listen to me _this_ time. If
_you'd_ listened to me before, we'd have been in Saratoga today in our
own machines. But no; you done what you done--God! Did anyone ever
hear of such a thing!--taking chances with that little rube from
Brookhollow--that freckled-faced mill-hand--that yap-skirt! And Minna
and Max having you watched all the time! You big boob! No--don't
interrupt! Listen to _me_! Where are you now? You had good money; you
had a theaytre, you had backing! Quint was doing elegant; Doc and
Parson and you and me had it all our way and comin' faster every day.
Wait, I tell you! This ain't a autopsy. This is business. I'm tellin'
you two guys all this becuz I want you to realise that what Eddie done
was against my advice. Come on, now; wasn't it?"

"It sure was," admitted Curfoot, removing his cigar from his lean,
pointed visage of a greyhound, and squinting thoughtfully at the smoke
eddying in the draught from the open window.

"Am I right, Eddie?" demanded Stull, fixing his black, smeary eyes on
Brandes.

"Well, go on," returned the latter between thin lips that scarcely
moved.

"All right, then. Here's the situation, Doc. We're broke. If Quint
hadn't staked us to this here new game we're playin', where'd we be, I
ask you?

"We got no income now. Quint's is shut up; Maxy Venem and Minna Minti
fixed us at Saratoga so we can't go back there for a while. They won't
let us touch a card on the liners. Every pug is leery of us since
Eddie flimflammed that Battling Smoke; and I told you he'd holler,
too! Didn't I?" turning on Brandes, who merely let his slow eyes rest
on him without replying.

"Go on, Ben," said Curfoot.

"I'm going on. We guys gotta do something----"

"We ought to have fixed Max Venem," said Curfoot coolly.

There was a silence; all three men glanced stealthily at Neeland, who
quietly turned the page of his book as though absorbed in his story.

"That squealer, Max," continued Curfoot with placid ferocity blazing
in his eyes, "ought to have been put away. Quint and Parson wanted us
to have it done. Was it any stunt to get that dirty little shyster in
some roadhouse last May?"

Brandes said:

"I'm not mixing with any gunmen after the Rosenthal business."

"Becuz a lot of squealers done a amateur job like that, does it say
that a honest job can't be pulled?" demanded Curfoot. "Did Quint and
me ask you to go to Dopey or Clabber or Pete the Wop, or any of them
cheap gangsters?"

"Ah, ca