“In this case I hadn’t a great deal. I saw the game was crooked, but it made no difference to me whether the other stranger knew it or not. If he did it was dog eat dog, and if he didn’t he deserved to lose for playing with strangers in such a place. However, I noticed pretty soon that the old fellow, whom the others called Major, and the proprietor, whom they all addressed as Pete, were looking uneasily at me and at each other from time to time, and that the third player, whose back was turned toward me, was making an ostentatious show of hiding his cards from me, as if he suspected or feared me and wanted me to know it. Accordingly I thought the wisest thing for me was to stroll back to the front room and treat the bartender.
“While we were drinking, another man came in. He wore no coat, vest, or hat. He was, I think, the handsomest man I ever saw, though he was slightly flushed with liquor; not drunk, by any means, but he had evidently been drinking. He was a little above the medium height, with a symmetrical form, magnificent chest and shoulders, and the easy motion and graceful carriage of a skilled athlete. He passed directly to the card-room, nodding to the barkeeper and merely glancing at me, and I heard him say:
“‘Do you want another in the game?’
“The response was pleasant, and he took a seat. Up to this time I had not been greatly interested, as I said, and I continued talking to the man behind the bar, simply because I had nothing else to do. The newcomer, however, was talkative, and, as I noticed in a few moments, inclined to be surly. He seemed to be trying to pick a quarrel with the stranger, and I lingered, with some natural curiosity, to see if he would succeed. Presently the explosion came. He lost a jack-pot which the stranger won on three tens.
“‘You opened that pot on a pair of tens,’ he exclaimed with an oath, ‘and when we catch any cross-roads gambler playing that kind of a game in this town we commonly hang ’em, do you understand?’
“It was said noisily and furiously, and I looked in expecting to see a fight, but the stranger spoke as coolly as though the other had been calling for his draw.
“‘I did nothing of the sort, sir. I came in on a pair of tens, as I had a perfect right to do, after the Major opened it, and I caught the third ten in the draw.’
“‘I say you opened it,’ shouted the newcomer with another oath.
“The stranger looked at him with the most perfect composure and said:
“‘I appeal to the table. Gentlemen, did I open it?’