Monte Carlo--the initiated call it merely “Monte”--has often been
described, in fiction and out of it, but the frank confession of a
ruined gambler is a rare thing; partly because the ruined gambler can’t
often write well enough to express himself accurately, partly because
he isn’t in the mood for literary composition, and partly because he is
sometimes dead. So, since I am not dead, and since it is only by
means of literary composition that I can hope to restore my shattered
fortunes, I will give you the frank confession of a ruined gambler.
Before I went to Monte Carlo I had all the usual ideas of the average
sensible man about gambling in general, and about Monte Carlo in
particular. “Where does all the exterior brilliance of Monte Carlo come
from?” I asked sagely. And I said further: “The Casino administration
does not disguise the fact that it makes a profit of about 50,000 francs
a day. Where does that profit come from?” And I answered my own question
with wonderful wisdom: “Out of the pockets of the foolish gamblers.” I
specially despised the gambler who gambles “on a system”; I despised him
as a creature of superstition. For the “system” gambler will argue that
if I toss a penny up six times and it falls “tail” every time, there is
a strong probability that it will fall “head” the seventh time. “Now,”
I said, “can any rational creature be so foolish as to suppose that the
six previous and done-with spins can possibly affect the seventh spin?
What connection is there between them?” And I replied: “No rational
creature can be so foolish. And there is no connection.” In this spirit,
superior, omniscient, I went to Monte Carlo.
[Illustration: 0255]
Of course, I went to study human nature and find material. The sole
advantage of being a novelist is that when you are discovered in a place
where, as a serious person, you would prefer not to be discovered, you
can always aver that you are studying human nature and seeking material.
I was much impressed by the fact of my being in Monte Carlo. I said to
myself: “I am actually in Monte Carlo!” I was proud. And when I got into
the gorgeous gaming saloons, amid that throng at once glittering and
shabby, I said: “I am actually in the gaming saloons!” And the thought
at the back of my mind was: “Henceforth I shall be able to say that I
have been in the gaming saloons at Monte Carlo.” After studying human
nature at large, I began to study it at a roulette table. I had gambled
before--notably with impassive Arab chiefs in that singular oasis of
the Sahara desert, Biskra--but only a little, and always at _petits
chevaux_, But I understood roulette, and I knew several “systems.” I
found the human nature very interesting; also the roulette. The sight of
real gold, silver, and notes flung about in heaps warmed my imagination.
At this point I felt a solitary five-franc piece in my pocket. And
then the red turned up three times running, and I remembered a simple
“system” that began after a sequence of three.
*****
I don’t know how it was, but long before I had formally decided to
gamble I knew by instinct that I should stake that five-franc piece.
I fought against the idea, but I couldn’t take my hand empty out of
my pocket. Then at last (the whole experience occupying perhaps ten
seconds) I drew forth the five-franc piece and bashfully put it on
black. I thought that all the fifty or sixty persons crowded round
the table were staring at me and thinking to themselves: “There’s
a beginner!” However, black won, and the croupier pushed another
five-franc piece alongside of mine, and I picked them both up very
smartly, remembering all the tales I had ever heard of thieves leaning
over you at Monte Carlo and snatching your ill-gotten gains. I then
thought: “This is a bit of all right. Just for fun I’ll continue the
system.” I did so. In an hour I had made fifty francs, without breaking
into gold. Once a croupier made a slip and was raking in red stakes
when red had won, and people hesitated (because croupiers never make
mistakes, you know, and you have to be careful how you quarrel with the
table at Monte Carlo), and I was the first to give vent to a protest,
and the croupier looked at me and smiled and apologised, and the winners
looked at me gratefully, and I began to think myself the deuce and all
of a Monte Carlo habitué.
Having made fifty francs, I decided that I would prove my self-control
by ceasing to play. So I did prove it, and went to have tea in the
Casino _café_. In those moments fifty francs seemed to me to be a really
enormous sum. I was as happy as though I had shot a reviewer without
being found out. I gradually began to perceive, too, that though
no rational creature could suppose that a spin could be affected by
previous spins, nevertheless, it undoubtedly was so affected. I began to
scorn a little the average sensible man who scorned the gambler. “There
is more in roulette than is dreamt of in your philosophy, my conceited
friend,” I murmured. I was like a woman--I couldn’t argue, but I knew
infallibly. Then it suddenly occurred to me that if I had gambled with
louis instead of five-franc pieces I should have made 200 francs--200
francs in rather over an hour! Oh, luxury! Oh, being-in-the-swim! Oh,
smartness! Oh, gilded and delicious sin!
