poker-player and never showed more cards than were sufficient to take
the pool.

'Aren't you going to leave him a single bellow?' I asked
sympathetically. 'Remember, everything goes in the States, from a
trouser-button to a double-eagle.'

'That's just the curse of it,' said Keller below his breath. 'We've
played 'em for suckers so often that when it comes to the golden
truth--I'd like to try this on a London paper. You have first call
there, though.'

'Not in the least. I'm not touching the thing in our papers. I shall
be happy to leave 'em all to you; but surely you'll cable it home?'

'No. Not if I can make the scoop here and see the Britishers sit up.'

'You won't do it with three columns of slushy headline, believe me.
They don't sit up as quickly as some people.'

'I'm beginning to think that too. Does _nothing_ make any difference
in this country?' he said, looking out of the window. 'How old is
that farmhouse?'

'New. It can't be more than two hundred years at the most.'

'Urn. Fields, too?'

'That hedge there must have been clipped for about eighty years.'