From talking and brooding on these figures, it was but a step to opening the chest; and once the chest open, the glamour of the cash was irresistible.  Each felt that he must see his treasure separate with the eye of flesh, handle it in the hard coin, mark it for his own, and stand forth to himself the approved owner.  And here an insurmountable difficulty barred the way.  There were some seventeen shillings in English silver:  the rest was Chile; and the Chile dollar, which had been taken at the rate of six to the pound sterling, was practically their smallest coin.  It was decided, therefore, to divide the pounds only, and to throw the shillings, pence, and fractions in a common fund.  This, with the three pound fourteen already in the heel, made a total of seven pounds one shilling.

“I’ll tell you,” said Wicks.  “Let Carthew and Tommy and me take one pound apiece, and Hemstead and Amalu split the other four, and toss up for the odd bob.”

“O, rot!” said Carthew.  “Tommy and I are bursting already.  We can take half a sov’ each, and let the other three have forty shillings.”

“I’ll tell you now—­it’s not worth splitting,” broke in Mac.  “I’ve cards in my chest.  Why don’t you play for the slump sum?”

In that idle place, the proposal was accepted with delight.  Mac, as the owner of the cards, was given a stake; the sum was played for in five games of cribbage; and when Amalu, the last survivor in the tournament, was beaten by Mac, it was found the dinner hour was past.  After a hasty meal, they fell again immediately to cards, this time (on Carthew’s proposal) to Van John.  It was then probably two P.M. of the 9th February; and they played with varying chances for twelve hours, slept heavily, and rose late on the morrow to resume the game.  All day of the 10th, with grudging intervals for food, and with one long absence on the part of Tommy from which he returned dripping with the case of sherry, they continued to deal and stake.  Night fell:  they drew the closer to the fire.  It was maybe two in the morning, and Tommy was selling his deal by auction, as usual with that timid player; when Carthew, who didn’t intend to bid, had a moment of leisure and looked round him.  He beheld the moonlight on the sea, the money piled and scattered in that incongruous place, the perturbed faces of the players; he felt in his own breast the familiar tumult; and it seemed as if there rose in his ears a sound of music, and the moon seemed still to shine upon a sea, but the sea was changed, and the Casino towered from among lamplit gardens, and the money clinked on the green board.  “Good God!” he thought, “am I gambling again?” He looked the more curiously about the sandy table.  He and Mac had played and won like gamblers; the mingled gold and silver lay by their places in the heap.  Amalu and Hemstead had each more than held their own, but Tommy was cruel far to leeward, and the captain was reduced to perhaps fifty pounds.