He won again and again, adding other towers of counters to his original
allotment, so that he had the semblance of a tiny castle. When the cards
had been dealt for the fifth time he felt the light contact of a slipper
touching his foot under the table.

That slipper, he decided (from the nature of things) could belong to
none other than his Helene, and even as he came to this conclusion the
slight pressure against his foot was gently but distinctly increased
thrice. He pressed the slipper in return with his shoe, at the same time
giving Madame de Vaurigard a look of grateful surprise and tenderness,
which threw her into a confusion so evidently genuine that for an
unworthy moment he had a jealous suspicion she had meant the little
caress for some other.

It was a disagreeable thought, and, in the hope of banishing it, he
refilled his glass; but his mood had begun to change. It seemed to him
that Helene was watching Cooley a great deal too devotedly. Why had she
consented to sit by Cooley, when she had promised to watch Robert Russ
Mellin? He observed the pair stealthily.

Cooley consulted her in laughing whispers upon every discard, upon every
bet. Now and then, in their whisperings, Cooley's hair touched hers;
sometimes she laid her hand on his the more conveniently to look at his
cards. Mellin began to be enraged. Did she think that puling milksop
had as much as a shadow of the daring, the devilry, the carelessness of
consequences which lay within Robert Russ Mellin? "Consequences?" What
were they? There were no such things! She would not look at him--well,
he would make her! Thenceforward he raised every bet by another to the
extent of the limit agreed upon.