"I am twenty-three; play a hundred louis on that number."
I placed the stake. My hands trembled so violently that the gold tumbled
and rolled about the table. I gathered it quickly, and replaced it as
the croupier bawled out that the game was made.
What a terrible moment that was! I have seen action on the
battle-field, I have been in runaways, fires, railroad accidents, but I
shall never again know the terror of that moment. How she ever stood it
I don't know.
If you have played roulette you will have observed that sometimes the
ball will sink to the lower rim, but will not drop into the little
compartments intended for it; that is to say, it will hang as if in mid
air, all the while making the circle. Well, the ball began to play us
the agonizing trick. Twice it hung above 23; twice it threatened zero.
Heavens! how I watched the ball, how the girl watched it, how all save
the croupier watched it! Then it fell--23!
"Put it all on black," she whispered. It was all like clairvoyance.
Black won; again, and again!
"Gentlemen, the bank is closed," said the croupier, smiling. He put the
ball in the silver socket.
I had actually and incontestably (even inconceivably!) broken the bank!
I was, for the moment, dumfounded. How they crowded around us, the
aristocrats, the half-world, the confirmed gamblers, the sightseers and
the hangers-on! From afar I could hear the music of the band. They were
playing a _polonaise_ of Chopin's. I was like one in a dream.
"They are asking you where to send the gold," she said.
"The gold? Oh, yes! to the hotel, to the hotel!"--finding my senses.
An attendant put our winnings into a basket, and, in company with two
guardians of the peace, or gendarmes, if you will call them so, preceded
us to the hotel.
"To your brother's room?" I asked.
"At once! I feel as if I were about to faint. Mr. Chadwick, my name is
Carruthers. Will you go to my brother's room with me and explain all
this to him?"
I nodded, and was about to follow her with the attendant who still
carried our gold, when a voice struck my ear,--a voice which filled me
with surprise, chagrin and terror.
"So, I have found you!"
A handsome woman of thirty-five stood at my side. Anger and wrath lay
visibly written on her face and in her eyes. My sister! She did not
appear to notice the young girl beside me, who instinctively shrank from
me at the sound of my sister's voice.
"So, I have found you! I had a good mind to leave you here, you wretched
boy! You have wasted your patrimony, you have lost over these abominable
gaming-tables the house in which we both were born. I have heard all;
not a word of excuse! And yet I am here to give you money enough to
reach home with. I heard all about you at Nice."
In spite of my keen chagrin, I found my voice.
"My dear sister, I thank you for your assistance, but I do not need it.
I have just this moment broken one of the banks at the Casino." I
beckoned the attendant to approach. I lifted back the cover. My sister
gasped.
"Merciful heavens! how much is in there?" she asked, overcome at the
sight of so much money. The sudden transition from wrath to amazement
made me laugh.
"Something like seventy thousand, my dear Nan."
"Pounds?" she cried.
"Dollars!"
"And who is this young woman?"--suddenly, and with not unjust suspicion.
Miss Carruthers flushed. My sister had a way of being extraordinarily
insolent upon occasion. But evidently Miss Carruthers came of equally
distinguished blood. She lifted her head proudly, and her eyes flashed.
"As I have no desire to enter into your family affairs," she said
haughtily to me, "I beg of you to excuse me." She made as though to
leave.
"Wait!" I implored, striving to detain her. Somehow I felt that if she
went I should never see her again.
"Let me go, Mr. Chadwick; I have only the kindest regards for you."
"But the money?"
"The money?" echoed my sister.
"Nan," said I indignantly, "but for this young lady, who, I dare say,
comes of as good a family as ours-- Well, if it hadn't been for her you
might have carried me home in a pine box."
"Robert!"--aghast.
"Miss Carruthers is a lady," I declared vehemently.
"Carruthers? You are English?" asked my sister, her frown smoothing.
"You will certainly pardon me if I have been rude; but this brother of
mine--"
"Is a very good gentleman," Miss Carruthers interrupted. "My name is now
known to you; yours--"
"Is Lady Rexford,"--with a tilt of the chin.
Miss Carruthers bent forward.
"Of Suffolk?"
"Yes-- Merciful heavens! you are of the Carruthers who are my neighbors
when I am at home! I know the judge, your father, well."
"My father!" The burden of her trouble came back to her, the reaction
from the intense excitement of the preceding hour. She reached out her
arms blindly, and would have fallen had not my sister caught her.
"You wretch!" she cried, "what have you been doing to this girl?"
"Don't be a fool, Nan! I haven't been doing anything. But don't let's
have a scene here. Where's your room?"
We were still in the parlor of the hotel, and many curious glances were
directed at us. The attendant had set down his heavy and precious
burden, and was waiting patiently for further directions from me.
"Don't scold him," said Miss Carruthers; "for he has been very good to
me." She stretched out a small white hand, and I clasped it. "Mr.
Chadwick, make me a solemn promise."
"What is it?"--wondering.
"Promise me never to play games of chance again. Think of what might
have happened if God hadn't been so good to us after our having been so
bad."
I promised. Then we went to my sister's room, and the whole story came
out.
The colonel abruptly concluded his narrative.
"Here, here!" we cried; "this will never do. What was the end?"
"What happened to young Carruthers?" I demanded, with the novelist's
love for details.
"That wasn't his name," replied the colonel, smiling.
"And what became of the girl?" asked Fletcher. "You can't choke us off
that way, Bob. What became of the girl?"
"Seventy thousand dollars; I believe you're codding us a whole lot,"
said Collingwood.
"You're a fakir if you don't tell us what became of the girl," Fletcher
again declared persistently.
"Very well," laughed the colonel; "I'm a fakir."
But the very ease with which he acknowledged this confirmed my
suspicions that he had told only the plain truth. At this moment the
butler appeared in the doorway, and we all arose.
"Madam desires me to announce that dinner is served."
The Scotch and the brandy saved the colonel any further embarrassment;
we were all ravenously hungry. On our way to the drawing-room where we
were to join the ladies, Fletcher began hoping for a clear, cold day for
the morrow; and the colonel escaped.
It was my happiness to take in the hostess that night. She was toying
with her wine-glass, when I observed that the bracelet on her beautiful
arm had a curious bangle.
"I thought bangles passé," I said.
"This isn't a fad." She extended her arm or the bracelet (I don't know
which) for my inspection.
"Why," I exclaimed breathlessly, "it is a miniature French louis!" A
thousand fancies flooded my brain.
"Look," she said. She touched a spring, and the bangle opened,
discovering the colonel's youthful face.
"How came you to select a louis for a bangle?" I asked.
"That is a secret."
"Oh, if it's a secret, far be it that I should strive to peer within.
The colonel is a lucky dog. If I were half as lucky, I shouldn't be
writing novels for a living."
"Who knows?" she murmured, a far-away light in her glorious eyes.