He was watching Trent's face all the time, but the younger man gave no sign. When he had finished, Trent took up the cards, which he had shuffled for Poker, and dealt them out for Patience. Monty's eyes were dim with disappointment.

"What!" he cried. "You don't agree! Did you understand me? Fifty pounds, Trent! Why, you must be mad!"

"Oh, shut up!" Trent growled. "I don't want your money, and the brandy's poison to you! Go to sleep!"

Monty crept a little nearer to his partner and laid his hand upon his arm. His shirt fell open, showing the cords of his throat swollen and twitching. His voice was half a sob.

"Trent, you are a young man--not old like me. You don't understand my const.i.tution. Brandy is a necessity to me! I've lived on it so long that I shall die if you keep it from me. Remember, it's a whole day since I tasted a drop! Now I'll make it a hundred. What do you say to that? One hundred!"

Trent paused in his game, and looked steadfastly into the eager face thrust close to his. Then he shrugged his shoulders and gathered up the cards.

"You're the silliest fool I ever knew," he said bluntly, "but I suppose you'll worry me into a fever if you don't have your own way."

"You agree?" Monty shrieked. Trent nodded and dealt the cards.

"It must be a show after the draw," he said. "We can't bet, for we've nothing to raise the stakes with!"

Monty was breathing hard and his fingers trembled, as though the ague of the swamps was already upon him. He took up his cards one by one, and as he s.n.a.t.c.hed up the last he groaned. Not a pair!

"Four cards," he whispered hoa.r.s.ely. Trent dealt them out, looked at his own hand, and, keeping a pair of queens, took three more cards. He failed to improve, and threw them upon the floor. With frantic eagerness Monty grovelled down to see them--then with a shriek of triumph he threw down a pair of aces.

"Mine!" he said. "I kept an ace and drew another. Give me the brandy!"

Trent rose up, measured the contents of the bottle with his forefinger, and poured out half the contents into a horn mug. Monty stood trembling by.

"Mind," Trent said, "you are a fool to drink it and I am a fool to let you! You risk your life and mine. Sam has been up and swears we must clear out to-morrow. What sort of form do you think you'll be in to walk sixty miles through the swamps and bush, with perhaps a score of these devils at our heels? Come now, old 'un, be reasonable."

The veins on the old man's forehead stood out like whipcord.

"I won it," he cried. "Give it me! Give it me, I say."

Trent made no further protest. He walked back to where he had been lying and recommenced his Patience. Monty drank off the contents of the tumbler in two long, delicious gulps! Then he flung the horn upon the floor and laughed aloud.

"That's better," he cried, "that's better! What an a.s.s you are, Trent!

To imagine that a drain like that would have any effect at all, save to put life into a man! Bah! what do you know about it?"

Trent did not raise his head. He went on with his solitary game and, to all appearance, paid no heed to his companion's words. Monty was not in the humour to be ignored. He flung himself on the ground opposite to his companion.

"What a slow-blooded sort of creature you are, Trent!" he said. "Don't you ever drink, don't you ever take life a little more gaily?"

"Not when I am carrying my life in my hands," Trent answered grimly. "I get drunk sometimes--when there's nothing on and the blues come--never at a time like this though."

"It is pleasant to hear," the old man remarked, stretching out his limbs, "that you do occasionally relax. In your present frame of mind--you will not be offended I trust--you are just a little heavy as a companion. Never mind. In a year's time I will be teaching you how to dine--to drink champagne, to--by the way, Trent, have you ever tasted champagne?"

"Never," Trent answered gruffly "Don't know that I want to either."

Monty was compa.s.sionate. "My young friend," he said, "I would give my soul to have our future before us, to have your youth and never to have tasted champagne. Phew! the memory of it is delicious!"

"Why don't you go to bed?" Trent said. "You'll need all your strength to-morrow!"

Monty waved his hand with serene contempt.

"I am a man of humours, my dear friend," he said, "and to-night my humour is to talk and to be merry. What is it the philosophers tell us?--that the sweetest joys of life are the joys of antic.i.p.ation. Here we are, then, on the eve of our triumph--let us talk, plan, be happy.

Bah! how thirsty it makes one! Come, Trent, what stake will you have me set up against that other tumblerful of brandy."

"No stake that you can offer," Trent answered shortly. "That drop of brandy may stand between us and death. Pluck up your courage, man, and forget for a bit that there is such a thing as drink."

Monty frowned and looked stealthily across towards the bottle.

"That's all very well, my friend," he said, "but kindly remember that you are young, and well, and strong. I am old, and an invalid. I need support. Don't be hard on me, Trent. Say fifty again.

"No, nor fifty hundred," Trent answered shortly. "I don't want your money. Don't be such a fool, or you'll never live to enjoy it."

Monty shuffled on to his feet, and walked aimlessly about the hut. Once or twice as he pa.s.sed the place where the bottle rested, he hesitated; at last he paused, his eyes lit up, he stretched out his hand stealthily. But before he could possess himself of it Trent's hand was upon his collar.

"You poor fool!" he said; "leave it alone can't you? You want to poison yourself I know. Well, you can do as you jolly well like when you are out of this--not before."

Monty's eyes flashed evil fires, but his tone remained persuasive.

"Trent," he said, "be reasonable. Look at me! I ask you now whether I am not better for that last drop. I tell you that it is food and wine to me. I need it to brace me up for to-morrow. Now listen! Name your own stake! Set it up against that single gla.s.s! I am not a mean man, Trent.

Shall we say one hundred and fifty?"

Trent looked at him half scornfully, half deprecatingly.

"You are only wasting your breath, Monty," he said. "I couldn't touch money won in such a way, and I want to get you out of this alive.

There's fever in the air all around us, and if either of us got a touch of it that drop of brandy might stand between us and death. Don't worry me like a spoilt child. Roll yourself up and get to sleep! I'll keep watch."

"I will be reasonable," Monty whined. "I will go to sleep, my friend, and worry you no more when I have had just one sip of that brandy! It is the finest medicine in the world for me! It will keep the fever off. You do not want money you say! Come, is there anything in this world which I possess, or may possess, which you will set against that three inches of brown liquid?"

Trent was on the point of an angry negative. Suddenly he stopped--hesitated--and said nothing Monty's face lit up with sudden hope.

"Come," he cried, "there is something I see! You're the right sort, Trent. Don't be afraid to speak out. It's yours, man, if you win it.

Speak up!"

"I will stake that brandy," Trent answered, "against the picture you let fall from your pocket an hour ago."

CHAPTER III

For a moment Monty stood as though dazed. Then the excitement which had shone in his face slowly subsided. He stood quite silent, muttering softly to himself, his eyes fixed upon Trent.

"Her picture! My little girl's picture! Trent, you're joking, you're mad!"

"Am I?" Trent answered nonchalantly. "Perhaps so! Anyhow those are my terms! You can play or not as you like! I don't care."

A red spot burned in Monty's cheeks, and a sudden pa.s.sion shook him. He threw himself upon Trent and would have struck him but that he was as a child in the younger man's grasp. Trent held him at a distance easily and without effort.

"There's nothing for you to make a fuss about," he said gruffly. "I answered a plain question, that's all. I don't want to play at all. I should most likely lose, and you're much better without the brandy."