McLagan shook his head.
“Sure it’s locked and I’ve hidden up the key,” he said quietly. “My prospect’s a tight one. You see, it’s been a long trail and I’m taking no chances. Easy money’s fine for those who make it. But I’m not passing easy money to a soul. Guess I’ll go and clean up for Max’s party.” He laughed pleasantly. “And I’ll collect your highball on the way, boy. So long.”
CHAPTER VII
The Speedway
MAX LEPENDE, for all Jubilee Hurst’s estimate of him, was a creature of unusual mentality. His ability was quite beyond question; his morals were something of a less buoyant nature; while his poses were wholly Latin in their extravagance, and contrived to set up an impenetrable armour against those who sought to discover the real man underneath.
The Speedway was the reality of his own dream. Its inspiration was a product of memories and experiences of early life in a land of beauty and an atmosphere of bygone glories. And as such it was a sufficient anachronism in its present setting to grip the imagination of the crude minds which made up the clientele he hoped to pillage in the outland territory he had chosen for his hunting ground.
He boasted the refinements of his designing, and was mercilessly jealous of the Speedway’s fame. The attitude of other minds was less benevolent towards it. The citizens of Beacon Glory were prone at all times to downrightness, and, consequently, they set no halo about the place. But they delighted in the licence it afforded them for indulgence in pleasant surroundings.
The fronting colonnade of five gaudily decorated pillars meant nothing to the citizens of Beacon Glory. Yet they sometimes marvelled at the costliness and the extent of the white paint that looked so drab in the sunlight. Some never even paused to consider the rich carpetings they trod underfoot in the gaming rooms, or the wonderful block-flooring over which their heavy boots glided in the great dance hall. But there were few enough who failed to appreciate the raised private boxes which lined the walls of the latter, furnished as they were with drinking tables, and deeply upholstered chairs and divans, and hung with curtains to be drawn at will. Then there was the glitter of innumerable mirrors, and the broad staircase with its carved balustrades leading to the rooms above, where every game from “crap dice” to “baccarat” could be indulged in.
The general run of the men and women of Beacon Glory demanded a good time. And the Speedway, under Max’s consummate guidance and absolute control, provided for their every need in this direction. Oh, yes, Max saw to that. For underneath his patient, smiling veneer, and his pose of polished respectability, he possessed a hard, unyielding, astute commercial soul, greedy for the last cent of profit he could extract from his customers.