"I don't deny, don't explain, don't argue," he retorted curtly. "I only say that I shall be willing to part with her services and turn her over to your own care, if you _both_ so like. We know she has appealed to you for aid. My own errand, if you please, is near to its close. It has been--" "Cut the cards, man!" cried the Missourian. It was lucky that he interrupted. He was just in time to prevent the other from making the mistake of saying what was the truth--that he was in any case about to leave the young lady to her own devices, and by her own request. The game which he most valued now was not on the table before him. He was playing it in his own mind. In short, duty or no duty, he was resolved to end the role of jailer and prisoner, for sake of the prisoner herself. Let others attempt the unpleasant task if they liked. Let others condemn if they liked. He, Carlisle, could be jailer no longer. Yet he deliberated well the risk he ran. "It would be ruin to me if this were known, Senator Dunwody, and of that you are perfectly aware."' "I know that as well as you, but there can be honor even in politics, war, or--love. I have given you my word. Deal!" "You are impatient. You rejoice as a strong man to run a race, my dear sir." "I _do_ run a race. I _am_ strong. Play! It is in the cards that I must win." "But if you should lose?" "I shall not lose!" His insistence, his confidence, almost caused the older man to laugh. "No, my friend," said he to himself, "you shall not lose!" But what he said aloud was, "You must not be excited, Dunwody. You may need all your nerve. I thought you cooler in times of stress." "You don't know me. I don't know myself. Perhaps it is ice in your blood--I don't know,--it's fire in mine." "Very well,--I hope you like the cards I have given you." But there was no ice in the red flush on Carlisle's sanguine face, "Give me four more," cried the Missourian, flinging down his own cards with hands that trembled. "Quite right, sir, you shall have them. But how you tremble! I wouldn't have so poor a nerve as yours for all the money in the world, my dear Senator. You act as though there were four hundred acres of niggers at stake, as Mr. Jones would say!" "Go on! You don't know what there is at stake." "So, now. You have your four cards. For myself--though you are so excited you wouldn't notice it if I did not call your attention to it--I take but three. You are an infant, man. See that you be not delivered into the hands of the enemy." They looked now each into his renewed hand of five cards. Dunwody swept a stack of money toward the center of the table. "A thousand dollars against one look from her eye!" "My dear sir," rejoined the other calmly, "you are raised to the extent of two glances--one from each eye." "Another thousand for the touch of her glove." "I come back. You shall have a pair."