Part 2

"Miss Berkeley has omitted one thing," said I maliciously.

"And, pray, what?" asked Miss Berkeley's uncle.

"Remember," she whispered, "you are supposed to be a gentleman."

I took umbrage at the word "supposed."

"Miss Berkeley must tell you what she has omitted in the course of her narrative."

"And I refuse to tell."

"Hang it, Nell, I'll wager Mr. Anonymous kissed you!" cried her uncle.

"Caught!" cried one of the ladies.

"Allow me a word," I interposed. I was already sorry. "There was a method in my action which must not be misconstrued. I believed, for a moment, that Miss Berkeley might be a new species of bunko-steerer. If she objected noisily to my salute I should find my case proved; if she cried, I was wrong."

"And?"

"She did neither. She rubbed her cheek."

"I'll warrant!" my host bawled. "Oh, this is rich! A bunko-steerer!"

"Miss Berkeley," I whispered, "we are quits."

"Not yet,"--ominously.

It was almost time for me to go!

"I was going to ask your pardon," said the uncle in his hunter-voice; "but I think you have been paid for your trouble. Is there anything you would like?"

"Three things, sir."

"And these?" he asked, while every one looked curiously at me. I was still an unknown quantity.

"My hat, my coat, and the way to the door, for I presume you have no further use for me."

My reply appealed to the guests as monstrous funny. It was some time ere the laughter subsided. My host seemed threatened with an attack of apoplexy.

"My dear sir," said he, "I beg of you to remain, not as a source for our merriment, but as the chief guest of honor. I believe you have won that place."

I turned to Miss Berkeley. "Do you bid me remain?"

Silence.

I placed my hand on the back of my chair, preparatory to sliding it from under me. She stayed me.

"Do not go,"--softly. "I haven't had my revenge."

I sat down. I was curious to learn what color this revenge was going to take. "Mr. Ainsworth, my compliments!"--raising my glass, being very careful not to touch the contents.

"Bully!" cried my host, thumping the table with his fist. "James, a dozen bottles of '96. There's a gentleman,"--nodding to those nearest him; "you can tell 'em a mile off. A little shy of strangers," humorously falling into horse-talk, "but he's money coming down the home-stretch."

Then everybody began to talk at once, and I knew that the dinner proper was on the way.

"Aren't you just a little above such escapades as this?" I asked of the girl.

"Do not make me any more uncomfortable than I am," she begged. "But having gone into it I had too much courage to back down."

"The true courage would have been to give the house-party."

"But men always insist upon your marrying them at house-parties."

"I see I have much to learn,"--meekly. "And the men are right."

"What an escape I have had!"

"Meaning house-parties, or that I am a gentleman?"

"If you had not been a gentleman! For, of course, you are, since my uncle has so dubbed you. If you had not been a gentleman!"

"If you had not been a lady! If you had been a bunko-steerer! And I do not know that you are not one still. Do you believe me? I kept my hand on my wallet pocket nearly all the time."

"I understood you to say that you were poor."

"Oh, I mean that I am too poor to hunt for excitement in bizarre things."

"Confess that you look upon me with a frank contempt!"--imperiously.

"Never!"

"That in your secret mind you write me down a silly fool."

"Allow me to quote Dogberry--'Masters, remember that I am an ass; though it be not written down, yet forget not that I am an ass!' Thus, I may not call you a fool. Besides, it would be very impolite."

"You neither eat nor drink. Why?"

"I demand to retain some of my self-respect."

She leaned on her elbows, her chin in her palms. She had wonderful eyes, and for as long a time as a minute these eyes impaled me on barbs of light. "You must think us a pack of fools."

"Oh, indeed, no; only rich."

"That is almost an epigram,"--warningly. "You will lead me to believe that you belong to smart society in some provincial town."

"Heaven forfend!"--earnestly.

"But speak all the thought. Nothing prevents truth from either of us to-night."

"All of what thought?"

"We are not fools, only rich."

"Well, I lower the bucket, then; and if I can bring truth to the top of the well you will promise not to blush on beholding her?"

"I promise."

"It is maddening and unhealthy to be rich and idle. The rich and idle do such impossible things in the wild effort to pass away the dragging hours. Society is not made up of fools: rather knaves and madmen. Money and idleness result in a mild attack of insanity."

