The Serapion Brethren Volume Ii Part 21

"Taking no interest in the game, with his mind fully occupied about something else, he strolled up and down the room, just now and then casting a glance at the table, where the gold was streaming in upon the banquier from every side. All at once an elderly Colonel observed him, and cried out, 'Oh, the devil! here's the Chevalier Menars, with his luck, and none of us can win because he hasn't taken a side. This won't do. He must stake for me instantly.'

"The Chevalier tried his utmost to excuse himself, saying he knew nothing about the game. But nothing would serve the Colonel but that he must to the table w.i.l.l.y nilly.

"It happened to him exactly as it did to you, Baron. He won on every card, so that he soon had hauled in a considerable sum for the Colonel, who could not congratulate himself enough on the great idea he had been inspired with of availing himself of the celebrated luck of the Chevalier Menars.

"On the Chevalier himself his luck, which so astonished all the others, made not the slightest impression. Nay, he did not himself quite understand how it came about that his detestation of play, if possible, increased, so that the next morning, when he felt the languor and listlessness consequent on having sat up so late, and gone through the excitement, he made a firm resolution that nothing would ever induce him to enter a gambling-house again.

"This resolution was strengthened by the conduct of the old Colonel, who had the most extraordinary ill-luck as soon as he took a card in his hand, and attributed this, in the most absurd way, to the Chevalier. And he insisted, in the most importunate manner, that Menars should either play his cards for him, or at all events be at his side when he played himself, by way of exorcising the demon who placed in his hand the losing cards. We know that nowhere is there such absurd superst.i.tion as amongst gamblers. It was only with the utmost difficulty that Menars managed to shake the Colonel off. He had even to go the length of telling him he would rather fight him than stake for him; and the Colonel was by no means fond of fighting. The Chevalier cursed himself for ever having yielded to the old a.s.s at all.

"Of course the story of the Chevalier's luck could not but be pa.s.sed on from one to another, with all sorts of mysterious, inexplicable additions added on to it, representing him as a man in league with supernatural powers. But that one who had his luck should go on abstaining from touching cards was a thing which could not but give the highest idea of the firmness of his character, and much increase the consideration in which he was held.

"A year after this the Chevalier found himself in the most pressing and distressing embarra.s.sment in consequence of the non-payment to him of the trifling sum on which he managed by a struggle to live. He was obliged to confide this to his most intimate friend, who, without a moment's hesitation, helped him to what he required, at the same time telling him he was the most extraordinary, eccentric individual the world had ever probably contained.

"'Destiny,' he said, 'gives us hints, indications of the direction in which we have to seek and find our welfare, and it is only our indolence which is to blame when we neglect those hints and fail to understand them. The Power which rules over us has very distinctly whispered into your ear, "If thou wouldest have money and possessions, go and play; otherwise thou wilt for ever remain poor, needy, dependent."'

"Then, for the first time, the thought of the wonderful luck he had had at the faro table rose vividly before his mind's eye, and, waking and dreaming, he saw cards before him, and heard the monotonous _gagne-perd_ of the banquier, and the clink of the gold pieces.

"'It is true,' he said to himself, 'a single night like that one would raise me out of poverty, and free me from the terrible necessity of being a burden on my friends. It is simply a duty to follow the promptings of Destiny.'

"The same friend who advised him to take to playing went with him to the table, and, to make him easy in his mind, presented him with twenty louis d'or.

"If his game had been an extraordinary one when he was staking for the old Colonel, it was doubly so now. He drew out his cards by chance, by accident, and staked on them, whatever they happened to be. And the unseen hand of that higher Power, which is in league with that which we term 'Chance'--nay, which _is_ that Chance--directed his play. When the game was done he had won 1000 louis d'or.

"Next morning he felt in a sort of stupor on awaking. The money was lying on the table by his bed, just as he had shaken it out of his pockets. At first he thought he was dreaming. He rubbed his eyes and drew the table nearer to him. But as he gradually recollected what had happened--when he sunk his hands well into the heap of gold money, and counted the coins delightedly over and over again--suddenly there awoke in him, and pa.s.sed through his being like a poisoned breath, the love of the vile mammon. The pureness of mind which had so long been his was gone.

"He could scarcely wait till evening came to get back to the play-table. His luck continued to attend him, so that in a few weeks, during which he played every night, he had won a very large sum.

