“I hold a royal straight flush,” was the answer.
And then suddenly came a change. Blenkiron raised his head, and his sleepy, ruminating eyes looked straight at Ivery.
“I call you,” he said.
I didn’t believe my ears. Nor did Ivery.
“The hour for bluff is past,” he said.
“Nevertheless I call you.”
At that moment I felt someone squeeze through the door behind me and take his place at my side. The light was so dim that I saw only a short, square figure, but a familiar voice whispered in my ear. “It’s me—Andra Amos. Man, this is a great ploy. I’m here to see the end o’t.”
No prisoner waiting on the finding of the jury, no commander expecting news of a great battle, ever hung in more desperate suspense than I did during the next seconds. I had forgotten my fatigue; my back no longer needed support. I kept my eyes glued to the crack in the screen and my ears drank in greedily every syllable.
Blenkiron was now sitting bolt upright with his chin in his hands. There was no shadow of melancholy in his lean face.
“I say I call you, Herr Graf von Schwabing. I’m going to put you wise about some little things. You don’t carry arms, so I needn’t warn you against monkeying with a gun. You’re right in saying that there are three places in these walls from which you can shoot. Well, for your information I may tell you that there’s guns in all three, but they’re covering you at this moment. So you’d better be good.”