THE HELL.
The scene that opened upon us was, to me, a painfully interesting one.
It was a mere hell, without any of those attractive adjuncts which, in a
diseased state of popular refinement, such as exists in the fashionable
atmospheres of London and Paris, provides it with decorations, and
conceals its more discouraging and offensive externals. The charms of
music, lovely women, gay lights, and superb drapery and furniture,
were here entirely wanting. No other arts beyond the single passion
for hazard, which exists, I am inclined to think, in a greater or less
degree in every human breast, were here employed to beguile the young
and unsuspecting mind into indulgence. The establishment into which I
had fallen, seemed to presuppose an acquaintance, already formed, of the
gamester with his fascinating vice. It was evidently no place to
seduce the uninitiate. The passion must have been already awakened--the
guardianship of the good angel lulled into indifference or
slumber--before the young mind could be soon reconciled to the moral
atmosphere of such a scene.
The apartment was low and dimly lighted. Groups of small tables intended
for two persons were all around. In the centre of the floor were
tables of larger size, which were surrounded by the followers of Pharo.
Unoccupied tables, here and there, were sprinkled with cards and domino;
while, as if to render the characteristics of the place complete, a
vapor of smoke and a smell of beer assailed our senses as we entered.
There were not many persons present--I conjectured, at a glance, that
there might be fifteen; but we heard occasional voices from an inner
room, and a small door opening in the rear discovered a retreat like
that we occupied, in the dim light of which I perceived moving faces
and shadows, and Kingsley informed me that there were several rooms all
similarly occupied with ours.
An examination of the persons around me, increased the unpleasant
feelings which the place had inspired. With the exception of a few, the
greater number were evidently superior to their employments. Several of
them were young men like my companion--men not yet lost to sensibility,
who looked up with some annoyance as they beheld Kingsley accompanied
by a stranger. Two or three of the inmates were veteran gamesters.
You could see THAT in their business-like nonchalance--their rigid
muscles--the manner at once demure and familiar. They were evidently
“habitues del l'enfer”--men to whom cards and dice were as absolutely
necessary now, as brandy and tobacco to the drunkard. These men were
always at play. Even the smallest interval found them still shuffling
the cards, and looking up at every opening of the door, as if in
hungering anticipation of the prey. At such periods alone might you
behold any expression of anxiety in their faces. This disappeared
entirely the moment that they were in possession of the victim.
That imperturbable composure which distinguished them was singularly
contrasted with the fidgety eagerness and nervous rapidity by which you
could discover the latter; and I glanced over the operations of the two
parties, as they were fairly shown in several sets about the room, with
a renewed feeling of wonder how a man so truly clever and strong, in
some things, as Kingsley, should allow himself to be drawn so deeply
into such low snares; the tricks of which seemed so apparent, and
the attractions of which, in the present instance, were obviously so
inferior and low. I little knew by what inoffensive and gradual changes
the human mind, having once commenced its downward progress, can hurry
to the base; nor did I sufficiently allow for that love of hazard
itself, in games of chance, which I have already expressed the opinion,
is natural to the proper heart of man, belongs to a rational curiosity,
and arises, most probably, from that highest property of his intellect,
namely, the love of art and intellectual ingenuity. It would be very
important to know this fact, since then, instead of the blind hostility
which is entertained for sports of this description, by certain classes
of moralists among us, we might so employ their ministry as to deprive
them of their hurtfulness and make them permanently beneficial in the
cause of good education.
Kingsley seemed to conjecture my thoughts. A smile of lofty significance
expressing a feeling of mixed scorn and humility, rose upon his
countenance--as if admitting his own feebleness, while insisting upon
his recovered strength, A sentence which he uttered to me in a whisper,
at this moment, was intended to convey some such meaning.
“It was only when thrown to the earth, Clifford, that the wrestler
recovered his strength.”
“That fable,” I replied, “proves that he was no god, at least. Of the
earth, earthy, he found strength only in his sphere. The moment he
aspired above it the god crushed him. I doubt if Hercules could have
derived any benefit from the same source.”
“Ah! I am no Hercules, but you will also find that I am no Antaeus. I
fall, but I rise again, and I am not crushed. This is peculiarly the
source of HUMAN strength.”
“Better not to fall.”
“Ah! you are too late from Utopia. But--”
We were interrupted; a voice at my elbow--a soft, clear, insinuating
voice addressed my companion:--
“Ah, Monsieur Kingsley, I rejoice to see you.”
Kingsley gave me a single look, which said everything, as he turned to
meet the new-comer. The latter continued:--
“Though worsted in that last encounter, you do not despair, I see.”
“No! why should I?”
“True, why? Fortune baffles skill, but what of that? She is capricious.
Her despotism is feminine; and in her empire, more certainly than any
other, it may be said boldly, that, with change of day there is change
of doom. It is not always rain.”
“Perhaps not, but we may have such a long spell of it that everything is
drowned. 'It's a long lane,' says the proverb, 'that has no turn;' but a
man be done up long before he gets to the turning place.”