"There are two sorts of gamblers. To many the game in itself presents an indescribable, mysterious joy, quite without any reference to winning. The wonderful enchainments of the chances alternate in the most marvellous variety; the influence of the Powers which govern the issue displays itself, so that, inspired by this, our spirits stretch their wings in an attempt to reach that darksome realm, that mysterious laboratory, where the Power in question works, and there see it working. I knew a man once who used to sit alone in his room for days and nights keeping banque, and staking against himself. That man, I consider, was a proper player. Others have only the gain in view, and look upon the game as a means of winning money quickly. The Chevalier belonged to the latter cla.s.s, thereby proving the theory that the true pa.s.sion for play must exist in a person's nature, and be born with him.

"For this reason the circle within which the mere ponteur is restricted soon became too narrow for him. With the very large sum he had now won he started a banque of his own; and here, too, fortune favoured him, so that in a very short time his was the richest banque in Paris. As lies in the nature of things, to him, as the luckiest, richest banquier, resorted the greatest number of players.

"The wild rugged life of a gambler soon blotted out in him all those mental and bodily superiorities which had formerly brought him love and consideration. He ceased to be a faithful friend, an open-hearted pleasant companion, a chivalric and gallant honourer of ladies. His love for art and science was extinguished, as well as all his wish to make progress in knowledge of the desirable sort. In his deathly pale countenance and gloomy eyes, sparkling with darksome fire, was imprinted the plain expression of that devouring pa.s.sion which held him fast in its bands. It was not the love of play, it was the most detestable avarice, the craving for money, which the Devil himself had kindled within him. In one word, he was the most thorough specimen of a banquier ever seen.

"One night--though he had not, so to speak, lost very much--he found that fortune had not been quite so favourable to him as usual. And just at this juncture there came up to the table a little old weazened man, in poverty-stricken clothes, and altogether of almost disgustingly repulsive appearance. He drew a card, with shaking hand, and staked a piece of gold on it. Several of those at the table looked at him with deep amazement, and immediately behaved towards him with conspicuous despite; but he took not the slightest notice, not even by a look, far less by a word.

"He lost--lost one piece of gold after another, and the more he lost the better the other players were pleased. And when the old man, who kept on doubling his stakes, at last staked five hundred louis on a card, and lost it in a moment, one of them cried out, laughing loud, 'Well done, Signor Vertua; keep it up! Don't give in; keep up your game! You seem to me as if you would certainly break the bank, your luck is so splendid!'

"The old man darted a basilisk look at him, and ran off out of the room as quickly as he could; but only to come back in half an hour, with his pockets crammed with gold. When the final _taille_ came he could not go on, as he had lost all the money he brought with him the second time.

"The Chevalier, who, notwithstanding all the atrocity of his ongoings, still insisted on there being a certain observance of ordinary _convenance_ amongst the frequenters of his establishment, had been in the highest degree displeased at the derision and contempt with which the old man had been treated, which was sufficient reason for his talking very seriously, when the evening's play was over, to the man who had jeered at him, and to one or two others whose contemptuous behaviour to him had been the most striking, and whom the Chevalier had begged to remain behind on purpose.

"'That fellow,' one of them cried out. 'You don't know old Francesco Vertua, Chevalier, or you wouldn't find fault with us for what we did.

You would rather thank us. This Vertua, by birth a Neapolitan, has been for fifteen years here, in Paris, the most vile, foul, wicked miser and usurer that could exist. He is lost to every feeling of humanity. If his own brother were to drag himself to his door, writhing in the death agony, and curl round about his feet, he wouldn't give a louis d'or to help him. The curses and execrations of heaps of people, whole families, whom he has driven to ruin by his infernal machinations, lie heavy on him. There is n.o.body who does not pray that vengeance for what he has done, and is always doing, may overtake him and finish his sin-spotted life. He has never played, at all events since he has been in Paris, and you need not be astonished at our surprise when we saw the old skinflint come to the table. Of course we were just as delighted at his losing, for it would have been altogether too bad if fortune had favoured the scoundrel. The wealth of your banque has dazzled the old noodle. He thought he was going to pluck you, but he has lost his own feathers. But the thing I can't understand is how he can have made up his miserly mind to play so high.'

"This, however, did not prove well founded, for the next night Vertua made his appearance, and staked and lost a great deal more than on the night before. He was quite impa.s.sible all the time; in fact, he now and then smiled with a bitter irony, as one who knew how utterly differently everything would soon turn. But his losses swelled like a mountain avalanche on each of the succeeding nights, so that at last it was calculated that he had lost to the banque well on to thirty thousand louis d'or. After this, he came one night, long after the play had begun, pale as death, with his face all drawn, and stationed himself at some distance from the table, with his eyes fixed on the cards which the Chevalier was dealing. At last, when the Chevalier had shuffled, had the cards cut, and was going to begin the deal, the old man cried out, in a screaming voice, 'Stop!' Every one looked round, almost terrified. The old man elbowed his way through the crowd close up to the Chevalier, and whispered into his ear, 'Chevalier, my house in the Rue St. Honore, with all its contents, in furniture, gold, silver, and jewels, is valued at eighty thousand francs. I stake it! Do you accept?'

