“Nothing much, sir,” rejoined the humpback, as he dropped the bar across the closed door. “A bit of backcap, that’s all. It’s over now.”
“It had better be,” was the significant response.
Flood’s keen eyes had taken in the situation, yet his coldly dispassionate countenance masked his feelings as with a veil of ice. He passed back of the table, gravely greeting the several players, then paused to gaze down at the sleeping youth on the couch.
“Did he come in with you?” he asked, turning soberly to Cecil Kendall.
“Yes,” replied the latter, with a faint smile crossing his pale face. “We have been over to Boston. Only returned this noon.”
“He has been drinking heavily, hasn’t he?”
“Rather.”
“Wayward fool!”
“I tried to dissuade him,” muttered Kendall. “He’s in no shape to go home, so we dropped in here.”
Flood’s face was clouded with a censorious frown as he turned away to place his hat on a rack near-by.