In fact, the owner of the place had lost his complacence and his smile together. He approached near to the wheel and watched its spin with a face turned sallow and flat of cheek from anxiety. For with the setting of the sun it seemed that luck flooded upon Terry Hollis. He began to bet in chunks of five hundred, alternating between the red and the odd, and winning with startling regularity. His winnings were now shoved into an awkward canvas bag. Twenty thousand dollars! That had grown from the fifty. No wonder the crowd had two looks for Terry. His face had lost its color and grown marvellously expressionless. "The real gambler's look," they said. His mouth was pinched at the corners, and otherwise his expression never varied. Once he turned. A broad-faced man, laughing and obviously too self- contented to see what he was doing, trod heavily on the toes of Terry, stepping past the latter to get his winnings. He was caught by the shoulder and whirled around. The crowd saw the tall man draw his right foot back, balance, lift a trifle on his toes, and then a balled fist shot up, caught the broad-faced man under the chin and dumped him in a crumpled heap half a dozen feet away. They picked him up and took him away, a stunned wreck. Terry had turned back to his game, and in ten seconds had forgotten what he had done. But the crowd remembered, and particularly he who had twice laughed at Terry from the veranda of the hotel. The heap in the canvas sack diminished, shrank--he dumped the remainder of the contents into his pocket. He had been betting in solid lumps of a thousand for the past twenty minutes, and the crowd watched in amazement. This was drunken gambling, but the fellow was obviously sober. Then a hand touched the shoulder of Terry. "Just a minute, partner." He looked into the face of a big man, as tall as he and far heavier of build: a magnificent big head, heavily marked features, a short-cropped black beard that gave him dignity. A middle-aged man, about forty-five, and still in the prime of life. "Lemme pass a few words with you." Terry drew back to the side. CHAPTER 22 "My Name's Pollard," said the older man. "Joe Pollard." "Glad to know you, sir. My name--is Terry." The other admitted this reticence with a faint smile. "I got a name around here for keeping my mouth shut and not butting in on another gent's game. But I always noticed that when a gent is in a losing run, half the time he don't know it. Maybe that might be the way with you. I been watching and seen your winnings shrink considerable lately." Terry weighed his money. "Yes, it's shrunk a good deal." "Stand out of the game till later on. Come over and have a bite to eat with me." He went willingly, suddenly aware of a raging appetite and a dinner long postponed. The man of the black beard was extremely friendly.