"Yes?" said the druggist, looking at him. "Yes, and the fact is, he got here broke and has called on me to help him out. He’s a devilish good fellow, and I don’t exactly know what to do. Every one I know has gone home, and—could you let me have ten till tomorrow? You can count on it then." "Oh, I guess so, but I’m rather short." "I’ll give it to you tomorrow without fail." He went out with a ten dollar note crumpled in his hand. A man may fail to get rent money, clothes money, bread money; he may meet with obstacles that he cannot overcome; his self-respect withholds him from asking favors of certain men. But the fool in hot quest of poker money knows no self-respect, recognizes no embarrassments that might stand in modesty’s way. Bodney bounded up the stairs, afraid that the game might have broken up. Panting and tremulous, he pressed the electric button. A negro porter pulled aside a blue curtain, peeped through the glass and opened the door. The game had not broken up. Every seat was taken, the regulars, with chips stacked high before them, the "suckers" squirming with "short money." How dull and spiritless everything had looked when Bodney went out, and now how bright it all was, the carpet, the window curtains, the pictures on the walls. The room was large, affording ample space for a meditative walk up and down, and as he was too nervous to sit still, he walked. "Think there’ll be a seat pretty soon?" he asked of the man at the desk. "Very soon, I think. Sit down and make yourself comfortable. Have a cigar." He lighted the cigar and resumed his walk. Passing the table he saw a man in the death throes of a "show-down." Some one had opened a pot and he had been compelled to stay. Bodney eagerly watched the draw. The opener drew one card. The "show-down" man had to draw four, presumably to an ace. This was encouraging to Bodney. He was the next in line; he would get the seat. He leaned forward to catch the result. The opener had tens up. The four-card draw yielded a better crop, aces up, and with a sense of disappointment and injury Bodney resumed his walk. But pretty soon a man cashed in, and the young lawyer bought five dollars worth of chips, and took his seat. He won the first pot, the second and the third, but without stayers. Surely his luck had returned. Again he felt a current of pleasure flowing through his mind. He laughed at a stale joke. It had never sounded so well before. A man, the offensive fellow, now quite a gentleman, began to tell a story, and Bodney encouraged him with a smile. "I knew a man once, a preacher, by the way," said he, "who got into the habit of playing faro; I guess he must have played before he began to preach, and found that he couldn’t quit. Some fellow that was kin to him croaked, and left him a lot of money. Then he knew he wouldn’t play any more. Well, one day he went by the bank where he had his money, and pretty soon he says to