to the left of Toussaint, with Kelley opposite. The pink cards fell
harmless, and for a while the game was a dull one to see. Holding a pair
of kings, Cutler won a little from Toussaint, who remarked that luck must
go with the money of Uncle Sam. After a few hands, the half-breed began
to bet with ostentatious folly, and, losing to one man and another, was
joked upon the falling off of his game. In an hour's time his blue chips
had been twice reinforced, and twice melted from the neat often-counted
pile in which he arranged them; moreover, he had lost a horse from his
string down on Chug Water.

"Lend me ten dollar," he said to Cutler. "You rich man now."

In the next few deals Kelley became poor. "I'm sick of this luck," said
he.

"Then change it, why don't you? Let's have a new deck." And Loomis rose.

"Joole, you always are for something new," said Cutler. "Now I'm doing
pretty well with these pink cards. But I'm no hog. Fetch on your fresh
ones."

The eyes of the half-breed swerved to the yellow curtain. He was by a
French trapper from Canada out of a Sioux squaw, one of Red Cloud's
sisters, and his heart beat hot with the evil of two races, and none of
their good. He was at this moment irrationally angry with the men who had
won from him through his own devices, and malice undisguised shone in his
lean flat face. At sight of the blue cards falling in the first deal,
silence came over the company, and from the distant parade-ground the
bugle sounded the melancholy strain of taps. Faint, far, solemn,
melodious, the music travelled unhindered across the empty night.