by Louis Tracy
CHAPTER IX
BREAKING THE BANK
There were not many people in this part of the Casino gardens. A fewlove-making couples and a handful of others who preferred the chillyquietude of Nature to the throng of the interior promenade, made up theoccupants of the winding paths that cover the seaward slope.
At last Mensmore halted. There was no one in front, and he turned tolook if the terrace were clear behind him. He caught sight of Bruce, butdid not recognize him, and leant against a low wall, ostensibly to gazeat the sea until the other had passed.
Claude came up to him and cried cheerily:
"Hello! Is that you, Mr. Mensmore? Isn't it a lovely night?"
Mensmore, startled at being thus unexpectedly addressed by name, wheeledabout, stared at the new-comer, and said, very stiffly:
"Yes; but I felt rather seedy in the Casino, so I came here to bealone."
"Of course," answered the barrister. "You look a little out of sorts.Perhaps got a chill, eh? It is dangerous weather here, particularly onthese heavenly evenings. Come back with me to the hotel, and have astiff brandy and soda. It will brace you up."
Mensmore flushed a little at this persistence.
"I tell you," he growled, "that I only require to be left in peace, andI shall soon recover from my indisposition. I am awfully obliged to you,but--"
"But you wish me to walk on and mind my own business?"
"Not exactly that, old chap. Please don't think me rude. I am verysorry, but I _can't_ talk much to-night."
"So I understand. That is why I think it is best for you to havecompany, even such disagreeable companionship as my own."
"Confound it, man," cried the other, now thoroughly irritated; "tell mewhich way you are going and I will take the other. Why on earth cannotyou take a polite hint, and leave me to myself?"
"It is precisely because I am good at taking a hint that I positivelyrefuse to leave you until you are safely landed at your hotel. Indeed, Imay stick to you then for some hours."
"The devil take you! What do you mean?"
"Exactly what I say."
"If you don't quit this instant I will punch your head for you."
"Ah! You are recovering already. But before you start active exercisetake your overcoat off. That revolver in the breast pocket might go offaccidentally, you know. Besides, as I shall hit back, I might fetch myknuckles against it, and that would be hardly fair. Otherwise, I can doas much in the punching line as you can, any day."
This reply utterly disconcerted Mensmore.
"Look here," he said, avoiding Bruce's steadfast gaze, "what are youtalking about? What has it got to do with you, anyhow?"
"Oh, a great deal. My business principally consists in looking afterother people's affairs. Just now it is my definite intention to preventyou from blowing out your brains, or what passes for them."
"Then all I can say is that I wish you were in Jericho. It is your ownfault if you get into trouble over this matter. Had you gone about yourbusiness I would have waited. As it is--"
It so happened that the guard, having nothing better to do, strolledalong the terraces by the same path that Mensmore and Bruce hadfollowed. The first sight that met his astonished eyes, when in theflood of moonlight he discovered their identity, was the spectacle ofthese two springing at each other like a pair of wild cats.
"_Parbleu_," he shouted, "the solitary ones are fighting!"
He ran forward, drawing his short sword, ready to stick the weapon intoeither of the combatants if the majesty of the law in his own personwere not at once respected.
In reality, the affair was simple enough. Mensmore made an ineffectualattempt to draw his revolver, and Bruce pinioned him before he could gethis hand up to his pocket. Both men were equally matched, and it wasdifficult to say how the struggle might have ended had not thesword-brandishing guard appeared on the scene.
Claude, even in this excited situation, kept his senses. Mensmore, blindwith rage and the madness of one who would voluntarily plunge into theValley of the Shadow, took heed of naught save the effort to rid himselfof the restraining clutch.
"Put away your sword. Seize his arms from behind. He is a suicide,"shouted the barrister to the gesticulating and shrieking Frenchman.
Fortunately, Bruce was an excellent linguist. The man caught Mensmore'sarms, put a knee in the small of his back, and doubled him backwardswith a force that nearly dislocated his spine. In the same instantClaude secured the revolver, which he promptly pocketed.
"It is well," he said to the guard. "Here is a louis. Say nothing, butleave us."
"Monsieur understands that the honor of a French policeman--"
"I understand that if there is any report made of this affair to theauthorities you will be dismissed for negligence. Had this lunatic beenleft to your care he would now have been lying here dead. Do you doubtme?"
The guard hesitated. "Monsieur mentioned a louis," he said, for Bruce'sfinger and thumb had returned the coin to his waistcoat pocket.
This transaction satisfactorily ended, Bruce accosted Mensmore, who wasawkwardly twisting himself to see if his backbone were all right.
