"Wot d'yer mean?" cried Maxwell. "Do I ever orfer to leave off when I'm winnin'? Let's 'ave six games at five-pound points. It'll take a denced sight more nor that to break me." "Would yer?" sed I, lookin' up at Louis. "Let me take yer place," sed 'e; "I'll play 'im for any points 'e likes." "No," I answered, "I'll see it out with 'im." So we resoomed the game, and at the end I'd won a matter of five thousand pound. Didn't I wish it was real instead o' gammon? "Now I'm on welwet," sed I, grinnin' and rubbin' my 'ands. "Fortune o' war," sed Maxwell, takin' out a pocketbook stuffed with flash notes. "Who cares? My turn yesterday, yourn to-day." "Plenty more where that comes from, I 'ope," sed I. "Don't you be afeerd," sed Maxwell, "if yer won ten times as much off me yer'd git every farthin' of it." "That's a comfort," sed I, countin' out the money as 'e passed it over to me. The wonder wos that Louis took it all in, but I never did see sech a migsture as 'e wos. One minute 'e could be as cunnin' as a fox, and the next as soft as butter. There was somethink atwixt 'im and Maxwell I never got to the bottom of, a sort o' relationship through a sister as wos dead, and they talked sometimes of some one abroad, and sed if they got 'old of 'im they'd make it warm for 'im. But all that wos nothink to me. eg If Louis 'ad 'ad a chance of 'andlin' the flash notes as I counted 'em out it'd been all up the orchard with us, but we took care that 'e never at any time 'ad one in 'is fingers. 'E wos short-sighted, and at a little distance the flimseys looked all right. The notes of some o' the country banks, yer know, ain't as spick and span as Bank of England paper, but there' a lot o' that sort knockin' about in the ring, and the bookeys pay 'em out free to them as 'll take 'em. The biggest part of the wonder wos that Louis should 'ave believed we carried sech large sums o' money about us. 'E wos jest the sort o' chap that's took in with the confidence trick, and you read of 'em pritty orfen in the papers. There's more o' that goin' on nor people think of. For one case as comes afore the beak there's twenty that's never 'eard of. If ain't a bad payin' trade, I can tell yer. As I pocketed the notes Maxwell arst if I'd play 'im another match to-morrer. "No, no," cried Louis, all of a tremble; "it's my turn now. Yer've got to give me my revenge!" The fish wos 'ooked. "That's only fair," sed I. "You 'ave a shy at 'im, Louis." "I will--I will!" 'e cried. "If 'e's game." "Game!" sed Maxwell. "We've seed a lot of each other, and when did yer see me show the white feather? But I'm too tired now to go on playin', I want to git to bed." "To-morrer night, then," sed Louis. "It shall be make or break." "All right," sed Maxwell. "We'll begin at nine." "Agreed. At nine o'clock." So it wos settled, and wot we'd been workin' for so long wos comin' off at last. CHAPTER XXIX.