Six or seven of us were in the street outside the club when the meeting was over. Where the rest had vanished to I do not know. There was not a cab to be seen. I doubt if a cab ever does ply for hire in that locality. Besides, what would be one cab among so many? The night was fine. Archie put his arm through mine.

"Come along, lets pad the hoof, my dears."

Off we went, the lot of us abreast. We had not gone a dozen yards before we came upon a policeman coming along as if the pavement had been in his family for years.

"Now, officer," cried Silvester, "make way!"

The officer slowed. He thrust his thumbs into his belt. He surveyed us with a genial grin which might almost have suggested that we were friends of his.

"What are you gentlemen doing here? This isn't the sort of place for the likes of you. If some of the chaps caught sight of those shirt-fronts of yours they might rumple 'em a bit."

Silvester pulled up the collar of his coat.

"My dear Mr. Policeman, how you frighten us! Could you tell us where we are or which is the way to anywhere?"

The officer jerked his thumb over his shoulder.

"If you go straight on, through Strutton Ground, it'll take you out into Victoria Street, but you'll find it a roughish way."

We did find it a roughish way. We also found that there were some roughish people thereabouts, especially the proprietors of the costers' barrows. It must have been at least eleven, but they were carrying on a market in the gutter as briskly as if it had been the middle of the day. I said to Archie, as soon as I saw what sort of place it was, that we had better sneak through in single file, and thank our stars when we found ourselves out of it. But the others didn't seem to see it. They were bent on improving the shining hour. And they improved it. When I did begin to understand that I was in Victoria Street, at last, some gentleman had borrowed my hat, and I had to tie a handkerchief under my chin to keep the rest of my hair on my head.

"A lively five minutes," observed Teddy, picking what were either pieces of a potato or of an onion from his eye.

I moved a little from him. Owing to his having been upset among the dried fish on a coster's barrow he smelt a bit strong. Silvester held up something in the air.

"I've got a cabbage, and, by jove, I believe some one's got my watch."

There was a roar of voices issuing from the street through which we had come.

"Here they are again!" I cried. "I've had enough of it. I'm off. Hi! cabby!"

Two hansoms were prowling by. I jumped into one. Two or three of the fellows followed me. We drove away from our friends of Strutton Ground with a parting yell, the rest of the fellows in the second hansom bringing up the rear.

They would not let us in at the Criterion. The individual at the door seemed to think that there was something in our appearance which was not exactly what it ought to be. Silvester presented him with the cabbage for which, quite unintentionally, he had exchanged his watch. But so far from allowing that handsome contribution to the family larder--it had cost Eugene perhaps fifty pounds--to melt his heart, the stiff-necked Cerberus actually threatened us with the police. So we adjourned to the tavern at the corner till they turned us out. Then we went for a quiet stroll along Piccadilly, seven abreast, which soon landed us in the thick of a row. It was a fight of giants while it lasted. But the police were one too many. They bore the Honourable off in triumph. We followed him in a body to Vine Street Station, where every one was most polite. But they wouldn't hear of bail. A policeman had a most dreadful eye, and he made out that it was Jem. So we had to leave him in the hands of cruel strangers to spend the night. Poor Jem!

When we got outside, being all of us so clear-headed and in such a thoroughly judicial frame of mind, Archie proposed that we should adjourn to his place and have a hand at cards. We belonged to perhaps two dozen clubs between us, but they were none of them sufficiently cerulean--though blue enough--to have admitted us without our first having gone through the ceremony of going home and washing ourselves and changing our clothes. So, as that sort of thing would have been an awful bore, we snapped at Archie's kind invite. And some uncivil policeman coming up and suggesting that it would be well for our own health and for the health of the neighbourhood if we stood not on the order of our going, we tumbled into a couple of cabs and went.

Archie's rooms were in Wilton Street. As the cabs drew up at his door, Pendarvon came strolling up. He pulled up at the sight of us. He stared. He appeared surprised. As every one who had been favoured with a near view of us during the last hour or so had appeared surprised, however much we might feel wounded, we could scarcely openly resent such an exhibition on the part even of a friend.

"What on earth have you fellows been doing?" he inquired. "You don't seem to me to have a whole suit of clothes between you."

Archie explained--

"My dear Pendarvon, if you had been doing what we have been doing, you would look as we are looking. Come inside!"

So Pendarvon entered with the rest of us.

