“Aw-w, Bet, don't you cry,” said Babe. “Y' see, when we got here, Curly, we found her boy'd been shot in a fight over a mine. Allie, she hadn't no money left, and no gumption much, like Bet an' me, to fight her way, so we took 'er along o' us. We tried to keep her the little lady that she was, but--Well, we got snowed in last winter up on the divide an'--Faro Sam--Well, it broke her pure heart, an' most Bet's an' mine, too. An' she ain't never got over the cold she took, up there in the snow.” “Life's hard for a girl anyways you put it, an' she'll be happier over the river where there ain't no cold nor sorrer. Bet! Aw-w, she'll sleep on a finer bed nor you an' I could give 'er, an' wake happy, with ever'one she loved best around her. She's layin' there so white an' small an' still it'd most break your hear to see 'er. Like a little snowdrop you've picked, an' worn, an' slung away. So gentle--” “Well, what's this, anyway? A wake?” broke in Faro Sam's icy voice. “Do I hire fiddlers to play a funeral dirge? Get on with you,” scattering the girls in the direction of the card tables and the dancing platform. “Which ones do you want, Curly?” “I want Babe and Betsy. Where's that little pale printer's devil, the one they call the gambler's ghost? I know Sam won't let you girls leave here.” “He's workin' up on the paper, I guess. They ran out of coal oil and had to fire up with pine knots.” “He's comin, now. He ain't no gambler's ghost tonight, though; he's pot black!” “Ghost,” said Curly, “you take this around to Allie.” It was a $50 octagonal slug. “Yessir.” “And you say that there's more, all she wants, where that comes from.” “Yessir.” Then, shaking his mop of brown, curly hair as though to relieve his head of a burden, he took the girls for what he felt was a much-needed round of drinks. By midnight the place was wild! “Sam,” shouted Curly, “what's the limit on your pesky old game?” “The ceiling's the limit.” “Well, I'll put up one bet! Bein' on Easy Street I was goin' back to the States to marry my girl, but I'm blamed if I don't put up my swag for one turn of the cards.” He sent for his “dust,” and piled the long, buckskin bags criss-cross before Faro Sam's table. “I'll copper the jack, gentlemen,” he shouted. “All on the jack!” Teddy Karn's face turned a pasty hue, and the tip of his tongue slid along his puffed lips, but the lines of Faro Sam's face never changed, and his eyes retained the blank impassivity of a snake's as he slipped his cards. There was a sudden, tense silence. The girls pressed forward with hurried breathing and the men waited, rigid as stones. Somebody's mongrel paced to the middle of the platform and scratched for fleas, with soft thumping on the floor. That was all. Suddenly a man swore! A woman's voice shrilled hysterically! Faro Sam rose to his feet ceremoniously. “The house is yours.” “By Jinks!” yelled Curly, “I've coppered the jack! I've broken the bank! I've--”