*****
Five days afterwards I went to Monte Carlo again, to lunch with some
brother authors. In the meantime, though I had been chained to my desk
by unalterable engagements, I had thought constantly upon the art and
craft of gambling. One of these authors knew Monte Carlo, and all that
therein is, as I know Fleet Street. And to my equal astonishment and
pleasure he said, when I explained my system to him: “Couldn’t have a
better!” And he proceeded to remark positively that the man who had a
decent system and the nerve to stick to it through all crises, would
infallibly win from the tables--not a lot, but an average of several
louis per sitting of two hours. “Gambling,” he said, “is a matter
of character. You have the right character,” he added. You may guess
whether I did not glow with joyous pride. “The tables make their money
from the plunging fools,” I said, privately, “and I am not a fool.”
A man was pointed out to me who extracted a regular income from
the tables. “But why don’t the authorities forbid him the rooms?” I
demanded, “Because he’s such a good advertisement. Can’t you see?” I
saw.
We went to the Casino late after lunch. I cut myself adrift from the
rest of the party and began instantly to play. In forty-five minutes,
with my “system,” I had made forty-five francs. And then the rest of the
party reappeared and talked about tea, and trains, and dinner. “Tea!” I
murmured disgusted (yet I have a profound passion for tea), “when I am
netting a franc a minute!” However, I yielded, and we went and had tea
at the Restaurant de Paris across the way. And over the white-and-silver
of the tea-table, in the falling twilight, with the incomparable
mountain landscape in front of us, and the most _chic_ and decadent
Parisianism around us, we talked roulette. Then the Russian Grand Duke
who had won several thousand pounds in a few minutes a week or two
before, came veritably and ducally in, and sat at the next table. There
was no mistaking his likeness to the Tsar. It is most extraordinary how
the propinquity of a Grand Duke, experienced for the first time, affects
even the proverbial phlegm of a British novelist. I seemed to be moving
in a perfect atmosphere of Grand Dukes! And I, too, had won! The art of
literature seemed a very little thing.
*****
After I had made fifty and forty-five francs at two sittings, I
developed suddenly, without visiting the tables again, into a complete
and thorough gambler. I picked up all the technical terms like picking
up marbles--the greater martingale, the lesser martingale, “en plein,”
“à cheval,” “the horses of seventeen,” “last square,” and so on, and so
on--and I had my own original theories about the alleged superiority of
red-or-black to odd-or-even in betting on the even chances. In short,
for many hours I lived roulette. I ate roulette for dinner, drank it
in my Vichy, and smoked it in my cigar. At first I pretended that I was
only pretending to be interested in gambling as a means of earning
a livelihood (call it honest or dishonest, as you please). Then the
average sensible man in me began to have rather a bad time, really. I
frankly acknowledged to myself that I was veritably keen on the thing. I
said: “Of course, ordinary people believe that the tables must win,
but we who are initiated know better. All you want in order to win is
a prudent system and great force of character.” And I decided that it
would be idle, that it would be falsely modest, that it would be inane,
to deny that I had exceptional force of character. And beautiful schemes
formed themselves in my mind: how I would gain a certain sum, and then
increase my “units” from five-franc pieces to louis, and so quadruple
the winnings, and how I would get a friend to practise the same system,
and so double them again, and how generally we would have a quietly
merry time at the expense of the tables during the next month.
And I was so calm, cool, collected, impassive. There was no hurry. I
would not go to Monte Carlo the next day, but perhaps the day after.
However, the next day proved to be very wet, and I was alone and idle,
my friends being otherwise engaged, and hence I was simply obliged to
go to Monte Carlo. I didn’t wish to go, but what could one do? Before
starting, I reflected: “Well, there’s just a _chance_--such things have
been known,” and I took a substantial part of my financial resources out
of my pocket-book, and locked that reserve up in a drawer. After this,
who will dare to say that I was not cool and sagacious? The journey to
Monte Carlo seemed very long. Just as I was entering the ornate portals
I met some friends who had seen me there the previous day. The thought
flashed through my mind: “These people will think I have got caught in
the meshes of the vice just like ordinary idiots, whereas, of course my
case is not ordinary at all.” So I quickly explained to them that it was
very wet (as if they couldn’t see), and that my other friends had
left me, and that I had come to Monte Carlo merely to kill time. They
appeared to regard this explanation as unnecessary.
