Chapter 13

THE ROULETTE-WHEEL

I stared at the scene in amazement, for the transition from the dark tunnel through which I had come was an astounding one, and I could hardly believe the evidence of my eyes.

I had passed right through the hollow heart of those mighty hills and now stood underneath the huge glacier, with its million tons of ice above me, from which the cataracts tumbled, drenching me with spray, though I was fully a hundred yards away from the log _château_.

The building was located, as I had surmised, upon a narrow strip of land, invisible from above except where its tongue, containing the enclosed yard, ran out into the lake. It stood far back beneath the over-hanging ledge and seemed to be secured against the living rock. It was evident that there was no other approach except the tunnel through which I had come, for all around the land that turbulent whirlpool raved, where the two cataracts contended for the mastery of the waters.

And for countless ages they must have fought together thus, and neither gained, not since the day when those mountains rose out of the primeval ooze.

Within the enclosed space, which was larger than I had thought on viewing it from above, were two or three small cabins--inhabited, probably, by habitant or half-breed dependents of the seigneur.

I must have crouched for nearly an hour at the tunnel entrance, staring in stupefied wonder--for it grew dark, and one by one lights began to flare at the windows until the whole north wing and central portion of the building were illuminated. But the south wing, nearest me, was dark, and I surmised that this portion was not occupied.

Fortune still seemed to favour me, and with this conclusion and the thought of Jacqueline, I gained courage to advance again.

It was almost dark now and growing bitterly cold. I felt in my pocket for my pistol and loaded it with the two cartridges that alone remained of the lot I had brought with me. Then I advanced stealthily until I stood beneath the cataract; and here I found the spray no longer drenched me. The splendid torrent shot out like a crystal-arch above me--so strong and compact that only those at some distance could feel the mist that veiled it like a luminous garment.

I came upon a door in the dark wing and, turning the handle noiselessly, found myself inside the _château_. And at once my ears were filled with yells and coarse laughter in men's and women's voices.

There was no storm-door, and the interior of the _château_--at least, the wing in which I found myself--was almost as cold as the outside. I stood still, hesitating which way to take. A fiddle was being played somewhere, and the bursts of noisy laughter sounded at intervals.

As my eyes became accustomed to my surroundings I perceived that I was standing near the foot of an uncarpeted wooden stairway. There was a dark room with an open door immediately in front of me, and another at the farther end of the passage, from beneath which a glimmer of light issued, and it was from this room that the sounds of laughter and music came.

While I was pondering upon my next movement, heavy footsteps fell on the story above me, and a man began coming down the stairs. I stole into the dark room in front of me, and had hardly ensconced myself there than he brushed past and went into the room at the end of the hallway.

And I was certain that he was Leroux.

It was evident that he had not closed the door behind him, for the sounds of the fiddle and of the revellers became much more distinct, I had left my snowshoes near the entrance to the tunnel, and my moccasins made no sound upon the floor.

I crept out of my hiding place and went toward the open door. As I had surmised, this was the place of the assemblage. I crouched there, with my pistol in my hand. On the opposite side of the room Simon Leroux was standing, a sneering smile upon his face.

The scene I saw through the crack of the door quite took my breath away.

The room was an enormous one, evidently forming the entire central portion of the _château_. It was a ballroom, or had been a ballroom, once, for it had a wide hardwood floor, somewhat worn and uneven. The walls were hung with portraits, evidently of the owner's ancestors, for I caught a glimpse of several faces in wigs and periwigs.

The furniture was of an old type. Pushed against one wall, near where Leroux stood, was an ancient piano, and standing upon the other side an old man played upon a violin.

He must have been nearly eighty years of age. His face had fallen in over the toothless gums, leaving the prominent cheek-bones protruding like those of a skull, and his head was a heavy mat of straight grey hair. He looked like a full-blooded Indian.

Two couples were dancing on the floor. Each man had an Indian woman. One was middle-aged; the other, a comely young girl with heavy silver earrings, was laughing noisily as her companion dragged her to a standstill in front of the fiddler.

"Play faster, Pierre Caribou!" he yelled, pushing the old man backward.

It was the man with the patch!

"Be quiet, Jean Petitjean!" exclaimed the girl, giving him a mock blow. "Thou shall not hurt my father!"

They laughed drunkenly and resumed the dance. The man with the older woman was not--greatly to my surprise--Jean Petitjean's companion of the night. The woman was addressing him as Raoul. She seemed trying to quiet him, for he was shouting boisterously as he twirled.

From his post across the room Leroux watched the proceedings with his sneering smile.

Flaring candles were set in sconces of wrought iron around the room, casting a pallid light upon the scene, and so unreal it would have been but for my recognition of the men that I might have expected it to disappear before my eyes.

I crept back from the door and, tracing my journey along the corridor, began to ascend the stairs.

On the first story I perceived a number of rooms, but those whose doors were open were dark and apparently empty. I imagined that all the magnificence of the _château_ was concentrated in that big ballroom.

The corridor on the first story had smaller passages opening out of it--one at each end. I turned to the left. Now the sound of the cataracts, which had never left my ears, became a din. The passages were full of stale tobacco smoke. And advancing I suddenly found myself face to face with Philippe Lacroix.

He was seated at a table in a room writing, and I came right upon the door before I was aware of it. I saw his thin face with the little upturned mustache and the cold sneer about the mouth; and I think I should have shot him if he had looked up. But he neither heard nor saw me, but wrote steadily, puffing at a vile cigar, and I crept back from the door.