"Thanks."

"You are welcome. Shall I lower truth along with the butter of flattery?"

"You may lower the butter of flattery. So that is how the great public looks upon us?"

"Yes, in a way; while it envies you."

"I have always been rich. What is poverty like?"

"It is comparative."

"It must be horrid."

"Poverty is ugly only when man himself is the cause of it."

"Another epigram. I have always been under my uncle's care,"--with the slightest droop of the lips.

"Ah! His knowledge ends at the stable and begins at the table: horses and vintages. If a woman had crossed his path he would have been a great man."

"Poor Uncle Dan! To him I am his favorite filly, and he has put huge sums on me to win the ducal race. Everybody says that I'm to marry the Duke of Roxclift."

"And you?" I do not know why my heart sank a little as I put this question.

"I? Oh, I'm going to balk at the quarter and throw the race. To-night, what would you have done in my place?"

"Hailed a gentleman exactly like myself."

She dallied with a rose, brushing it across her lips. "I do not know why I desire your good opinion. Perhaps it's the novelty of sitting beside a man who does not believe in flattery."

"Flattery is a truth that is not true. I think you are charming, beautiful, engaging, enchanting, mystifying. I can think of no other adjectives."

"If flattery is a truth that is not true, then all your pretty adjectives mean nothing."

"Oh, but I do not flatter you. Men flatter homely women--homely women who are rich and easily hoodwinked. What I have offered you in the line of decorative adjectives your mirror has already told you time and time again. If I said that you were witty, scholarly, scientific, vastly and highly intellectual, not knowing you any better than I do, that would be flattery. Do you grasp the point?"

"Nebulously. You are trying to say something nice."

"We are getting on capitally. When I left the club to-night the wildest stretch of my fancy would not have placed me here beside you."

"Yes,"--irrelevantly, "most of us are mad. Everything is so monotonous."

"To-night?"

"Well, not to-night."

"You have not yet asked me who I am."

"Then you are somebody?"--drolly. She contemplated me, speculatively as it were.

I laughed. This was the most amusing and enchanting adventure I had ever had the luck to fall into. "The world thinks so," I replied to her question.

"The world? What world?"

"My world ... and a part of yours."

"Are you one of those men who accomplish something besides novel dinners?"

"So I am led to believe."

"In what way?"

"Ah, but that is a secret."

She shrugged. Evidently she was incredulous. "Are you an actor?" suddenly recollecting where she had picked me up.

"Only in 'All the world's a stage.'"

"I will ask you: Will you do me the honor of telling me who you are?"

"My self-respect denies me that pleasure."

"Fiddlesticks!" This was very human.

"Is it possible that I am interesting you?"--surprised.

"You are a clever man, whoever and whatever you are. Where did you learn to read a woman so readily? Who told you that when you confront a woman with a mystery you trap her interest along with her curiosity? Yes, you are clever. If you told me your name and your occupation I dare say I should straightway become bored."

"Truth still shivers on the well's edge."

She nibbled the rose-leaves.

"Does your interest in episodes like to-night always die so suddenly?"--nodding toward the others, who had long since ceased to pay me any particular attention.

"Nearly always."

"Very well; since they have forgotten us let us forget them." I leaned toward her, and my voice was not so steady as it should have been. "In what manner would it benefit me to tell you my name and what my occupation in the great world is? Would it put me on the list of your acquaintance?"

She eyed me thoughtfully. "That depends."

"Upon what?"

"Whether you were worth knowing. I addressed other gentlemen in front of your club. They politely said I had made a mistake."

"They were old or married."

"That wasn't it."

"Then they didn't see you in the light, as I did."

"What difference would that have made?"

"All the difference in the world. But you have tabooed flattery. I see that I should have been a barber, a mild lunatic, or a detective."

"You would have been easier to dispose of."

I directed my gaze toward the door, and she surrendered a smile.

"You might be worth knowing,"--musingly.

"I promise to be."

"I shall give it thought. I should never forgive myself if I were the indirect cause of your joining this carnival of fools."

"I see that I shall last longer in your thoughts as the Unknown."

"Eat," she commanded.

"I am not hungry; I have dined."

"Drink, then."

"I am not thirsty."