When we were in we found that with Pendarvon we were six. We had been seven without him. The Honourable we had dropped at Vine Street, and Lister, for anything any one seemed to know to the contrary, was a clear case of lost, stolen, or strayed. Of the six, Gravesend was obviously no good for cards. He fell asleep as soon as he had found a chair to do it on. It did not seem to rouse him to any appreciable extent even when he tumbled off. The best we could do for him was to put him comfortably to bed on the hearthrug in Archie's bedroom. There was no fear of his doing himself a mischief if he rolled about.

Of the five who were left, Teddy was not exactly fit. But as the idea of leaving him out, filled him with nothing else but wrath, we cut him in. Silvester had quenched his thirst, but I do not think I ever saw him too drunk to play. He presented a truly remarkable spectacle as regards attire. The gentleman who had borrowed his watch, or some of his friends, had taken away the large portion of his shirt to wrap it up in. His coat was slit right down his back. Waistcoat he had none. And he had tied his braces round his waist in order to retain possession of what was left him of his trousers. However, with the assistance of one of Archie's dressing-gowns, he managed. The more Archie drinks, the more he's in the vein. As for me, I was ready to play for my boots. And Pendarvon was as sober as a judge.

BeauprÉ made it poker--poker is his pet game. We began with a ten shilling ante, and a ten pound limit. It made a pretty game, while it lasted. In the first jack-pot, when it came to threes, Silvester declared that all his cash was gone. It was he began the IOU's. Teddy's luck was wonderful. Before very long very nearly all our ready-money had gone his way. I had ten tenners and gold when I began. They soon paid a visit to Teddy. Pendarvon seemed to have a pocket full of money. He brought out a whole sheaf of bank-notes to give our appetites a twist.

Teddy had just taken another plump jack-pot when BeauprÉ ran dry. He replenished his pockets at his desk. When he came back, Pendarvon was about to deal.

"Don't you think," he said, "that this is a little slow? Suppose we double the limit. Teddy, I suppose you don't object."

Teddy said he didn't. More than half drunk, and fancying himself in the vein, he was not likely to object. I took it that Archie had already lost a hundred and fifty. I saw that he had only brought about another century to table. I guessed--for reasons--that he was squeezed for funds. I suspected that he might not care to plunge deeper than we were already. And so, to save him, I struck in.

"So far as I am concerned, I am content to go on as we are. It's good enough for me."

To my surprise, and to my amusement, Archie was quite vehement upon the other side.

"Rubbish! This sort of thing's only fit for babes, not men! Reggie, where's your courage--make it twenty."

So we made the limit twenty pounds.

Luck began to slip away from Teddy--small wonder either! He did some outrageous bluffing, against Pendarvon, too, who is one of the hardest men to bluff there is about. Teddy waxed wild. He and Pendarvon were the only two left in. They raised each other till there was, perhaps five hundred in the pool. Then Pendarvon saw him. Teddy threw down his cards with a curse.

"Ace high."

"Fours."

Pendarvon showed four sevens. Teddy had paid for his whistle.

After that, the luck, and, for the matter of that, the play too, went dead against him. He kept on drinking--he was not in the least fit for poker, but he would keep on playing. Archie, too, kept on the shady side. Silvester about held his own. I had an occasional hand worth backing. Pendarvon and I bid fair to share the spoils.

One round we all came in. I was first bettor. Silvester was blind. I opened with the limit. Each man went the limit better in his turn. When there was four hundred in the pool Silvester went out. Another round or two and Teddy went. There was over five hundred in the pool. Pendarvon had raised the limit over Archie. It was sixty pounds for me to come in. I had a straight, knave high. I saw the sixty. Archie saw it, and went twenty better. Pendarvon raised him twenty. I saw the forty. Archie scribbled another IOU--he had been reduced for some time to paper. He had raised again. Pendarvon followed suit. I thought that it was enough for me, and went. The two kept at it. There must have been over a thousand in before Pendarvon saw. Archie laid down his hand, with a smile, as though he felt sure that, this time, the luck was his.

"A full--queens high."

Pendarvon laughed.

"Not good enough! I take this pool--I pip you."

He also had a full--with three kings on top. Silvester spoke.

"Will somebody kindly stick a penknife into Teddy."

I looked up--poor Teddy was asleep. When, however, we charged him with it, he endeavoured to wake up and call us names. He insisted on continuing to play. It proved to be as much as he could do to pick up his cards--more than he could do to see them when picked up. The very next round, when asked if he proposed to cover the ante, he threw down his cards face upwards on the table, observing that it was no good coming in on a hand like that. He had held three queens! I struck. I declined to go shares in a robbery.

