For once the gambler did not display his usual readiness. He did not speak for some moments, but took up a position whence he could see the children at their play, and best watch the little washerman, on whom he intended to thrust a proposition that had been revolving in his mind some time. He chewed his tobacco steadily, while his expression went through many changes. At last he drew his shaggy brows together and eyed his victim with shrewd suspicion.
“Say, you’re kind o’ smart, ain’t you?” he demanded harshly.
The other looked up with a start, and his mildly inquiring glance should have convinced the most skeptical to the contrary. But apparently it had no such effect on his visitor.
“I’d never ha’ tho’t it,” Bill went on coldly. “To look at you one ’ud sure think you was that simple a babby could fool you. Howsum,” he sighed, “I don’t guess you ken never rightly tell.”
A flush began to warm Scipio’s cheeks. He couldn’t understand. He wondered hard, vainly endeavoring to grasp wherein he had offended.
“I––I don’t get you,” he said, in a bewildered fashion, dropping the garment he was washing back into the soapsuds.
Bill’s expression underwent another change as he caught at the words.
“You don’t get me?” he said ironically. “You don’t get me?” Then he shrugged as though he was not angry, but merely deplored the other’s unsuspected cunning. “You can’t strike it rich an’ guess you’re goin’ to blind folks. I’d say it needs every sort of a man to do that around these parts.”
Scipio gasped. He had no other feeling than blank astonishment.
“I ain’t struck it rich,” he protested.