Sergeant Silk the Prairie Scout Part 8

"You've got the eyes of a lynx," commented the dealer encouragingly.

"You'll sure make your pile at this rate. Try once more!"

The cards were thrown again, and again the supposed rancher won. He made a clever show of becoming eager, though he knew that he was only being decoyed to a final plunge. When he had won twenty dollars and the watching crowd had drawn closer, he laughed and glanced across at the sharper.

"Say, do you put any limit on this here game?" he asked.

"How far will you go?" questioned the dealer. "You're twenty dollars to the good already. You're shaping to break me."

Sergeant Silk hesitated and looked swiftly back over his shoulder. He wanted to delay operations until one or more of his chums of the Mounted Police should come in to his support, as had been planned in case of trouble.

"How much do you bet?" invited the sharper.

Silk leant forward, fumbling at his belt pocket.

"Fifty dollars," he readily answered.

The man with the diamond ring made a pretence of hesitation. Silk deliberately counted out ten five-dollar bills and held them between his fingers on the table.

"All right," the gambler a.s.sented, taking up what appeared to be the same three cards. "I don't mind running the risk, just for once on the off-chance of my luck taking a turn."

And he began to make pa.s.ses with the three pieces of pasteboard.

"Wait a bit, though," objected Silk very calmly. "I don't see your own stake. Here is my money. Where's yours?"

"Oh, that's all serene," said the other. "My credit's good for anything in this emporium."

"May be so," demurred Silk. "All the same," he insisted firmly, "I expect to see your money alongside of mine."

There was some quibbling, but after consulting with one of his confederates the gambler yielded and reluctantly counted the money in gold from a bulky canvas bag that he drew from his breast pocket.

Probably Silk was the only stranger present who was aware that the coins were counterfeit.

"That ought to satisfy you," sneered the trickster, as he dealt out the three cards.

Very coolly and without an instant's hesitation Sergeant Silk bent over and placed his hand upon the card nearest to him, drawing it an inch or two towards him, but not turning it up.

"This is the king," he declared positively, for the first time looking the gamester straight in the eye.

"Ah, so that's your fancy, is it?" The professional swindler leant back with a satisfied smile. "Well, suppose you just turn it over and let every one see."

Silk's steel-blue eyes flashed for an instant. He knew that with his next move there was going to be trouble.

"No," he cried. "You will turn over the other two."

With an oath the swindler refused, betraying by his agitation that for once he had met his match.

"That's not the way this game is played," he objected in confusion.

"Show us your king."

"It's the way that I intend to see it played," declared Silk very calmly but firmly. And with his forefinger he adroitly flicked the two cards over, face upward. "You see," he cried, "neither of yours is a king.

Therefore mine is bound to be."

Utterly confounded, and dreading the consequences if the third card should now be revealed, the swindler tried to shuffle out of his awkward position by giving in.

"In that case, you win," he said.

Sergeant Silk quietly pocketed the hundred dollars with one hand, while with the other he still retained the third card.

The gambler s.n.a.t.c.hed at it.

"Give me that card!" he demanded, dreading that any one should see it.

Silk laughed and stood up.

"Not before the company have seen it," he retorted, and turning the card over he cried: "See, boys, it's the three of diamonds! The king is up his sleeve!"

His voice, the accusing flash of his eyes, his whole att.i.tude, revealed him in his true ident.i.ty to the crowd, who now recognised him through his disguise as a well-known officer of the Mounted Police. There was a cry--

"It's Silk--Sergeant Silk!"

In the wild confusion that followed his exposure of the cheat, Percy Rapson did not see exactly what happened. All that he knew was that the unmasked card-sharper and his confederates were fighting their way out of the saloon, that one or two pistol shots were fired, and that Sergeant Silk had been flung to the floor with blood upon his face.

"So that was Nick-By-Night, was it?" Silk now asked of Rapson as they rode into the valley. "How do you know?"

"I found out only this morning," Percy explained. "I was at Hilton's Jump and heard two fellows talking about him in Canadian French. They called him Nick Cutler, and Cutler was the name by which Pierre Roche referred to the card-sharper in the Golden Bar. I expect he has heaps of aliases and disguises. Anyhow, you'll know him when you see him, won't you?"

"Why, cert'nly," nodded Silk, "thanks to you. You see, I never forget a face."

"Say, Sergeant," interposed Constable Medlicott, "that outfit in front of us has pulled up. I guess they're intending to make camp for the night."

"Do you suppose they've spotted us?" questioned Percy Rapson.

"It's likely," said Silk. "What if they have?"

"Well," returned Percy, looking serious, "I was thinkin' it might be a trap. It's quite possible that the man you're trackin'--Nick-By-Night--is in that wagon with some of his gang, lying in wait for you, and that he planted that hair-pin and the other signs to decoy you."

Silk smiled.

"It's 'cute of you to hit upon such a notion," he said, "but, you see, it was by the merest chance that we halted where we did; and besides, the innocent hair-pin was dropped there quite early in the morning, before I myself knew we were coming on this trail. Just in case there is any trickery, however, I will ride on in advance, and if I find that the wagon is occupied by a gang of armed bandits, I'll sound my whistle. You two will wait right here."

CHAPTER VI

THE SURPRISE VISIT

He touched his mare's flank with his heel and went off at an easy gallop down the trail. As he drew near to the wagon he saw that the two men in charge of it had unharnessed the mules and were taking them to a neighbouring stream. A large deerhound appeared from behind the vehicle, followed by a girl. The hound barked at the approaching horseman.