given him strength to carry out the rejection of
Lablache's challenge which his remorse suggested. However, none of these
things were at hand, and John Allandale set out, from force of habit, to
get his morning "Collins" down at "old man" Smith's. Something to pull
him together before he encountered his niece, he told himself.

It was a fatal delusion. "Old man" Smith sold drink for gain. The more
he sold the better he liked it. John Allandale's "Collins" developed, as
it always did now, into three or four potent drinks. So that by the time
he returned to the ranch for breakfast his remorse was pushed well into
the background, and with feverish craving he lodged for the fateful
game.

In spite of his devotion to the bottle John Allandale usually made a
hearty breakfast. But this morning the sight of Jacky presiding at his
table upset him, and he left his food almost untasted. Remorse was
deadened but conscience was yet unsilenced within him. Every time she
spoke to him, every time he encountered her piercing gray eyes he felt
himself to be a worse than Judas. In his rough, exaggerated way he told
himself that he was selling this girl as surely as did the old slave
owners sell their slaves in bygone days. He endeavored to persuade
himself that what he was doing was for the best, and certainly that it
was forced upon him. He would not admit that his mania for poker was the
main factor in his acceptance of Lablache's terms. Gradually, however,
his thoughts became intolerable to him, and when Jacky at last remarked
on the fact that he was eating nothing and drinking only his coffee, he
could stand it no longer. He pushed his chair back and rose from the
table, and, muttering an excuse, fled from the room.

Her uncle's precipitate flight alarmed Jacky. She had seen, as anybody
with half an eye could see, that he had had a heavy night. The bleared
eyes, the puffed lids, the working, nervous face were simple enough
evidence. She knew, too, that he had already been drinking this morning.
But these things were not new to her, only painful facts which she was
unable to alter; but his strange behavior and lack of appetite were
things to set her thinking.

She was a very active-minded girl. It was not her way to sit wondering
and puzzling over anything she could not understand. She had a knack of
setting herself to unravel proble