On the following morning, about eleven o'clock, just as M. de Morin
was getting ready to go out, the faithful Joseph informed him that
Dr. Delange wished to see him. "Aha!" said the young painter to
himself. "Now I've got him!" and he at once gave the order for his
visitor to be shown up.
Notwithstanding his knowledge of the world, the Doctor could not, on
meeting M. de Morin, hide a certain degree of embarrassment; in fact,
he was decidedly uncomfortable and by no means at his ease. His face
alone, had need been, would have told the painter that an important
service was to be solicited.
"You are surprised to see me?" commenced M. Delange, with a very
hesitating manner.
"Not the least in the world. Why should such a happy thought on your
part astonish me? You had an hour to spare before breakfast, and you
are giving me the benefit of it. I am delighted."
"Alas!" replied the Doctor, "I am not here for the pleasure alone of
seeing you. I want to speak to you about a matter of considerable
importance."
"Indeed! What is it?"
"You know that I was a heavy loser at the Club the other night."
"Yes, and I am very sorry for it. You see, I wanted to stop playing
at eight o'clock, but you were so persistent that I was compelled to
carry on the bank."
"Good Heavens! My loss then was more than I could pay, and I wanted
to go on, in the hope of getting some of it back. It is the old story
over again."
"That is bad. What is the amount of your loss?"
"Ninety thousand francs."
"It is a lot, a very big lot, and I sympathise with you sincerely."
"But worse remains behind," said the Doctor, and his voice trembled.
"It is absolutely impossible for me to pay up just at present."
"You don't mean to say so! That is unfortunate, very unfortunate.
What will they say at the Club? They have this year been very much
down on all that sort of thing. The Committee decided, at their last
meeting, to apply the rule in all its severity."
"I know all about it. I shall be posted in twenty-four hours."
"And are you really unable to avoid this—this—unpleasantness?"
"Utterly unable," replied M. Delange.
"Come, let us think it over. Two heads are better than one. Is there
no one who would help you out of your difficulty? You have plenty of
friends, and rich ones, too."
"The amount is too large. I should never manage to get hold of so
much all at once."
He stopped, hesitated for a moment or two, and then, taking courage,
said—
"You, and you alone, can, if you will, get me out of this scrape."
"I! Do you imagine that I could lend you ninety thousand francs? My
dear fellow, if you only knew how terribly I am in want of money just
now, and what expense I am put to! I am, as you may perhaps have
heard, about to undertake a tremendously costly journey, and I am
bound to scrape together every farthing I can get hold of."
"You do not understand me," replied the Doctor. "I do not ask you to
lend me this amount; I only ask you not to press me for payment at
once."
"I do not understand you now. Please explain."
"Did you not win about ninety thousand francs the other night?"
"Possibly. I have not yet made up my account."
"Well, at all events, I lost all that you won."
"Excuse me," said M. de Morin, very curtly, "I do not admit that.
Counters have very properly been brought into use in clubs in order
to avoid all disputes between the players. Consequently, my dear sir,
you do not owe me a farthing, not a single farthing. I have in my
drawer a larger number of counters, which I shall take with me to the
Club when I go there, either to-night or to-morrow, and, in exchange
for them, the Club, my sole debtor, will give me bank notes."
"The Club," said M. Delange, nervously, "will reply, or will cause
you to be informed, that as the accounts for the game in question
have not been settled, it is not in a position to pay you."
"In that case I shall complain to the Committee. As for you. Doctor,
you will have no reproaches from me. I assure you, once more, that I
do not look upon you as my debtor."
"Be it so; but the Club will look upon me as its debtor, and, as we
have already said, that means being posted."
"What on earth do you want me to do?" exclaimed M. de Morin.
"I want you—I want you—" replied M. Delange, hesitating. "I do not
know how to put it, but there is a way—"
"What is it?"