"You are not hurt, I hope?"
"It is matterless. Why could you not let me finish the business in myown way?"
"Because the world has some use for a man like you. Because you are amoral coward, and require support from a stronger nature. Because I didnot want to think of that girl crying her eyes out to-morrow when sheread of your death, or heard of it, as she assuredly would have done."
Mensmore, though still furious at his fellow-countryman's interference,was visibly amazed at this final reference.
"What do you know about her?" he cried.
"Nothing, save what my eyes tell me."
"They seem to tell you a remarkable lot about my affairs."
"Possibly. Meanwhile I want you to give me your word of honor that youwill not make any further attempt on your life during the next sevendays."
"The word of honor of a disgraced man! Will you accept it?"
"Most certainly."
"You are a queer chap, and no mistake. Very well, I give it. At the sametime, I cannot help dying of starvation. I lost my last cent to-night atroulette. I am hopelessly involved in debts which I cannot pay. I haveno prospects and no friends. You are not doing me a kindness, my dearfellow, in keeping me alive, even for seven days."
"You might have obtained your fare to London from the authorities of theCasino?"
"Hardly. I lost very little at roulette. I am not such a fool. My lossesare nearly all in bets over the pigeon-shooting match which I ought tohave won. I was backing myself at a game where I was apparently sure tosucceed."
"Until you were beaten by a woman's voice."
"Yes, wizard. I am too dazed to wonder at you sufficiently. Yet I wouldhave lost fifty times for her sake, though it was for her sake that Iwanted to win."
"Come, let us smoke. Sit down, and tell me all about it."
They took the nearest seat, lighting cigarettes. The guard, watchingthem from the shade of a huge palm-tree, murmured:
"Holy Virgin, what madmen are these English! They move apart, unknown;they fight; they fraternize; they consume tobacco--all within fiveminutes."
And he lovingly felt for the louis to assure himself that he was notdreaming.
"There is not much to tell," said Mensmore, who had quite recovered hisself-control, and was now trying to sum up the man who had so curiouslyentered his life at the moment when he had decided to do away with it."I came here, being a poor chap living mostly on my wits, to go in forthe pigeon-shooting tournaments. I won several, and was in fair funds.Then I fell in love. The girl is rich, well-connected, and all that sortof thing. She is the first good influence that has crossed my life, so Ithought that perhaps my luck was now going to turn. I backed myself forall I was worth, and more, to win the championship. If it came off Ishould have won over L3,000. As it is, I owe L500, which must be paid onMonday. My total assets, a
fter I settled my hotel bill and sent a chequeto a chum who took some of my bets in his own name, was L16. Now I havenothing. So you see--"
"Yes," interrupted Bruce, "it is a hard case. But death is nosettlement. Nobody gets paid, and everybody is worried."
"My dear fellow, my life is in your keeping for seven days. After that,I presume, I take myself in charge again."
The barrister took thought for a while before he inquired:
"Why did you go to the Casino to-night, if you did not patronize thetables as a rule?"
The other colored somewhat and laughed sarcastically.
"Just a final bit of folly. I dreamt that my luck had turned."
"Dreamt?"
"Yes, last night. Three times did I imagine that I was playing roulette,and that after a certain number--whether thirteen or twenty-three I wasuncertain--turned up, there was a run of seventeen on the red. The funnything is that I had an impression that the number was twenty-three,but with a doubt that it might be thirteen. I remember, during asub-conscious state in the third dream, resolving to listen and lookmore carefully to discover the exact number. But again things gotblurred. The only clear point was that the run of seventeen on the redcommenced at once."
"Well?"
"Well, I took my remaining cash, went to the Casino, became a bitimpatient when neither number turned up for quite a while, and whenthirteen appeared I backed the red. But four times it was the black thatwon."
"So I saw."
"Have you been keeping guard over me?"
"Yes, in a sort of way."
"You are a queer chap. I can't help saying that I am obliged to you. Butit won't do any good. I am absolutely dead broke."
"Now listen to me. I will pay your fare back to London and give yousomething to live on until I return a week hence. Then you must come tosee me, and I will help you into some sort of situation. But you mustonce and for all abandon this notion of suicide."
"What about my debts?"
"Confound your debts. Tell people to wait until you are able to paythem."
"And--and the girl?"
"If she is worth having she will give you a chance of making a livingsufficient to enable you to marry her. She is of age, I suppose, and canmarry any one she likes."