"Teddy," I remarked, "if you'll take my advice you'll go home to bed. Just now poker's not your line."

"I'm not feeling very well," he said. "I hate this game; it makes me ill. Let's play something else."

"We will. We'll sing 'Rock-a-by, baby,' and play at going to sleep. Come along, Teddy, let me offer you the temporary loan of my arm."

Archie interposed.

"Hang it, Reggie, you're not going! Put the beggar to sleep alongside Gravesend on the rug."

"I'm not going to sleep on the rug," said Teddy, "I hate the rug."

We compromised, putting him to bed on the couch in Archie's bedroom. It seemed unlikely that he would fall off, since he was asleep before we had the whole of him laid down. While we were together in the bedroom, I said a private word to Archie.

"If you'll hearken to the wisdom of the wise, old man, you'll cut it. You're not in the vein."

He chose to misunderstand my meaning.

"Do you mean I'm drunk?"

"I think I am--at least too drunk for poker; and too sleepy, also. If you'll allow me, I'll get home."

Archie looked at me in the way I knew, all his Scotch temper in his eyes.

"Are you afraid, or broke? Or what the devil's up?"

Pendarvon called from the next room.

"Are you fellows having a little game by yourselves?"

I jerked my thumb towards Pendarvon as Archie and I went in together.

"That's just what is up--the devil."

We four went at it again. I reckoned that at that time Archie had lost about two thousand pounds--nearly the whole of it to Pendarvon in IOU's. His heavier losses all came afterwards. Silvester also lost. He made a very nasty loser. He allowed things to escape his tongue which, under other circumstances, might have brought the sitting to a prompt and a turbulent close. Pendarvon, to whose address Silvester's little observations were principally directed, seemed to take it for granted that the fact of his being three-parts drunk covered a multitude of sins. For my part, on the whole I won. By degrees, as Silvester's sulkiness increased, the game resolved itself into a sort of triangular duel. Archie went for Pendarvon, and Pendarvon went for me. As he found, for the most part, that his assaults were unavailing, and that my mood was beatific, Pendarvon began to follow Silvester's lead and lose his temper. Not, however, on Silvester's lines. The more enraged he grew, the more he laughed. I knew the gentleman so well.

Archie began to play like a lunatic. Once Silvester declined to come in. I had four knaves; it was the second four hand I had had within a very few minutes. Of course, I started to back it for all I was worth. What Archie and Pendarvon had was more than I could guess; I did not much care. I felt that, whatever they had, I was about their match. I had taken one card, wishing them to suppose that I had drawn to two pairs. Archie had had two. I took it that he had started with a triplet. Pendarvon had had three; apparently he had opened with a pair. It seemed from the betting that they had both improved their hands, for neither seemed disposed to tire. The pool crept up to a thousand. Then Archie found fault with the rate of progression.

"Confound this limit! It's child's play; we shall be at it all night. Will either of you see me for £500?"

Pendarvon hesitated, or appeared to.

"Having fixed a limit, isn't it rather against the rules to travel outside? But, so far as I am personally concerned, I don't mind seeing your five hundred, and raising you another five. What do you say, Townsend?"

"I object. At this point of the game to change the points in such a fashion would simply be to plunder you. I hold the winning hand."

Archie became excited, and not quite civil.

"That's rot. I say ditto to Pendarvon, Reggie. Will you pay a thousand to see our hands?"

"I will do this. I will agree to each man tabling a thousand, and showing his hand."

"Done!" Archie scribbled an IOU. "Now, Pen, down with your thousand."

Pendarvon counted out a heap of Archie's IOU's, laughing as he did so.

"I hope that's good enough."

I drew a cheque on a sheet of paper.

"Now, Archie, if you please, let us see your hand."

He faced his cards.

"A straight flush!" he cried.

For a moment he took my breath away. That he could have drawn two cards for a straight flush had not entered into my philosophy. My next feeling was that the thing looked ugly. For a man with a straight flush in his hand to propose to increase the stakes was--well, not the thing. While words were coming near my lips, Pendarvon leaned towards him.

"Where is your straight flush? Show it us?" Then, with a laugh, "That's not a straight flush."

Archie stared at his cards.

"What do you mean?" Then, with a shout, "I'm damned if it is!"

As he recognised the fact, he seemed to me to turn quite green, and he swore. In his haste, giving only a single glance at his cards, he had let himself in. It was all but a straight flush--a case of the miss which is as good as a mile. His hand was four, five, seven, eight, and nine of hearts. It was a flush, but not a straight flush--he had overlooked the absence of the six. The curious part of the thing was that he should have drawn to such a hand.

