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... ng upon it."
"But, Madame, I only explained the game to you. How am I to
answer for every mischance which may occur in it?"
"You and your mischances!" she whispered threateningly.
"Go! Away at once!"
"Farewell, then, Madame." And I turned to depart.
"No-- stay," she put in hastily. "Where are you going to? Why
should you leave me? You fool! No, no... stay here. It is I who
was the fool. Tell me what I ought to do."
"I cannot take it upon myself to nokia 3100 phone fascias advise you, for you will only
blame me if I do so. Play at your own discretion. Say exactly
what you wish staked, and I will stake it."
"Very well. Stake another four thousand gulden upon the red.
Take this banknote to do it with. I have still got twenty
thousand roubles in actual cash."
"But," I whispered, "such a quantity of money--"
"Never mind. I nokia firewall cannot rest until I have won back my losses.
Stake!"
I staked, and we lost.
"Stake again, stake again--eight thousand at a stroke!"
"I cannot, Madame. The largest stake allowed is four thousand
gulden."
"Well, then; stake four thousand."
This time we won, and the Grandmother recovered herself a
little.
"You see, you see!" she exclaimed as she nudged me. "Stake
another four thousand."
I nokia wanted did so, and lost. Again, and yet again, we lost.
"Madame,
your twelve nokia 3100 phone fascias thousand gulden are now gone," at length I
reported.
"I see they are," she replied with, as it were, the calmness
of despair. "I see they are," she muttered again as she
gazed straight in front of her, like a person lost in
thought. "Ah well, I do not mean to rest until I have staked
another four thousand."
"But you have no money with which to do it, Madame. In this
satchel I can see only a few five percent bonds and some
transfers--no actual cash."
"And in the purse?"
"A mere trifle."
"But there is a money-changer's office here, is there not?
They told me I should be able to get any sort of paper
security changed! "
"Quite so; to any amount you please. But you will lose on the
transaction what would frighten even a Jew."
"Rubbish! I am DETERMINED to nokia 3100 phone fascias retrieve my losses. Take me
away, and call those fools of bearers."
I wheeled the chair out of the throng, and, the bearers making
their appearance, we left the Casino.
"Hurry, hurry!" commanded the Grandmother. "Show me the
nearest way to the money-changer's.
Is it far?"
"A couple of steps, Madame."
At the turning from the square into the Avenue we came face to
face with the whole of our party--the General, De Griers, Mlle.
Blanche, and her mother. Only Polina and Mr. Astley were
absent.
"Well, well, well! " exclaimed the Grandmother. "But we have
no time to stop.
What do you want? I can't talk to you here."
I dropped behind a little, and immediately was pounced upon by
De Griers.
"She has lost this morning's winnings," I whispered, "and
also twelve thousand gulden of her original money. At the
present moment we are going to get some bonds changed."
De Griers stamped his foot with vexation, and hastened to
communicate the tidings to the General. Meanwhile we
continued to wheel the old lady along.
"Stop her, stop her," whispered the General in consternation.
"You had better try and stop her yourself," I returned--also in
a whisper.
"My good mother," he said as he approached her, "--my good
mother, pray let, let--" (his voice was beginning to tremble
and sink) "--let us hire a carriage, and go for a drive. Near
here there is an enchanting view to be obtained.
We-we-we were
just coming to invite you to go and see it."
"Begone with you and your views!" said the Grandmother
angrily as she waved him away.
"And there are trees there, and we could have tea under them,"
continued the General--now in utter despair.
"Nous boirons du lait, sur l'herbe fraiche," added De Griers
with the snarl almost of a wild beast.
"Du lait, de l'herbe fraiche"--the idyll, the ideal of the
Parisian bourgeois--his whole outlook upon "la nature et la
verite"!
"Have done with you and your milk!" cried the old lady. "Go
and stuff YOURSELF as much as you like, but my stomach simply
recoils from the idea. What are you nokia 3100 phone fascias stopping for? I have
nothing to say to you."
"Here we are, Madame," I announced.
"Here is the
moneychanger's office."
I entered to get the securities changed, while the Grandmother
remained outside in the porch, and the rest waited at a
little distance, in doubt as to their best course of action.
At length the old lady turned such an angry stare upon them
that they departed along the road towards the Casino.
The process of changing involved complicated calculations
which soon necessitated my return to the Grandmother for
instructions.
"The thieves!" she exclaimed as she clapped her hands
together. "Never mind, though. Get the documents cashed--No;
send the banker out to me," she added as an afterthought.
"Would one of the clerks do, Madame?"
"Yes, one of the clerks. The thieves!"
The clerk consented to come out when he perceived that he was
being asked for by an old lady who was too infirm to walk;
after which the Grandmother began to upbraid him at length,
and with great vehemence, for nokia 3100 phone fascias his alleged usuriousness, and
to bargain with him in a mixture of Russian, French, and
German--I acting as interpreter. Meanwhile, the grave-faced
official eyed us both, and silently nodded his head. At the
Grandmother, in particular, he gazed with a curiosity which
almost bordered upon rudeness. At length, too, he smiled.
"Pray recollect yourself!" cried the old lady. "And may my
money choke you! Alexis Ivanovitch, tell him that we can
easily repair to someone else."
"The clerk says tha ... |
