velvet-covered sofas, eating ices and smoking pipes. In the
drawing-room, at the head of a long table, around which were
assembled about a score of players, sat the master of the house
keeping the bank. He was a man of about sixty years of age, of a
very dignified appearance; his head was covered with silvery white
hair; his full, florid countenance expressed good-nature, and his
eyes twinkled with a perpetual smile. Naroumoff introduced Hermann
to him. Chekalinsky shook him by the hand in a friendly manner,
requested him not to stand on ceremony, and then went on dealing.

The game occupied some time. On the table lay more than thirty
cards. Chekalinsky paused after each throw, in order to give the
players time to arrange their cards and note down their losses,
listened politely to their requests, and more politely still,
straightened the corners of cards that some player's hand had
chanced to bend. At last the game was finished. Chekalinsky
shuffled the cards, and prepared to deal again.

"Will you allow me to take a card?" said Hermann, stretching out
his hand from behind a stout gentleman who was punting.

Chekalinsky smiled and bowed silently, as a sign of acquiescence.
Naroumoff laughingly congratulated Hermann on his abjuration of
that abstention from cards which he had practised for so long a
period, and wished him a lucky beginning.

"Stake!" said Hermann, writing some figures with chalk on the back
of his card.

"How much?" asked the banker, contracting the muscles of his eyes,