would have been unintelligible, illustrating them by certain
almost imperceptible shiftings of the fingers or changes in the
position of his hand, so slight as to thwart discovery. Through it
all the girl stood by and followed his every word and motion with
eager attention. She needed no explanation of the terms they used.
She knew them all, knew that the "hearse-driver" was the man who
kept the cases, knew all the code of the "inside life." To her it
was all as an open page, and she memorized more quickly than did
Toby the signs by which the Bronco Kid proposed to signal what
card he had smuggled from the box or held back.

In faro it is customary for the case-keeper to sit on the opposite
side of the table from the dealer, with a device before him
resembling an abacus, or Chinese adding-machine. When a card is
removed from the faro-box by the dealer, the "hearse-driver" moves
a button opposite a corresponding card on his little machine, in
order that the players, at a glance, may tell what spots have been
played or are still in the box. His duties, though simple, are
important, for should he make an error, and should the position of
his counters not tally with the cards in the box on the "last
turn," all bets on the table are declared void. When honestly
dealt, faro is the fairest of all gambling games, but it is
intricate, and may hide much knavery. When the game is crooked, it
is fatal, for out of the ingenuity of generations of card sharks
there have been evolved a multitude of devices with which to
fleece the unsuspecting. These are so carefully masked that none
but the initiated may know them, while the freemasonry of the
craft is strong and discovery unusual.

Instead of using a familiar arrangement like the "needle-tell,"