Fenton."
The servant made no comment, but as Mr. Snaffle went upstairs, he
reported to the steward that the intruder was again in the house and
had been introduced by Mr. Fenton. The steward in turn reported this to
the Secretary, and before Arthur himself came in, a rod was already
preparing for him in the shape of a complaint to be made before the
Executive Committee.
It was thus that precisely the thing happened which Fenton had with his
usual cleverness endeavored to guard against. Impudent as Mr. Snaffle
was capable of being, he would never have ventured uninvited into the
precincts of the St. Filipe Club, where even when introduced he found
himself somewhat overpowered by the social standing and the lofty
manners of those around him. This feeling of awe showed itself in two
ways, had any one been clever enough to appreciate the fact. It
rendered him unusually silent, and it induced him to play high, as if
he felt under obligations to pay for his admission into company where
he did not belong.
It was to this last fact that he owed his invitation to be present on
this particular evening. Arthur Fenton was going to the club to play
poker, urged partly by the love of excitement and perhaps even more by
the hope of raising a part or the whole of the fifty dollars of which
he had pressing need, when he encountered Snaffle standing on a street
corner.
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