*****
I had a fancy for the table where I had previously played and won.
I went to it, and by extraordinary good fortune secured a chair--a
difficult thing to get in the afternoons. Behold me seated next door to
a croupier, side by side with regular frequenters, regular practisers
of systems, and doubtless envied by the outer ring of players and
spectators! I was annoyed to find that every other occupant of a chair
had a little printed card in black and red on which he marked
the winning numbers. I had neglected to provide myself with this
contrivance, and I felt conspicuous; I felt that I was not correct.
However, I changed some gold for silver with the croupier, and laid the
noble pieces in little piles in front of me, and looked as knowing and
as initiated as I could. And at the first opening offered by the play I
began the operation of my system, backing red, after black had won three
times. Black won the fourth time, and I had lost five francs.... Black
won the sixth time and I had lost thirty-five francs. Black won
the seventh time, and I had lost seventy-five francs. “Steady, cool
customer!” I addressed myself. I put down four louis (and kindly
remember that in these hard times four louis is four louis--three
English pounds and four English shillings), and, incredible to relate,
black won the eighth time, and I had lost a hundred and fifty-five
francs. The time occupied was a mere nine minutes. It was at this point
that the “nerve” and the “force of character” were required, for it was
an essential part of my system to “cut the loss” at the eighth turn.
I said: “Hadn’t I better put down eight louis and win all back again,
_just this once?_ Red’s absolutely certain to win next time.” But my
confounded force of character came in, and forced me to cut the loss,
and stick strictly to the system. And at the ninth spin red did win. If
I had only put down that eight louis I should have been all right. I
was extremely annoyed, especially when I realised that, even with decent
luck, it would take me the best part of three hours to regain that
hundred and fifty-five francs.
*****
I was shaken. I was like a pugilist who had been knocked down in a prize
fight, and hasn’t quite made up his mind whether, on the whole, he won’t
be more comfortable, in the long run, where he is. I was like a soldier
under a heavy fire, arguing with himself rapidly whether he prefers
to be a Balaclava hero with death or the workhouse, or just a plain,
ordinary, prudent Tommy. I was struck amidships. Then an American person
behind my chair, just a casual foolish plunger, of the class out of
which the Casino makes its profits, put a thousand franc note on the odd
numbers, and thirty-three turned up. “A thousand for a thousand,” said
the croupier mechanically and nonchalantly, and handed to the foolish
plunger the equivalent of eighty pounds sterling. And about two minutes
afterwards the same foolish plunger made a hundred and sixty pounds
at another single stroke. It was odious; I tell you positively it was
odious. I collected the shattered bits of my character out of my boots,
and recommenced my system; made a bit; felt better; and then zero turned
up twice--most unsettling, even when zero means only that your stake
is “held over.” Then two old and fussy ladies came and gambled very
seriously over my head, and deranged my hair with the end of the rake
in raking up their miserable winnings.... At five o’clock I had lost
a hundred and ninety-five francs. I don’t mind working hard, at great
nervous tension, in a vitiated atmosphere, if I can reckon on netting
a franc a minute; but I have a sort of objection to three laborious
sittings such as I endured that week when the grand result is a dead
loss of four pounds. I somehow failed to see the point. I departed in
disgust, and ordered tea at the Café de Paris, not the Restaurant de
Paris (I was in no mood for Grand Dukes). And while I imbibed the tea,
a heated altercation went on inside me between the average sensible man
and the man who knew that money could be made out of the tables and
that gambling was a question of nerves, etc. It was a pretty show, that
altercation. In about ten rounds the average sensible man had knocked
his opponent right out of the ring. I breathed a long breath, and seemed
to wake up out of a nightmare. Did I regret the episode? I regretted the
ruin, not the episode. For had I not all the time been studying human
nature and getting material? Besides that, as I grow older I grow too
wise. Says Montaigne: “_Wisdome hath hir excesses, and no leise need of
moderation, then follie._” (The italics are Montaigne’s)... And there’s
a good deal in my system after all.