"They've got the devil in 'em! If they was alive I'd jump on 'em! I've played this game of solitaire for nineteen years--I've played a million games--an' damned if I ever got beat in my life as it's beat me since we left Halifax!" "Dear Heaven!" gasped Father Roland.

"Have you been playing all the way from Halifax ?" The solitaire fiend seemed not to hear, and resuming his seat with a low and ominous muttering, he dealt himself another hand.

In less than a minute he was on his feet again, shaking the cards angrily under the Little Missioner's nose as though that individual were entirely accountable for his bad luck.
"Look at that accursed trey of hearts!" he demanded.

"First card, ain't it?
First card!--an' if it had been the third, 'r the sixth, 'r the ninth, 'r anything except that confounded Number One, I'd have slipped the game up my sleeve.

Ain't it enough to wreck any honest man's soul?
I ask you--ain't it ?" "Why don't you change the trey of hearts to the place that suits you ?" asked David, innocently.