Part 12

Here the Professor fell. “Confirms what?” he snapped, and saw too late the trap into which he had plunged.

“My belief that you are predestined to help me,” replied his neighbour with joyful conviction.

“Oh, but that’s quite a mistake—a complete mistake. I never in my life helped anybody, in any way. I’ve always made it a rule not to.”

“Not even a Russian refugee?”

“Never!”

“Oh, yes, you have. You’ve helped _me_!”

The Professor turned an ireful glance upon her, and she nodded. “I am a Russian refugee.”

“You?” he exclaimed. His eyes, by this time, had definitely escaped from his control, and were recording with an irrepressible activity and an exasperating precision the details of her appearance and her dress. Both were harmonious and opulent. He laughed incredulously.

“Why do you laugh? Can’t you _see_ that I’m a refugee; by my clothes, I mean? Who has such pearls but Russian refugees? Or such sables? We have to have them—to sell, of course! You don’t care to buy my sables, do you? For you they would be only six thousand pounds cash. No, I thought not. It’s my duty to ask—but I didn’t suppose they would interest you. The Paris and London jewellers farm out the pearls to us; the big dressmakers supply the furs. For of course we’ve all sold the originals long ago. And really I’ve been rather successful. I placed two sets of silver fox and a rope of pearls last week at Monte Carlo. Ah, that fatal place! I gambled away the whole of my commission the same night.... But I’m forgetting to tell you how you’ve already helped me....”

She paused to draw breath, and in the pause the Professor, who had kept his hand on his loosened ear-pad, slipped it back over his ear.

“I wear these,” he said coldly, “to avoid argument.”

With a flick she had it off again. “I wasn’t going to argue—I was only going to thank you.”

“I can’t conceive for what. In any case, I don’t want to be thanked.”

Her brows gathered resentfully. “Why did you _ask_ to be, then?” she snapped; and opening a bejewelled wrist-bag she drew forth from a smother of cigarette papers and pawn-tickets a slip of paper on which her astonished companion read a phrase written in a pointed feminine hand, but signed with his own name.

“_There!_”

The Professor took the paper and scanned it indignantly. “This copy of ‘The Elimination of Phenomena’ was presented by Professor Loring G. Hibbart of Purewater University, Clio, N. Y., to the library of the American Y. M. C. A. Refugee Centre at Odessa.

“A word of appreciation, sent by any reader to the above address, would greatly gratify Loring G. Hibbart.”

“_There!_” she repeated. “Why did you ask to be thanked if you didn’t want to be? What else does ‘greatly gratify’ mean? I couldn’t write to you from Odessa because I hadn’t the money to buy a stamp; but I’ve longed ever since to tell you what your book did for me. It simply changed my whole life—books do sometimes, you know. I saw everything differently—even our Refugee Centre! I decided at once to give up my lover and divorce my husband. Those were my two first Eliminations.” She smiled retrospectively. “But you mustn’t think I’m a frivolous person. I have my degree as a Doctor of Philosophy—I took it at sixteen, at the University of Moscow. I gave up philosophy the year after for sculpture; the next year I gave up sculpture for mathematics and love. For a year I loved. After that I married Prince Balalatinsky. He was my cousin, and enormously wealthy. I need not have divorced him, as it turned out, for he was soon afterward buried alive by the Bolsheviks. But how could I have foreseen it? And your book had made me feel—”

“Good gracious!” the author of the book interrupted desperately. “You don’t suppose _I_ wrote that rubbish about wanting to be thanked, do you?”

“Didn’t you? How could I tell? Almost all the things sent from America to the refugee camp came with little labels like that. You all seemed to think we were sitting before perfectly appointed desks, with fountain pens and stamp-cases from Bond Street in our pockets. I remember once getting a lip-stick and a Bernard Shaw calendar labelled: ‘If the refugee who receives these would write a line of thanks to little Sadie Burt of Meropee Junction, Ga., who bought them out of her own savings by giving up chewing-gum for a whole month, it would make a little American girl very happy.’ Of course I was sorry not to be able to write to little Sadie.” She broke off, and then added: “Do you know, I was sure you were my Professor as soon as I saw your name on your suit-case?”

