Page:Jackson Gregory--joyous trouble maker.djvu/276

260 that Embry's hand at his hip was very still, that the fingers were tense. Then he passed on. At the far end of the bar he stopped again, this time calling for a cigar and carelessly collecting the change returned to him from a ten-dollar gold piece.

"Just lookin' 'em over, Mr. Steele?" said Truitt, who had come to serve him. "Or takin' a whirl at the wheel tonight?"

For as Steele stood he was looking toward the roulette table where a half dozen men were making "pikers'" bets or idly watching the speeding ivory ball.

Before replying Steele meditated upon a fact which seemed and perhaps was quite trifling: Truitt, on his way to get the box of cigars from a shelf under his counter opposite Embry, had had a quiet word with him. While upon the surface the two had not been friendly, Steele had imagined that their supposed dislike for each other was but a part of Embry's smooth work; he'd hardly care to let the impression go to Beatrice that he had anything in common with the man who managed the hateful saloon at Summit City. And now just the look in Flash Truitt's eyes … Embry's were absolutely cold and noncommittal … told Steele that they might have a very great deal in common.

"Two of a kind, after all," he reflected.

He was taking his time in answering Truitt's question. Truitt's voice was evidently meant to be casual and careless … and it failed to ring true. Truitt's face, usually very pale, was slightly flushed; Truitt, who, like most gamblers, drank little, had broken his rule today. It seemed obvious that he wanted to see