She took my glass and poured the contents into hers, then handed it to me. "Now!" she said.

"Why?"

"You make me think of Monte Cristo: what terrible revenge are you going to take?"

"It will be upon myself: that of never forgetting you."

"One single sip!"

I accepted the glass and took one sip. "Now I have lost what I desired to retain--my respect. So long as I touched nothing at this table I held the advantage. My name is--"

She put her hands over her ears. "Don't!"

"Very well: the woman tempted me."

"Haven't you a better epigram?"

"Perhaps I am saving them."

"For what?"

"Who knows that I am not writing a play?"

"I live here; a card will find me on Thursdays after four."

"I will come Wednesdays, thereby saving you the trouble."

"That is not wit; it is rudeness. Do not come either Thursdays or Wednesdays."

"How shall you know who it is?"

"Trust a woman."

"Ah, here comes the butler with the liqueurs. I am glad. Presently I should be making love to you; now I am about to be free."

"Are you quite sure?"--with a penetrating glance. I believe she knew the power of her beauty.

"Well, I shall be free to go home where I belong,"--compromising.

And I rose. Perhaps the drollest episode of the dinner took place as I started for the door.

"Ever heard of Starlight?" cried Uncle Daniel down the room. "No? Well, she's down on the winter books at fifty to one. Stack your money on her now; it's a hunch."

"Thank you," said I. I did not have the courage to ask him what a "hunch" was.

"Good night," said I to the girl, bowing.

"Good night," smiling.

I wonder if she knew that I had stolen the rose? On the way home my mind returned to my play. Had the fourth act gone off as smoothly as the others?

What a girl for a man!

The curtain fell on the first act, and the thrilling sound of beating hands came to me dimly.

"They are calling for you," said Shaw excitedly.

"What am I to do?"--nervously.

"What? Haven't you thought out something to say?"--disgustedly.

"Nary a word!"

"Well, just lead out Miss Blank and bow. You're not an old hand, so they will let you off without a speech."

So I led the young woman who had helped to make me famous to the footlights, and bowed. I do not know what caused me to glance up toward the left upper proscenium, but I did so ... and felt my heart stop and then throb violently. It was Miss Berkeley. Heaven only knows how long I should have stared at her but for the warning pressure of the actress' hand over mine. We disappeared behind the curtain. I was confused by many emotions.

While the hands were shifting about the next "set" a boy handed me the crumpled margin of a program. I unfolded it and read: "Will 'Mr. Anonymous' do Miss Berkeley the honor of visiting her box?"

"Mr. Anonymous" presented himself forthwith. Miss Berkeley was with an elderly woman, who proved to be her grandaunt. I was introduced.

"Aunty, this is the gentleman I told you about. Isn't it terrible?"

"Terrible? I should call it wholly enchanting. Sir, you will pardon the child for her wildness. My nephew doesn't know as much as his celebrated horses. Now, go ahead and talk while I look over the audience."

If only all elderly ladies were as thoughtful!

"And I have read your books; I have witnessed your play!" Miss Berkeley said.

"Thursday, after four?"

"No. Everybody calls then. Come Wednesday."

"I have a confession to make," said I. "You dropped a rose on the floor last night. I stole it. Must I return it to you?"

"I never do anything without a purpose," was all she said.

So I kept the rose.

THE BLIND MADONNA

THE ADVENTURE OF THE GOLDEN LOUIS

It had rained all day, a miserable drizzling rain, cold and foggy.

The horses had remained in the stables, the dogs in the kennels, and the fox in the chicken-coop. I stole out during luncheon to take a look at Master Reynard. He looked shamefaced and bedraggled enough, shut up in that coop. I felt sorry for him, and told Mrs. Chadwick so.

"At least you might have given him a chicken for company," I said. "He looked disgusted with life."

Mrs. Chadwick smiled and remarked that she would see that Master Reynard had his chicken.

"Do you think he would prefer it broiled or baked?"

From then on I had played ping-pong, bridge and billiards, and made violent love to three or four married women because it was safe, and easy, and politic--and exciting. I had an idea for a story, but needed a married woman's opinion as to how it should properly end.