"The only plan is for you, when you hand in your counters, not to ask
for any money in exchange, but to say merely that you and I have
arranged everything between ourselves. I shall be your debtor all the
same, your understand, and I give you my word of honour to pay you as
soon as I possibly can."
"I do not doubt it, but you are asking me—"
"It would save me! It would save me!" cried the Doctor, whose
distress was now at its height.
"It would save you!" replied M. de Morin. "I do not quite see that. I
fear that, on the contrary, I should be doing you a very bad turn.
You would continue to be a member of the Club; you would play with
equal recklessness, and suffer similar losses. Your debt, already of
some magnitude, would increase considerably, and the ruin, which to-day
merely threatens you, would in three or four months become
inevitable. No, no—in your interest, and purely out of sympathy with
you, I am anxious to compel you to forsake the life you are now
leading. Only think of the brilliant career that lies before you! And
you have neglected, nay, almost cast it on one side altogether,
simply to give yourself up, soul and body, to a passion which must
ruin you."
"There is yet time enough for me to set to work in earnest," replied
M. Delange. "If I can only manage honourably to get out of the false
position in which I am now placed, I promise solemnly to hand in my
resignation as a member of the club, and never to touch a card again
in my life."
"Oh, yes!" replied M. de Morin. "'When the devil was sick, the devil
a saint would be,' &c., &c., we know all that. But I tell you plainly
that if you remain in Paris, and with your present set, you will come
to grief sooner or later. You must summon up courage to expatriate
yourself, and go far, far away."
"But Paris is the only place where I am known, and where I have any
chance of repairing my shattered fortune and getting out of your
debt."
"Nonsense! But there is, possibly, another door open to you. Light
this cigar, and give me your undivided attention. An idea has struck
me."
M. Delange looked up quickly, and M. de Morin, after having taken a
few vigorous whiffs at his cigar, continued his remarks as follows—
"Are you of opinion that if I do you the service you wish me to do,
I, in turn, have a right to ask you for something in exchange?"
"Certainly, you may dispose of me as you will, I shall be entirely at
your orders."
"Even," replied M. de Morin, and he spoke very slowly and dwelt on
each word so that his hearer might be taken as little as possible by
surprise, "even supposing that it should be a question of undertaking
with me this journey I am contemplating, or, in other words, of
accompanying me to Africa?"
The young Doctor was evidently not prepared for this proposal, and
could not, in spite of the oratorical precautions of M. de Morin,
repress a movement of surprise. Nevertheless, he replied at once—
"I would go with you. To what part of Africa are you going?"
"Equatorial Africa."
"You know that it is terribly unhealthy? You may lose your skin
there. Pardon the expression, it is proverbial."
"And it is true," replied the young painter. "But we have just come
to the conclusion, I think, that in Paris it is possible, under
certain conditions, and with certain proclivities, to lose one's
honour."
M. Delange took the hint, and hastened to say—
"The unhealthiness of Africa does not alarm me as far as I myself am
concerned. I spoke solely in your interest; I am a doctor, and so
free from all fear of diseases."
"Then, speaking generally, you will not raise any serious objections
to accompany my friends and me?"
"Certainly not, if you require me so to do. In what capacity shall I
join you?"
"As our medical adviser, and _savant_ generally to the expedition."
"But how am I to make money by it?" asked the Doctor. "Do you imagine
that I shall secure a large practice amongst the tribes of Africa,
forsooth? I shall return to Paris perhaps in a year, more probably
not for several, quite forgotten, and without having discharged my
gambling debt to you."
"First of all, I want you to understand that the all-important point
is to wean you from your evil habits of play—that is essential.
Secondly, you will very probably get rid of your liability to me."
"I do not understand you. Do you offer me ninety thousand francs to
accompany you?"
"I offer you nothing of the sort. The sum you mention is either too
much or too little. Our mutual position in society precludes me from
offering you a salary, and you from accepting such an offer. But,"
added M. de Morin, after a long pull at his cigar, "I can give you
your revenge for the day before yesterday."