Mensmore puffed his cigarette in silence for fully a minute. Then hesaid:
"You are a very decent sort, Mr.--"
"Bruce--Claude Bruce is my name."
"Well, Mr. Bruce, you propose to hand me L10 for my railway fare, and,say, L5 for my existence, until we meet again in London, in exchange forwhich you purchase the rights in my life indefinitely, accidents andreasonable wear and tear excepted."
"Exactly!"
"Make it L20, with five louis down, and I accept."
"Why the stipulation?"
"I want to back my dream. The number is twenty-three. It evidently wasnot thirteen. I want to see that thing through. I will back the redafter twenty-three turns up, and if I lose I shall be quite satisfied."
"What if I refuse?"
"Then I don't care a bit what happens during the next seven days. Afterthat, _au revoir_, should we happen to meet across the divide. Pleasemake up your mind quickly. That run on the red may come and go while weare sitting here."
Bruce opened his pocket-book. "Here," he said with a smile, "I will giveyou four hundred francs. You will reach the maximum more quickly if youare right."
Mensmore's face lit up with excitement. "By Jove, you are a brick," hesaid. "So you really trust me?"
"Yes."
"Then give me back my revolver."
Without a word, Bruce handed him the weapon.
Mensmore extracted the cartridges and threw them into a clump of shrubs.
"Come," he cried; "come with me to the Casino. You will see something.This is not my own luck; it is borrowed. Come, quick!"
They raced off, Bruce himself being more fired with the zest of thething than he cared to admit. Within the Casino all the tables were nowcrowded, but Mensmore hurried to that at which he sat during his earliervisit.
"It was here that I played in my dream," he whispered, "soon after Icame to it."
He edged through the onlookers, closely followed by Bruce. Neither caredfor the scowls and injured looks cast at them by the people whom theyforced out of the way.
The Italian, the winner of half an hour ago, had come back like a mothto the candle. Now he was getting his wings singed. At last, with agroan, he hastily rose, but as a final effort flung the maximum, sixthousand francs, on the black.
The disc whirled and slowly slackened pace, the ball rested in one ofthe little squares, and the _croupier's_ monotonous words came:
"_Vingt-trois_, _rouge_, _impair_, _et passe_!"
Out bounced the Italian, and Mensmore seized his chair, turning to Brucewith white face as he murmured:
"You hear! Twenty-three!"
The barrister nodded, and placed his hands on Mensmore's shoulders asthough to steady him.
Mensmore staked his ten louis on the red. They became twenty, thenforty. Another whirl and they were eighty. A fourth made them onehundred and sixty.
Mensmore was now so agitated that the table and the players swam beforehis eyes. But Bruce, under the stress of exciting circumstances, had thegift of remaining preternaturally cool.
At the fifth coup the sum to Mensmore's credit was L256. He would haveleft it all on the table had not Bruce withdrawn L16 in notes, as themaximum is L240.
When Mensmore won the sixth and seventh coups a buzz of animatedinterest passed around the board. People began to note the run on thered, together with the fact that a man was staking the maximum eachtime. Even the _croupiers_ cast fleeting glances at the new-comer, when,several times in succession, the long rake pushed across the table thelittle pile of money and notes.
Thenceforth Mensmore sat in a state of stupor more pronounced now thathe was playing and awake than when he dreamt he was playing.
Each time he mechanically staked the maximum and received back twice asmuch, while the eager onlookers now burst into cries of wonder thatbrought others running from all parts of the room.
But Bruce did not lose count.
When the red had turned up seventeen times, and the amount to Mensmore'scredit was L3,128, he shook the latter violently as he was about toshove forward another maximum, and, of his own volition, placed themoney on the black.
"_Douze_, _noir_, _pair et manque_," sang out the _croupier_, and Brucehissed into Mensmore's ear:
"Get up at once."
His strangely made acquaintance obeyed, gathered up his gold and notes,fastened them securely in an inner pocket, and the pair quitted theCasino amid extravagant protestations of good-will and friendship fromall the voluble foreigners present, having attracted not a littleattention from the less demonstrative Americans and English in the room.
It was some time before the roulette tables began their orderly roundagain, for Mensmore's sensational performance was in everybody's mouth.
The highest recorded sum is twenty-three on the black, but a run ofeighteen on the red is sufficiently remarkable to keep Monte Carlo intalk for a week.
Albert Mensmore certainly could not complain that the events of theparticular evening were dull. For one hour at least he lived in the firethat consumes, for he stepped back from the porch of dishonored death tofind himself the possessor of a sum more than sufficient for hisreasonable requirements.
The pace was rapid and almost fatal.