The other replied by some of the usual commonplaces by which, in
condescending language, the gamester provoked and stimulates his
unconscious victim. Kingsley, however, had reached a period of
experience which enabled him to estimate these phrases at their proper
worth.
“You would encourage me,” he said quietly, and in tones which, to the
unnoteful ear, would have seemed natural enough, but which, knowing him
as I did, were slightly sarcastic, and containing a deeper signification
than they gave out: “but you are the better player. I am now convinced
of that. Something there is in fortune, doubtless; my self-esteem makes
me willing to admit that; and yet I do not deceive myself. You have been
too much for me--you are!”
“The difference is trifling, very trifling, I suspect. A little more
practice will soon reconcile that.”
“Ha! ha! you forget the practice is to be paid for.”
“True, but it is the base spirit only that scruples at the cost of its
accomplishments.”
“Surely, surely!”
“You are fresh for the encounter to-night?”
“Pleasantly put! Is the query meant for the player or his purse?”
“Good, very good! Why, truly, there is no necessary affinity between
them.”
“And yet the one without the other would scarcely be able to commend
himself to so excellent an artist as Mr. Latour Cleveland. Clifford, let
me introduce you to my ENEMY; Mr. Cleveland, my FRIEND.”
In this manner was I introduced. Thus was I made acquainted with the
particular individual whom it was the meditated purpose of Kingsley to
expose. But, though thus marked in the language of his introduction,
there was nothing in the tone or manner of my companion, at all
calculated to alarm the suspicions of the other. On the contrary, there
was a sort of reckless joviality in the air of ABANDON, with which
he presented me and spoke. A natural curiosity moved me to examine
Cleveland more closely. He was what we should call, in common speech, a
very elegant young man. He was probably thirty or thirty-five years of
age, tall, graceful, rather slenderish, and of particular nicety in his
dress. All his clothes were disposed with the happiest precision. White
kid-gloves covered his taper fingers. Withdrawn, a rich diamond
blazed upon one hand, while a seal-ring, of official dimensions, with
characters cut in lava, decorated the other. His movements betrayed the
same nice method which distinguished the arrangement of his dress. His
evolutions might all have been performed by trumpet signal, and to the
sound of measured music. He was evidently one of those persons whose
feelings are too little earnest, ever to affect their policy; too little
warm ever to disparage the rigor of their customary play; one of those
cold, nice men, who, without having a single passion at work to produce
one condition of feeling higher than another, are yet the very ideals of
the most narrow and concentrated selfishness. His face was thin, pale,
and intelligent. His lips were thick, however--the eyes bright, like
those of a snake, but side-looking, never direct, never upward, and
always with a smiling shyness in their glance, in which a suspicious
mind like my own would always find sufficient occasion for distrust.
Mr. Cleveland bestowed a single keen glance upon me while going
through the ordeal of introduction. But his scrutiny labored under one
disadvantage. His eyes did not encounter mine! One loses a great deal,
if his object be the study of human nature, if he fails in this respect.
“Much pleasure in making your acquaintance, Mr. Clifford; I trust,
however, you will find me no worse enemy than your friend has done.”
“If he find YOU no worse, he will find himself no better. He will pay
for his enmity, whatever its degree, as I have done, and be wiser, by
reason of his losses.”
“Ah! you think too much of your ill fortunes. That is bad. It takes from
your confidence and so enfeebles your skill. You should think of it
less seriously. Another cast, and the tables change. You will have your
revenge.”
“I WILL!” said Kingsley with some emphasis, and a gravity which the
other did not see. He evidently heard the words only as he had
been accustomed to hear them--from the lips of young gamesters who
perpetually delude themselves with hopes based upon insane expectations.
A benignant smile mantled the cheeks of the gamester.
“Ah, well! I am ready; but if you think me too much for you--”
He paused. The taunt was deliberately intended. It was the customary
taunt of the gamester. On the minds of half the number of young men, it
would have had the desired effect--of goading vanity, and provoking the
self-esteem of the conceited boy into a sort of desperation, when the
powers of sense and caution become mostly suspended, and no unnecessary
suspicion or watchfulness then interferes to increase the difficulty of
plucking the pigeon. I read the smile on Kingsley's lip. It was brief,
momentary, pleasantly contemptuous. Then, suddenly, as if he had newly
recollected his policy, his countenance assumed a new expression--one
more natural to the youth who has been depressed by losses, vexed at
defeat, but flatters himself that the atonement is at hand. Perhaps,
something of the latent purpose of his mind increased the intense
bitterness in the manner and tones of my companion.
“Too much for me, Mr. Cleveland! No, no! You are willing, I see, to rob
good fortune of some of her dues. You crow too soon. I have a shrewd
presentiment that I shall be quite too much FOR YOU to-night.”
A pleasant and well-satisfied smile of Cleveland answered the speaker.
“I like that,” said he; “it proves two things, both of which please me.
Your trifling losses have not hurt your fortunes nor the adverse run of
luck made you despond of better success hereafter. It is something of
a guaranty in favor of one's performance that he is sure of himself. In
such case he is equally sure of his opponent.”
