Chance in Chains: A Story of Monte Carlo

PART II

CHAPTER VI

Two men sat alone in a first-class compartment of the Riviera train-de-luxe.

The night before the most luxurious train in Europe had left the Gare de Lyon at Paris. The night had been bitterly cold, and as the vast machine swung out of the station all the suburbs of Paris and, indeed, the plains of mid-France, were seen through the dark windows of the corridors to be covered with a white sprinkling of snow.

A special carriage was reserved for a Monsieur Montoyer and his valet, and the two persons mentioned upon the ticket had spent the whole night in the luxurious cabin, with its beds and little tables, talking earnestly.

Monsieur Charles Edouard Montoyer was an athletic, burly looking young man, dressed in the height of French fashion, clean-shaved, dark-complexioned, and wearing gold-rimmed spectacles, which only partially concealed a pair of blue eyes which seemed oddly at variance with his otherwise Southern appearance. His hair also was a dead black, and in certain lights it had an almost metallic lustre.

The valet presented no very extraordinary appearance, except that he seemed markedly intelligent and alert. His black hair was closely cropped to a large and well-shaped head. His complexion was of the true Southern swarthy tint, glowing out below the skin, as it were. He wore a small black moustache, and the long first finger of his right hand was deeply stained with the juice of cigarettes.

Once, about an hour after the start, the valet went to the restaurant car, and brought back two bowls of soup, and a bottle of Pomard, explaining to the waiter who gave them that his master was very hungry and one tureen would be insufficient. But when the door of the sleeping-car was locked, the blinds looking on the corridor drawn down, the table set, and all the electric lights switched on, a spectator – had there been one there – would have seen with some surprise that master and man shared the meal equally. And perhaps he would have thought it a touching testimony of the theoretical equality of Republican France that master and man addressed each other by their Christian names.

In short, the great enterprise was begun, Basil and Emile, their apparatus made, their plan of campaign concluded, were roaring and crashing through France to the fairy-like shores of the Mediterranean.

It was now close upon nine o'clock in the morning. The blinds of the sleeping-car were still drawn upon the corridor side, but the two men were dressed. Their hand luggage was strapped and they were smoking cigarettes.

"In a moment more, Basil," said Emile, his voice trembling with excitement, "in a moment more you shall have your first vision of the South! I would not let you look before and, indeed, as we went through Avignon it was too dark to see much, but Marseilles – my beloved native city – is the Gate of the South. You will see little of it, as within an hour we shall be pulling out again for the Côte d'Azur, but you will see something; you will at least breathe the enchanted air!"

Deschamps' voice was most powerfully affected. For a moment he had forgotten the enterprise entirely. He was only consumed with an over-mastering eagerness that his dearest friend and partner should breathe with him that subtle, intoxicating air, and realise for the first time in his life what the South means.

There was a long grinding of the brakes, and the train stood still. Emile drew up the blinds, opened the door into the corridor, and led Basil to the end of the car. Then they stepped down to the low platform.

They had left Paris in sullen bitter winter weather. Here, early as it was, the sun was shining brilliantly in the cool, quiet station. Exactly facing them was a huge stall of flowers, masses of purple violets, delicate ivory-coloured roses from Grasse, the pale golden plumes of the mimosa.

But the air! the air was the thing! So warm and sweet it was, it came upon them with such a veritable caress, it so bathed them with golden light and sweet odours, that tears started into Deschamps' eyes, and Basil forgot his disguise.

"How wonderful! how wonderful!" he said in English, breathing like a man who had been stifled all his life.

And that was their first glimpse of the enchanted country to which they had come.

Through all the morning until mid-afternoon the train moved, slowly and sleepily now, through scenes of loveliness such as the Englishman, at any rate, had never dreamed of. Everywhere the Mediterranean gleamed like an immense sapphire, flecked here and there with white fire. The low cliffs of sandstone were crimson. The sky was an inverted bowl of glowing turquoise, and everywhere tall, feathery palms were silhouetted against it in brilliant green. And there were flowers, flowers everywhere! Every station with its familiar name was full of flowers – Grasse, Cannes, Nice, Villefranche – there were flowers everywhere; flowers, exotic trees, and great white hotels that gleamed jewel-like in terrace after terrace from the sea till they were lost in the high places of the Maritime Alps.