“Good Lord!” groaned the Professor. He had forgotten to remove the obligatory steamer-labels! Instinctively he reached out a hand to tear off the offending member; but again a gesture of the Princess’s arrested him. “It’s too late now. And you can’t surely grudge me the pleasure of thanking you for your book?”

“But I _didn’t_ ask—”

“No; but I wanted to. You see, at that time I had quite discarded philosophy. I was living in the Actual—with a young officer of Preobrajensky—when the war broke out. And of course in our camp at Odessa the Actual was the very thing one wanted to get away from. And your book took me straight back into that other world where I had known my only pure happiness. Purity—what a wonderful thing it is! What a pity it is so hard to keep; like money, and everything else really valuable! But I’m thankful for any little morsel of it that I’ve had. When I was only ten years old—”

But suddenly she drew back and nestled down into her lustrous furs. “You thought I was going to tell you the story of my life? No. Put your ear-pads on again. I know now why you wear them—because you’re planning a new book. Is it not so? You see I can read your thoughts. Go on—do! I would rather assist at the birth of a masterpiece than chatter about my own insignificant affairs.”

The Professor smiled. If she thought masterpieces were born in that way—between railway stations, and in a whirl of prattle! Yet he was not wholly angry. Either because it had been unexpectedly agreeable to hear his book praised, or because of that harmonious impression which, now that he actually saw her, a protracted scrutiny confirmed, he began to feel more tolerantly toward his neighbour. Deliberately, his eyes still on hers, he pushed the other ear-pad away.

“Oh—” she said with a little gasp. “Does that mean I may go on talking?” But before he could answer, her face clouded. “I know—it only means that I might as well, now that I’ve broken in on your meditations. I’m dreadfully penitent; but luckily you won’t have me for long, for I’m getting out at Cannes, and Cannes is the next station. And that reminds me of the enormous little favour I have to ask.”

The Professor’s face clouded also: he had a nervous apprehension of being asked favours. “My fountain pen,” he said, regaining firmness of tone, “is broken.”

“Ah—you thought I meant to ask for your autograph? Or perhaps for a cheque?” (Lord, how quick she was!) She shook her head. “No, I don’t care for compulsory autographs. And I’m not going to ask for money—I’m going to give you some.”

He faced her with renewed dismay. Could it be—? After all, he was not more than fifty-seven; and the blameless life he had led had perhaps helped to preserve a certain ... at least that was _one_ theory.... In these corrupt European societies what might a man not find himself exposed to? With some difficulty he executed a pinched smile.

“_Money?_”

She nodded again. “Oh, don’t laugh! Don’t think I’m joking. It’s your ear-pads,” she disconcertingly added.

“My—?”

“Yes. If you hadn’t put them on I should never have spoken to you; for it wasn’t till afterward that I saw your name on the suit-case. And after that I should have been too shy to break in on the meditations of a Great Philosopher. But you see I have been watching—oh, for years!—for your ear-pads.”

He stared at her helplessly. “You want to buy them from me?” he asked in terror, wondering how on earth he would be able to get others in a country of which he did not speak the language.

She burst into a laugh that ran up and down the whole scale of friendly derision and tender mockery.

“Buy them? Gracious, no! I could make myself a better pair in five minutes.” She smiled at his visible relief. “But you see I’m ruined—stony broke; isn’t that what they call it? I have a young American friend who is always saying that about himself. And once in the Caucasus, years ago, a gipsy told me that if ever I had gambled away my last penny (and I nearly _have_) it would all be won back by a pale intellectual looking man in velvet ear-pads, if only I could induce him to put a stake on the tables for me.” She leaned forward and scrutinized him. “You _are_ very pale, you know,” she said, “and very intellectual looking. I was sure it was you when you told me you’d been ill.”

Professor Loring D. Hibbart looked about him desperately. He knew now that he was shut up with a madwoman. A harmless one, probably; but what if, in the depths of that jewelled bag, a toy revolver lurked under the pawn-tickets and the cigarette papers? The Professor’s life had been so guarded from what are known as “exciting situations” that he was not sure of his ability to meet one with becoming tact and energy.

