Lablache shuffled clumsily.  His fingers seemed too gross to handle cards.  And yet he could shuffle well, and his fingers were, in reality, most sensitive.  John Allandale looked on eagerly.  The money-lender, contrary to his custom, dealt swiftly—­so swiftly that the bleared eyes of his opponent could not follow his movements.

Both men picked up their cards.  The old instincts of poker were not so pronounced in the rancher as they used to be.  Doubtless the game he was now playing did not need such mask-like impassivity of expression as an ordinary game would.  After all, the pot opened, it merely became a question of who held the best hand.  There would be no betting.  John’s eyes lighted up as he glanced at the index numerals.  He held two “Jacks.”

“Can you?” Lablache’s husky voice rasped in the stillness.

“Yes.”

The dealer eyed his opponent for a second.  His face was that of a graven image.

“How many?”

“Three.”

The money-lender passed three cards across the table.  Then he discarded two cards from his own hand and drew two more.

“What have you got?” he asked, with a grim pursing of his sagging lips.

“Two pairs.  Jacks up.”

Lablache laid his own cards on the table, spreading them out face upwards for the rancher to see.  He held three “twos.”

“One to you,” said John Allandale; and he went and chalked the score upon the wall.

There was something very business-like about these two men when they played cards.  And possibly it was only natural.  The quiet way in which they played implied the deadly earnestness of their game.  Their surroundings, too, were impressive when associated with the secrecy of their doings.

Each man meant to win, and in both were all the baser passions fully aroused.  Neither would spare the other, each would do his utmost.  Lablache was sure.  John was consumed with a deadly nervousness.  But John Allandale at cards was the soul of honor.  Lablache was confident in his superior manipulation—­not play—­of cards.  He knew that, bar accidents, he must win.  The mystery of being able to deal himself “three of a kind” and even better was no mystery to him.  He preferred his usual method—­the method of “reflection,” as he called it; but in the game he was now playing such a method would be useless for obvious reasons.  First of all, knowing his opponent’s cards would only be of advantage where betting was to ensue.  Now he needed the clumsier, if more sure, method of dealing himself a hand.  And he did not hesitate to adopt it.

“Poker” John dealt The pot was not opened.  Lablache again dealt.  Still the hand passed without the pot being opened.  The next time John dealt Lablache opened the pot and was promptly beaten.  He drew to two queens and missed.  John drew to a pair of sevens and got a third.  The game was one all.  After this Lablache won three pots in succession and the game stood four—­one, in favor of the money-lender.