And then – at last – Monaco, a few tunnels cut in the cliffs, and the long, low station of Monte Carlo at last!

During the whole period of the slower journey along the seashore Basil Gregory's excitement had been gradually growing. He and Deschamps had talked but little, but both of them had been obsessed by the great idea that they were getting nearer and nearer to the world-famous theatre of their colossal enterprise.

Monte Carlo! Monte Carlo! The words had beaten themselves into a rythm in Basil's brain, a rythm in tune with the regular pulsing of the engine.

They were to stay at the Hôtel Malmaison, for the brothers Carnet had insisted that the two young men should lack nothing, and that Basil should appear to be a person of great wealth and consequence. There was to be no hole-and-corner business about the great coup. Suspicion was to be averted by every possible means. "Il fait aller en regal," Brother Charles had insisted, and so it was to be. Rooms had been engaged in advance, a sitting-room and bedroom for Monsieur Charles Edouard Montoyer, and a bedroom for his valet. It had been stipulated, however, that the valet's bedroom should be at the very top storey of the hotel, as that personage suffered from asthma.

The Malmaison was only some four hundred yards from the station, and in consequence some three hundred from the Casino. They drove there in the waiting omnibus, however, and at five o'clock were installed in their rooms.

It was a little difficult to account for two large boxes among the luggage, of extraordinary heaviness, which were placed in the sitting-room of Monsieur Montoyer. But the ready Deschamps in his rôle of valet explained that monsieur was a great student, and always travelled with many books.

"I go now, mon ami" Emile said, "to my own room. All your clothes are unpacked. I must not stay here too long at present. I shall have to meet all the other servants and gossip with them, but I will come at seven to assist you to dress, and then we can make our plans."

Basil was left alone in the brightly furnished sitting-room. He looked down into a terraced garden, brilliant still with the declining rays of the sun. Somewhere near by a band of guitars was playing accompanied by voices as sweet and passionate as they.

He strolled up and down the room thinking deeply. But it was not of the fairyland in which he found himself, it was not of the glories he was soon to witness, it was not even of the great hazard he was to try – the bold and reckless bid for fortune. It was of Ethel he was thinking.

CHAPTER VII

About ten o'clock in the morning of the day on which Basil Gregory and Emile Deschamps had arrived at Monte Carlo, another train had pulled into the long low station on the Mediterranean shore.

This train was very different from the huge, luxurious machine that brought the adventurers to the City of Fortune earlier in the day. It was the ordinary slow train, the third class, not even a rapide, and only a few second-class carriages were included in its make-up. Moreover, it had taken two whole days, and nights in its journey from Paris, being everywhere shunted aside for the rapides and trains de luxe to pass through.

From this train of poorer people two English ladies, quietly dressed, and pale and stained with travel under none too pleasant conditions, had descended.

They were driven at once with their trunks to a modest pension in the Rue Grimaldi in Monaco, and spent some hours in sleep.

Ethel McMahon had told her lover in Paris that she had obtained a fortnight's leave of absence from her school, had saved a little money, and was about to take her mother to Switzerland for a change of air.

Basil had accepted the statement implicitly, glad to hear that the girl he loved was to have a short respite from her labours, and, for his own part, finding that the proposed holiday would coincide with his own absence from Paris, he said nothing of his plans. So it had been arranged, and the two lovers were mutually ignorant of each other's purposes and without the slightest idea that they were bound for the same destination. Mrs. McMahon had absolutely refused to allow Ethel to communicate a word of their project to Gregory, and the girl was all the more ready because by now she was thoroughly infected with her mother's enthusiasm, and was absolutely convinced in her own mind that they were to gain a small fortune at the tables.

How splendid it would be to come to Basil and to tell him that they could be married at once! That funds for the launching of the great invention were forthcoming, that all was to end as happily as some old song!

About six o'clock Ethel went into her mother's room. The rest had refreshed her. Her eyes were glowing with excitement, and with her long hair falling over her dressing-gown she seemed the personification of radiant hope.

"Now, what are we to do, mother?" she said excitedly. "How do you feel?"

The older woman was seated in the one arm-chair the little bedroom of the pension boasted, and was anxiously scrutinising a bundle of faded papers covered with figures and bold masculine handwriting.

