the first games, watching carefully the while, so that he might study his combinations and plans, and learn in what measure he might pack and “bridge” the cards.  There is much in a shuffle, and already Mike believed him to be no more than an ordinary club player, capable of winning a few sovereigns from a young man fresh from the university; and although the cards Mike held did not warrant such a course, he played without proposing, and when he lost the trick he scanned his opponent’s face, and seeing it brighten, he knew the ruse had succeeded.  But luck seemed to run inexplicably against him, and he was defeated.  In the return match he met with similar luck, and rose from the table, having lost fifty pounds.  Mike wrote a second I O U for twenty-five pounds, to be paid out of the hundred and fifty pounds which he had agreed in writing to accept for the book before sitting down to play.  Then he protested vehemently against his luck, and so well did he act his part, that even if Thigh had not drunk another glass of whiskey-and-water he would not have perceived that Mike was simulating an excitement which he did not feel.

“I’ll play you for a hundred pounds—­the best out of seven games; damn the cards!  I can beat you no matter how they run!”

“Very well, I don’t mind, anything to oblige a friend.”

Lizzie besought Mike not to play again, and she nearly upset the apple-cart by angrily telling Thigh she did not wish her house to be turned into a gambling hell.  Thigh rose from the table, but Frank apologized for his wife, and begged of him to sit down.  The incident was not without a good effect, for it removed Thigh’s suspicions, if he had any, and convinced him that he was “in for a real good thing.”  He laid on the table a cheque, signed Beacham Brown, for a hundred pounds; Mike produced his nearly completed manuscript.  Thigh looked over the MS., judging its length.

“It is all here?”

“No, there’s one chapter to come; that’s good enough for you.”

“Oh yes, it will do.  You’ll have to finish it, for you’ll want to write for the paper.”

This time the cards were perfectly packed, and Mike turned the king.

“Cards?”

“No, play.”

Frank and Lizzie leaned breathless over the table, their faces white in the light of the unshaded lamp.  Mike won the whole five tricks.  But luck was dead against him, and in a few minutes the score stood at three games all.  Then outrageously, for there was no help for it, as he never would have dared if his opponent had been quite sober, he packed and bridged the cards.  He turned the king.

“Cards?”

“No, play.”

Mike won the fourth game, and put Mr. Beacham Brown’s cheque in his pocket.

“I’ll play you again,” said Thigh.

Mike accepted, and before eleven o’clock Thigh had paid three hundred pounds for the manuscript and lost all his available spare cash.  He glanced narrowly at Mike, paused as he put on his hat and coat, and Frank wished Lizzie would leave the room, feeling sure that violent words were inevitable.  But at that moment Mike’s shoulders and knuckles seemed more than usually prominent, and Mr. Beacham Brown’s agent slunk away into the darkness.