“I suppose I’m a physical coward,” he reflected bitterly, an uncomfortable dampness breaking out all over him. “And I _know_,” he added in self-extenuation, “that I’m in no condition yet for any sort of a struggle....” But what did one do with lunatics? If only he could remember! And suddenly he did: one humoured them!

Fortified by the thought, he made shift to glance more kindly toward the Princess Balalatinsky. “So you want me to gamble for you?” he said, in the playful tone he might have adopted in addressing little Sadie Burt of Meropee.

“Oh, how glorious of you! You will? I _knew_ you would! But first,” she broke off, “you must let me explain—”

“Oh, do explain, of course,” he agreed, rapidly calculating that her volubility might make the explanation last until they reached the next station, where, as she had declared, she was to leave the train.

Already her eye was less wild; and he drew an inward breath of relief.

“You angel, you! I _do_,” she confessed, “simply love to talk about myself. And I’m sure you’ll be interested when I tell you that, if you’ll only do as I ask, I shall be able to marry one of your own compatriots—such a beautiful heroic youth! It is for him, for him only, that I long to be wealthy again. If you loved, could you bear to see your beloved threatened with starvation?”

“But I thought,” he gently reminded her, “that it was you who were threatened with starvation?”

“We _both_ are. Isn’t it terrible? You see, when we met and loved, we each had the same thought—to make the other wealthy! It was not possible, at the moment, for either of us to attain our end by the natural expedient of a rich marriage with reasonable prospect of a quick divorce—so we staked our all at those accursèd tables, and we both lost! My poor betrothed has only a few hundred francs left, and as for me, I have had to take a miserably paid job as a dressmaker’s _mannequin_ at Cannes. But I see you are going on to Monte Carlo (yes, that’s on your luggage too); and as I don’t suppose you will spend a night there without visiting the rooms, I—” She was pulling forth the hundred francs from her inexhaustible bag when the Professor checked her with dismay. Mad though she might be, he could not even make believe to take her money.

“I’m _not_ spending a night at Monte Carlo,” he protested. “I’m only getting out there to take a motorbus for a quiet place up in the hills; I’ve the name written down somewhere; my room is engaged, so I couldn’t possibly wait over,” he argued gently.

She looked at him with what seemed to his inflamed imagination the craftiness of a maniac. “Don’t you know that our train is nearly two hours late? I don’t suppose you noticed that we ran over a crowded excursion charabanc near Toulon? Didn’t you even hear the ambulances rushing up? Your motorbus will certainly have left Monte Carlo when you arrive, so you’ll _have_ to spend the night there! And even if you don’t,” she added persuasively, “the station’s only two steps from the Casino, and you surely can’t refuse just to nip in for half an hour.” She clasped her hands in entreaty. “You wouldn’t refuse if you knew my betrothed—your young compatriot! If only we had a few thousands all would go smoothly. We should be married at once and go to live on his ancestral estate of Kansas. It appears the climate is that of Africa in summer and of the Government of Omsk in winter; so our plan is to grow oranges and breed sables. You see, we can hardly fail to succeed with two such crops. All we ask is enough money to make a start. And that you will get for me tonight. You have only to stake this hundred franc note; you’ll win on the first turn, and you’ll go on winning. You’ll see!”

With one of her sudden plunges she pried open his contracted fist and pressed into it a banknote wrapped in a torn envelope. “Now listen; this is my address at Cannes. Princess Balala—oh, here’s the station. Good-bye, guardian angel. No, _au revoir_; I shall see you soon. They call me Betsy at the dressmaker’s....”

Before he could open his convulsed fingers, or dash out after her, she had vanished, bag and baggage, in the crowd and confusion of the platform; other people, pushing and chattering and tearing themselves from the embrace of friends, had piled into her place, and were waving from the window, and blocking the way out; and now the train was moving on, and there he sat in his corner, aghast, clutching the banknote....

