The tram that passes the hotel gates took me into the town and dropped
me at the Place du Gouvernement. With its strange fusion of East
and West, its great white-domed mosque flanked by the tall minaret
contrasting with its formal French colonnaded facades, its groupings of
majestic white-robed forms and commonplace figures in caps and hard
felt hats; the mystery of its palm trees, and the crudity of its
flaring electric lights, it gave an impression of unreality, of a modern
contractor's idea of Fairyland, where anything grotesque might assume an
air of normality. The moon shone full in the heavens, and as I crossed
the Place I saw the equestrian statue of the Duke of Orleans silhouetted
against the mosque. The port, to the east, was quiet at this hour, and
the shipping lay dreamily in the moonlight. Far away one could see the
dim outlines of the Kabyle Mountains, and the vague melting of sea and
sky into a near horizon. The undefinable smell of the East was in the
air.
The Cafe de Bordeaux, which forms an angle of the Place, blazed in front
of me. A few hardy souls, a Zouave or two, an Arab, a bored Englishman
and his wife, and some French inhabitants were sitting outside in the
chilliness. I entered. The cafe was filled with a nondescript crowd, and
the rattle of dominoes rose above the hum of talk. In a corner near the
door I discovered the top of a silk hat projecting above a widely opened
newspaper grasped by two pudgy hands, and I recognised the Professor.
“Monsieur,” said he, when I had taken a seat at his table, “if the
unknown terrors which you are going to confront dismay you, I beg that
you will not consider yourself bound to me.”
“My dear Professor,” I replied, “a brave man tastes of death but once.”
He was much delighted at the sentiment, which he took to be original.
“I shall quote it,” said he, “whenever my honour or my courage is called
into question. It is not often that a man has the temerity to do so. Can
I have the honour of offering you a whisky and soda?”
“Have we time?” I asked.
“We have time,” he said, solemnly consulting his watch. “Things will
ripen.”
“Then,” said I, “I shall have much pleasure in drinking to their
maturity.”
While we were drinking our whisky and soda he talked volubly of many
things--his travels, his cats, his own incredible importance in
the cosmos. And as he sat there vapouring about the pathetically
insignificant he looked more like Napoleon III than ever. His eyes had
the same mournful depths, his features the same stamp of fatality. Each
man has his gigantic combinations--perhaps equally important in the eyes
of the High Gods. I was filled with an immense pity for Napoleon III.
Of the object of the adventure he said nothing. As secrecy seemed to
be a vital element in his fifteen-cent scheme, I showed no embarrassing
curiosity. Indeed, I felt but little, though I was certain that the
adventure was connected with the world-cracking revelations of Monsieur
Saupiquet, and was undertaken in the interest of his beloved lady, Lola
Brandt. But it was like playing at pirates with a child, and my pity
for Napoleon gave place to my pity for my valiant but childish little
friend.
At last he looked again at his watch.
“The hour his struck. Let us proceed.”
Instinctively I summoned the waiter, and drew a coin from my pocket; and
when the grown-up person and the small boy hobnob together the former
pays. But Anastasius, with a swift look of protest, anticipated my
intention. I was his guest for the evening. I yielded apologetically,
the score was paid, and we went forth into the moonlight.
He led me across the Place du Gouvernement and struck straight up the
hill past the Cathedral, and, turning, plunged into a network of narrow
streets, where the poor of all races lived together in amity and evil
odours. Shops chiefly occupied the ground floors; some were the ordinary
humble shops of Europeans; others were caves lit by a smoky lamp, where
Arabs lounged and smoked around the tailors or cobblers squatting at
their work; others were Jewish, with Hebrew inscriptions. There were
dark Arab cafes, noisy Italian wine-shops, butchers' stalls; children of
all ages played and screamed about the precipitous cobble-paved streets;
and the shrill cries of Jewish women, sitting at their doors, rose in
rebuke of husband or offspring. Not many lights appeared through the
shuttered windows of the dark, high houses. Overhead, between two
facades, one saw a strip of paleness which one knew was the moonlit sky.
Conversation with my companion being difficult--the top of his silk hat
just reached my elbow--I strode along in silence, Anastasius trotting by
my side. Many jeers and jests were flung at us as we passed, whereat he
scowled terribly; but no one molested us. I am inclined to think that
Anastasius attributed this to fear of his fierce demeanour. If so, he
was happy, as were the simple souls who flouted; and this reflection
kept my mind serene.
Presently we turned into a wide and less poverty-stricken street, which
I felt sure we could have reached by a less tortuous and malodorous
path. A few yards down we came to a dark _porte cochere_. The dwarf
halted, crossed, so as to read the number by the gas lamp, and joining
me, said:
“It is here. Have you your visiting-cards ready?”
