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262 to rest on number seventeen. No one had won; the dealer's hand raked in the chips with Steele's money and again set the ball circling.

"No luck?" laughed Truitt. "Maybe next time ...."

Steele shrugged.

"I don't carry my pockets full of coin these days," he returned lightly. "It isn't always wise, you know."

"I'll advance you something," suggested Truitt. "Just give me your ."

Here was just what Steele had lost his nine dollars and a half for; this and something else. He had moved back a little from the table so that, looking at Truitt and beyond him, he saw Joe Embry's back in the looking glass behind the bar. "Will you cash my check for a thousand dollars?" he said abruptly.

For a moment Flash Truitt hesitated. The amount was large and he knew little of the man who asked it, nothing of his financial rating. Men in towns like Boom Town have been known to give worthless checks. As this went through his mind, as Steele had known it must go, something else happened which Steele had more than half expected. Truitt's look had flashed again to Joe Embry. Watching the mirror, Steele saw that Embry had half turned, moving quickly as the words "a thousand dollars" fell on his ears, and that his answer to Truitt's enquiry was a positive nod.

"Certainly, Mr. Steele," Truitt was saying, as though the matter were of negligible importance. "Glad to cash your check."