"My revenge!" exclaimed the Doctor, whose face lighted up in a
moment. "You will promise to give me my revenge?"
"Why not?
"Then I may win back my losses? I may—"
"You may free yourself from your liabilities to me, and still not go
to Africa? That is your meaning, as I take it."
"I assure you—"
"Confess," continued M. de Morin, without paying the slightest
attention to the interruption, "that if I were to offer you such an
opportunity, I should be an egregious ass. What? You owe me already a
sum which you cannot pay, and I am to enter into an engagement to
commence afresh, perhaps to increase the amount, which would be
futile, or possibly to lose it, which would be idiotic, for you might
very well end some day in getting back all your losses?"
"Why, then, did you say anything about my having my revenge?"
"Your revenge under certain conditions."
"Will you kindly explain them to me?"
"That is exactly what I want to do. But it is nearly noon, so let us
go to breakfast, and we will discuss it and my ideas together."
An hour later MM. de Morin and Delange, seated face to face in a
private room at Bignon's, called for their coffee and writing
materials together, and drew up the following contract, on which,
after a lengthy discussion, they had agreed.
Art. 1. Dr. Delange hereby acknowledges to being indebted to M. de
Morin in the sum of ninety thousand francs, lost at cards.
Art. 2. M. de Morin undertakes to state that this sum has been paid
to him, though such is not the case.
Art. 3. In token of his gratitude to M. de Morin for his forbearance
and consideration in this matter. Dr. Delange gives his word of
honour that within a space of a few weeks he will quit Paris for the
purpose of accompanying M. de Morin, for a period of 300 days, to any
countries, wheresoever they may be, which the latter may wish to
visit.
Art. 4. It is agreed between the contracting parties that, on each
day during the voyage, without a single exception, unless in the case
of acute and dangerous illness, a game at cards shall take place
between MM. de Morin and Delange.
Art. 5. The loser on each night shall have the right of choosing on
the following day any game he may elect to play from amongst the
well-known games at cards, or he may even select any other game or
bet in lieu of cards.
Art. 6. On no pretext whatever shall the stakes exceed fifty louis
per diem. It is, therefore, perfectly understood that three hundred
_parties_ of 1,000 francs each are to be played Within the space of
three hundred days.
Art. 7. The two adversaries shall have the right of fixing, by mutual
agreement, the hour when play is to commence; but, should they not
agree, the loser shall decide. He may choose the very moment which
will suit him best, and may even, in case of need, awake his
adversary, should the latter summon sleep to aid him in evading his
engagement.
Art. 8. The loser shall also have the right of naming the place,
whether it be railway carriage, bridge of a steamer, tent, lake,
river, plain, mountain, or desert. At a given signal, his adversary
shall be bound to follow him into the shade, the sun, or the water,
to the mast-head, or the summit of a mountain-peak.
Art. 9. On the 301st day the account shall be made up. If M. de
Morin, after having deducted the ninety thousand francs due to him
this day, is the loser, he undertakes to hand over to his adversary a
cheque on some banker in Paris, and M. Delange will at once be at
liberty to return to France. If, on the other hand, the latter is
still in his debt, he will be at liberty to frame a fresh contract
for one, two, or three hundred days, at his option, under the
conditions already set forth.
Given under our hands at Paris this tenth day of September, one
thousand eight-hundred and seventy-two.
As soon as the various clauses of this contract had been committed to
paper, M. de Morin said to the Doctor—
"You remember exactly what we have just written?"
"Perfectly."
"And you are quite sure of not forgetting it?"
"I am quite sure."
"Very well. Amongst men like ourselves I am of opinion that there is
no necessity for any written agreement. I give you my word that I
will faithfully, and to the letter, carry out these engagements. Will
you give me yours?"
"I will."
"Then I propose to burn this document."
"I agree, and thank you for your proposal."
In an instant the flames of the taper, brought for the purpose of
lighting their cigars, had reduced the contract to ashes.