Chapter XXIII: View of the Interior of a Gambling House

“Look here, we must see about settling your affairs now,” said Dufresne, as he rose after the stormy night at Madame de Géran’s. “You must make more notes for about fifteen thousand francs, and I will try to discount them. I confess, however, that it is more difficult than I thought. People are none too anxious to have our signatures. They are becoming more exacting. Only a few Jews will take them, and they demand fifty per cent. What do you say to that?”

“That traitress, to betray me for a lackey!”

“What! you are still thinking of your faithless one! What folly!”

“If I could revenge myself!”

“The best revenge is to spend money freely, to live magnificently; then she will regret you. So you see that you still need money. I am going out to obtain some. Meanwhile, do not allow yourself to give way to melancholy, and throw off this languor, which will lead to nothing good. Go and take a turn at the card tables. That is where you will recover your nerve and your ideas.”

“I haven’t a sou; what sort of figure should I cut there?”

“You must think up some method of winning. Au revoir; I am going to get some money.”

Dufresne went out and Murville went home. He found a letter from his wife there; it was the sixth she had written him since she had gone to the country, but Edouard had never replied. He had read the first ones; they contained Adeline’s wishes for his welfare, entreaties that he would take care of his health, but not a word of love; Adeline no longer dared to mention hers. To speak of one’s affection to a faithless lover is like speaking of colors to a blind man, of music to a deaf man, of manners to a savage.

Edouard had ceased to read his wife’s letters, because he did not know what to reply. His heart said nothing, and his conscience said too much. He hardened the one, and did not listen to the other. The season was advanced; he was afraid that Adeline would talk of returning, and he felt that her presence would embarrass him more than ever. He desired to conceal from her the condition of his affairs, which confirmed only too fully the fears that his wife and his mother-in-law had manifested.

On entering his apartments, the business agent was greatly surprised to find bailiffs proceeding to levy upon his furniture.

“What does this mean,” cried Edouard; “who has sent you to my house?”

“Monsieur,” replied a little man in black, “the owner of the house, of which you don’t pay the rent.”

“You ought to have warned me.”

“Summonses have been sent to you.”

“I did not read them.”

“That isn’t my fault.”

“I don’t know the forms of procedure.”

“What! monsieur is joking--a business agent!”

“I am not one now.”

“That doesn’t concern us.”

Edouard left the officers of the law and went up to his office; the clerk was not there. He examined his papers, but he had no knowledge whatever of his business. He tossed the boxes angrily into the middle of the room. He went downstairs and called his servants; they had gone. The concierge alone remained, and he answered Edouard insolently, because he saw that he was ruined.

Murville left his home and walked slowly toward the Palais-Royal, having no idea what course to pursue, or how to rid himself of the bailiffs. He waited for Dufresne, in order to consult him; he arrived at last; he seemed content, and announced that he had obtained some money. Edouard revived at that news, and told Dufresne what was taking place at his house.

“Faith,” said Dufresne, “if you take my advice, you will let them go ahead and sell a lot of furniture which is of no use to you now; you don’t need such an establishment, as you are living the life of a bachelor; it is sleeping property, and we turn it to some use.”

“But if my wife should return----”

“Bah! she prefers the country; and besides, don’t you know that in Paris, with plenty of money, one can find in an hour’s time, a house and furniture and servants?”

“That is true; but you advised me to live luxuriously.”

“We will hire some magnificently furnished lodgings.”

“But my reputation----”

“Never fear, it is making progress. Make your fortune and let the fools talk--that is the essential thing.”

“Yes, but I am very far from making my fortune!”

“Because you go about it in the wrong way.”

“I do whatever you tell me.”

“Oh, no! you still have a false delicacy, which does you harm, and which you must get rid of. But come to a restaurant; let us drink some champagne and madeira, and snap our fingers at whatever may happen.”

Edouard allowed himself to be led away; he abandoned himself like a blind man to Dufresne’s advice; he followed the torrent which drew him on; and those people who had seen him at the time of his marriage had difficulty in recognizing him, so great a change had been wrought in him by debauchery and gambling.

What an existence is that of a gambler! Never a moment’s repose or tranquillity! It seems that a permanent fever acts constantly on his organs; his eyes are hollow and rimmed with red; his complexion pale and seamed by lack of sleep; his cheeks sunken, all his features drawn; his dress soiled and in disorder; his gait jerky or uncertain; feverish anxiety can be read in his eyes; if he smiles, it is with bitterness; it seems that cheerfulness is a stranger to his mind, which is incessantly excited by the thirst for gold, by the eagerness for gain, by the anxiety of the gaming table.