I nodded. We proceeded down the dark entry till we came to a slovenly,
ill-kept glass box lit by a small gas jet, whence emerged a slovenly,
ill-kept man. This was the concierge. Anastasius addressed a remark to
him which I did not catch.
“_Au fond de la cour, troisieme a gauche_,” said the concierge.
As yet there seemed to be nothing peculiarly perilous about the
adventure. We crossed the cobble-paved courtyard and mounted an
evil-smelling stone staircase, blackened here and there by the
occasional gas jets. On the third landing we halted. Anastasius put up
his hand and gripped mine.
“Two strong men together,” said he, “need fear nothing.”
I confess my only fear was lest the confounded revolver which swung
insecurely in my hip-pocket might go off of its own accord. I did not
mention this to my companion. He raised his hat, wiped his brow, and
rang the bell.
The door opened about six inches, and a man's dark-moustachioed face
appeared.
“_Vous desirez, Messieurs_?”
As I had not the remotest idea what we desired, I let Anastasius be
spokesman.
“Here is an English milord,” said Anastasius boldly, “who would like to
be admitted for the evening to the privileges of the Club.”
“Enter, gentlemen,” said the man, who appeared to be the porter.
We found ourselves in a small vestibule. In front of us was a large
door, on the right a small one, both closed. At a table by the large
door sat a dirty, out-of-elbows raven of a man reading a newspaper. The
latter looked up and addressed me.
“You wish to enter the Club, Monsieur?”
I had no particular longing to do so, but I politely answered that such
was my desire.
“If you will give your visiting-card, I will submit it to the
Secretariat.”
I produced my card; Anastasius thrust a pencil into my hand.
“Write my name on it, too.”
I obeyed. The raven sent the porter with the card into the room on the
right, and resumed the perusal of his soiled newspaper. I looked at
Anastasius. The little man was quivering with excitement. The porter
returned after a few minutes with a couple of pink oval cards which he
handed to each of us. I glanced at mine. On it was inscribed: _Cercle
Africain d'Alger. Carte de Member Honoraire. Une soiree_. And then there
was a line for the honorary member's signature. The raven man dipped a
pen in the ink-pot in front of him and handed it to me.
“Will you sign, Messieurs?”
We executed this formality; he retained the cards, and opening the great
door, said:
“_Entrez, Messieurs_!”
The door closed behind us. It was simply a _tripot_, or gambling-den.
And all this solemn farce of Secretariats and _cartes d'entree_ to
obtain admission! It is curious how the bureaucratic instinct is
ingrained in the French character.
It was a large, ill-ventilated room, blue with cigarette and cigar
smoke. Some thirty men were sitting or standing around a baccarat table
in the centre, and two or three groups hung around _ecarte_ tables in
the corners. A personage who looked like a slightly more prosperous
brother of the raven outside and wore a dinner-jacket, promenaded the
room with the air of one in authority. He scrutinised us carefully from
a distance; then advanced and greeted us politely.
“You have chosen an excellent evening,” said he. “There are a great many
people, and the banks are large.”
He bowed and passed on. A dingy waiter took our hats and coats and hung
them up. Anastasius plucked me by the sleeve.
“If you don't mind staking a little for the sake of appearances, I shall
be grateful.”
I whispered: “Can you tell me now, my dear Professor, for what reason
you have brought me to this gaming-hell?”
He looked up at me out of his mournful eyes and murmured, “_Patienza,
lieber Herr_.” Then spying a vacant place behind the chairs at the
baccarat table, he darted thither, and I followed in his wake. There
must have been about a couple of hundred louis in the bank, which was
held by a dissipated, middle-aged man who, having once been handsome in
a fleshy way, had run to fat. His black hair, cropped short, stood up
like a shoebrush, and when he leaned back in his chair a roll of flesh
rose above his collar. I disliked the fellow for his unhealthiness,
and for the hard mockery in his puffy eyes. The company seemed fairly
homogeneous in its raffishness, though here and there appeared a thin,
aristocratic face, with grey moustache and pointed beard, and the homely
anxious visage of a small tradesman. But in bulk it looked an ugly,
seedy crowd, with unwashed bodies and unclean souls. I noticed an
Italian or two, and a villainous Englishman with a face like that of a
dilapidated horse. A glance at the table plastered with silver and gold
showed me that they were playing with a five-franc minimum.
Anastasius drew a handful of louis from his pocket and staked one. I
staked a five-franc piece. The cards were dealt, the banker exposed a
nine, the highest number, and the croupier's flat spoon swept the table.
A murmur arose. The banker was having the luck of Satan.
“He always protects me, the good fellow,” laughed the banker, who had
overheard the remark.
