"Sophy be hanged!" Mr. Hamlin here quickly pulled up himself and horse, both being inclined to an exuberance startling to the youth and sex of the third party. "That is--I mean something in a different suit entirely." Here he again hesitated, doubtful of his slang. "I see," quoth Olly; "diamonds--Sophy's in spades." The gambler (in sudden and awful admiration), "Diamonds--you've just struck it! but what do _you_ know 'bout cards?" Olly, _pomposaménte_, "Everything! Tell our fortunes by 'em--we girls! I'm in hearts--Sophy's in spades--you're in clubs! Do you know," in a thrilling whisper, "only last night I had a letter, a journey, a death, and a gentleman in clubs, dark complected--that's you." Mr. Hamlin--a good deal more at ease through this revelation of the universal power of the four suits--"Speakin' of women, I suppose down there (indicating the school) you occasionally hear of angels. What's their general complexion?" Olly, dubiously, "In the pictures?" Hamlin, "Yes;" with a leading question, "sorter dark complected sometimes, hey?" Olly, positively, "Never! always white." Jack, "Always white?" Olly, "Yes, and flabby!" They rode along for some time silently. Presently Mr. Hamlin broke into a song, a popular song, one verse of which Olly supplied with such deftness of execution and melodiousness of pipe that Mr. Hamlin instantly suggested a duet, and so over the dead and barren wastes of the Sacramento plains they fell to singing, often barbarously, sometimes melodiously, but never self-consciously, wherein, I take it, they approximated to the birds and better class of poets, so that rough teamsters, rude packers, and weary wayfarers were often touched, as with the birds and poets aforesaid, to admiration and tenderness; and when they stopped for supper at a wayside station, and Jack Hamlin displayed that readiness of resource, audacity of manner and address, and perfect and natural obliviousness to the criticism of propriety or the limitations of precedent, and when, moreover, the results of all this was a much better supper than perhaps a more reputable companion could have procured, she thought she had never known a more engaging person than this Knave of Clubs. When they were fairly on the road again, Olly began to exhibit some curiosity regarding her brother, and asked some few questions about Gabriel's family, which disclosed the fact that Jack's acquaintance with Gabriel was comparatively recent. "Then you never saw July at all?" asked Olly. "July," queried Jack, reflectively; "what's she like?" "I don't know whether she's a heart or a spade," said Olly, as thoughtfully. Jack was silent for some moments, and then after a pause, to Olly's intense astonishment, proceeded to sketch, in a few vigorous phrases, the external characteristics of Mrs. Conroy. "Why, you said you never saw her!" ejaculated Olly. "No more I did," responded the gambler, with a quick laugh; "this is only a little bluff."