He scrawled a half-dozen lines, fairly digging the pen into the sheet
in his fierce eagerness, and then signed the document, flinging the
paper across toward Kirby.

"There, you blood-sucker," he cried insolently. "Is that all right?
Will that do?"

The imperturbable gambler read it over slowly, carefully deciphering
each word, his thin lips tightly compressed.

"You might add the words, 'This includes every chattel slave legally
belonging to me,'" he said grimly.

"That is practically what I did say."

"Then you can certainly have no objection to putting it in the exact
words I choose," calmly. "I intend to have what is coming to me if I
win, and I know the law."

Beaucaire angrily wrote in the required extra line.

"Now what?" he asked.

"Let McAfee there sign it as a witness, and then toss it over into the
pile." He smiled, showing a line of white teeth beneath his moustache.
"Nice little pot, gentlemen--the Judge must hold some cards to take a
chance like that," the words uttered with a sneer. "Fours, at least,
or maybe he has had the luck to pick a straight flush."

Beaucaire's face reddened, and his eyes grew hard.