Outwardly it was a sheer delight for those who were sufficiently young and reckless. It was a place to grip the imagination. Inwardly, or underneath its surface of pleasant seeming, there was perhaps a different aspect. There was not one of the immaculate waiters who was not a trained athlete in his ability to deal with the toughest human violence, and each man was fully armed with an automatic pistol or some other lethal weapon. Then the voiceless president at the chip bureau was a dead shot, and had under his fingers a system of switches which could summon any aid he needed and close every exit of the establishment, at an instant’s notice.
McLagan had made no attempt to cut into any of the games that had already started. For the moment he and the rotund Dr. Finch and Jubilee Hurst were onlookers. Jubilee was sitting on an unoccupied table, while the two others were smoking Max’s cigars, watching the game in progress at the next table.
The doctor and Jubilee seemed more deeply interested than was the oil man. A poker game was irresistible to Jubilee at all times. Doc Finch had partaken of a sufficiently good dinner to find interest in anything, provided it was witnessed from a comfortable chair. But McLagan’s attention undisguisedly wandered to the curtained entrance every time the hangings were drawn aside to admit a newcomer.
He was a keen poker player, but only as a pastime. And he rarely drifted into any of the really big games that were played at the Speedway. Just now he had no desire at all to participate in any of them. He was by no means a part of the Speedway’s human freight. But for months, now, he had never failed to spend his evenings in its scented atmosphere when business demanded his presence in the city.
Jubilee shook his carefully oiled head in response to McLagan’s challenge.
“No, I’m not cutting in yet,” he said. Then he added with a grin, indicating the table in front of them, “Guess I couldn’t make a one-night hotel bill out of a bunch like that. See that guy open a fi’ dollar jack pot, an’ throw in at the first bet? They’re a close bunch, without the nerve to buck four aces right. I’ll wait for the Saint.”
McLagan’s quick eyes shot a sharp look into a grinning face.