Loaded Dice

The year was 1904; the month, August; the time, late evening. The long, low-ceilinged card room was all but deserted, the shades drawn, the lights turned low. The round, green-topped tables, appearing to the eye like some field of giant mushrooms, stood in orderly rows, their outlines blending faintly with the dark oak paneling in the gloom. In the far distance, at the end of the room, a waiter, white-aproned, napkin on arm, hovered expectantly, for generous winners did not always heed the club's injunction regarding tips. Thus he made a pretense of dusting the tables, and waited, biding his time. Over by the window, where the faint cooling breeze from the bay stole softly in, four men were finishing their rubber of bridge. Vanulm, the portly brewer, prosperous, kindly, slow of speech, resolute of purpose, saying little, smiled often; from time to time, when perplexed as to the proper play, stroking his dark, closely-cropped beard with his large white hand. His partner, young Harry Palmer, scrupulously well dressed, carefully groomed, showed in his every action the handicap of having been born with more money than brains, of never having had to lift a finger to help himself, and, drifting with the tide, of never having wasted a thought on anything outside his own pleasures and how best to gratify them. Many times a millionaire, he had but recently come into his fortune, and was making a sincere and honest effort to spend as much of it as he could in the shortest possible time. His thoughts, seemingly, were far from being on the fall of the cards.