and relaxing. He was not talking to his daughter, but
to his conscience. It was the old threadbare, tattered tale--spawn of
the Goddess fortune; a thing of misbegotten hopes and desires.

The colonel, swollen with the winning of the Carter Handicap, had
conceived the idea that he was possessor of a God-given knowledge of the
"game." And there had been many to sustain that belief. Now, the colonel
might know a horse, but he did not know the law of averages, of chance,
nor did he even know how his fellow man's heart is fashioned. Nor that
track fortunes are only made by bookies or exceptionally wealthy or
brainy owners; that a plunger comes out on top once in a million times.
That the track, to live, must bleed "suckers" by the thousand, and that
he, Colonel Desha, was one of the bled.

He was on the wrong side of the table. The Metropolitan, Brooklyn,
Suburban, Brighton, Futurity, and a few minor meets served to swamp
the colonel. What Waterbury had to do with the case was not clear. The
colonel had taken his advice time and time again only to lose. But the
Kentucky estate had been sold, and Mr. Waterbury held the mortgage of
the Desha home. And then, his mind emptied of its poison, the colonel
slowly came to himself.

"What--what have I been saying?" he cried tensely. He attempted a laugh,
a denial; caught his daughter's eyes, looked into them, and then buried
his face in his quivering hands.

Sue knelt down and raised his head.

"Daddy, is that--all?" she asked steadily.

He did not answer. Then, man as he was, the blood came sweeping to face
and neck.

"I mean," added the girl quietly, her eyes, steady but very kind,
holding his, "I had word from the National this morning saying that our
account, the--the balance, was overdrawn--"

"Yes--I drew against it," whispered Colonel Desha. He would not meet
her eyes; he who had looked every man in the face. The fire caught him
again. "I had to, girlie, I had to," he cried over and over again. "I
intended telling you. We'll make it up a hundred times over. It was my
only chance. It's all up on the books--up on The Rogue. He'll win the
Carter as sure as there's a God in heaven. It's a ten-thousand stake,
and I've had twenty on him--the balance--your balance, girlie. I can pay
off Waterbury--" The fire died away as quickly. Somehow in the stillness
of the room, against the look in the girl's eyes, words seemed so
pitifully futile, so blatant, so utterly trivial.

Sue'