"Simply this, Miss Hollister, if I must answer; I had offered to fight these three gentlemen in order. It was agreed that the man who drew the jack of clubs from the pack with which they had been playing should be my first victim. They have shuffled their own cards and have drawn the whole pack and there is no jack of clubs in the pack! The only possible explanation is one to which I hesitate to apply the obvious plain Saxon terms." "It dropped out, that's all! You don't dare pretend that we threw out the jack to avoid drawing it!" protested Ormsby, though I saw from the glances the trio exchanged that they suspected one another. Ormsby and Gorse bent down to look for the missing card, but before they found it I stepped forward and drove my fist upon the table with all the power I could put into the blow. "Stop!" I cried. "I gave you every opportunity to stand up and take a trouncing, but I need hardly say that after this contemptible knavery I refuse to soil my hands on you!" "Do you insinuate"--began Henderson, jumping to his feet. "Gentlemen," said Miss Hollister, lifting the riding-crop, "it is perfectly clear to me that Mr. Ames has gone as far as any gentleman need go in protecting his honor. I do not offer myself as an arbitrator here, but I advise my young friend that nothing further is required of him in this deplorable affair." With one sweep of her crop she brushed to the floor the three piles of cards that lay on the table as they had been stacked when drawn. [Illustration: With one sweep of her crop she brushed to the floor the three piles of cards.] "Arnold," she said, with indescribable dignity, "will you kindly attend me to my horse?" XIX THE GHOST OF ADONIRAM CALDWELL A stable-boy held Miss Octavia's horse at the inn-door. Her face, her figure, her voice expressed outraged dignity as she tested the saddle-girth. "You need never tell me what had happened to provoke your wrath, for that is none of my affair; but I wish to say that your conduct and bearing won my highest approval. They had undoubtedly hidden the jack of clubs to avoid the drubbing you would have administered to the unfortunate man who would have drawn that card if it had been in the pack." "I was not in the slightest danger at any time, Miss Hollister," I protested. "By one of those tricks of fate to which you and I are becoming so accustomed, the card had fallen to the floor unnoticed. If you had not arrived so opportunely the lost jack would have been discovered, the cards reshuffled, and very likely Mr. Ormsby would have been dusting the inn-floor with me at this very minute."