Chapter I

The Card on the Floor

Tickell turned his cards. "A straight." The men all bent over to look. 

"King high--there you are, nine, ten, knave, queen, king; a mixed lot, but they'll take some beating."

Something on Beaton's face seemed to suggest that the other's hand was unexpectedly strong. He smiled--not easily. 

"You're right, they will; and I'm afraid----" He turned his hand half over, then, letting the five cards fall uppermost on the table, sat and stared at him, as if startled. It was Major Reith who announced the value of the hand. 

"A full and ace high--he's got you, Jack; a bumper, Sydney."

He pushed the salver which served as a pool over towards Beaton. Obviously it contained a great deal of money; there were both notes and gold, and cheques and half-sheets of paper.

"What will you take for it, Sydney?" asked George Pierce. 

Anthony Dodwell interposed. 

"One moment, before Beaton takes either the pool or--anything else. Perhaps he won't mind saying what is the card that he dropped on the floor."

They all looked at him--Beaton with a sudden startled turn of the head. 

"What do you mean?" he asked. 

Dodwell met his eager gaze with a calmness which, in its way, was almost ominous. 

"I'm afraid that question is quite unnecessary; I fancy you know quite well what I mean. Will you pick up the card you dropped, or shall I?"

"I dropped no card." He drew his chair a little away from the table so as to enable him to see the floor. "I didn't know it, but there does seem to be one down there." 

"Unless some good fairy removed it since you dropped it, there was bound to be. Draycott, would you mind picking up that card?"

Noel Draycott, stooping, picking up the card, showed it to the assembled players, in whose demeanour, for some as yet 

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