"It is certain, Ethel!" she said. "I have been going through your father's figures for the hundredth time. I am sure it can't fail. You know he only invented this particular system just before he died, and we never had an opportunity to try it properly."

Ethel nodded. "I feel just as you do, mother, dear," she answered. "It can't fail. But what are we to do? Are you thoroughly rested?"

"I feel in better health," the old lady answered, "than I have felt for years. Excitement would keep me up if nothing else would, but, as it is, I have no trace of fatigue. What's the use of spending the evening in this dull pension with these third-rate people, for such of the guests as I have seen are rather a seedy-looking lot, and Madame de Bonville is just the ordinary Southern Frenchwoman who keeps a place of this sort? No! We will dress, have dinner, and take a cab to the Casino. There will be no difficulty about obtaining our tickets for this evening. We shall have to renew them each day, until we have been here for some time – if, indeed, it is necessary to remain here. After a week or two they give you a ticket for a month, but I don't suppose we shall need that."

"Then we are to begin to-night!" Ethel cried, a flush mounting in her cheeks and her voice ringing with anticipation.

The elder lady smiled. "We will not begin the system to-night," she answered. "That, I do think, would be unwise. We will take a louis or two and get a place at one of the tables, if we can, and just see what happens. I want you to get accustomed to a scene which will seem extraordinarily strange to you. We will take it that we are merely reconnoitring this evening, and begin serious play upon the morrow. Dinner is at half-past seven, so go and prepare yourself, my child, and then come and help me."

Ethel left the room and crossed the passage to her own, singing for sheer lightness of heart. Already the beauty of the South had caught hold of her, and such glimpses of it as she had seen only intensified her mood. In her innocence she had not the slightest misgiving. She would have laughed to scorn anyone who had told her that there was a chance of losing the little unexpected capital that had come to them from the lottery.

Dinner at the pension de Bonville was the ordinary polyglot affair. An English major – no regiment specified – some stolid Germans, three shrill-voiced American girls, and some nondescript and rather haggard looking young men made up the company. Doings at the Casino during the day were compared and discussed. The little cards, printed in red and black, which are provided by the Casino authorities for recording the play, and pricked each time the wheel is spun, were handed about, and in this atmosphere, so familiar to her in the past, old Mrs. McMahon seemed like a changed being. She talked with the rest, in English or fluent French; she was like some old war horse once more snuffling the breeze of battle, and Ethel was no less interested and entranced, though her knowledge of roulette – for none of the pensionnaires seemed to indulge in the more expensive trente-et-quarante– was purely theoretical.

After dinner the major gallantly offered to escort the ladies to the Casino and to obtain their tickets. Shortly afterwards, muffled in opera cloaks, for between eight and nine is often the coldest hour of the day on the Riviera, the three walked up the steep, winding way towards the Palace of Chance.

A full moon hung in the sky; everywhere were brilliant illuminations; the air as it proved was not at all cold upon this night, but soft and odorous of flowers.

The gardens of the Casino were like enchantment to Ethel McMahon. It was indeed a scene from the "Arabian Nights." The tall palms clicked faintly in the breeze with a sound like distant castanets. The electric lights shone down upon enormous beds of flowers which everywhere studded the lawns. Faint music was heard on every side, and gaudily painted and luxurious automobiles flitted noiselessly along the polished roadways.

Here was the great Hôtel de Paris, its long façade glowing with colour, full of the wealthiest people in the world, dining very differently from the way in which the major and his new friends had dined in the Rue Grimaldi. Beyond, on the other side of the square, were the gardens of the Métropole, and the glass Café de Paris at its side winked and glittered like a gigantic topaz.

"That, my dear," said Mrs. McMahon, pointing to a modest looking restaurant in an arcade, "that is Ciro's."

Ethel's sense of humour was tickled by the calm patronage of the information. She knew, of course, that she was looking upon the most famous restaurant in the whole world, but her mother's tone amused her.

And then, in a moment, she had no thought but one.

Before her was a magnificent building of white marble with many steps leading to a wide entrance, glistening against the background of dark sky, spangled with golden stars.

Mrs. McMahon clutched her daughter's arm. "There!" she said, almost in an awed whisper. "Now you see it for the first time. That is the Casino!"