Pendarvon faced his cards.

"I fancy, Archie, that I am better than you."

He was. He had a full. Three aces and a pair of kings. No wonder he had been willing to back his luck. I don't know what his feelings were when he found that I could show still more.

"Fours. I think that takes it."

It did.

As I scooped the plunder, Silvester rose.

"Show four whenever you like--eh, Townsend?"

His tone was disagreeable, and meant to be.

"I wish I could."

"I should say that your wish was gratified. It occurs to me that this is distinctly a game at which the soberest wins."

We looked at him. He looked back at us. He was evidently in a state of mind in which he was disposed to pick a quarrel with us, either separately or altogether. The thing to do was not to gratify his whim. He treated Archie to a peculiarly impertinent stare. "That was an odd mistake of yours. I'm drunk, but I'm not drunk enough for that, and I never could be." He gave Pendarvon a turn--"You didn't choose your cards badly. But it's only a question of courage. Take my tip, next time you make it fours." He lurched away from the table. "I'm off. You're welcome to what you've got--cut it up between you."

He staggered from the room. Archie rose, intending, as host, to see him off the premises. Pendarvon caught him by the arm.

"Let the beggar see himself out. If we have luck he may break his neck as he goes downstairs. He's made a bid for it." It seemed that he had. We could hear him stumble down two or three steps at a time. We listened. There was the sound of another stumble. Pendarvon laughed. "Bid number two."

Directly afterwards we heard him fidgeting with the handle of the front door. Archie grew restless.

"He'll raise the dead if he goes on like that much longer. Let me go down, and let him out."

We heard the door open, and immediately afterwards shut with a bang.

"He's let himself out. I fancy a little more rapidly than he intended. I'll bet an even pony that he's gone face foremost into the street. Let's hope it." Pendarvon picked up a pack of cards. "It's my deal. What are we going to do?"

Getting up, Archie helped himself to another soda and whiskey.

"Who'll have some?" We both of us did. "Let's play unlimited. I'm sick of this." Pendarvon raised his glass.

"Here's to you, Archie; you're a gambler."

"I thank the stars I am. Have you any objection, Reggie?"

I shrugged my shoulders, perceiving that remonstrance would be thrown away.

"I'm at your service."

"Then we'll play unlimited."

And we did.

It was a warmish little game. There is something about unlimited poker which appeals to one. The spirit of the gamble gets into one's veins like the breath of the battle into the nostrils of the soldier. One feels that it is a game for men, and that the manhood which is in one has a chance to score. Archie evidently meant going for the gloves. He never bet less than a hundred, and a thousand--in pencil on a scrap of paper--was as nothing to him. If we wanted to be in that game we too had to treat thousands as if they had been sovereigns. At the beginning the luck went round to him--possibly because it took some little time to make his methods ours. He bluffed outrageously. With a pair one was not disposed, at the commencement, to pay a thousand to see his cards. The result was that he scooped pool after pool. When he had made it plain that, if we wanted him to show, we should have to pay, we began to pay.

And luck began!

The ante was fixed at a tenner. I was ante. The other two had come in. Making good, I drew three to a pair of sevens, without improving my hand. Pendarvon opened with a hundred, Archie promptly making it five. I had not had a sight--I had had no cards--for the last five hands. This time, the devil entering into me, I made up my mind that I would find out what sort of game Archie was playing, and have a view if it broke me. I saw his five hundred. Pendarvon saw it too. Then Archie turned up a pair of knaves. I yielded without showing, and to my surprise, Pendarvon did as I had done. A pair of knaves seemed hardly worth fifteen hundred pounds. It looked like easy earning.

The same thing went on time after time. Archie could not be induced to see a man while he could keep on raising. The very next hand, when we had both come in, Archie started with a five hundred bet. So Pendarvon and I let him have the entries. And we had a twenty pound pot.

We had gone right round and come back again to pairs, when Pendarvon announced that he could open. He made it a hundred to enter. Archie and I went in--though, so far as I was concerned, I had an empty hand. Pendarvon took two, Archie stood pat, and I drew five, finding myself in possession of a pair of aces. Pendarvon started with five hundred pounds; we seemed to be getting incapable of thinking of anything under. Archie raised him nine thousand five hundred pounds, tabling his IOU for a round ten thousand. I retired; a pair of aces was not quite good enough for that. If I was to be broken, I might just as well be broken for something better. Pendarvon looked at Archie as if he would have liked to have seen right into him.

