The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1892-02-17

NNEAysN,,MhIi& WA even his most init
,MSsaMeMl&E!4xAW mate colleagues il
NGS4A|sTASS the black-leg pro
s fession could tell
Ns.ssASTsssAIE&$YY = EsSYaIY To be sure he some.
p lyMkNNVlhNllll3 times won, but he
could not keep his winnings in his pocket
for twenty flour hours at time. He always
returned to the table to lose them. just
as surely as Fortune kissed his homely
face one day she would turn round and
slap it for the next four or five. Then Plug
would have to resort to the disagreeable
shift of borrowing from his luckier
brothers, and he did this so often that
there were very few indt ed of the pale
faced, white-handed gentlemen of for
tune, from the Atlantic to the Pacific,
who did not have Plug Hankins on their
books for sums varying from one to one
hundred dollars. Another singular fea-
ture of the case was the fact that scien-
tifcally he was one of the best card
players who ever sat before green table.
More than that, he was cool and brave.
He never spoke of his losses, and never
exulted over his winnings if he happened
to make any. He was sober and free
from nearly every vice save the passion
ate desire to gamble that had ruled his
life from boyhood. Other men made
fortunes aud lost them every month, but
Plug Hankins was always, to use the
phraseology of the sporting man,
ssbroke." In time his wretched luck be-
came jest among his fellow-gamblers.
They often laughed at him openly, but
Plug himself had never been known to
laugh. 1t was all dead earnest to him
The only profession he knew, and he must
make his living out Of it or
l. Besides his ll.fortune and his pluck
poor Plug was noted among his brethren
for one other characteristic. He was as
phenomenally homely as he was unlucky.
The gamblers pallor of his face, the
Dropping eyelids, the short hair, the
sunken cheeks and great ill-turned ears
made him look almost corpse-like. And
then there was long scar under his left
Eye where he had been slashed by knife
on one of the few occasions where he had
won. This, too, was a standing jest.
But Plug bore it very meekly.
D There were meny who predicted that
some day Plug would make a winning
that would startle them all. It was sup
posed that Plug himself looked forward
ito some such event to compensate him
for his fifteen or twenty years Of pa
thence. But the good luck never came,
and as ill-fortune was piled upon ill.
fortune Plugs patience began finally to
break down, and his natural moroseness
became almost mania. The fact was
noticed by the rest of them, but they are
not tender-hearted men, as a rule, and
they only made their jests at his expense
the louder and more frequent. More
Than that, though, his fellow gamblers
began to be very chary about lending
him money. In fact, as rule, they
had begun to decline in no very polite
manner, and some even went so far as to
advise him to quit the business and get
b job somewhere digging dirt.
1t was in frame of mind born of
such treatment at the hands of men who
had previously been more than kind to
him that Plug stood one midnight on the
euro at the corner of Twenty--street
and Broadway. 1t was the first midnight
in many year that Plug had not been
heated before dirty green table waiting
for the luck that was to make all things
right, and meantime losing what little
money he could manage by hook or
crook to get hold of. With his hands
thrust into his great pockets and his
hat pulled dowr over his eyes, he looked
the very picture of detection as he gazed
at the gutter under his feet. Even the
policeman on the beat had to smile when
he saw linn, and walked by with the
mental ejaculation, "Busted!" Indeed
he was "busted.", He had gone with
out his meals all that day and the day
before in order that he might stake the
money at faro. He had asked every one
he knew to lend him money and had
been refused, and he hadn't cent. He
had looked forward to this climax of ill
fortune for good many years. 1t was
q long time coming, though, and Plug
had almost begun to believe that it
never would come, when, behold, here
it was!
:. When he had first thought of the pos
sibility of his present position Plug had
grimly resolved, that when that time
came he would quietly aud with the
nerve becoming a gambler put himself
out of this miserable world; but now
that the time had really come at last, he
hesitated. HIS hesitation was not born
of fear, however. Plug did not know
:That fear was. 1t was merely the
strength of ruling passion that is said to
be so strong in death. He was merely
revolving in his mind problem. The
problem was simple one. In his hip
pockt be carried the only bit of per-
soE property he had not as yet pawned.
It was pretty little silver-nounted re-
volver that girl had given him years
before in the. West. He had always
promised himself that if the day should
ever come it would he this souvenir of
his only romance that should do the
h,,.;nooe Rut pnv ha found that he was