Burns shrugged. But the look in his friend’s eyes interested him.
“There’ll be trouble before the night’s out. I’m going to stop around.”
McLagan’s words came sharply, but in a tone only meant for the banker’s ears. There was a curious hard set to his plain face, and his small eyes were coldly bright. Victor Burns held him in deep regard, and his understanding of him was the understanding of years of intimate association. He had long since probed McLagan’s interest in Claire Carver, and made his estimate of it. And now, as he observed the man’s hard-set look, he realised something of the depths to which he was stirred.
“You don’t need to worry,” he said quietly. “There’s no man around here to-night crazy enough to play tough—not to-night.”
McLagan’s reply came with cold conviction.
“Ordinarily, I’d say you’re right, Victor. But ther’s mischief back of that feller’s eyes. He paid five hundred to cut in. Why? For a hand at poker? Not on your life. I’m going to get in and watch the game.”
McLagan was far too familiar with the poker games played at the Speedway to concern himself with the bigness of the game he was looking on at. It mattered little enough to him the relative value of the heavy red, white and blue chips. Their value might be twenty-five, fifty and one hundred calculated in cents or dollars. It made no impression whatsoever upon his imagination, but the skill of the players was a never-failing source of interest. The human psychology in the game was fascinating beyond words.
To him the young girl, who seemed literally to have given up her life to the lure of the game, was the epitome of all that was demanded of human nature in the play. Her beautiful face smiled or remained serious as mood inclined her. But no change in it was wrought or influenced by the progress of the game. Her mood seemed at all times buoyant, and her flashes of inspiration came and passed without a moment of apparent effort or hesitation. In three hands she had her opponent’s measure with an instinct and observation that were unerring, while she played her own hand with the baffling inconsequence which only a beautiful woman could achieve. The values of every hand, estimated through her understanding of her opponent’s methods, were instinctive knowledge to her, and she played on the instant at all times, while her skill in the draw proclaimed her utter and complete mistress of the game.
A hand had been dealt since Cy Liskard had sat in and the ante had remained unchallenged. Now a jack-pot was being dealt for. Claire’s smile was good to watch, and a light of deep absorption was shining behind her beautiful eyes. She dealt the hand, and sat waiting for the opening or passing of the jack-pot.