As a
gambler he read the soul of his opponent.
Durade's jaw worked convulsively, as if he had difficulty in holding
it firm enough for utterance. What he would not sell for any price
he would risk on a gambler's strange faith in chance.
"All my winnings against this girl," went on Hough, relentlessly.
Scorn and a taunting dare and an insidious persuasion mingled with
the passion of his offer. He knew how to inflame. Durade, as a
gambler, was a weakling in the grasp of a giant. "Come! ... Do you
accept?"
Durade's body leaped, as if an irresistible current had been shot
into it.
"Si, Senor!" he cried, with power and joy in his voice. In that
moment, no doubt the greatest in his life of gambling, he
unconsciously went back to the use of his mother tongue.
Actuated by one impulse, Hough and Durade sat down at the table. The
others crowded around. Fresno lurched close, with a wicked gleam in
his eyes.
"I was onto Hough," he said to his nearest ally. "It's the girl he's
after!"
The gamblers cut the cards for who should deal. Hough won. For him
victory seemed to exist in the suspense of the very silence, in the
charged atmosphere of the room. He began to shuffle the cards. His
hands were white, shapely, perfect, like a woman's, and yet not
beautiful.
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