“Thank you, Jack!” said Langham gratefully.  “The fact is the pickings here are pretty small.”

Again the lawyer mopped his brow and again North moved impatiently.

“Don’t say another word about it, Marsh,” he repeated.  “McBride has agreed to take the last of my gas bonds off my hands; that will get me away from here.”

“How many have you left?” asked Langham curiously.

“Ten,” said North.

Langham whistled.

“Do you mean to tell me you are down to that?  Why, you told me once you held a hundred!”

“So I did once, but it costs money to be the kind of fool I’ve been! said North.

“Well, I suppose you are doing the sensible thing in getting out of this.  Have you any notion where you are going or what you’ll do?”

North shook his head.

“Oh, you’ll get into something!” the lawyer encouraged.  “When shall you see McBride?”

“This afternoon.  Why?”

“I was going to say that I was just there with Atkinson.  He and McBride have been in a timber speculation, and Atkinson handed over three thousand dollars in cash to the old man.  I suppose he has banked it in some heap of scrap-iron on the premises!” said Langham laughing.

“I think I shall go there now,” resolved North.  While he was speaking he had moved to the door leading into the hail, and had opened it.

“Hold on, John!” said Langham, detaining him.  “Evelyn is home.  She came quite unexpectedly to-day; you won’t leave town without getting up to the house to see her?”

“I think I shall,” replied North hastily.  “I much prefer not to say good-by.”

“Oh, nonsense!” cried Langham.

“No, Marsh, I don’t intend to say good-by to any one!” North quietly turned back into the room.

“I had intended having you up to the house to-night for a blow-out,” urged Langham, but North shook his head.  “You and Gilmore, Jack; and by the way, this puts me in a nice hole!  I have already asked Gilmore, and he’s coming.  Now, how the devil am to get out of it?  I can’t spring him alone on the family circle, and I don’t want to hurt his feelings!”

“Call it off, Marsh; say I couldn’t come; that’s a good enough excuse to give Gilmore.  Why, that fellow’s a common card-sharp, you can’t ask Evelyn to meet him!”

A slight noise in the hall caused both men to glance toward the door, where they saw just beyond the threshold the swarthy-faced Gilmore.

There was a brief embarrassed silence, and then North nodded to the new-comer, but the salutation was not returned.

“Well, good-by, Marsh!” he said, and turned to the door.  As he brushed past the gambler their eyes met for an instant, and in that instant Gilmore’s face turned livid with rage.

“I’ll fix you for that, so help me God, I will!” he said, but North made no answer.  He passed down the hall, down the stairs, and out into the street.