red--an occurrence never before known at roulette-- so that men
spoke of it with astonishment. Naturally enough, many deserted
the red after a dozen rounds, and practically no one could now
be found to stake upon it. Yet upon the black also--the
antithesis of the red--no experienced gambler would stake
anything, for the reason that every practised player knows the
meaning of "capricious fortune." That is to say, after the
sixteenth (or so) success of the red, one would think that the
seventeenth coup would inevitably fall upon the black; wherefore,
novices would be apt to back the latter in the seventeenth
round, and even to double or treble their stakes upon it--only,
in the end, to lose.
Yet some whim or other led me, on remarking that the red had
come up consecutively for seven times, to attach myself to that
colour. Probably this was mostly due to self-conceit, for I
wanted to astonish the bystanders with the riskiness of my play.
Also, I remember that--oh, strange sensation!--I suddenly, and
without any challenge from my own presumption, became obsessed
with a DESIRE to take risks. If the spirit has passed through a
great many sensations, possibly it can no longer be sated with
them, but grows more excited, and demands more sensations, and
stronger and stronger ones, until at length it falls exhausted.
Certainly, if the rules of the game had permitted even of my
staking fifty thousand florins at a time, I should have staked
them. All of a sudden I heard exclamations arising that the
whole thing was a marvel, since the red was turning up for the
fourteenth time!
"Monsieur a gagne cent mille florins," a voice exclaimed beside
me.
I awoke to my senses. What? I had won a hundred thousand
florins? If so, what more did I need to win? I grasped the
banknotes, stuffed them into my pockets, raked in the gold
without counting it, and started to leave the Casino. As I
passed through the salons people smiled to see my
bulging pockets and unsteady gait, for the weight which I was
carrying must have amounted to half a pood! Several hands I saw
stretched out in my direction, and as I passed I filled them
with all the money that I could grasp in my own. At length two
Jews stopped me near the exit.
"You are a bold young fellow," one said, "but mind you depart
early tomorrow--as early as you can--for if you do not you will
lose everything that you have won."
But I did not heed them. The Avenue was so dark that it was
barely possible to distinguish one's hand before one's face,
while the distance to the hotel was half a verst or so; but I
feared neither pickpockets nor highwaymen. Indeed, never since
my boyhood have I done that. Also, I cannot remember what I
thought about on the way. I only felt a sort of fearful pleasure
--the pleasure of success, of conquest, of power (how can I best
express it?). Likewise, before me there flitted the image of
Polina; and I kept remembering, and reminding myself, that it
was to HER I was going, that it was in HER presence I should
soon be standing, that it was SHE to whom I should soon be able
to relate and show everything. Scarcely once did I recall what
she had lately said to me, or the reason why I had left her, or
all those varied sensations which I had been experiencing a bare
hour and a half ago. No, those sensations seemed to be things of
the past, to be things which had righted themselves and grown
old, to be things concerning which we needed to trouble
ourselves no longer, since, for us, life was about to begin
anew. Yet I had just reached the end of the Avenue when there
DID come upon me a fear of being robbed or murdered. With each
step the fear increased until, in my terror, I almost started to
run. Suddenly, as I issued from the Avenue, there burst upon me
the lights of the hotel, sparkling with a myriad lamps! Yes,
thanks be to God, I had reached home!
Running up to my room, I flung open the door of it. Polina was
still on the sofa, with a lighted candle in front of her, and
her hands clasped. As I entered she stared at me in astonishment
(for, at the moment, I must have presented a strange spectacle).
All I did, however, was to halt before her, and fling upon the
table my burden of wealth.
XV
I remember, too, how, without moving from her place, or changing
her attitude, she gazed into my face.
"I have won two hundred thousand francs!" cried I as I pulled
out my last sheaf of bank-notes. The pile of paper currency
occupied the whole table. I could not withdraw my eyes from it.
set myself to arrange the pile in order, and to sort the notes,
and to mass the gold in a separate heap. That done, I left
everything where it lay, and proceeded to pace the room with
rapid strides as I lost myself in thought. Then I darted to the
table once more, and began to recount the money; until all of a
sudden, as though I had remembered something, I rushed to the
door, and closed and double-locked it. Finally I came to a
meditative halt before my little trunk.
"Shall I put the money there until tomorrow?" I asked,
turning sharply round to Polina as the recollection of her
returned to me.
She was still in her old place--still making not a sound. Yet her
eyes had followed every one of my movements. Somehow in her face
there was a strange expression--an expression which I did not
like. I think that I shall not be wrong if I say that it
indicated sheer hatred.
Impulsively I approached her.
"Polina," I said, "here are twenty-five thousand florins--fifty
thousand francs, or more. Take them, and tomorrow throw them
in De Griers' face."
She returned no answer.
"Or, if you should prefer," I continued, "let me take
them to him myself tomorrow--yes, early tomorrow morning. Shall
I?"
