play? If so, I will be most pleased for
a little game."

"I'd shake dice with the devil himself, friend Ruiz," answered Jim
heartily.

"I must have some money from Ortega here," said Rios carelessly.
"Unless my check will satisfy?"

"Better get the money," returned Kendric pleasantly.

As Rios turned away with the proprietor Kendric was impelled to look
again toward the woman. She had moved a little to one side so that now
she stood in the shadow cast by an angle of the wall. He could not see
her eyes, so low had she drawn her wide _sombrero_, nor could he make
out much of her face. He had an impression of an oval line curving
softly into the folds of her scarf; of masses of black hair. But one
thing he knew: she was looking steadily at him. It did not matter that
he could not see her eyes; he could feel them. Under that hidden gaze
there was a moment during which he was oddly stirred, vaguely agitated.
It was as though she, some strange woman, were striving to subject his
mind to the spell of her own will; as though across the room she were
seeking not only to read his thought but to mold it to the shape of her
own thought. He had the uncanny sensation that her mind was rifling
his, that it would be hard to hide from those probing mental fingers
any slightest desire or intention. Kendric shook himself savagely,
angered that even for an instant he should have submitted to such
sickish fancies. But even so, and while he strode to the nearby table
for the dice cup, he could not free himself from the impression which
she had laid upon him.

She beckoned Rios as he came back with Ortega. He went to her side and
she whispered to him.

"We will play here, at this end of the room, senor," Rios said to
Kendric.

As Kendric looked quite naturally from the one who spoke to the one
from whom so obviously the order had come, he saw for the first time
the gleam of the woman's eyes. A very little she had lifted the brim
of her hat so that from beneath she could watch what went forward.
They held his gaze riveted; they seemed to glow in the shadows as
though with some inner light. He could not judge their color; they
were mere luminous pools. He started with an odd fancy; he caught
himself wondering if those eyes could see in the dark?

Again he shrugged as though to shake physically from him these strange
fancies. He snatched up the little table and brought it to where Ruiz
Rios waited, putting it down not