“Because he said if he were asleep the door would be locked, and if he were dead the door would be open.”
“When did he say that?”
“He said it several times, sir; about a week ago the last time.”
Robbins turned the handle of the door; it was not locked. A dim light was in the room, but a screen before the door hid it from sight. When he passed round the screen he saw, upon the square marble-topped arrangement at the head of the bed, a candle burning, and its light shone on the dead face of the Skeleton, which had a grim smile on its thin lips, while in its clenched hand was a letter addressed to the proprietor of the hotel.
The Living Skeleton had given more than the eighty francs to that deserving charity.
HIGH STAKES.
The snow was gently sifting down through the white glare of the electric light when Pony Rowell buttoned his overcoat around him and left the Metropolitan Hotel, which was his home. He was a young man, not more than thirty, and his face was a striking one. It was clean cut and clean shaven. It might have been the face of an actor or the face of a statesman. An actor’s face has a certain mobility of expression resulting from the habit of assuming characters differing widely. Rowell’s face, when you came to look at it closely, showed that it had been accustomed to repress expression rather than to show emotion of any kind. A casual look at Pony Rowell made you think his face would tell you something; a closer scrutiny showed you that it would tell you nothing. His eyes were of a piercing steely gray that seemed to read the thoughts of others, while they effectually concealed his own. Pony Rowell was known as a man who never went back on his word. He was a professional gambler.
On this particular evening he strolled up the avenue with the easy carriage of a man of infinite leisure. He hesitated for a moment at an illy-lighted passage-way in the middle of a large building on a side street, then went in and mounted a stair. He rapped lightly at a door. A slide was shoved back and a man inside peered out at him for a moment. Instantly the door was opened, for Pony’s face was good for admittance at any of the gambling rooms in the city. There was still another guarded door to pass, for an honest gambling-house keeper can never tell what streak of sudden morality may strike the police, and it is well to have a few moments’ time in which to conceal the paraphernalia of the business. Of course, Mellish’s gambling rooms were as well known to the police as to Pony Rowell, but unless some fuss was made by the public, Mellish knew he would be free from molestation.