Thank God, Jacqueline was not among those brutes below! But I shuddered to think of her environment here.

I turned back and followed the corridor to the right, and came to a little hall toward the rear of the building, as I judged, where the noise of the torrents was less loud, although I now perceived that the _château_ was in a continual mild tremor from the force of their discharge.

The windows in this little hall were broken in several places, and had evidently been in this condition for a long time, for they were covered with strips of paper, through which the wind entered in chilling gusts. Beyond me was an open door, and behind it I saw the dull glow of a stove and felt its heat.

I approached cautiously and looked in.

I never saw a room so littered and uncared for. There were books around the walls and books upon the floor, covered with dust; there was dust and dirt and débris everywhere, and spider-webs along the walls and ceiling. The impression of the whole place was that of ruin.

Facing me, above a cracked and ancient mirror, were two rusty broad-swords, and in the mirror I saw a large, oaken table reflected. Seated at it, clothed in a threadbare coat of very ancient fashion, was an old man with long, snow-white hair and a white, forked beard. He was busily transferring a stack of gold-pieces from his right to his left side; and then he began scribbling on a sheet of paper. He paid me not the smallest attention as I entered.

Not even when I stood beside him did he look up, but went on sorting out his coins and jotting down figures upon the paper. Sheets of it, covered with penciled figures, stood everywhere stacked upon the table, and other sheets were strewn among the books upon the floor; and while I watched, the old man laid aside the sheet he had been writing on and drew another sheet from the top of a thick pile beside him.

There was a door behind his chair leading, I imagined, into a lumber-room. I walked around the room and looked through it, but the place beyond was dark.

Then I came back to the old man, who still paid me not the least attention.

Now I perceived that the top of the table was very curiously designed. It was marked off with squares and columns, and in each square were figures in black and red. Upon one end of the table at which the old man sat was a cup-shaped, circular affair of very dark wood--teak, it resembled--once delicately inlaid with pearl. But now most of the inlay had disappeared, leaving unsightly holes.

At the bottom of the cup were a number of metallic compartments, and the whole interior portion was revolving slowly at a turn of the old man's fingers.

He picked a tiny ivory ball from the table and placed it in the cup. He set the interior spinning and the ball circulating in the reverse direction. The sphere clicked and clattered as it forced its way among the metallic strips.

It may seem strange that I did not at first recognize a roulette-wheel. But the game is more a diversion of the rich than of those with whom fortune had thrown me. Gambling had never appealed to me, and I knew roulette only by reputation.

The ball stopped and settled in one of the compartments, and the old man took a gold-piece from one of the squares on the table, transferred a little pile of gold from his right side to his left, and jotted down some figures upon his paper.

And suddenly I was aware of an abysmal rage that filled me. It seemed like an abominable dream--the futile old man, the ruffians and their wenches below. And I had endured so much for Jacqueline, to find myself immeshed in such things in the end. I stepped forward and swept the entire heap of gold into the centre of the table.

"M. Duchaine!" I shouted. "Why are you playing the fool here when your daughter is suffering persecution?"

The old man seemed to be aware of my presence for the first time. He looked up at me out of his mild old eyes, and shook his head in apparent perplexity.

"You are welcome, _monsieur_," he said, half rising with a courtly air. "Do you wish to stake a few pieces in a game with me?"

He gathered up a handful of the coins and pushed them toward me.

"Of course, we shall give back our stakes at the end," he continued, eyeing me with a cunning expression, in which I seemed to detect avarice and madness, too.

"This is just to see how well we play. Afterward, if we are satisfied, we will play for real money--real gold."

He began to divide the gold-pieces into two heaps.

"You see, _monsieur_, I have a system--at least, I nearly have a system," he went on eagerly. "But it may not be so good as yours. Come. You shall be the banker, and see if you can win my money from me. But we shall return the stakes afterward."

"M. Duchaine!" I shouted in his ear. "Where is your daughter?"

"My daughter," he repeated in mild surprise. "Ah, yes; she has gone to New York to make our fortune with the system. You see," he continued with senile cunning, "she has taken away the system, and so I am not sure whether I can beat you. But make your play, _monsieur_." There was at least no indecision in the manner in which he set the wheel spinning.

I did not know what to do. I was fascinated and bewildered by the situation.

In desperation I thrust a gold-piece upon one of the numbers at the head of a column. The wheel stopped, and the ball rolled into one of its compartments. The old man thrust several gold-pieces toward me.

I staked again and again, and won every time. Within five minutes the whole heap of gold-pieces lay at my side.

The dotard looked at me with an expression of imbecile terror.

"You will give them back to me?" he pleaded. "Remember, _monsieur_, it was agreed that we should return the money."

I thrust the heap of coins toward him. "Now, M. Duchaine," I said; "in return for these you will conduct me to Mlle. Jacqueline."

He shook his head as though he had not understood.

"It is very strange," he said. "I do not understand it at all. The system cannot be at fault; and yet----"

I snatched the paper from his grasp and threw it on the floor, then pulled him to his feet.

"Enough of this nonsense, M. Duchaine," I said. "Will you conduct me to Mlle. Jacqueline immediately, or shall I go and find her?"

"I am here, _monsieur_," answered a voice at the door; and I whirled, to see Jacqueline confronting me.