"'Yes,' said the Chevalier calmly, without looking at him, and began to deal.

"'Queen!' said the old man, and the queen lost. The old man fell back, and leaned against the wall, motionless as a stone image. n.o.body troubled himself further about him. When the game was over for the night, and the Chevalier and his croupiers were packing away the won money in the strong box, Vertua came wavering like a spectre forward out of his corner. In a hollow, faint voice, he said, 'One word, Chevalier; one single word.'

"'Well, what is it?' said the Chevalier, taking the key from the box and putting it in his pocket, as he surveyed the old man contemptuously from head to foot.

"'I have lost all I possessed in the world to your banque, Chevalier.

I have nothing left--nothing. I don't know where I shall lay my head to-morrow, or how I shall appease my hunger. I betake myself to you.

Lend me the tenth part of the sum you have won from me, that I may recommence my business, and raise myself from the depths of poverty.'

"'How can you be so absurd, Signor Vertua,' said the Chevalier. 'Don't you know that a banquier never lends his winnings? It would be against all the rules, and I abide by them.'

"'You are right, Chevalier,' said Vertua. 'What I asked was absurd, extravagant. Not a tenth part--lend me a twentieth part.'

"'What I tell you is,' said the Chevalier, 'that I never lend any of my winnings.'

"'Quite right,' said Vertua, his face growing paler and paler, and his looks more fixed and staring. 'Of course you can't lend. I never used to do it myself. But give an alms to a beggar. Let him have one hundred louis d'or out of the fortune which blind Chance threw to you tonight.'

"'Well, really, Signor Vertua, you understand how to bother,' was the Chevalier's answer. 'I tell you that not one hundred, nor fifty, nor twenty, nor one single louis d'or will you get out of me. I should be a lunatic to give you any help towards recommencing your shameful trade.

Fate has dashed you down into the dust like a venomous reptile, and it would be a crime to lift you up. Be off with you, and die, as you deserve to do.'

"Vertua sank down, with both his hands before his face. The Chevalier ordered his servants to take the Strong box down to the carriage, and then cried out, in a domineering way, 'When are you going to make over your house and effects to me, Signor Vertua?'

"Vertua raised himself from the ground, saying, in a firm voice, 'At once. This very moment, Chevalier. Come with me.'

"'Good,' said the Chevalier, 'you may drive there with me. To-morrow you must leave it for good and all.'

"On the way neither of them spoke. When they came to the house in the Rue St. Honore Vertua rang at the door, and a little old woman opened, and cried, when she saw him, 'Oh, saviour of the world, is it you at last, signor? Angela has been nearly dead with anxiety about you.'

"'Hush!' said Vertua. 'Heaven grant that Angela has not heard the unlucky bell. I don't want her to know that I have come.' He took the candle-holder from the amazed old woman's hand, and lighted the Chevalier up the staircase to the salon.

"'I am ready for everything,' said Vertua. 'You detest me and despise me. You ruin me for the gratification of yourself and others. But you do not know me. I will tell you, then, that I was once a gambler like yourself; that capricious fortune was as kind to me as to you; that I travelled over the half of Europe, stopping wherever high play and the expectation of large winnings attracted me to remain; that the gold in the banque which I kept was heaped up as mountain high as in your own.

I had a devoted and beautiful wife, whom I neglected, who was miserable in the midst of the most marvellous wealth. It happened once, in Genoa, when I had started my banque there, that a young Roman lost all his great fortune to me. As I begged of you to-day, he begged of me that I would lend him as much money as would, at all events, take him to Rome.

I refused, with scornful laughter, and in his despair he thrust his stiletto deep into my breast. The surgeons managed to cure me with difficulty, and my illness was long and painful. My wife nursed me, comforted me, supported me when I would have given in with the pain.

And with returning health there dawned within me, and grew stronger and stronger, a feeling which I had never known before. The gambler is a stranger to all the ordinary emotions of humanity, so that till then I had no knowledge of love, and the faithful devotion of a wife. The debt which my ungrateful heart owed to my wife burned in the depths of my soul, as well as the sense of the wickedness of the occupation to which I had sacrificed her. Like torturing spirits of vengeance appeared to me all those whose happiness, whose very existence, I had ruined, reproaching me, in hoa.r.s.e and hollow voices, with the guilt and crime of which _I_ had planted the germs. None but my wife could dispel the nameless sorrow, the terror, which then took possession of me. I made a solemn vow that I would never touch a card again. I tore myself away.