Then all at once she burst out laughing, and laughed for a long
while. With astonishment and a feeling of offence I gazed at
her. Her laughter was too like the derisive merriment which she
had so often indulged in of late--merriment which had broken
forth always at the time of my most passionate explanations. At
length she ceased, and frowned at me from under her eyebrows.
"I am NOT going to take your money," she said contemptuously.
"Why not?" I cried. "Why not, Polina?"
"Because I am not in the habit of receiving money for nothing."
"But I am offering it to you as a FRIEND in the same way I
would offer you my very life."
Upon this she threw me a long, questioning glance, as though she
were seeking to probe me to the depths.
"You are giving too much for me," she remarked with a smile.
"The beloved of De Griers is not worth fifty thousand francs."
"Oh Polina, how can you speak so?" I exclaimed reproachfully.
"Am I De Griers?"
"You?" she crie
d with her eyes suddenly flashing. "Why, I
HATE you! Yes, yes, I HATE you! I love you no more than I do De
Griers."
Then she buried her face in her hands, and relapsed into
hysterics. I darted to her side. Somehow I had an intuition of
something having happened to her which had nothing to do with
myself. She was like a person temporarily insane.
"Buy me, would you, would you? Would you buy me for fifty
thousand francs as De Griers did?" she gasped between her
convulsive sobs.
I clasped her in my arms, kissed her hands and feet, and fell
upon my knees before her.
Presently the hysterical fit passed away, and, laying her hands
upon my shoulders, she gazed for a while into my face, as though
trying to read it--something I said to her, but it was clear
that she did not hear it. Her face looked so dark and despondent
that I began to fear for her reason. At length she drew me towards
herself--a trustful smile playing over her features; and then,
as suddenly, she pushed me away again as she eyed me dimly.
Finally she threw herself upon me in an embrace.
"You love me?" she said. "DO you?--you who were willing even to
quarrel with the Baron at my bidding?"
Then she laughed--laughed as though something dear, but
laughable, had recurred to her memory. Yes, she laughed and wept
at the same time. What was I to do? I was like a man in a fever.
I remember that she began to say something to me--though WHAT I do
not know, since she spoke with a feverish lisp, as though she
were trying to tell me something very quickly. At intervals,
too, she would break off into the smile which I was beginning to
dread. "No, no!" she kept repeating. "YOU are my dear one;
YOU are the man I trust." Again she laid her hands upon my
shoulders, and again she gazed at me as she reiterated: "You love
me, you love me? Will you ALWAYS love me?" I could not take my
eyes off her. Never before had I seen her in this mood of
humility and affection. True, the mood was the outcome of
smiled slightly. The next moment, for no apparent reason, she
began to talk of Astley.
She continued talking and talking about him, but I could not
make out all she said--more particularly when she was
endeavouring to tell me of something or other which had happened
recently. On the whole, she appeared to be laughing at Astley,
for she kept repeating that he was waiting for her, and did I
know whether, even at that moment, he was not standing beneath
the window? "Yes, yes, he is there," she said. "Open the
window, and see if he is not." She pushed me in that direction;
yet, no sooner did I make a movement to obey her behest than she
burst into laughter, and I remained beside her, and she
embraced me.
"Shall we go away tomorrow?" presently she asked, as though
some disturbing thought had recurred to her recollection. "How
would it be if we were to try and overtake Grandmamma? I think
we should do so at Berlin. And what think you she would have to
say to us when we caught her up, and her eyes first lit upon us?
What, too, about Mr. Astley? HE would not leap from the
Shlangenberg for my sake! No! Of that I am very sure!"--and she
laughed. "Do you know where he is going next year? He says he
intends to go to the North Pole for scientific investigations,
and has invited me to go with him! Ha, ha, ha! He also says that
we Russians know nothing, can do nothing, without European help.
But he is a good fellow all the same. For instance, he does not
blame the General in the matter, but declares that Mlle.
Blanche--that love--But no; I do not know, I do not know." She
stopped suddenly, as though she had said her say, and was
feeling bewildered. "What poor creatures these people are. How
sorry I am for them, and for Grandmamma! But when are you going
to kill De Griers? Surely you do not intend actually to murder
him? You fool! Do you suppose that I should ALLOW you to fight
De Griers? Nor shall you kill the Baron." Here she burst out
laughing. "How absurd you looked when you were talking to the
Burmergelms! I was watching you all the time--watching you from
where I was sitting. And how unwilling you were to go when I
sent you! Oh, how I laughed and laughed!"
Then she kissed and embraced me again; again she pressed her
face to mine with tender passion. Yet I neither saw nor heard
her, for my head was in a whirl. . . .
It must have been about seven o'clock in the morning when I
awoke. Daylight had come, and Polina was sitting by my side--a
strange expression on her face, as though she had seen a vision
and was unable to collect her thoughts. She too had just
awoken, and was now staring at the money on the table. My head
ached; it felt heavy. I attempted to take Polina's hand, but she
pushed me from her, and leapt from the sofa. The dawn was full
of mist, for rain had fallen, yet she moved to the window,
opened it, and, leaning her elbows upon the window-sill, thrust
out her head and shoulders to take the air. In this position did
she remain for several minutes, without ever looking round at
me, or listening to what I was saying. Into my head there came
the uneasy thought: What is to happen now? How is it all to end?
