"That is the real thing—the real leaf," he said. He looked at the chessmen.
"Reginald, when are we to have another game of poker? I am sure Mr. Banks plays the game of his nation. We must sit in again soon. We must not be frightened away from a harmless amusement by that silly trick Jim Harley played on us a few nights ago."
Mr. Banks feigned astonishment. "What was the trick?" he asked. "I should never have suspected Harley of playing a trick—especially a card trick. He has always seemed to me a very serious chap."
"Rather a queer thing happened a few nights ago, while we were playing poker, here," said Rayton. "Captain Wigmore thinks Harley was at the bottom of it; but I don't. Tell about it, captain."
So for the second time, Banks heard of the card marked with two red crosses and dealt to young David Marsh. He watched Wigmore throughout the telling as intently as he had watched the guide.
"Very interesting? Jim Harley is not such a serious fellow as I thought," he said, by way of comment. And that was all until after Wigmore took his leave, at half-past ten. Wigmore had not mentioned the tradition behind the two red marks. When the door had closed upon the queer old captain, Rayton and Banks talked for nearly an hour about Harley's story of the red crosses, and David Marsh's experience of them. The Englishman convinced the New Yorker that Dick Goodine had played no part in David's accident. Mr. Banks, like Jim Harley, found it natural to accept Rayton's readings of men and things.
Mr. Banks lay awake in his comfortable bed for a full hour after turning in, his mind busy with the mystery of Samson's Mill Settlement. He decided that whoever marked the card had known the tragic story of the Harley family. He did not take much stock in David's accident. That had been nothing more nor less than a piece of bad luck. Canoe poles break frequently, owing to some hidden flaw in the white wood. But he felt sure that the two red crosses on the face of the card were not matters of chance.
"I'll work this thing out if it drives me crazy. I have always had an itch to do a bit of detective work," he murmured.
Then he sank into deep and peaceful slumber.
When Banks entered the kitchen next morning, at an early hour, he found the porridge neglected and sullenly boiling over the brim of the pot onto the top of the stove, and his host standing with drooped shoulders gazing mournfully at a five-foot length of spruce pole that stood in the corner. Banks jumped ponderously and rescued the porridge.