collecting winnings, so that the wheel spun less often.

Meantime he was by no means unnoticed. A little whisper had gone the
rounds that a real plunger was in town. And when men came into the hall,
their attention was directed automatically by the turn of other eyes
toward six feet of muscular manhood, heavy-shouldered and erect, with a
flare of a red silk bandanna around his throat and a heavy sombrero worn
tilted a little to one side and back on his head.

"He's playing a system," said someone. "Been standing there all afternoon
and making poor Pedro--the thief!--sweat and shake in his boots."

In fact, the owner of the place had lost his complacence and his smile
together. He approached near to the wheel and watched its spin with a
face turned sallow and flat of cheek from anxiety. For with the setting
of the sun it seemed that luck flooded upon Terry Hollis. He began to bet
in chunks of five hundred, alternating between the red and the odd, and
winning with startling regularity. His winnings were now shoved into an
awkward canvas bag. Twenty thousand dollars! That had grown from the
fifty.

No wonder the crowd had two looks for Terry. His face had lost its color
and grown marvellously expressionless.

"The real gambler's look," they said.

His mouth was pinched at the corners, and otherwise his expression never
varied.

Once he turned. A broad-faced man, laughing and obviously too self-