"My mistake, viscount. Find a cue."
Pete found a cue that suited as to weight. His host bowed until he rocked on his heels and assigned him the honor of opening the game.
For some fifteen minutes they played in silence, the stout gentleman revealing a measure of skill and technique that quite astonished his antagonist. His difficulties seemed to be wholly in measuring angles with the eye; otherwise his game was well nigh faultless and his control of the cue masterly. It was the eye difficulty that eventually compassed his defeat, although Pete was hard put, even with the employment of all his own skill, to nose out a winner.
With the shot that settled the game the stout gentleman flung his cue on the table and embraced his conqueror.
"Viscount," he said, "you're a prince. Firs' man beat me cowboy pool all summer."
"It was but an accident, sir," said Pete modestly.
"Nope. No accident. Strictly on merits. 'Sall right; pleasure all mine. Firs' time ever stacked up against gentleman from Arabian Nights."
From which remark Pete perceived that his host had not been wholly insensible of his costume, although it was evident that he was in no whit surprised by it, nor did he regard it as in any way incongruous.
"I think, sir, if you will pardon me, that I should be taking my leave," observed Pete, as his eye chanced upon a tall clock that stood in a corner.