Daughter of the Sun | Page 5

S. bank notes," he announced. "Keep your eye on me,
Señor Don Ruiz Rios de Mexico, while I count 'em."
Unbuttoning the pocket flaps, he began pouring forth the treasure
which he had brought back with him after two years in Old Mexico.
Boyish and gleeful, he enjoyed the expressions that came upon the
faces about him as he counted aloud and Rios watched with narrow,
suspicious eyes. He sorted the gold, arranging in piles of twenties and
tens, all American minted; he smoothed out the bank notes and stacked
them. And at the end, looking up smilingly, he announced:
"An even ten thousand dollars, señor."
"You damn fool!" cried out Twisty Barlow hysterically. "Why, man,
with that pile me an' you could sail back into San Diego like kings!
Now that dago will pick you clean an' you know it."
No one paid any attention to Barlow and he, after that one involuntary
outburst, recognized himself for the fool and kept his mouth shut,
though with difficulty.

Ruiz Rios's dark face was almost Oriental in its immobility. He did not
even look interested. He merely considered after a dreamy, abstracted
fashion.
Again a quick eager hand was laid on his arm, again his companion
whispered in his ear. Rios nodded curtly and turned to Ortega.
"Have you the money in the house?" he demanded.
"Seguro," said the gambling house owner. "I expected Señor Kendric."
"You do me proud," laughed Jim. "Let's see the color of it in American
money."
With most men the winning or losing of ten thousand dollars, though
they played heavily, was a matter of hours and might run on into days
if luck varied tantalizingly. All of the zest of those battling hours Jim
Kendric meant to crowd into one moment. There was much of love in
the heart of Headlong Jim Kendric, but it was a love which had never
poured itself through the common channels, never identified itself with
those two passions which sway most men: he had never known love for
a woman and in him there was no money-greed. For him women did
not come even upon the rim of his most distant horizon; as for money,
when he had none of it he sallied forth joyously in its quest holding that
there was plenty of it in this good old world and that it was as rare fun
running it down as hunting any other big game. When he had plenty of
it he had no thought of other matters until he had spent it or given it
away or watched it go its merry way across a table with a green top like
a fleet of golden argosies on a fair emerald sea voyaging in search of a
port of adventure. His love was reserved for his friends and for his
adventurings, for clear dawns in solitary mountains, for spring-times in
thick woods, for sweeps of desert, for what he would have called
"Life."
"Ready?" Ruiz Rios was asking coldly. Ortega had returned with a
drawer from his safe clasped in his fat hands; the money was counted
and piled.

"Let her roll," cried Kendric heartily.
Never had there been a game like this at Ortega's. Men packed closer
and closer, pushing and crowding. The Mexican slowly rattled the
single die in the cup. Then, with a quick jerk of the wrist, he turned it
out on the table. It rolled, poised, settled. The result amply satisfied
Rios and to the line of the lips under his small black mustache came the
hint of a smile; he had turned up a six.
"The ace is high!" cried Jim. He caught up die and box, lifting the
cupped cube high above his head. His eyes were bright with excitement,
his cheeks were flushed, his voice rang out eagerly.
"Out of six numbers there is only one ace," smiled Ruiz Rios.
"One's all I want, señor," laughed Jim. And made his throw.
When large ventures are made, in money or otherwise, it would seem
that the goddess of chance is no myth but a potent spirit and that she
takes a firm deciding hand. At a time like this, when two men seek to
put at naught her many methods of prolonging suspense, she in turn
seeks stubbornly to put at naught their endeavors to defeat her aims.
Had Jim Kendric thrown the ace then he would have won and the thing
would have been ended; had he shaken anything less than a six the
spoils would have been the Mexican's. That which happened was that
out of the gambler's cup Kendric turned another six.
Ruiz Rios's impassive face masked all emotion; Kendric's displayed
frankly his sheer delight. He was playing his game; he was getting his
fun.
"A tie, by thunder!" he