Again we staked, again the hands were dealt. Our tableau or end of the
table won, the other lost. The croupier threw the coins in payment. I
let my double stake lie, and so did Anastasius. At the next coup we lost
again. The banker stuffed his winnings into his pocket and declared a
_suite_. The bank was put up at auction, and was eventually knocked down
to the same personage for fifty louis. The horse-headed Englishman
cried “_banco_,” which means that he would play the banker for the whole
amount. The hands were dealt, the Englishman lost, and the game started
afresh with a hundred louis in the bank. The proceedings began to bore
me. Even if my experience of life had not suggested that scrupulous
fairness and honour were not the guiding principles of such an
assemblage, I should have taken little interest in the game. I am a
great believer in the wholesomeness of compounding for sins you are
inclined to by damning those you have no mind to. It aids the nice
balance of life. And gambling is one of the sins I delight to damn. The
rapid getting of money has never appealed to me, who have always had
sufficient for my moderately epicurean needs, and least of all did it
appeal to me now when I was on the brink of my journey to the land where
French gold and bank notes were not in currency. I repeat, therefore,
that I was bored.
“If the perils of the adventure don't begin soon, my dear Professor,” I
whispered, “I shall go to sleep standing.”
Again he asked for patience and staked a hundred-franc note. At that
moment the man sitting at the table in front of him rose, and the dwarf
slipped swiftly into his seat. He won his hundred francs and made
the same stake again. It was obvious that the little man did not damn
gambling. It was a sin to which he appeared peculiarly inclined. The
true inwardness of the perilous adventure began to dawn on me. He had
come here to make the money wherewith he could further his gigantic
combinations. All this mystery was part of his childish cunning. I
hardly knew whether to box the little creature's ears, to box my own,
or to laugh. I compromised with a smile on the last alternative, and
baccarat being a dreary game to watch, I strolled off to the nearest
_ecarte_ table, and, to justify my presence in the room, backed one of
the players.
Presently my attention was called to the baccarat table by a noise as
of some dispute, and turning, I saw the gentleman in the dinner-jacket
hurrying to what appeared to be the storm centre, the place where
Anastasius was sitting. Suspecting some minor peril, I left the _ecarte_
players, and joined the gentleman in the dinner-jacket. It seemed that
the hand, which is played in rotation by those seated at each tableau
or half-table, had come round for the first time to Anastasius, and
objection had been taken to his playing it, on the score of his physical
appearance. The dwarf was protesting vehemently. He had played baccarat
in all the clubs of Europe, and had never received such treatment. It
was infamous, it was insulting. The malcontents of the punt paid
little heed to his remonstrances. They resented the entrusting of their
fortunes to one whose chin barely rose above the level of the table.
The banker lit a cigarette and sat back in his chair with a smile of
mockery. His attitude brought up the superfluous flesh about his chin
and the roll of fat at the back of his neck. With his moustache
_en croc_, and his shoebrush hair, I have rarely beheld a more
sensual-looking desperado.
“But gentlemen,” said he, “I see no objection whatever to Monsieur
playing the hand.”
“Naturally,” retorted a voice, “since it would be to your advantage.”
The raven in the dinner-jacket commanded silence.
“Gentlemen, I decide that, according to the rules of the game, Monsieur
is entitled to play the hand.”
“Bravo!” exclaimed one or two of my friend's supporters.
“_C'est idiot_!” growled the malcontents.
“_Messieurs, faites vos jeux_!” cried the croupier.
The stakes were laid, the banker looked around, estimating the
comparative values of the two tableaux. Anastasius had backed his hand
with a pile of louis. To encourage him, and to conciliate the hostile
punt, I threw down a hundred-franc note.
“_Les jeux sont faits? Rien ne va plus_.”
The banker dealt, two cards to each tableau, two to himself. Anastasius,
trembling with nervous excitement, stretched out a palsied little fist
towards the cards. He drew them towards him, face downwards, peeped at
them in the most approved manner, and in a husky voice called for an
extra card.
The card dealt face upwards was a five. The banker turned up his own
cards, a two and a four, making a point of six. Naturally he stood,
Anastasius did nothing.
“Show your cards--show your cards!” cried several voices.
He turned over the two cards originally dealt to him. They were a king
and a nine, making the natural nine, the highest point, and he had
actually asked for another card. It was the unforgivable sin. The five
that had been dealt to him brought his point to four. There was a roar
of indignation. Men with violent faces rose and cursed him, and shook
their fists at him. Others clamoured that the coup was ineffective. They
were not going to be at the mercy of an idiot who knew nothing of the
game. The hand must be dealt over again.
“_Jamais de la vie_!” shouted the banker.
