After supper, with the note in my pocket, I hastened to the place indicated. It appeared to be a dwelling-house, and I rang the bell at the front door, which was presently opened by a man in a white jacket. I asked for Mr. Lamar, and was assured that he was in his room. I was conducted up three flights of stairs, and the man knocked at a door. I thought Mr. Lamar ought to be able to afford better accommodations for himself; but the door opened, and I entered the room.
I looked for my friend; but instead of him, I saw only Mr. Leonidas Lynchpinne and Morgan Blair.
[CHAPTER XIX.]
IN WHICH PHIL FINDS HIMSELF A PRISONER IN THE GAMBLERS' ROOM.
I was not suspicious; I had no idea that any one intended to wrong me. I was even willing to believe that Morgan Blair was sincere, and really thought that I ought to advance him money from the estate of his uncle, even before he had proved his claim. After all, it is pleasant to believe that no one intends to injure you; it is even better to be occasionally deceived than to be always suspicious.
I went up the stairs in the house to which the note from Mr. Lamar had given me the address without a suspicion that anything was, or could be, wrong. I had never before seen the handwriting of my correspondent, and had no reason to suppose that the note was a fraud upon me. Though I had had a sharp experience of the villany of men since I came from my home in the wilderness, I was still a child in the ways of the great world.
I entered the room to which I had been conducted by the man in a white jacket, and the door was instantly closed behind me and locked. The apartment was an attic chamber, on the fourth floor of the house, and contained the ordinary furniture of a bedroom. Mr. Leonidas Lynchpinne, otherwise Lynch, sat in a rocking-chair, smoking a cigar. Blair had slipped in behind me when I entered in order to secure the door; and having done this, he took a chair near the blackleg. On a small table, over which hung the gas-light, was a silver box, such as I had seen in the hands of Redwood at Leavenworth. It contained a pack of cards, and another lay upon the table. There was also a dice-box, and some other gambling implements, of which I do not even know the names. I concluded, from the position of the parties and the articles on the table between them, that Lynch had been giving the young man a lesson in the art of winning money.
"How are you, Phil Farringford?" said Lynch, with a sort of triumphant smile, which indicated the pleasure he felt at the success of his trick.