“I bear witness,” cried the lieutenant gallantly, “and we are proud to play second when a Studevaris leads.”

But Morganstein stared at her in open admiration.  “You thoroughbred!” he said.

“It shall stay in the family,” confirmed Marcia.

Then Frederic bid two lilies, the lieutenant passed and Mrs. Feversham raised to three hearts.  She wavered, and Tisdale saw the cards tremble in her hand.  “Four diamonds,” she said at last.  The men passed, and Marcia doubled.  Then Morganstein led a lily, and the lieutenant spread his hand on the table.  There were six clubs; in diamonds a single trey.

But Mrs. Weatherbee was radiant.  She moved a little and glanced back at Elizabeth, inviting her to look at her hand.  She might as well have said:  “You see, I have only to lead out trumps and establish clubs.”

Marcia played a diamond on her partner’s second lead of spades, and led the ace of hearts, following with the king; the fourth round Frederic trumped over Mrs. Weatherbee and led another lily.  Mrs. Feversham used her second diamond and, returning with a heart, saw her partner trump again over Mrs. Weatherbee.  It was miserable.  They gathered in the book before the lead fell to her.  The next deal the cards deserted her, and after that the lieutenant blundered.  But even though the ruby was inevitably lost, she finished the rubber pluckily; the flush deepened in her cheek; the blue fires flamed in her eyes.  “You thoroughbred!” Morganstein repeated thickly.  “You thoroughbred!”

To Tisdale it was unendurable.  He rose and crossed to the farther side of the desk.  The Aquila, rounding the northern end of Bainbridge Island, had come into Agate Pass; the tide ran swift in rips and eddies between close wooded shores, but these things no longer caught his attention.  The scene he saw was the one he had put behind him, and in the calcium light of his mind, one figure stood out clearly from the rest.  Had he not known this woman was a spendthrift?  Had he not suspected she inherited this vice from her father, that old gambler of the stock exchange.  Was it not for this reason he had determined to hold that last half interest in the Aurora mine?  Still, still, she had not shown the skill of long practice; she had not played with ordinary caution.  And had not Elizabeth remonstrated, as though her loss was inevitable?  Every one had been undeniably surprised.  Why, then, had she done this?  She had told him she was in “desperate need.”  Could this have been the alternative to which she had referred?

The Aquila’s whistle blew, and she came around, close under a bluff, into a small cove, on the rim of which rose the new villa.  The group behind Tisdale began to push back chairs.  He turned.  The game was over, and Mrs. Feversham stood moving her hand slowly to catch the changing lights of the ring on her finger.  Then she looked at the loser.  “It seems like robbery,” she exclaimed, “to take this old family talisman from you, Beatriz.  I shall make out a check to ease my conscience.”