Lemon and Arnold agreed, but they had barely begun before Curtis cried out, "It's no use, Lemon, I can see those deuces up your sleeve. You've some up yours, too, Arnold—the deuce of clubs and the deuce of hearts. Moreover, you can tell our cards by notches and thumb smears on the backs. I'll show you how." He told the cards correctly—there was no gainsaying it. The men were overwhelmed.
"What are you, anyway?" Lemon asked; "tecs?"
"Never mind what we are!" Curtis said savagely. "We know what you are—and that's where the rub comes in. Now what are you going to pay us to hold our tongues?"
"Pay you!" Lemon hissed. "Why, damn you—nothing. We're not bankers. All we've got to do is clear out and try somewhere else."
"That might not be so easy as you imagine," Hamar interposed. "We would make it our business to have a scene first. Why not come to terms? We'll not be over exorbitant—and consider the convenience of not having to shift your quarters."
"Well, of all the blooming frousts I've struck, none beats this," Lemon said. "Fancy being pipped by a couple of suckers like these. Farmers, indeed! Why don't you call yourselves parsons? How much do you want?"
After a prolonged haggling, Hamar and Curtis agreed to take fifty dollars; and, considering their penniless condition, they were by no means dissatisfied with their bargain.
They were now ready to go, and looking round for Kelson, found him engaged in a desperate tête-à-tête with the young lady at the bar, who, despite her avowed lack of faith in mankind, counted half the room her friends. She promised Kelson that she would meet him at eight o'clock that evening; but as both she and he were quite used to making such promises and subsequently forgetting all about them, their rencontre resulted in only one thing, namely, in furnishing the three allies with the nucleus of the big fortune they intended making.
On finding themselves outside the dive Hamar, Curtis and Kelson first of all divided the spoil. They then went to a clothes depot and rigged themselves out in fashionably cut garments; after which they took rooms at a presentable hotel in Kearney Street, next door to Knobble's boot store. Then, dressed for the first time in their lives like Nob Hill dukes, they paraded the pet resorts of the beau-monde—of the bonanza and railroad set—and making eyes at all the pretty wives and daughters they met, cogitated fresh devices for making money. As they sauntered across Pacific Avenue, in the direction of Californian Street, Kelson suddenly gave vent to a whistle.
"What the deuce is wrong with you?" Hamar exclaimed. "Seen your grandmother's ghost?"