“Piker money! Piker money!” chanted the winner. “Still, ever’ little bit helps—eh, boys?”
And then and there, before Gash Tuttle’s bulging and horrified eyes, he split up the winnings in the proportion of five for Flem and five for Fox and five for himself. Of a sudden the loser was shouldered out of the group. He looked not into friendly faces, but at contemptuous backs [112] and heaving shoulders. The need for play acting being over, the play actors took their ease and divided their pay. The mask was off. Treachery stood naked and unashamed.
Reaching blindly for his valise, Gash Tuttle stumbled for the door, a load lying on his daunted spirit as heavy as a stone. Flem hailed him.
“Say, hold on!” He spoke kindly. “Ain’t that your quarter yonder?”
He pointed to a coin visible against the flat glass cover of the cigar case.
“Sure it is—it’s yourn. I seen you leave it there when I give you the change out of that dollar and purposed to tell you ’bout it at the time, but it slipped my mind. Go on and pick it up—it’s yourn. You’re welcome to it if you take it now!”
Automatically Gash Tuttle reached for the quarter—small salvage from a great and overwhelming loss. His nails scraped the glass, touching only glass. The quarter was cunningly glued to its underside. Surely this place was full of pitfalls. A guffawed chorus of derision rudely smote his burning ears.
“On your way, sucker! On your way!” gibed the perfidious Fox, swinging about with his elbows braced against the bar and a five-dollar bill held with a touch of cruel jauntiness between two fingers.
“Whut you got in the gripsack—hay samples or punkins?” jeered the exultant Slit-Eye.
[113]
“Yes; whut is the valise fur?” came Flem’s parting taunt.