d Santa Fe wasn't non-plustered
often, and didn't like it when he was--but he pulled himself together
and put down what cards he had: telling Boston monte was a game he
sometimes played with friends for amusement--which was the everlasting
truth, only the friends mostly was less amused than he was--and he'd
had a dog named Carlo, he said, when he was a boy.

Boston seemed to think that was funny, and took to snickering sort of
superior. He was about a full dose for uppishness, that young feller
was: going on as if he'd bought the Territory, and as if the folks in
it was the peones he'd took over--Mexican fashion--along with the
land. Then he said he guessed Santa Fe did not ketch his meaning, and
Monte Carlo was the biggest gambling hell there was.

Being in the business, Santa Fe was apt to get peevish when anybody
took to talking about gambling; and Boston's throwing in hell on top
of it that way was more'n he cared to stand. He didn't let on--at
least not so the fool could see it--his dander was started, setting on
himself being one of the things his work trained him to; but the boys
noticed he begun to get palish up at the top of his forehead--where
there was a white streak between his hair and where his hat come--and
all hands knowed that for a bad sign. Boston, of course--being
strangers with him--didn't know what Charley's signs was; and he just
kept on a-talking as fresh as his green clothes.

"Not less psychologically than sociologically," says he, "is it
interesting to find in this slum of the wilderness the degenerate
Old-World vices in crude New-World garb. Here," says he, jerking his
head across to the table, "is a coarse reproduction of Monaco's
essence; and there, I observe, are other repulsive features equally
coarse"--and he jerked his head over to where Shorty Smith was setting
up drinks for Carrots at the bar.

"If you dare to say one word more about my features, young man," says
Carrots--having a pug-nose, Carrots was techy about her features; and
she had a temper the same color as her hair--"I'll smack you in the
mouth!"

"And Oi'll smack your whole domn head off!" put in Blister Mike.
"D'you think Oi'm going to have ladies drinking at my bar insulted by
slush like you?" And Blister reached down to where he kept it among
the tumblers to get his gun.

It looked as if there was going to be a ruction right off. There was
Carrots red-hotter than her hair; and Blister, who was special
friends wit