Then Gordon broke the silence. "This sounds suspicious, Harry," he said quizzically. "'Out tomorrow' has come to mean only one thing nowadays."
Palmer caught at the offered opening with evident relief. "That's what it is!" he cried. "I've had enough of sporting around, and I'm going to quit it and settle down. You all know who she is. May Sinclair, General Sinclair's daughter, and I think I'm the luckiest chap going."
Gordon was the first to extend his hand, and a careful observer might have noted an unusual gleam of genuine interest in eyes as a rule carefully schooled not to show any emotion whatever. "Lucky!" he exclaimed. "Well, I should say you were! You're a sharp one to steal a march on us like this. Why, that's the best news I've heard in a long time."
Vanulm and Mott-Smith in turn added their congratulations to his, and then Gordon touched the bell.
"John," he cried gaily, as the waiter appeared in answer, "will you kindly bring us the oldest, biggest and best magnum of champagne you've got in your cellar? We want to celebrate a great event."
Palmer raised a protesting hand. "Oh, I say, Gordon!" he exclaimed, his face flushing as he spoke, "thank you just as much, but please don't bother. I'm not drinking now. You know I really can't touch the stuff. I—"
Gordon cut him short. "There, there," he said good-humoredly, "I refuse to listen to any such talk as that. On any ordinary occasion I'd say you were perfectly right, but this is the one time in a man's life when a drink is really the only proper thing. It would hardly be fair to the lady, otherwise, Harry."
The appeal to Palmer's pride was successful. "Well," he assented half-doubt fully, "if you really think so, Gordon—perhaps this once—but I'm going to cut the whole thing out, you know," and Gordon's point, as usual, was gained.
Then, while they waited for John's reappearance, a slightly embarrassed silence fell upon them. Mott-Smith was thinking half enviously of a girl he himself knew, and of the difference between his income and Palmer's. Gordon, too, was thinking, not at random, but quickly, daringly and to the point. Vanulm began mechanically to figure up the bridge scores. Then he laughed. "'Unlucky at cards, Harry,'" he quoted. "You're sixty-eight dollars to the bad, I'm out forty-five, and Mott-Smith's plus thirteen. Our friend Gordon must be deucedly unlucky in love, for he's robbed us of an even century."
Gordon laughed again. "Poor consolation," he said. "I think we'll all agree that Harry's the real winner to-night." And then, as John filled the glasses, he added: "Here's to you both, my boy, and may the Goddess of Fortune bring you all the luck you deserve."