Page:Jackson Gregory--joyous trouble maker.djvu/277

Rh Steele play roulette, and what need to seek for a reason for that? The more men to play, the bigger winnings for the house. That's what the wheel was there for.

"I'll watch her spin a while," said Steele coolly. Truitt had turned toward Embry again. Embry, however, showed him only his back with his elbows hooked over the edge of the bar, seeming to give his attention entirely to the dancers out in the middle of the floor. He was turning a big black unlighted cigar slowly between his lips. Embry, of course, would like to see him lose just because ...

A sudden thought brought a quick tensing of the muscles up and down Steele's big body! A sudden suspicion which, in a flash, was close to certainty; he wondered that it had never presented itself to him until now. Even now, if it had not been for the look he had surprised in Truitt's eyes when they went to Embry, he would not have thought of it. If he could but be sure! He had knocked out his pipe and put it into his pocket. If he could just be sure! Slowly he cut the end of his cigar, slowly lighted it. Then, his change in his hand, he stepped to the roulette table and placed a bet. The nine dollars and a half which Truitt had returned to him he piled on number five.

He had no thought of winning, no desire to win. But he thought that he saw the way to have the answer to his question. The dealer, a small, quick-fingered man, lifted tired eyes briefly, dropped them under a pair of long, dark lashes and lazily watched the ball. The first burst of its wild racing over, it loitered, clicking and ever seeming about to stop, and at last came