The end was still hidden in a nebulous uncertainty as the colonel (our host) led us men into the armory, with its huge fireplace, its long basswood table upon which we had at various times carved our initials, its gunracks and trophies of the chase. A servant passed around fine Scotch and brandy and soda, with which we proceeded to tonic our appetites; for dinner was to be announced within an hour. I took out my penknife and went on with my uncompleted carving.

Renwood, who owned a fine racing-stable, brought up the subject which had interested us during the mail hour that morning: the losses which Cranford had suffered in an exclusive gambling house in New York City.

"Thirty thousand is a fat lump to lose this side of the Atlantic," Renwood observed.

"Not beyond the Rockies," added Collingwood, who had done some fancy mining in Nevada. "I saw Judge Blank lose seventy-five thousand at faro one night in Carson City."

"What did Cranford play,--roulette or faro?" I asked.

"The papers say roulette," replied Renwood. "It's a bad game. There is some chance at faro, if the game is square. But roulette; bah! It is plain robbery."

"The blind Madonna of the Pagan, as Stevenson called chance," mused the colonel, lighting a cigar. "I often wonder if gambling is not as much a particle of our blood as salt. Perhaps you have all wondered why I never have kept a racing-stable, why I play bridge and poker for fun. I remember--"

Chairs moving noisily in the colonel's direction interrupted him. I doubled up my knife and carried my Scotch to his end of the table.

"If it's a story, Colonel," said Old Fletcher, navy, retired, "let's have it."

The colonel took out his watch and eyed it critically.

"We have just three-quarters of an hour. Did you ever hear of how I broke one of the roulette banks at Monte Carlo?"

"Why, you old reprobate!" exclaimed Fletcher; "you've just told us that you never gambled."

"I merely said that I do not," replied the colonel.

"Broke the bank?" cried Renwood. "You never told me about that."

"I have never told any one. I ought not to tell you--"

"You can't back out of it now," said I.

"Not in a thousand years," echoed Fletcher. "If you took any gold away from Monte Carlo, I want to hear all about it."

"Very well," acquiesced the colonel; "but the tale must not go beyond this armory;" and he looked at me as he said it.

"Oh, I shouldn't mention any names," I declared; "and I should twist it around some."

There was an interval of silence, broken only by the rattling of the ice in Collingwood's glass.

Our host was a man of about forty-eight. His hair was white, but his face was youthful and amazingly handsome; and I knew many a woman who envied Mrs. Chadwick, even as many a man envied the colonel. I never saw a handsomer pair, or a pair so wrapt up in each other. I shall let the colonel tell his own story, which needs no embellishments from me.

In the spring of 1887 I packed up and took passage for England. The slump in Wall Street the preceding winter had left me with only seven thousand in cash, and this estate heavily mortgaged. The only way I could save the seven thousand and what remained of the property was to get away from the Street.

I made my sister a short visit. I had been one of the ushers at her wedding, and her husband, Lord Rexford, thought I was a jolly good lad because I was the only sober man at the bachelor dinner at the Richmond. This was due to a little invention of my own which I acquired at Harvard in my college days: putting plenty of olive oil on my salad. I played golf over his lordship's course, fished and hunted over his really fine preserves; and in return told him not to invest in Southern Pacific till the following year.

It was my misfortune to run into Jack Smeed in London. He was a classmate of mine, and one of the best fellows that ever lived. But he was the most splendid spendthrift I ever came across. He showed me Paris as few foreigners have seen it.

At that time he was a famous war correspondent, art critic and poet. He inveigled me and my seven thousand to Dieppe. It was still summer. One night we visited a gambling casino. I had gambled in stocks, but had never played straight gambling, thinking it too tame a sport for a speculator. Tame! I smile these days when I think of my adventure; but heaven knows I did not smile then.

Very well. Smeed aroused the latent gambler's blood in my veins, and I began to play.

"Never play a system," said Smeed one night, after having won something like ten thousand francs. "Systems make gambling a vice. Take your chance on any old number, if it's roulette. If you are lucky you will win, no matter where you play. Systems and suicides were born of the same mother."

A week later he received one of those historic telegrams, calling him to some African outbreak, or Indian, I can't recall which. At any rate, it left me alone in Dieppe. I had been passably fortunate at roulette; that is to say, I invariably won back what I lost. I believe I had about five thousand of the original seven. Dieppe is very enticing in the summer: the bands, the hotels, the handsome women, the military and the sea.

