Gaunt nodded, Lady One-Eye fixed her with her Cyclopian stare. Neither of them spoke.
“Mind if I join you?”
“Yes, we do mind,” Lady-One Eye said in her icy drawl. “Find someone else to annoy.”
“You’ll find me more than annoying when we play poker again tonight, dearie, for I’ll be the one to do the trimming.”
“Like hell you will.”
Sabina laughed. “Such language from an alleged lady,” she said mockingly, and hip-swayed to an empty table not far away.
Gaunt and Lady One-Eye resumed their conversation, in voices too low for Sabina to hear. They seemed to be at odds about something, she tight-lipped with evident anger, he calm and stoic. The attention Jack O’Diamonds was paying to Lily Dumont, perhaps?
A waitress brought Sabina’s breakfast order: two eggs, a large slice of ham, bread and butter, coffee. An expense-account meal, not that paying for it herself would have deterred her. Thank goodness she was blessed with a metabolism to match her considerable appetite. Unlike most other women she knew past the age of thirty, she never gained weight no matter how much she ate or how rich the food.
She was mopping up the last of the egg yolk with a morsel of bread when Lady One-Eye abruptly shoved back her chair, levered herself upright, and limped out with the support of her gold-knobbed cane. Gaunt remained seated, watching his sister until she disappeared into the lobby. Then he removed a small, black ledger book from the inside pocket of his coat and began making pencil notations in it.
Sabina dabbed at her mouth with her cloth napkin, stood, adjusted her dress, and once again approached Gaunt’s table. Without being invited, she sat down in the chair Lady One-Eye had occupied. “Toting up your sister’s winnings from last night?” she asked.
He sat back, regarding her with his frosty blue eyes. “That is no concern of yours.”
“Yes it is, since a fair lot of that money was mine until the last hand. It will be mine again tonight, plus a good deal more.”
“So you stated earlier.” Gaunt closed the ledger book, returned it to his coat pocket. “I wouldn’t be so confident if I were you, Miss Rose.”
“Miss Rose. Hoo! I do like a courtly Southern gentleman.”
Gaunt said nothing. The deep, wide cleft in his chin was somewhat disconcerting when seen up close like this. On most men such a cleft would have been an attractive feature, but not on him. It gave his face a different kind of sinister cast from his sister’s, as if a hole had been bored below his mouth, or a bullet had once been lodged there and dug out to leave a crater.
“Are you and the Lady from New Orleans?” Sabina asked.
“Who told you that?”
“No one. Your accents suggest it. Not so?”
“Louisiana, yes. N’Orleans, no. Baton Rouge.”
“But your sister’s played her share of poker in the Vieux Carré, no doubt, same as I have. On the Mississippi River packets, too — I expect that’s where Jack O’Diamonds once did much of his gambling. Surprising our paths never crossed until now.”
“Yes, isn’t it.”
“But I’m known as the Saint Louis Rose for good reason. That city was my home base for some time before I came west. The Lady and Jack do much business in the Missouri Belle or any of the other Saint Louie parlors?”
“Some.”
“Must have been before my time,” Sabina said. “Where else has she plied her talents?”
“Various places.”
“Austin? San Antonio? Tombstone?”
“Various places, as I said.”
“Where are you bound after Grass Valley? Another town in the Mother Lode? San Francisco?”
“That hasn’t been decided yet.”
“But you will be on your way soon?”
“You think so? Why?”
“The kettle’s getting a bit hot here, wouldn’t you say?”
“No, I wouldn’t. Why should you think that?”
“I have eyes, mister. Good, sharp eyes.”
Gaunt refused to take the bait. “You’re quite inquisitive, aren’t you, Miss Rose,” he said flatly.
“I like to know who I’m dealing with. Especially when I’ve been trimmed as neatly as I was last night.”
“That is the second time this morning you have used the word ‘trimmed.’ I don’t care for your inference.”
“What inference?”
“That my sister is anything but an extremely skilled poker player.”
“Well, now, the thought did cross my mind.”
Gaunt’s mustache twitched. “Lady One-Eye has no need of trickery,” he said. “She is in a class by herself.”
“Oh? Has she ever sat at table with Poker Alice?”
“Not yet. It will be a match for the ages when she does.”
“If she does. And if she’s as honest as you claim she is. Poker Alice would spot a mechanic straightaway, no matter how skilled her gaff.”
“So would you, I should think, if you possess the credentials you claim to have.”
“I’ve been fooled before by expert mechanics, but not for long. I intend to keep an extra sharp eye on the cards when the Lady and I play tonight.”
Gaunt’s piercing gaze remained fixed on her for several more seconds. Then, abruptly, without so much as a by-your-leave, he pushed to his feet and walked out.
There was no sign of Jack O’Diamonds, Lily Dumont, or Lady One-Eye when Sabina entered the Gold Nugget. One of the bartenders told her that Amos McFinn was in his office.
The little man was in his usual jittery state. “It’s about time you reported, Mrs. Carpenter. I—”
“The Saint Louis Rose,” she reminded him.
“Yes, yes, there’s no one else here. Well? What’s your opinion of Lady One-Eye’s game after losing to her last night? Is she honest or not?”
“I’d rather not say just yet. I’ll have to play her once more before I can be sure.”
“But you think she may be a clever sharp, is that it?”
“You’ll have my answer tonight, Mr. McFinn. Another hour at table with her ought to be sufficient, win or lose. For which I’ll need an additional stake.”
McFinn made a groaning sound. “How much this time?”
“Five hundred.”
“For a total of two thousand if you lose again and she’s honest.”
“And full restitution if she’s not.”
He went to a large Mosler safe behind his desk, removed five hundred dollars in greenbacks. “I’d rather forfeit the two thousand,” he muttered as he handed the money to Sabina. “My house percentage on her winnings already amounts to twice as much.”
Sabina tucked the bills into her bag without comment.
“Do you have anything else to report?” McFinn asked.
“Again, not yet. I had a conversation with Jeffrey Gaunt a few minutes ago, but it yielded nothing of import.”
“He didn’t say anything about that damned... the threatening letter?”
“No. The Saint Louis Rose has no way of knowing about it, and he wouldn’t bring it up to her in any case. Nor would he be drawn into a discussion of Jack O’Diamonds’ infatuation with Lily Dumont.”
“Quincannon mentioned his suspicion of an affair last night,” McFinn said. “I asked the girl about it this morning, straight-out.”
“She denied the involvement, of course.”
“In no uncertain terms.”
“And you believed her?”
“She... well, she seemed sincere.”
“Glen Bonnifield, Lady One-Eye, and her brother all seem to suspect infidelity. As do John and I. If we’re correct, it makes the situation even more volatile and potentially violent.”
McFinn groaned again. “As if I need anything more to worry about.”
He would have been all the more fretted if Sabina had told him about the shooting at Lily Dumont’s cottage. The decision she and John had made not to reveal it yet was the right one.