"You are very caustic this morning."

"I lost all my money last night.

"Then I have chosen a bad time. Farewell."

From that day, De la Haye became my secret enemy, and to him I was in a
great measure indebted, two years later, for my imprisonment under The
Leads of Venice; not owing to his slanders, for I do not believe he was
capable of that, Jesuit though he was--and even amongst such people there
is sometimes some honourable feeling--but through the mystical
insinuations which he made in the presence of bigoted persons. I must
give fair notice to my readers that, if they are fond of such people,
they must not read these Memoirs, for they belong to a tribe which I have
good reason to attack unmercifully.

The fine marriage was never again alluded to. M. Dandolo continued to
visit his beautiful widow every day, and I took care to elicit from
Paralis a strong interdiction ever to put my foot in her house.

Don Antonio Croce, a young Milanese whom I had known in Reggio, a
confirmed gambler, and a downright clever hand in securing the favours of
Dame Fortune, called on me a few minutes after De la Haye had retired. He
told me that, having seen me lose all my money the night before, he had
come to offer me the means of retrieving my losses, if I would take an
equal interest with him in a faro bank that he meant to hold at his
house, and in which he would have as punters seven or eight rich
foreigners who were courting his wife.

"If you will put three hundred sequins in my bank," he added, "you shall