"Have you the Bank of England at your back?"

"What are you going to raise me?" inquired Archie.

"Nothing. I go. The courage is yours. I opened with a pair of jacks."

Pendarvon showed them. I doubt if he had anything more. I doubt if Archie had as much. But, still, ten thousand. The average man is not inclined to go as far as that upon a pair of jacks. I could see that Pendarvon felt that he had been bluffed. It put his back up. He meant to be even with Archie--and he was.

"Let me clearly understand what unlimited poker means. Does it mean that I'm at liberty to put half a sheet of notepaper on the table and say I raise a million?"

Archie fired up at the innuendo Pendarvon's words seemed to convey.

"What do you mean by half a sheet of notepaper? Do you suggest that my IOU is nothing but half a sheet of notepaper?"

"Not a bit of it. Why should I? My dear Archie, don't get warm. Only we are none of us millionaires. I know I'm not. Ten thousand pounds is a considerable sum to me. We, all of us, are playing on the nod. Before you go any further suppose we name a date by which all paper must be redeemed."

"I'm willing."

"Suppose we say that it must be redeemed within a week?"

"I'm willing again."

I also acquiesced. I saw the force of what he said, and I saw the pull which it would give him over Archie. Where Archie was likely to find such a sum as ten thousand pounds within a week was more than I knew, and, unless I greatly erred, more than he knew either. Pendarvon is a man of substance. His stannary dues alone are supposed to average thirty or forty thousand pounds a year, and if it came to a question of ready-money not improbably he could buy up Archie lock, stock, and barrel, and scarcely feel that he had made a purchase.

Archie must have been possessed by the very spirit of mischief. He entirely refused to be out-crowed on his own dunghill--even though he knew his rival to be the larger and the stronger bird. Almost immediately afterwards Pendarvon started the betting with a thousand pounds. Archie retorted by raising him fourteen thousand, laying on the table his IOU for fifteen thousand pounds. I went. I had two pairs, but the atmosphere promised to grow too hot for me. Pendarvon laughed.

"I'll see your raise."

He placed his own IOU on Archie's.

"Three kings."

Archie faced them. Pendarvon laughed again. He threw his cards away.

"Too good!"

He had supposed that Archie was bluffing--and had paid for his supposition.

The game fluctuated. Pendarvon had Archie once or twice upon the hip, paring down his winnings. At last we came to what proved to be the last, and hardest-fought-for pool of the sitting. It was a pot. We had gone right through the hands. In the second round Archie opened when it came to two pairs or better. He made it a hundred to go in. I went in, though I had only queens. I kept the pair and an ace, and took two--two more queens. Pendarvon and Archie both stood pat. I perceived that the scent of a big battle was coming into the air--when I saw my four queens, and made sure that they were four queens, it did me good to smell it coming.

Archie began, for him, very modestly--with a five hundred bet. I turned it into a thousand, which Pendarvon doubled. Then we went at it, hammer and tongs. As I raised Archie, and Pendarvon every time raised me, it made it impossible for Archie to even the bets, and force a display. At last it grew too hot even for him. I reckoned that I had thirty thousand in the pool. Pendarvon had made it another four thousand for Archie to come in. Although he was beginning to look as if he was not altogether enjoying himself, in he came. I raised him. Pendarvon raised me. The betting went on. I had IOU's for sixty thousand in the pool. The fates alone knew where the cash was to come from if I lost--unless it came from Sir Haselton Jardine, against which possibility the odds seemed pretty strong. Pendarvon raised me five thousand more. Archie realised at last that he could not see us unless we chose to let him--and that we did not mean to let him. He threw down his cards with a curse--it being a bad habit of his to use strong language when, if he only knew it, milder words would serve him at least equally well. One can damn so effectively with a softly-uttered blessing.

When Archie went I saw Pendarvon.

"Fours," he said.

I felt a shudder go all down my back.

"Four what?"

"Tens."

"Queens."

As I faced them, in its holy of holies my heart sang a loud Te Deum. Pendarvon stood up, still laughing.

"That's enough for me."

When I heard the peculiar something that was ringing in his laughter, knowing the man as I did, I knew that Mr. Pendarvon would watch for me and wait. His turn would come.

"I'm hanged!" cried Archie, "if I haven't thrown my money clean away!"

He certainly had--that is, if his IOU's represented money, which his best friend might be excused for doubting.