II

At Monte Carlo the Professor captured a porter and rescued his luggage. Exhausted by this effort, and by the attempt to communicate with the porter, first in Latin and then in French as practised at Purewater, he withdrew to a corner of the waiting-room and fished in his pockets for the address of the quiet _pension_ in the hills. He found it at last, and handed it wearily to the porter. The latter threw up his hands. “_Parti! Parti! Autobus_ gone.” That devil of a woman had been right!

When would there be another, the Professor asked.

Not till tomorrow morning at 8:30. To confirm his statement the porter pointed to a large time-table on the wall of the waiting-room. The Professor scanned it and sat down again with a groan. He was about to consult his companion as to the possibility of finding a night’s lodging in a respectable _pension_ (fantastic as the idea seemed in such a place); but hardly had he begun: “Can you tell me where—” when, with a nod of comprehension and a wink of complicity, the porter returned in fluent English: “Pretty ladies? Turkish bath? Fottographs?”

The Professor repudiated these suggestions with a shudder, and leaving his bags in the cloak-room set forth on his quest. He had hardly taken two steps when another stranger of obviously doubtful morality offered him a pamphlet which he was indignantly rejecting when he noticed its title: “The Theory of Chance in Roulette.” The theory of chance was deeply interesting to the Professor, and the idea of its application to roulette not without an abstract attraction. He bought the pamphlet and sat down on the nearest bench.

His study was so absorbing that he was roused only by the fall of twilight, and the scattered twinkle of many lamps all radiating up to the central focus of the Casino. The Professor started to his feet, remembering that he had still to find a lodging. “And I must be up early to catch the bus,” he reminded himself. He took his way down a wide empty street apparently leading to a quieter and less illuminated quarter. This street he followed for some distance, vainly scrutinizing the houses, which seemed all to be private dwellings, till at length he ran against a slim well-set-up young fellow in tennis flannels, with a bright conversational eye, who was strolling along from the opposite direction.

“Excuse me, sir,” said the Professor.

“What for?” rejoined the other, in a pleasant tone made doubly pleasant by the familiar burr of the last word, which he pronounced like _fur_.

“Why, you’re an American!” exclaimed the Professor.

“Sher_lock_!” exulted the young man, extending his hand. “I diagnose the same complaint in yourself.”

The Professor sighed pleasurably. “Oh, yes. What I want,” he added, “is to find a plain quiet boarding-house or family hotel.”

“Same as mother used to make ’em?” The young man reflected. “Well, it’s a queer place in which to prosecute your search; but there _is_ one at Monte, and I’m about the only person that knows it. My name’s Taber Tring. Come along.”

For a second the Professor’s eye rested doubtfully on Mr. Tring. He knew, of course—even at Purewater it was known—that in the corrupt capitals of Europe one could not always rely implicitly on the information given by strangers casually encountered; no, not even when it was offered with affability, and in the reassuring twang of the Western States. But after all Monte Carlo was not a capital; it was just an absurd little joke of a town crammed on a ledge between sea and mountain; and a second glance at the young man convinced the Professor that he was as harmless as the town.

Mr. Tring, who seemed quick at thought-reading, returned his look with an amused glance.

“Not much like our big and breezy land, is it? These Riviera resorts always remind me of the subway at rush hours; everybody strap-hanging. But my landlady is an old friend, and I know one of her boarders left this morning, because I heard her trying to seize his luggage. He got away; so I don’t see why you shouldn’t have his room. See?”

The Professor saw. But he became immediately apprehensive of having his own luggage seized, an experience unprecedented in his history.

“Are such things liable to occur in this place?” he enquired.

“What? A scrap with your landlady? Not if you pay up regularly; or if she likes you. I guess she didn’t like that other fellow; and I know he was always on the wrong side of the tables.”

“The tables—do you refer to the gambling tables?” The Professor stopped short to put the question.

“That’s it,” said the other.

“And do you yourself sometimes visit the gambling-rooms?” the Professor next enquired.

“Oh, hell,” said Taber Tring expressively.

The Professor scrutinized him with growing interest. “And have you a theory of chance?”

The young man met his gaze squarely. “I have; but it can’t be put into language that would pass the censor.”

