In the Days of My Youth Part 81

"You will find Major Dalrymple in Madame de Ste. Amaranthe's boudoir, playing with M. le Vicomte de Caylus," said he, courteously, and resumed his game.

Playing with De Caylus! Sitting down amicably with De Caylus! I could not understand it.

Crowded as the rooms now were, it took me some time to thread my way across, and longer still, when I had done so, to pa.s.s the threshold of the boudoir, and obtain sight of the players. The room was very small, and filled with lookers-on. At a table under a chandelier sat De Caylus and Dalrymple. I could not see Dalrymple's face, for his back was turned towards me; but the Vicomte I recognised at once--pale, slight, refined, with the old look of dissipation and irritability, and the same restlessness of eye and hand that I had observed on first seeing him.

They were evidently playing high, and each had a pile of notes and gold lying at his left hand. De Caylus kept nervously crumbling a note in his fingers. Dalrymple sat motionless as a man of bronze, and, except to throw down a card when it came to his turn, never stirred a finger.

There was, to my thinking, something ominous in his exceeding calmness.

"At what game are they, playing?" I asked a gentleman near whom I was standing.

"At _ecarte_," replied he, without removing his eyes from the players.

Knowing nothing of the game, I could only judge of its progress by the faces of those around me. A breathless silence prevailed, except when some particular subtlety in the play sent a murmur of admiration round the room. Even this was hushed almost as soon as uttered. Gradually the interest grew more intense, and the bystanders pressed closer. De Caylus sighed impatiently, and pa.s.sed his hand across his brow. It was his turn to deal. Dalrymple shuffled the pack. De Caylus shuffled them after him, and dealt. The falling of a pin might have been heard in the pause that followed. They had but five cards each. Dalrymple played first--a queen of diamonds. De Caylus played the king, and both threw down their cards. A loud murmur broke out instantaneously in every direction, and De Caylus, looking excited and weary, leaned back in his chair, and called for wine. His expression was so unlike that of a victor that I thought at first he must have lost the game.

"Which is the winner?" I asked, eagerly. "Which is the winner?"

The gentleman who had replied to me before looked round with a smile of contemptuous wonder.

"Why, Monsieur de Caylus, of course," said he. "Did you not see him play the king?"

"I beg your pardon," I said, somewhat nettled; "but, as I said before, I do not understand the game."

"_Eh bien_! the Englishman is counting out his money."

What a changed scene it was! The circle of intent faces broken and shifting--the silence succeeded by a hundred conversations--De Caylus leaning back, sipping his wine and chatting over his shoulder--the cards pushed aside, and Dalrymple gravely sorting out little shining columns of Napoleons, and rolls of crisp bank paper! Having ranged all these before him in a row, he took out his check-book, filled in a page, tore it out and laid it with the rest. Then, replacing the book in his breast-pocket, he pushed back his chair, and, looking up for the first time since the close of the game, said aloud:--

"Monsieur le Vicomte de Caylus, I have this evening had the honor of losing the sum of twelve thousand francs to you; will you do me the favor to count this money?"

M. de Caylus bowed, emptied his gla.s.s, and languidly touching each little column with one dainty finger, told over his winnings as though they were scarcely worth even that amount of trouble.

"Six rouleaux of four hundred each," said he, "making two thousand four hundred--six notes of five hundred each, making three thousand--and an order upon Rothschild for six thousand six hundred; in all, twelve thousand. Thanks, Monsieur ... Monsieur ... forgive me for not remembering your name."

Dalrymple looked up with a dangerous light in his eyes, and took no notice of the apology.

"It appears to me, Monsieur le Vicomte Caylus," said he, giving the other his full t.i.tle and speaking with singular distinctness, "that you hold the king very often at _ecarte_."

De Caylus looked up with every vein on his forehead suddenly swollen and throbbing.

"Monsieur!" he exclaimed, hoa.r.s.ely.

"Especially when you deal," added Dalrymple, smoothing his moustache with utter _sang-froid_, and keeping his eyes still riveted upon his adversary.

With an inarticulate cry like the cry of a wild beast, De Caylus sprung at him, foaming with rage, and was instantly flung back against the wall, dragging with him not only the table-cloth, but all the wine, money, and cards upon it.

"I will have blood for this!" he shrieked, struggling with those who rushed in between. "I will have blood! Blood! Blood!"

Stained and streaming with red wine, he looked, in his ghastly rage, as if he was already bathed in the blood he thirsted for.

Dalrymple drew himself to his full height, and stood looking on with folded arms and a cold smile.

"I am quite ready," he said, "to give Monsieur le Vicomte full satisfaction."

The room was by this time crowded to suffocation. I forced my way through, and laid my hand on Dalrymple's arm.

"You have provoked this quarrel," I said, reproachfully.

"That, my dear fellow, is precisely what I came here to do," he replied.

"You will have to be my second in this affair."

Here De Simoncourt came up, and hearing the last words, drew me aside.

"I act for De Caylus," he whispered. "Pistols, of course?"

I nodded, still all bewilderment at my novel position.

"Your man received the first blow, so is ent.i.tled to the first shot."

I nodded again.

"I don't know a better place," he went on, "than Bellevue. There's a famous little bit of plantation, and it is just far enough from Paris to be secure. The Bois is hackneyed, and the police are too much about it.

"Just so," I replied, vaguely.

"And when shall we say? The sooner the better, it always seems to me, in these cases."

"Oh, certainly--the sooner the better."

He looked at his watch.

"It is now ten minutes to five," he said. "Suppose we allow them five hours to put their papers in order, and meet at Bellevue, on the terrace, at ten?"

"So soon!" I exclaimed.

"Soon!" echoed De Simoncourt. "Why, under circ.u.mstances of such exceeding aggravation, most men would send for pistols and settle it across the table!"

I shuddered. These niceties of honor were new to me, and I had been brought up to make little distinction between duelling and murder.

"Be it so, then, Monsieur De Simoncourt," I said. "We will meet you at Bellevue, at ten."

"On the terrace?"

"On the terrace."

We bowed and parted. Dalrymple was already gone, and De Caylus, still white and trembling with rage, was wiping the wine from his face and shirt. The crowd opened for me right and left as I went through the _salon_, and more than one voice whispered:--

"He is the Englishman's second."

I took my hat and cloak mechanically, and let myself out. It was broad daylight, and the blinding sun poured full upon my eyes as I pa.s.sed into the street.

"Come, Damon," said Dalrymple, crossing over to me from the opposite side of the way. "I have just caught a cab--there it is, waiting round the corner! We've no time to lose, I'll be bound."