"Yes—why not?" The money-lender's smile broadened and he leaned forward to impress his hearer the more surely. "A little game—a game of poker, eh?"
John Allandale shook his head. He failed to grasp the other's meaning.
"I don't understand," he said, struggling with the liquor which fogged his dull brain.
"No, of course you don't," easily. "Now listen to me and I'll tell you what I mean." The money-lender spoke as though addressing a wayward child. "The stakes shall be my terms against your influence with Jacky. If you win you keep your girl, and I cancel your mortgages; if I win I marry your girl under the conditions I have already offered. It's wholly an arrangement for your benefit. All I can possibly gain is your girl. Whichever way the game goes I must pay. Saints alive—but what an old fool I am!" He laughed constrainedly. "For the sake of a pretty face I'm going to give you everything—but there," seriously, "I'd do more to win that sweet child for my wife. What d'you say, John?"
There could be no doubt that Lablache meant what he said, only he might have put it differently. Had he said that there was nothing at which he would stop to secure Jacky, it would have been more in keeping with the facts, He meant to marry the girl. His bilious eyes watered. There was a sensual look in them. His heavy lips parted and closed with a sucking smack as though expressing appreciation of a tasty morsel.
John remained silent, but into his eyes had leapt a gleam which told of the lust of gaming aroused. His look—his whole face spoke for him. Lablache had primed his hook with an irresistible bait. He knew his man.
"See," he went on, as the other remained silent, "this is the way we can arrange it. We will play 'Jackpots' only. The best seven out of thirteen. It will be a pretty game, in which, from an outsider's point of view, I alone can be the loser. If I win I shall consider myself amply repaid. If I lose—well," with an expressive movement of the hands, "I will take my chance—as a sportsman should. I love your niece, John, and will risk everything to win her. Now, think of it. It will be the sweetest, prettiest gamble. And, too, think of the stake. A fortune, John—a fortune for you. And for me a bare possibility of realizing my hopes."
The old gambler's last vestige of honor struggled to make itself apparent in a negative movement of the head. But the movement would not come. His thoughts were of the game, and ere yet the last words of the money-lender had ceased to sound, he was captured. The satanic cunning of the proposal was lost upon his sodden intellect. It was a contemptible, pitiable piece of chicanery with which Lablache sought to trap the old man into giving his consent and assistance. The money-lender had no intention of losing the game. He knew he must win. He was merely resorting to this means because he knew the gambling spirit of the rancher. He knew that "Poker" John's obstinacy was proof against any direct attack; that no persuasion would induce the consent he desired. The method of a boxer pounding the body of an opponent whom he knows to be afflicted with some organic weakness of the heart is no more cowardly than was Lablache's proposal.
The rancher still remained silent. Lablache moved in his chair; one of his great fat hands rested for a moment on John's coat sleeve.
"Now, old friend," he said, with a hoarse, whistling breath. "Shall you play—play the game? It will be a grand finale to the many—er—comfortable games we have played together. Well? Thirteen 'Jackpots,' John—yes?"