For a moment all three were silent. The spirit of chance, the terrible fever of the gambler was in their blood, and even the tough old major, an habitué of every gambling hell in Europe, shared for a moment the emotion of his companions as they surveyed the supreme Temple of Chance.

They went up the steps, Ethel alert to everything she saw, and turned into a long office to the left, rather more like a small bank than anything else.

Two or three civil, quickly glancing Frenchmen, in black frock coats, were standing in this room before the counter. Ethel was conscious of a quick all-embracing scrutiny from three pairs of dark eyes, she heard her name spoken in French by one of the officials, and shortly afterwards two purple cards, bearing the mystic words:

"Cercle des Etrangers,

Valable pour un jour,"

and with their names written upon the back in thin clerkly script, were handed to them.

From there, into a vestibule where cloaks were exchanged for metal discs with a number upon them, and then in their evening frocks, but still wearing their hats, the two ladies passed with their cavalier into the Atrium.

The huge hall, with its galleries, marble columns and tesselated floor, its gleaming lights in the roof, and its little groups of people dotted here and there under the galleries or in the centre space, reminded Ethel of a dance she had once attended in England at the magnificent town hall of a great Northern city. Everyone was in evening dress, everyone talked animatedly, new arrivals kept constantly pouring in. But at one end of this enormous hall, where the huge marble pillars clustered more thickly, was a series of great swing doors of an abnormal height, doors which constantly opened noiselessly and closed again. And round the doors were innumerable officials in their long frock coats, standing there watching and waiting as the votaries of Chance pressed inwards to the very sanctum of the Temple.

Mrs. McMahon nodded. "Come, Ethel," she said in a voice that was positively hoarse with excitement, "the rooms are in there; let us go."

The two ladies walked up the long hall, presented their cards to an official who glanced at them and bowed, and then one of the great doors swung open and they entered. Although it was early yet, the rooms were fairly full.

Ethel found herself in an enormous salon of great height, and with a polished parquet floor. It resembled nothing so much as an immense ball-room in some royal palace. The walls were covered by huge pictures let into the gilded panelling, separated from each other by pilaster after pilaster of gold. The ceilings, also, where electric lights glowed brilliantly, were painted, and the general effect was one of almost overpowering magnificence. Beyond this huge salon she saw, under an immense archway, there was another and even larger one crossing it at right angles, and beyond that still another. The size and splendour of the place made her catch her breath and dazzled her eyes. "How wonderful!" she whispered to her mother.

Her next impression was that she was in some church! Despite the gorgeous decoration certainly not in the least ecclesiastical, the size and shape, the curious hush and silence that pervaded everything, helped the impression. There was only the very lowest murmur of conversation perceptible. Women in astonishingly gorgeous toilets, with gold purses hanging from their wrists by jewel-studded chains, moved slowly up and down the parquet floor with a rustling of skirts. The air was full of mingled perfume and suggested that odour of incense in a cathedral.

As all these impressions crowded into her mind, the girl's eyes became more used to the surroundings, and she saw, at intervals under the high dome-like roof, long tables were set, each one as long as two billiard tables. There were four of them in this first salon, and many more stretched away in the vista of brilliance. The air was quite clear, nobody was smoking, and she could see everything very distinctly.

Around each table was a thick cluster of people, men and women, almost entirely hiding it from view.

She turned to the table nearest her.

Around it, without any intervals, people were sitting in chairs. Behind them stood other people, at some tables two deep. Above the tables were suspended huge lamps with green shades – like the lights over a billiard table, though not so brilliant.

"Why, they are oil lamps!" Ethel said in a low voice to her mother. "How strange and antiquated!"

Mrs. McMahon smiled.

"If they had electric lights immediately over the tables," she said, "or even gas, some of the gangs of bad characters who infest Monte Carlo would find means to cut the pipes or wires, and in the confusion anybody could take what money he pleased." She clutched her daughter's arm tightly. "Child," she said, in an impressive voice, "at any one of these tables at the present moment, lying about, unprotected, in notes and gold, there is at least fifty thousand pounds!"

At that moment the major drew their attention to the fact that at a table immediately ahead of them there was a little stir and movement.

