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Whereupon the four seated themselves about a tabouret in the corner, and, a waiter immediately bringing them four fresh glasses from the bar, Mellin began to understand what Mr. Pedlow meant by “gittin’ ready for dinner.” The burden of the conversation was carried almost entirely by the Honorable Chandler, though Cooley, whose boyish face was deeply flushed, now and then managed to interrupt by talking louder than the fat man. Mr. Sneyd sat silent.

“Good ole Sneyd,” said Pedlow. “He never talks, jest saws wood. Only Britisher I ever liked. Plays cards like a goat.”

“He played a mighty good game on the steamer,” said Cooley warmly.

“I don’t care what he did on the steamer, he played like a goat the only time I ever played with him. You know he did. I reckon you was there!”

“Should say I was there! He played mighty well–“

“Like a goat,” reiterated the fat man firmly.

“Nothing of the sort. You had a run of hands, that was all. Nobody can go against the kind of luck you had that night; and you took it away from Sneyd and me in rolls. But we’ll land you pretty soon, won’t we, ole Sneydie?”

“We sh’ll have a shawt at him, at least,” said the Englishman.

“Perhaps he won’t want us to try,” young Cooley pursued derisively. “Perhaps he thinks I play like a goat, too!”

Mr. Pedlow threw back his head and roared. “Give me somep’n easy! You don’t know no more how to play a hand of cards than a giraffe does. I’ll throw in all of my Blue Gulch gold-stock–and it’s worth eight hundred thousand dollars if it’s worth a cent–I’ll put it up against that tin automobile of yours, divide chips even and play you freeze-out for it. You play cards? Go learn hop-scotch!”

“You wait!” exclaimed the other indignantly. “Next time we play we’ll make you look so small you’ll think you’re back in Congress!”

At this Mr. Pedlow again threw back his head and roared, his vast body so shaken with mirth that the glass he held in his hand dropped to the floor.

“There,” said Cooley, “that’s the second Martini you’ve spilled. You’re two behind the rest of us.”

“What of it?” bellowed the fat man. “There’s plenty comin’, ain’t there? Four more, Tommy, and bring cigars. Don’t take a cent from none of these Indians. Gentlemen, your money ain’t good here. I own this bar, and this is my night.”

Mellin had begun to feel at ease, and after a time–as they continued to sit–he realized that his repugnance to Mr. Pedlow was wearing off; he felt that there must be good in any one whom Madame de Vaurigard liked. She had spoken of Pedlow often on their drives; he was an “eccentric,” she said, an “original.” Why not accept her verdict? Besides, Pedlow was a man of distinction and force; he had been in Congress; he was a millionaire; and, as became evident in the course of a long recital of the principal events of his career, most of the great men of the time were his friends and proteges.

“‘Well, Mack,’ says I one day when we were in the House together”–(thus Mr. Pedlow, alluding to the late President McKinley)–“‘Mack,’ says I, ‘if you’d drop that double standard business’–he was waverin’ toward silver along then–‘I don’t know but I might git the boys to nominate you fer President.’ ‘I’ll think it over,’ he says–‘I’ll think it over.’ You remember me tellin’ you about that at the time, don’t you, Sneyd, when you was in the British Legation at Washin’ton?”

“Pahfictly,” said Mr. Sneyd, lighting a cigar with great calmness.

“‘Yes,’ I says, ‘Mack,’ I says, ‘if you’ll drop it, I’ll turn in and git you the nomination.'”

“Did he drop it?” asked Mellin innocently.

Mr. Pedlow leaned forward and struck the young man’s knee a resounding blow with the palm of his hand.

“He was nominated, wasn’t he?”

“Time to dress,” announced Mr. Sneyd, looking at his watch.