Such had Edouard become; who could recognize now the young man who, engrossed by his good fortune and his love, proudly led his charming bride to the altar? Now his features are worn, the expression of his face is changed, his very voice is not recognizable, for amid the passions and agonies of suspense which he endures every day, his transports of despair and rage, his oaths and imprecations have made his accents threatening or hoarse; his conversation bears the imprint of the society which he frequents; not in gambling hells, with swindlers or abandoned women, does one acquire the tone of refined society; one loses in such company all courtesy, all modesty, all restraint. Edouard had acquired the habit of shouting, swearing, flying into a rage on all occasions; his manners, his bearing, his principles, were like those of the models which he had constantly under his eyes. A virtuous, upright, reasonable man has much difficulty in resisting the influence of an evil companion; what then is likely to become of a weak man, enslaved by his passions, who is surrounded by none but the offscourings of society?

The winter arrived; Edouard received no more letters from his wife. He did not know that Dufresne received them for him and returned them to Adeline as from her husband. The first notes had been paid with the money arising from the sale of the furniture; but the second ones were about to mature, and the two inseparables had no more money. In vain did Murville, who no longer blushed to put out his hand to borrow in every direction, go at night, with the small sums he had succeeded in obtaining, to take his seat at the fatal green cloth; in vain did he too try to calculate, and to make combinations by pricking cards, or forming martingales; nothing succeeded. He saw the money that he had deposited with trembling hand upon a number, pass to the banker’s pile; the fatal rake swept from him the sum which he had hoped to quadruple; he had nothing left, he turned his eyes in all directions, seeking some acquaintance from whom he could borrow again, but he saw no one; a gambler has no friends. Edouard left number 9, and hurried through the galleries of the Palais-Royal, entering each academy in search of Dufresne or some other; he found no one who was willing to lend him. He arrived at number 113, which he had never entered as yet. He saw the poor mechanic who goes thither, trembling with anticipation, to risk the fruit of his day’s labor; he leaves the place with empty pockets, and returns to his home, where his wife with her children is waiting for the return of her husband, to go out to buy something for her little family’s supper; but he brings nothing, the poor children will go to bed without food, and the unhappy wife will wet her pillow with her tears, because her husband has been to the gambling house.

And this tradesman, whom people believe to be engrossed by his business,--what does he do in this den of iniquity? he squanders his fortune, his reputation, his honor, the property of his correspondents; he has to pay on the morrow notes which he has signed, and he resorts to the roulette table in search of the funds. His gaze is fixed on the color which he hopes to see come forth, and every time that luck betrays his hopes, his hand, concealed in his coat, tears his clothing and rends his breast. But he feels nothing, his sensations are concentrated on the little ball which is to decide his fate.

This young man, of respectable exterior and decently dressed, who acts as if he wished to hide, because he is still sensitive to shame, comes hither to venture, at the game of chance, a sum which the banker by whom he is employed has intrusted to him to be taken to a notary. Luck betrays him, he has lost all! And yet he remains there; he cannot as yet credit his crime, his misfortune! What will he do upon leaving that vile den, where he has left honor behind? His family is poor, but honorable; he cannot make up his mind to bring dishonor upon it, to endure his father’s reproaches; despair takes possession of his soul, and he sees but one means to avoid the future which terrifies him. He goes forth, he walks hurriedly in the direction of the river, he arrives there, and puts an end to his existence by leaping into the waves! And a man who might have followed a happy and honorable career, a man who should have assured the happiness of his family, commits suicide at twenty years of age because he has been to the gambling house.

Such pictures are only too true; we have examples of them every day; when will these abodes of crime cease to be tolerated?

Edouard should have profited by the lessons which he had before his eyes; instead of that, he took his seat at the game of _biribi_; he still had ten sous in his pocket; and he hastened to risk them on the table where the last farthing is extorted from the poor wretches who resort to it.

He had been at the table but a moment, seated among people who resembled beggars, when Dufresne appeared and motioned to him to follow him.

“I have good news for you,” he said with a joyful air; “in the first place, your mother-in-law died last night of an attack of apoplexy.”

“Is it possible?”

“It was a young fellow employed here, who lives in her house, who just told me. Moreover, I have obtained the money on your notes, on condition that you give a mortgage on your house at Villeneuve-Saint-Georges.”

“My house--but----”

“Come, come; don’t raise objections! In any event, with what little money you get from your mother-in-law, you will be able to pay your notes and redeem your house. You see that everything is turning out for the best. Oh! if only I had thought of your country house before! But now you are in funds, that is the essential thing; all that you will need, to obtain what Madame Germeuil has left, is a power of attorney from your wife.”

“How am I to get it? I shall never dare to tell her of her mother’s death; she will be desperate!”

“Very well; I will undertake to do it. If you wish, I will go to Villeneuve-Saint-Georges in your place, and I will tell your wife the news with all possible precaution.”

“You will do me a great favor. Tell her also that I have not forgotten her, that I expect to go to see her very soon.”

“Yes, I know all that I must say to her; rely upon my zeal and my friendship.”

This arrangement being concluded, Dufresne urged Edouard to make haste to provide him with the necessary papers, that he might go to Adeline, whom he was burning to see again. As for Edouard, having pledged his country house, the last shelter of his family, and having obtained the proceeds of his notes, he abandoned himself anew to the frantic passion which dominated him.