the chips and cards, and also the distressful spectacle of Tarantula
Bill Joyce, a number twelve man, all gleaming teeth, and rolling
eyeballs, inserting hisself into a number nine opening, and doing
surprising well at it.

"'Look at them. Look at them well,' she gibed.

"The second was the Gold-Belt dance-hall, with the kid cavorting
through a drunken orgy of painted ladies, like a bull in a pansy
patch. But the other--it took my breath away till I felt I was on
smooth ice, with cracks showing. It was the inside of a cabin, after
a big 'pot-latch,' displaying a table littered up with fizz bottles
and dishes galore. Diamond Tooth Lou stood on a chair, waving kisses
and spilling booze from a mug. In the centre stood Morrow with
another girl, nestling agin his boosum most horrible lovin'. Gee!
It was a home splitter and it left me sparring for wind. The whole
thing exhaled an air of debauchery that would make a wooden Indian
blush. No one thing in particular; just the general local colour of
a thousand-dollar bender.

"'Charming, isn't it?' she sneered.

"'I don't savvy the burro. There's something phony about it. I can
explain the other two, but this one--.' Then it come to me in a
flash. The man's face was perfect, but he wore knickerbockers! Now,
to my personal knowledge, the only being that ever invaded Rampart
City in them things was R. Alonzo Struthers.

"'There's secrets of the dark-room that I ain't wise to,' says I,
'but I feel that this is going to be a bad night for the newspaper