A very tall and handsome young man had risen from his chair. His face was a little flushed and his eyes sparkled, while he tried in vain to conceal the smile of pleasure and excitement upon his lips. Several of the other people at this table, who all appeared to know him, rose also and began to congratulate him in low voices.

"That is the Archduke Theodore," the major said in a husky whisper. "He is a cousin of the Tsar. For the last week he has been winning enormous sums, and apparently he has done so again to-night. His pockets are simply bulging with notes!"

Mrs. McMahon looked significantly at Ethel. Then she saw her chance. "Come," she said, "we can sit down at this table. This is a very fortunate chance." They went to the table and found two chairs unoccupied, slipping into them quickly in the momentary diversion created by the Archduke's success, and for the first time Ethel McMahon sat actually a guest of the unknown goddess of Fortune, and about to woo her.

To the girl's unaccustomed eyes the scene was bewilderingly strange. The long expanse of green baize cloth stretched away on either side of her. It was marked with numbered squares and triangles, while at one end were two huge diamonds of red and black in either corner. She faced a row of people, men and women in correct evening costume, save that the women, like herself, wore the large hats which are de rigueur in the Casino. Jewels gleamed bewilderingly almost everywhere. Exactly opposite her was a woman who was simply plastered with diamonds, and yet next this gorgeous vision with the painted face and laughing eyes, with a king's ransom round her throat and in her hair, sat an elderly yellow-faced woman in a black dress and without a single ornament – more quietly and even shabbily dressed than Mrs. McMahon herself. There were two fresh-faced English boys, who looked like soldiers, there was an enormous black-bearded Bulgarian, with eyes like black velvet and hands like fat claws.

And all these people, on the green baize before them, had wads of notes or piles of gold, save only the old lady, before whom were only a few five-franc pieces – the minimum stake allowed at Monte Carlo.

And on the numbers themselves money was already beginning to be placed from every part of the table. Sometimes the people pushed it themselves on the chosen numbers, sometimes, when they were too far away, they gave it to one of the silent croupiers who sat round among the people and pushed the coins to the destined spot with their long india-rubber-tipped rakes.

Dividing the long table in the centre was the wheel itself, and the croupier in charge of it was already fingering the ivory ball. Behind him, on a higher seat, sat the official in charge of all the others engaged at this table, and from his lips came the occasional croak of the famous "Faites vos jeux, messieurs: faites vos jeux."

Ethel had three golden louis in her purse. It was all the money that they had brought with them.

Her mother had told her that beginners nearly always won the first time they played – a very common superstition among gamblers, and one which, for some reason or other, seems to be amply justified.

"What shall I do, mother?"

"Do whatever you like," Mrs. McMahon answered quickly. "I mustn't influence you or it will spoil the luck."

Ethel hesitated, and as she did so the croupier swung the capstan and spun the ball.

A low, humming whirr broke the silence.

"Quick! quick!" whispered Mrs. McMahon, "make your stake or it will be too late."

Hardly knowing what she did, Ethel pushed her three louis on to the green cloth, and as she did so the ball began to rattle on the diamond-shaped pieces of silver at the side of the bowl, and the croupier called out sharply, "Rien ne va plus," announcing that no more stakes could be put upon the table.

Ethel had pushed her three golden louis exactly upon the edge of the line which divided six numbers, from 13 to 18, unconsciously played what is called a transversale simple.

If any of these six numbers turned up she would win five times her original stake. And now – it all passed in a few seconds – the ball was rattling among the compartments, clicking like a pair of castanets. There was a final click as it fell into the slot, the croupier put out his finger and stopped the capstan, announcing the number – "Rouge – dix-huit!"

Red had turned up, but with that Ethel had no concern as she had not backed the colour, but 18 had won, though for a moment she did not realise it.

Then followed what to her was an extraordinary scene. The long rakes of the croupiers shot out from every part of the table, threading their way in and out among the masses of gold, silver and bank notes with extraordinary rapidity and the most delicate manipulation.

A small fortune was swiftly swept away into the bank until the table was comparatively bare. It was all done with the precision of a machine, without a single mistake, and hardly was it completed when the stakes of those who had won were being added to in a golden shower.