“Look to it, then, for I have just that sort of self-guaranty which
makes me sure of mine. I shall play deeply, that I may make the most
of my presentiments. Nay, to show you how confident I am, this night
restores me all that I have lost, or leaves me nothing more to lose.”
The eyes of the other brightened.
“That is said like a man. I thank you for your warning. Shall we begin?”
“Ready, ay, ready!” was the response of Kingsley, as he turned to one of
the tables. Quietly laying down upon it the short, heavy stick which
he carried, he threw off his gloves, and rubbed his hands earnestly
together, laughing the while without restraint, as if possessed suddenly
of some very pleasant and ludicrous fancy.
“They laugh who win,” remarked Cleveland, with something of coldness in
his manner.
“Ha! ha! ha!” was the only answer of Kingsley to this remark. The
other continued--and I now clearly perceived that his purpose was
provocation:--
“It is certainly a pleasure to win your money, Kingsley--you bear it
with so much philosophy. Nay, it seems to give you pleasure, and thus
lessens the pain I should otherwise feel in receiving the fruits of my
superiority.”
“Ha! ha! ha!” again repeated Kingsley. “Excuse me, Mr. Cleveland. I
am reminded of your remark, 'They laugh who win.' I am laughing, as
it were, anticipatively. I am so certain that I shall have my revenge
to-night.”
Cleveland looked at him for a moment with some curiosity, then called:--
“Philip!”
He was answered by a young mulatto--a tall, good-looking fellow, who
approached with a mixed air of equal deference and self-esteem, plaited
frills to a most immaculately white shirt-collar, a huge bulbous
breastpin in his bosom, chains and seals, and all the usual equipments
of Broadway dandyism. The fellow approached us with a smile; his eyes
looking alternately to Cleveland and Kingsley, and, as I fancied, with
no unequivocal sneer in their expression, as they settled on the latter.
A significance of another kind appeared in the look of Cleveland as he
addressed him.
“Get us the pictures, Philip--the latest cuts--and bring--ay, you may
bring the ivories.”
In a few moments, the preliminaries being despatched, the two were
seated at a table, and a couple of packs of cards were laid beside them.
Kingsley drew my attention to the cards. They were of a kind that my
experience had never permitted me to see before. In place of ordinary
kings and queens and knaves, these figures were represented in attitudes
and costumes the most indecent--such as the prolific genius of Parisian
bawdry alone could conceive and delineate. It seems to be a general
opinion among rogues that knavery is never wholly triumphant unless the
mind is thoroughly degraded; and for this reason it is, perhaps, that
establishments devoted to purposes like the present, have, in most
countries, for their invariable adjuncts, the brothel and the bar-room.
If they are not in the immediate tenement, they are sufficiently nigh
to make the work of moral prostitution comparatively easy, in all its
ramifications, with the young and inconsiderate mind. Kingsley turned
over the cards, and I could see that while affecting to show me the
pictures he was himself subjecting the cards to a close inspection of
another kind. This object was scarcely perceptible to myself, who knew
his suspicions, and could naturally conjecture his policy. It did not
excite the alarm of his antagonist.
The parties sat confronting each other. Kingsley drew forth a wallet,
somewhat ostentatiously, which he laid down beside him. The sight of
his wallet staggered me. By its bulk I should judge it to have held
thousands; yet he had assured me that he had nothing beside, the one
hundred dollars which he had procured from me. My surprise increased
as I saw him open the wallet, and draw from one of its pockets
the identical roll which I had put into his hands. The bulk of the
pocket-book seeemed (sic) scarcely to be diminished. My suspicions
were beginning to be roused. I began to think that he had told me a
falsehood; but he looked up at this instant, and a bright manly smile
on his deep purposeful countenance, reassured me. I felt that there was
some policy in the business which was not for me then to fathom. The
cards were cut. A box of dice was also in the hands of Cleveland.
“Spots or pictures?” said Cleveland.
“Pictures first, I suppose,” said Kingsley, “till the blood gets up.
The ivories then as the most rapid. But these pictures are really so
tempting. A new supply, Philip!”
“Just received, sir,” said the other.
“And how shall we begin?” demanded Cleveland, drawing a handful of
bills, gold, and silver, from his pocket; “yellow, white, or brown?”
It was thus, I perceived, that gold, silver, and paper money, were
described.
“Shall it be child's play, or--”
“Man's, man's!” replied Kingsley, with some impatience “I am for
beginning with a cool hundred,” and, to my consternation, he unfolded
the roll he had of me, counted out the bills, refolded them and placed
them in a saucer, where they were soon covered with a like sum by
his antagonist. I was absolutely sickened, and stared aghast upon my
reckless companion. He looked at me with a smile.
“To your own game, Clifford. You will find men enough for your money in
either of the rooms. Should you run short, come to me.”
Thus confidently did he speak; yet he had actually but the single
hundred which he had so boldly staked on the first issue. I thought him
lost; but he better knew his game than I. He also knew his man. The
eyes of Cleveland were on the huge wallet in reserve, of which the “cool
hundred” might naturally be considered a mere sample. I had not courage
to wait for the result, but wandered off, with a feeling not unallied to
terror, into an adjoining apartment.