"No," he drawled. "We're not sticking you for a locomotive tank, and this comes out of my treasury. I'll call you three dollars, and take my chances on the draw."
"Well," said the dealer, "that's a little more encouraging. Anybody wanting to make it better?"
A young lad in elaborately-embroidered deerskin with a flushed face leaned upon the table. "Show you how we play cards in the old country," he said. "I'll make it thirty--for a beginning."
There was a momentary silence, for the lad had staked heavily and lost of late, but one or two more bets were made. Then the cards were turned up, and the lad smiled fatuously as he took up his winnings.
"Now I'll let you see," he said. "This time we'll make it fifty."
He won twice more in succession, and the men closed in about the table, while, for the dealer knew when to strike, the glasses went around again, and in the growing interest nobody quite noticed who paid for the refreshment. Then, while the dollars began to trickle in, the lad flung a bill for a hundred down.
"Go on," he said, a trifle huskily. "To-night you can't beat me!"
Once more he won, and just then two men came quietly into the room. One of them signed to the hotel keeper.
"What's going on? The boys seem kind of keen," he said.
The other man laughed a little. "Ferris has struck a streak of luck, but I wouldn't be very sorry if you got him away, Mr. Courthorne. He has had as much as he can carry already, and I don't want anybody broke up in my house. The boys can look out for themselves, but the Silverdale kid has been losing a good deal lately, and he doesn't know when to stop."