“_Le coup est bon_!” cried the raven in authority, and the croupier's
spoon hovered over the tableau. But the horse-headed Englishman clutched
the two louis he had staked. He was damned, and a great many other
things, if he would lose his money that way. The raven in the
dinner-jacket darted round, and bending over him, caught him by the
wrist. Two or three others grabbed their stakes, and swore they would
not pay. The banker rose and went to the rescue of his gains. There
was screaming and shouting and struggling and riot indescribable. Those
round about us went on cursing Anastasius, who sat quite still, with
quivering lips, as helpless as a rabbit. The raven tore his way
through the throng around the Englishman and came up to me excited and
dishevelled.
“It is all your fault, Monsieur,” he shrieked, “for introducing into the
club a half-witted creature like that.”
“Yes, it's your fault,” cried a low-browed, ugly fellow looking like
a butcher in uneasy circumstances who stood next to me. Suddenly the
avalanche of indignation fell upon my head. Angry, ugly men crowded
round me and began to curse me instead of the dwarf. Cries arose. The
adventure began, indeed, to grow idiotically perilous. I had never been
thrown out of doors in my life. I objected strongly to the idea. It
might possibly hurt my body, and would certainly offend my dignity. I
felt that I could not make my exit through the portals of life with the
urbanity on which I had counted, if, as a preparatory step, I had been
thrown out of a gambling-hell. There were only two things to be done.
Either I must whip out my ridiculous revolver and do some free shooting,
or I must make an appeal to the lower feelings of the assembly. I chose
the latter alternative. With a sudden movement I slipped through the
angry and gesticulating crowd, and leaped on a chair by one of the
deserted _ecarte_ tables. Then I raised a commanding arm, and, in my
best election-meeting voice, I cried:
“_Messieurs_!”
The unexpectedness of the manoeuvre caused instant silence.
“As my friend and myself,” I said, “are the cause of this unpleasant
confusion, I shall be most happy to pay the banker the losses of the
tableau.”
And I drew out and brandished my pocket-book, in which, by a special
grace of Providence, there happened to be a considerable sum of money.
Murmurs of approbation arose. Then the Englishman sang out:
“But what about the money we would have won, if that little fool had
played the game properly?”
The remark was received with cheers.
“That amount, too,” said I, “I shall be happy to disburse.”
There was nothing more to be said, as everybody, banker and punt, were
satisfied. The raven in the dinner-jacket came up and informed me that
my proposal solved the difficulty. I besought him to make out the bill
for my little entertainment as quickly as possible. Then I dismounted
from my chair and beckoned to the dwarf, still sitting white and
piteous, to join me. He obeyed like a frightened child who had been
naughty. All his swagger and braggadocio were gone. His bosom heaved
with suppressed sobs. He sat down on the chair I had vacated and buried
his face on the _ecarte_ table. We remained thus aloof from the crowd
who were intent on the calculation at the baccarat table. At last the
raven in the dinner-jacket arrived with a note of the amount. It was
two thousand three hundred francs. I gave him the notes, and, taking
Anastasius by the arm, led him to the door, where the waiter stood with
our hats and coats. Before we could reach it, however, the banker, who
had risen from his seat, crossed the room and addressed me.
“Monsieur,” said he, with an air of high-bred courtesy, “I infinitely
regret this unpleasant affair and I thank you for your perfect
magnanimity.”
I did not suggest that with equal magnanimity he might refund the
forty-six pounds that had found its way from my pocket to his, but I
bowed with stiff politeness, and made my exit with as much dignity as
the attachment to my heels of the crestfallen Anastasius would permit.
Outside I constituted myself the guide, and took the first turning
downhill, knowing that it would lead to the civilised centre of the
town. The dwarf's roundabout route was characteristic of his tortuous
mind. We walked along for some time without saying anything. I could
not find it in my heart to reproach the little man for the expensiveness
(nearly a hundred pounds) of his perilous adventure, and he seemed too
dazed with shame and humiliation to speak. At last, when we reached,
as I anticipated, the Square de la Republique, I patted him on the
shoulder.
“Cheer up, my dear Professor,” said I. “We both are acquainted with
nobler things than the ins and outs of gaming-hells.”
He reeled to a bench under the palm trees, and bursting into tears, gave
vent to his misery in the most incoherent language ever uttered by man.
I sat beside him and vainly attempted consolation.
“Ah, how mad I am! Ah, how contemptible! I dare not face my beautiful
cats again. I dare not see the light of the sun. I have betrayed my
trust. Accursed be the cards. I, who had my gigantic combination. It is
all gone. Beautiful lady, forgive me. Generous-hearted friend, forgive
me. I am the most miserable of God's creatures.”
“It is an accident that might happen to any one,” I said gently. “You
were nervous. You looked at the cards, you mistook the nine for a ten,
in which case you were right to call for another card.”
“It is not that,” he wailed. “It is the spoiling of my combination, on
which I have wasted sleepless nights. A curse on my mad folly. Do you
know who the banker was?”
“No,” said I.
“He was Captain Vauvenarde, the husband of Madame Brandt.”