Suddenly Polina rose from the window, approached the table, and,
looking at me with an expression of infinite aversion, said with
lips which quivered with anger:
"Well? Are you going to hand me over my fifty thousand francs?"
"Polina, you say that AGAIN, AGAIN?" I exclaimed.
"You have changed your mind, then? Ha, ha, ha! You are sorry
you ever promised them?"
On the table where, the previous night, I had counted the money
there still was lying the packet of twenty five thousand
florins. I handed it to her.
"The francs are mine, then, are they? They are mine?" she
inquired viciously as she balanced the money in her hands.
"Yes; they have ALWAYS been yours," I said.
"Then TAKE your fifty thousand francs!" and she hurled them
full in my face. The packet burst as she did so, and the floor
became strewed with bank-notes. The instant that the deed was
done she rushed from the room.
At that moment she cannot have been in her right mind; yet, what
was the cause of her temporary aberration I cannot say. For a
month past she had been unwell. Yet what had brought about this
PRESENT condition of mind,above all things, this outburst? Had
it come of wounded pride? Had it come of despair over her
decision to come to me? Had it come of the fact that, presuming
too much on my good fortune, I had seemed to be intending to
desert her (even as De Griers had done) when once I had given
her the fifty thousand francs? But, on my honour, I had never
cherished any such intention. What was at fault, I think, was
her own pride, which kept urging her not to trust me, but,
rather, t
o insult me--even though she had not realised the fact.
In her eyes I corresponded to De Griers, and therefore had been
condemned for a fault not wholly my own. Her mood of late had
been a sort of delirium, a sort of light-headedness--that I knew
full well; yet, never had I sufficiently taken it into consideration.
Perhaps she would not pardon me now? Ah, but this was THE PRESENT.
What about the future? Her delirium and sickness were not likely to
make her forget what she had done in bringing me De Griers'
letter. No, she must have known what she was doing when she
brought it.
Somehow I contrived to stuff the pile of notes and gold under
the bed, to cover them over, and then to leave the room some ten
minutes after Polina. I felt sure that she had returned to her
own room; wherefore, I intended quietly to follow her, and to ask
the nursemaid aid who opened the door how her mistress was.
Judge, therefore, of my surprise when, meeting the domestic on
the stairs, she informed me that Polina had not yet returned,
and that she (the domestic) was at that moment on her way to my
room in quest of her!
"Mlle. left me but ten minutes ago," I said.
"What can have become of her?" The nursemaid looked at me
reproachfully.
Already sundry rumours were flying about the hotel. Both in the
office of the commissionaire and in that of the landlord it was
whispered that, at seven o'clock that morning, the Fraulein had
left the hotel, and set off, despite the rain, in the direction
of the Hotel d'Angleterre. From words and hints let fall I could
see that the fact of Polina having spent the night in my room
was now public property. Also, sundry rumours were circulating
concerning the General's family affairs. It was known that last
night he had gone out of his mind, and paraded the hotel in
tears; also, that the old lady who had arrived was his mother,
and that she had come from Russia on purpose to forbid her son's
marriage with Mlle. de Cominges, as well as to cut him out of
her will if he should disobey her; also that, because he had
disobeyed her, she had squandered all her money at roulette, in
order to have nothing more to leave to him. "Oh, these
Russians!" exclaimed the landlord, with an angry toss of the
head, while the bystanders laughed and the clerk betook himself
to his accounts. Also, every one had learnt about my winnings;
Karl, the corridor lacquey, was the first to congratulate me.
But with these folk I had nothing to do. My business was to set
off at full speed to the Hotel d'Angleterre.
As yet it was early for Mr. Astley to receive visitors; but, as
soon as he learnt that it was I who had arrived, he came out
into the corridor to meet me, and stood looking at me in silence
with his steel-grey eyes as he waited to hear what I had to say.
I inquired after Polina.
"She is ill," he replied, still looking at me with his direct,
unwavering glance.
"And she is in your rooms."
"Yes, she is in my rooms."
"Then you are minded to keep her there?"
"Yes, I am minded to keep her there."
"But, Mr. Astley, that will raise a scandal. It ought not to be
allowed. Besides, she is very ill. Perhaps you had not remarked
that?"
"Yes, I have. It was I who told you about it. Had she not been
ill, she would not have gone and spent the night with you."
"Then you know all about it?"
"Yes; for last night she was to have accompanied me to the
house of a relative of mine. Unfortunately, being ill, she made
a mistake, and went to your rooms instead."
"Indeed? Then I wish you joy, Mr. Astley. Apropos, you have
reminded me of something. Were you beneath my window last night?
Every moment Mlle. Polina kept telling me to open the window and
see if you were there; after which she always smiled."
"Indeed? No, I was not there; but I was waiting in the
corridor, and walking about the hotel."
"She ought to see a doctor, you know, Mr. Astley."