“That’s all right, but I insist on paying my own way,” answered J. Rutherford Brown, smoothly. “I’ve got money myself.” Once at the resort it was an easy matter for the sharper to get Hockley into a side room, where the pair were free from observation. In pulling a handkerchief from his pocket, the man from Montana let fall a pack of cards. “Hullo, you play cards?” asked Hockley. “But of course you do. So do I. Let’s have a game.” J. Rutherford Brown was willing, indeed, he was going to suggest a game himself, and having ordered more liquor, and also a fine dinner, they sat down. At first they played for fun. But then the man from Montana spoke of a game in which he had won five dollars, and poor, deluded Hockley at once insisted they put up something. Thus the betting started, at a dollar, and the youth was allowed to win twenty times that sum. “Told you I could do it,” said Hockley. “But you shall have a chance to win it back directly after dinner.” And after the meal the game began again, and lasted the best part of two hours. It is not my intention in these pages to describe the manner in which Hockley was fleeced out of his money, nearly a hundred and seventy-five dollars all told. Let me say flatly that I do not approve of gambling in any form, and the person who gambles and loses his money deserves no sympathy. It is a poor way in which to waste valuable time, and money won at gambling rarely does the winner any good. It is generally a case of “easy come and easy go,” and with the coming and going the player loses a self-respect which is hard to regain. When the last game was played Hockley sat back in a dazed, blank way. He had lost it all--every dollar had passed into the hands of J. Rutherford Brown. And not only his money but also his watch and his ring, those precious gifts from his father and his mother. At first he could not realize it. “Gone!” he muttered hoarsely, and there was almost a sob in his voice. “Better luck next time,” returned the man from Montana, cheerfully. And then he shoved a glass of liquor at the foolish youth, who clutched and drank it eagerly, in the hope of regaining his “nerve.” What happened immediately after that Hockley could scarcely tell with certainty. He remembered being helped into a carriage, and of taking a long drive, and then all became a blank. When he came to his senses he sat up in a dazed fashion. He knew nothing but that his head ached as if it was going to split open and that his mouth felt parched to the last degree. “Where am I?” he muttered and stared around him. On all sides were boxes and barrels, and he had been lying on some of these, with some old bagging for a pillow. Gradually it dawned upon him that this was a warehouse and that the rising sun was shining in at several of the long, slatted windows. A strong smell of tobacco pervaded the place.