I burst the bonds which had held me. I withstood the enticements of my croupiers, who could not get on when my luck was gone from the enterprise. I had bought a small country house near Rome, and there I fled with my wife as soon as I had recovered. Alas! for only one single year was it that I was vouchsafed a peace, a happiness, a contentment, such as I had never dreamt of. My wife bore me a daughter, and died a few weeks afterwards. I was in despair. I accused heaven, and then turned round and cursed myself and my sinful career, punished in this way by the eternal power, by taking my wife from me, who saved me from destruction--the only creature on earth who gave me comfort and hope.

Like the criminal whom the dreadfulness of solitude terrifies, I fled from my country place to Paris. Angela blossomed up, the lovely counterpart of her mother. My whole heart hung upon her. For her sake I made it my business not only to keep a considerable fortune together, but to increase it. It is true that I lent money at high rates of interest. But it is a shameful calumny when I am accused of being a fraudulent usurer. Who are my accusers? Light-minded creatures, who torture and tease me till I lend them money, which they waste and squander as if it were of no value, and then are furious when I get it back from them with infallible strictness--the money which is not mine but my daughter's, whose steward I consider myself to be. Not long ago I rescued a young man from ruin and disgrace by lending him a considerable sum. I knew he was very poor, and I said nothing about repayment till I knew he had succeeded to a fortune. Then I asked him to pay me. Would you credit it, Chevalier, this light-minded scoundrel, who was indebted to me for his very existence, wanted to deny his liability, and, when the law obliged him to pay me, he called me a vile skinflint. I could tell you of plenty similar cases, which have made me hard and unfeeling when I have been met with ingrat.i.tude and baseness.

More than that, I could tell you of many bitter tears which I have wiped away, of many a prayer which has gone up to heaven for me and my Angela; but you would look upon that as boasting, and besides, as you are a gambler, you would care nothing about it. I hoped and believed that the eternal power was appeased. All delusion, for Satan was freely empowered to blind and deceive me in a more terrible manner than ever.

I heard of your luck, Chevalier. Every day I was told of this one and the other having beggared himself at your banque. Then it came to me that I was destined to pit my luck, which had never failed me, against yours--that I was destined to put an end to your career. And this idea, which nothing but madness of the most extraordinary kind could have suggested to me, left me no further peace or rest. Thus I came to your banque. Thus my terrible folly did not leave me until my fortune--no, my Angela's fortune--was all yours. But you will let my daughter take her clothes away with her, will you not?'

"'I have nothing to do with your daughter's clothes,' answered the Chevalier; 'and you may take away the beds and the ordinary household things for cooking and so forth. What do I care for rubbish of that sort? But take care that nothing of any value of that which is now my property goes away amongst them.'

"Old Vertua stared speechlessly at the Chevalier for a few seconds, then a stream of tears burst from his eyes. Like a man annihilated, all sorrow and despair, he sank down before the Chevalier with hands uplifted.

"'Have you any human feeling left in your heart?' he cried. 'Have some mercy! Remember it is not me whom you are dashing into ruin and misery, but my unoffending angel child--my Angela! Oh, have mercy upon her!

Lend her the twentieth part of the fortune you have robbed her of. I know you will allow yourself to be implored. Oh! Angela, my daughter!'

"And the old man moaned, sobbed, and called out the name of his child in heart-breaking tones.

"'I really don't think I can stand much more of this stage business of yours,' the Chevalier said indifferently, and in a bored manner. But the door opened, and a girl in a white night dress, with her hair undone, and death in her face, rushed up to old Vertua, raised him, took him in her arms, and cried, 'Oh, father, I have heard it all--I know it all! Have you lost everything?--everything? You have still your Angela. What would be the use of money if you had not Angela to take care of you. Oh, father! don't humiliate yourself more before this despicable, inhuman creature. It is not we, it is he who is poor and miserable in all his despicable riches, for he stands there in the most gruesome, comfortless loneliness. There is not one loving heart in the wide world to cling to his breast, to open to him when he is like to despair of life--of himself. Come, father, away from this house with me; let us go as quickly as we can, that the horrible creature may not gloat over our sorrow.'

"Vertua sank half senseless into a chair, whilst Angela knelt down before him, took his hands, kissed them and stroked them, and told over, with childlike prolixity, all the accomplishments and acquirements which she possessed, with which she would be able to support him comfortably, imploring him with the warmest tears to have no fear, inasmuch as life would, for the first time in her experience, begin to possess a real value and delightsomeness for her when--not for the enjoying of it, but for her father--she should st.i.tch, sew, sing, play the guitar.