thinking he saw the short easy way out.

Already she was prepared for the question.  In her gloved hand was a little hand bag, a trifle in black leather the size of a man's purse. She opened it and spilled the contents on the table. Poured out into the mellow lamp light a long glorious string of pearls appeared, each separate lustrous gem glowing with its silvery sheen, satiny and tremulous with its shining loveliness.

"Holy God!" gasped Twisty Barlow.

"There is the worth of your money many times over," came the quiet assurance in the low voice like liquid music.

"If they are real pearls," muttered Kendric.  "And not just imitations."

She made no reply.  He felt that from the shelter of the broad hat brim a pair of inscrutable eyes were smiling scornfully.

"Can't I tell real pearls like them, when I see 'em?" cried Twisty Barlow excitedly.  He leaned forward and caught the great necklace up in his eager hands.  "What would I be wantin' that steamer in San Diego Bay for if I didn't know?"  He held them up to the lamp light; he fingered them one after the other; he put them down at the end reverently and with a great sigh.  "The worth of them, Headlong, my boy," he said shakily, "would make your pile look sick.""And yet I'd bet a thousand they're phony," burst from Kendric.  Then he caught himself up short.  Suppose they were or were not?  A woman was offering to play him and he was holding back; he was making excuses, the second already; in his own ears his words, sensible though they were, began to ring like the petty talk of a hedger.  "Turn out the die, Señora," he said abruptly.  "As you say, one throw and ace high."

With her left hand she quietly shook the box, setting the white cube dancing therein.  "You lose, Jim," said Monte at his elbow before the cast was made.  "Look out for left-handers."  Then she made her throw and turned up an ace. Kendric caught up box and die and threw.  And again he had turned the deuce, the lowest number on the die.  He heard her laugh as she drew money and jewels toward her.  All low music, ruining a man's blood, thrilling him after that strange perturbing fashion.

CHAPTER III

IN WHICH A SPELL IS WORKED AND AN EXPEDITION IS BEGUN

For a moment she and Jim Kendric stood facing each other with only the little table and its cargo of treasure 

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