“Ah—you refer, no doubt, to your personal experience. But, as regards the theory—”

“Well, the theory has let me down to bedrock; and I came down on it devilish hard.” His expression turned from apathy to animation. “I’m stony broke; but if you’d like to lend me a hundred francs to have another try—”

“Oh, no,” said the Professor hastily; “I don’t possess it.” And his doubts began to stir again.

Taber Tring laughed. “Of course you don’t; not for lending purposes. I was only joking; everybody makes that joke here. Well, here’s the house; I’ll go ahead and rout out our hostess.”

They stopped before a pleasant-looking little house at the end of the street. A palmtree, a couple of rose-bushes and a gateway surmounted by the word _Arcadie_ divided it from the pavement; the Professor drew a breath of relief as a stout lady in an orange wig bustled out to receive him.

In spite of the orange wig her face was so full of a shrewd benevolence that the Professor felt sure he had reached a haven of rest. She welcomed him affably, informed him that she had a room, and offered to lead him up to it. “Only for tonight, though? For it is promised to a Siamese nobleman for tomorrow.”

This, the Professor assured her, made no difference, as he would be leaving at daylight. But on the lowest step of the stair he turned and addressed himself to Mr. Tring.

“Perhaps the lady would be good enough to have my bags brought up from the station? If you would kindly explain that I’m going out now to take a little stroll. As I’m leaving so early tomorrow it’s my only chance to have a look around.”

“That’s so; I’ll tell her,” the young man rejoined sympathetically; and as the Professor’s hand was on the gate, he heard Mr. Tring call out, mimicking the stentorian tones of a megaphone man on a sight-seeing motorbus: “Third street to the left, then first right to the tables”; after which he added, in his natural tone: “Say, Arcadia locks up at midnight.”

The Professor smiled at the superfluous hint.

III

Having satisfied a polyglot door-keeper as to his nationality, and the fact that he was not a minor, the Professor found himself in the gambling-rooms. They were not particularly crowded, for people were beginning to go out for dinner, and he was able to draw fairly near to the first roulette table he encountered.

As he stood looking over the shoulders of the players he understood that no study of abstract theories could be worth the experience acquired by thus observing the humours of the goddess in her very temple. Her caprices, so ably seconded by the inconceivable stupidity, timidity or rashness of her votaries, first amused and finally exasperated the Professor; he began to feel toward her something of the annoyance excited in him by the sight of a pretty woman, or any other vain superfluity, combined with the secret sense that if he chose he could make her dance to his tune, and that it might be mildly amusing to do so. He had felt the same once or twice—but only for a fugitive instant—about pretty women.

None, however, had ever attracted him as strongly as this veiled divinity. The longing to twitch the veil from her cryptic features became violent, irresistible. “Not one of these fools has any idea of the theory of chance,” he muttered to himself, elbowing his way to a seat near one of the croupiers. As he did so, he put his hand into his pocket, and found to his disgust that it contained only a single five franc piece and a few _sous_. All the rest of his money—a matter of four or five hundred francs—lay locked up in his suit-case at _Arcadie_. He anathematized his luck in expurgated language, and was about to rise from the table when the croupier called out: “_Faites vos jeux, Messieurs_.”

The Professor, with a murmured expletive which was to a real oath what Postum is to coffee, dropped back into his place and flung his five franc piece on the last three numbers. He lost.

Of course—in his excitement he had gone exactly contrary to his own theory! It was on the first three that he had meant to stake his paltry bet. Well; now it was too late. But stay—

Diving into another pocket, he came with surprise on a hundred franc note. Could it really be his? But no; he had an exact memorandum of his funds, and he knew this banknote was not to be thus accounted for. He made a violent effort to shake off his abstraction, and finally recalled that the note in question had been pressed into his hand that very afternoon as he left the train. But by whom—?

“_Messieurs, faites vos jeux! Faites vos jeux! Le jeu est fait. Rien ne va plus._”

The hundred francs, escaping from his hand, had fluttered of themselves to a number in the middle of the table. That number came up. Across the green board thirty-six other hundred franc notes flew swiftly back in the direction of the Professor. Should he put them all back on the same number? “Yes,” he nodded calmly to the croupier’s question; and the three-thousand seven hundred francs were guided to their place by the croupier’s rake.