"Dick," she said, "I'll grant that it isn't impossible. We might pull it off all right, and the whole scheme really does you credit. But you've got to own up to the risk. It's one of those things where every move has got to come off just as we've planned it, and just on time. If any one of a dozen possible things happens, we're done. In a word, it's something we really ought not to try except as a very last resort."
Gordon nodded a trifle impatiently. "That's it, exactly," he acquiesced. "We don't differ a particle about it. But at the present moment I can't for the life of me see what other chance we've got. I'm afraid it isn't a matter of choice at all."
The girl hesitated a moment; then asked, apparently irrelevantly, "Have you any money with you, Dick?"
Gordon nodded again. "Bridge winnings," he said laconically. "About three hundred, I think."
"Three hundred," repeated the girl. "That would be enough. The wheel here is run straight, isn't it?"
Gordon glanced at her keenly. "Absolutely," he answered. "But I hope you're not planning to raise our hundred thousand that way, because I'm afraid it might take a long time."
He spoke in a tone of mild amusement. The girl smiled faintly. "No," she answered, "hardly that. I've seen and heard enough of 'systems' to know they're all impossible. But sheer, blind chance is always open to every one, and I'd like one try just to satisfy myself before we try your scheme. Let's chart the wheel thirty-eight times, then pick one of the numbers that hasn't come, and play it flatfoot three times running. If we lose, three hundred won't kill us, and if we win, you know what you told me about your friend McMurtrie and his black colt."
Gordon laughed, then shrugged his shoulders. "If you call my scheme a wild one," he said good-naturedly, "I wouldn't dare say what I think of yours. Still, it's possible. Everything's possible, for that matter, and, as you say, a few hundred won't be fatal. On the other hand, if we should win, I'll say frankly that I take considerable stock in old McMurtrie. He's crazy over racing, and knows the whole game, too, from A to Z. He'd never have told me what he did about his long shot if I hadn't made twenty thousand for him in two days shorting steel common. His gratitude for that took the somewhat doubtful form of this tip of his. I can't even remember the colt's name now, but I could find out to-night, I suppose--if we have any occasion to."