The night after Smeed had gone I sauntered over to the tables and played a modest stake, won and lost, won and lost again. The blind Madonna was merely flirting with me, luring me on.

I suddenly threw restraint to the winds, and plunged. I won heavily, and then began to lose. Unconsciously I had discovered a system, and like a stubborn fool I stuck to it--29 and 26. Neither of these numbers came up till more than four thousand of my capital had taken its place at the croupier's elbow. I had been sensible enough to leave some of my money at the hotel.

I went away from the tables, perspiring and burning with fever. I cursed the blind Madonna, and counted over the money I had remaining. It was exactly seven hundred. This would pay my passage home.

But the spirit of gambling ran riot in my veins. Besides, I thirsted for revenge. What! give up? Bah! all or nothing!

I returned, and placed the seven hundred on black. I won. I stuffed the original stake in my pocket and put the winnings on the odd. I won again. I had twenty-one hundred; so I stopped and watched the game. I observed a handsome young boy plunging madly; he was losing, but in a lordly fashion.

When I got back to my room I flipped up a coin to see whether I should stay in Dieppe or leave in the morning for Paris, where my sister was a guest of the wife of one of the British _attachés_.

When a man gambles he wants to do it thoroughly. Heads, I was to go; tails, I was to remain and buck the tiger. Heads it fell; and I packed my trunk. No more of the blind Madonna for me, I vowed. I had had enough, perhaps more than enough. But one does not lose the habit overnight.

On the way from Dieppe to Paris a veiled woman entered my carriage, which was third, nothing else being obtainable. Rather, she entered immediately after I did. She was accompanied by a young man of twenty-one or two. His face was good to look at, but at present it was marred by sullen chagrin and despair. Occasionally I saw the girl's hands close convulsively. These hands were so beautifully small and white that I was anxious to see their owner's face; but this pleasure was denied me.

Presently she addressed me in German, inquiring the time we should reach Paris.

I don't know what possessed me, but I replied in French that I did not understand German. She repeated the question in French, and I answered. The young man took out his fob, and I could see that his watch was gone.

Half an hour passed. I tried to read the magazines, but invariably found myself gazing in the direction of the girl. After a space I heard her address the young man in German.

"What have you done? What have you done?" It was a very pathetic voice, verging on tears.

"Curse it, what's the use of taking on so? The money's gone; sniveling won't bring it back." He thrust his hands into his pockets and scowled at his boots. Suddenly he raised his eyes and stared suspiciously at me. Evidently an idea struck him. "Betty, perhaps this fellow opposite can understand German."

I never turned a hair. Somehow I was positive that he was the girl's brother. And just then it occurred to me that I had seen his face before, but where, I could not tell.

"But what shall we do? You dare not write home, and I have given you all but passage money, and I will not let you have that."

She was not German, but she spoke that language with a sweetness and fluency impossible to describe.

"But the pater will stand another call from you," the youth declared.

"And immediately suspect the cause. Oh, that you should do such a thing! And I trusted you! Something told me not to let you carry the money."

"Oh, bother!" This was said in good English; and I looked over the top of my magazine.

"What made you do it?" wailed the girl. "Six thousand pounds, and father gave five of it to you to buy consols with. It will break his heart, and mother's too. It was all the ready money he had."

"Curse it, I'd have broke the bank in another moment. But 17, 20 and 32 never came up till all my cash was gone. Why, I had the maximum on black, even, the second dozen, and 20, one play. If it had come up I'd have broke the bank."

"But it didn't come up; it never does. What will you do? What excuse will you have?"

"I can tell the pater that I was robbed,"--lamely.

"You wouldn't lie, Dick!"

"Oh, of course not. I'll get it of old Uncle Lewis. My chance at the estate is worth twenty times six thousand. Damn the luck!" The youth swore softly in his native tongue, and I could see the sparkle of a tear behind the girl's veil.

Ah! I recollected. It was the young fellow whom I had seen at the Casino, plunging heavily. These roulette wheels were pretty gruesome things. I congratulated myself on being out of it. But I passed the congratulations a little too early, as will be seen. Your Uncle Lewis, I thought, would never get his pawnbroker's claws on any of my property.