The Desert Valley

He was tall, thin, very dark; his eyes were of beady blackness; he affected the sombre in garb from black hat and dark shirt to darker trousers and black boots. His face was clean-shaven; maybe he had just now been shaving in the rear room. His age might have lain anywhere between thirty-five and fifty. There are men like Jim Courtot, of dark visages and impenetrable eyes, thin and sallow men, upon whom the passing years appear to work all of their havoc early and then be like vicious stinging things deprived of their stings.

'For God's sake!' spoke up Barbee, querulously and nervously. 'Are you going to shuffle all the spots off? Come alive, Longstreet.'

Longstreet allowed Barbee to cut and began dealing. Jim Courtot, his step quick but strangely noiseless, came to the table. His eyes were for Barbee as he said quietly: 'Just a little game for fun? Any objection if I kick in?'

Barbee frowned. Further, he hesitated--and hesitation played but a small part in El Joven's make-up. Finally he evaded.

'Where've you been all this long time, Courtot?' he asked sullenly. 'The biggest game of six years was pulled off down in Poco Poco last week and you wasn't there. I heard a man say you must be dead.'

Courtot considered him gravely. Longstreet regarded the man, fascinated. He did not believe that the man knew how to smile. To imagine Jim Courtot laughing was to fancy a statue laughing.

'When there's a big game pulled off and I'm not there, kid,' he answered when he was good and ready to answer, 'it's because there's a bigger game somewhere else. And I'm heeled to play in your little game if you think you're man enough to take me on.'

Barbee snarled at him.

'Damn you,' he said savagely.

Jim Courtot drew up his chair and sat down. There was a strange sort of swiftness and precision in the man's smallest acts. Now he brought from his hip pocket a handful of loose coins and set the heap on the table before him. For the most part the coins were gold; he stood ready to put into play several hundred dollars.

'Heeled, kid,' he repeated. The voice was as nearly dead and expressionless as a human voice can be; only the words themselves carried his insolence. 'Please, can I play in your game?'

To Barbee's youth it was plain challenge and, though he hated the man with his whole soul, Barbee's youth answered hotly: 'I'll take you on, Jim Courtot, any day.'

Thereafter Courtot ignored Barbee. He turned to Longstreet and watched him deal five cards face down. Then he appeared to lose interest in everything saving his own hand. Longstreet dealt the second five cards, faces up. They fell in the order of nine, four, jack, ace and, to himself, a seven. He did not believe that the new player had seen any but his own card. Barbee, to whose lot the ace had fallen, placed his bet. There was bright bitter challenge in his eyes as he stared across the table at Courtot.