It takes a croupier at Monte Carlo a whole year to learn his business, but when he has learnt it no juggler upon the stage can provide a more startling exhibition. Coins flew from rapidly moving hands in a continuous stream, as if liquid gold was being squirted from a hose. No single coin rolled off its appointed square, but fell flat and motionless within an inch of the stake at which it was aimed. And now the rakes were pushing money towards the fortunate, not gathering it in any more, and, almost ere eager or indifferent hands had gathered up what Fortune had sent them, stakes were again being spread over the board for the next coup. To Ethel, who had not in the least known what had happened, there suddenly came a shower of gold falling just before her upon her original three louis.

She stared at it bewildered, and the big Bulgarian opposite smiled at her ignorance.

Not so Mrs. McMahon. "That is yours, Ethel," she said; "that is yours. You've won, after all." And as if in a dream the girl drew the glittering pile towards her. Fifteen louis, and her own three coins back again! Fifteen louis! More than thirteen English pounds – come to her as if by magic in less than a minute; her own, her very own to do as she liked with.

"I can't believe it!" she whispered to her mother. "It can't be true – all this – more than a quarter's salary in a minute!"

Old Mrs. McMahon was trembling with excitement, but there was triumph in her voice.

"My dear," she said, in those very tones of calm superiority which she had used when the lottery ticket had at last turned up trumps, "this is nothing. What did I tell you!"

"What shall I do now?" was Ethel's only answer. "Perhaps it would be better to do nothing."

Mrs. McMahon caught at the word with the true gambler's instinct. "My dear," she said, "put one of those louis upon zero."

There was a croupier three or four seats away from the girl. She leant forward, being now a little more accustomed to what she was doing, "Zero, s'il vous plait, monsieur," she said, tossing the coin to him.

"En plein, mademoiselle?" he asked.

Ethel turned to her mother. "What does he mean?" she said. Mrs. McMahon interposed. "Oui, en plein," she replied to the man. "You see, Ethel, it is rather unusual to stake a coin upon a single number, because you have thirty-five chances against you. Most people do what you did just now – cover several numbers and be content with smaller winnings. But you said 'nothing,' and it may be an omen."

Again the ball spun, and now, in full consciousness of what was happening, Ethel knew excitement so fierce and keen, so utterly overpowering and absorbing, that it burned within her like a flame, and frightened her by its intensity.

Her coin was the only one upon zero, which is the bank's number, for when it turns up all the stakes upon the board are taken by the bank, except those placed upon red or black, or the other even chances.

Dame Fortune was very kind to-night, for with a slight emphasis the croupier at the wheel called out "Zero," and several people within her vicinity turned to look with envy or amusement, as the case might be, at the beautiful girl who had alone staked upon the big white "O."

They paid her in notes this time, and Mrs. McMahon leant back in her chair with a gasp. "Fool! Fool that I was," she whispered, her hands clasping and unclasping themselves. "You had the money; you might have put on the maximum of nine louis, and you would have won, my dear, you would have won, and you would have won 6,300 francs – £252!"

"But, mother," Ethel whispered back, "I have won seven hundred francs already, and three hundred with the first spin, that is a thousand francs – almost my year's salary at the school!"

"You have been very fortunate" said the old lady. "And now let us go."

"Let us go, mother? No, look; they are beginning to spin again. Let me try once more?"

Mrs. McMahon gathered up the gold and crisp notes of the Bank of France and placed them in her chain purse.

"My dear," she replied, "I am almost as keen as you are to go on, but let us be content with our great good fortune. We shall have all the more money to play with when we begin upon the system to-morrow."

They vacated their seats, which were immediately occupied by people who had been standing behind them, and moved slowly through the great hall towards the doors. By this time the rooms were thronged with people of all nationalities.

The wealthiest millionaires of London, Paris and Vienna rubbed shoulders with well-dressed scoundrels known to the police of all three capitals. There was a reigning king present – a tall, elderly man with a long white beard – half the nobilities of Europe were represented. The most expensive and extravagant toilets to be found anywhere in the world at that hour were seen on either side, and yet there was a proportion of the players as poor in worldly goods as Ethel McMahon and her mother themselves; retired army men in whom the gambling fever burned and would burn until their death, young spendthrifts who had come to spend their all upon a last chance, financial defaulters who hoped by one smile of the goddess Fortune to restore money which was not theirs, and to yet preserve their honour in the eyes of the world.