oggedly.

"Don't you? I don't believe I do, either. There are intervals in my
career which might prove eloquent if I opened my lips. But I don't,
except to make floating rings and cabalistic signs out of cigarette
smoke. Can you read their meaning? Look! There goes one, and there's
another, and another--all twisting and uncurling into hieroglyphics.
They are very significant; they might tell you a lot of things, if you
would only translate them. But you haven't the key--have you?"

There was a heavy, jarring step in the main living-room, and Mortimer's
bulk darkened the doorway.

"Entrez, mon ami," nodded Leila, glancing up. "Where is Agatha?"

"I'm going to Desmond's," he grunted, ignoring his wife's question; "do
you want to try it again, Beverly?"

"I can't make Leila take her own winnings," said Plank, holding out the
signed but unfilled cheque to Mortimer, who took it and scrutinised it
for a moment, rubbing his heavy, inflamed eyes; then, gesticulating, the
cheque fluttering in his puffy fingers:

"Come on," he insisted. "I've a notion that I can give Desmond a whirl
that he won't forget in a hurry. Agatha's asleep; she's going to that
ball--where is it?" he demanded, turning on his wife. "Yes, yes; the
Page blow-out. You're going, I suppose?"

Leila nodded, and lighted another cigarette.

"All right," continued Mortimer impatiently; "you and Agatha won't start
before one. And if you think Plank had better go, why, we'll be back
here in time."

"That means you won't be back at all," observed his wife coolly; "and
it's good policy for Beverly to go where he's asked. Can't you turn in
and sleep, now, and amuse your friend Desmond to-morrow night?"

"No, I can't. What a fool I'd be to let a chance slip when I feel like a
winner!"

"You never feel otherwise when you gamble," said Leila.

"Yes, I do," he retorted peevishly. "I can tell almost every time what
the cards are going to do to me. Leila, go to sleep. We'll be back here
for you by one, or half past."

"Look here, Leroy," began Plank, "there's one thing I can't stand for,
and that's this continual loss of sleep. If I go with you I'll not be
fit to go to the Pages."

"What a farmer you are!" sneered Mortimer. "I believe you roost on the
foot-board of your bed, like a confounded turkey. Come on! You'd better
begin training, you know. People in this town are not going to stand for
the merry ploughboy game, you see!"

But Plank was shrewdly cover