to her. It was not very wrong to go there, and if the Prince did go and
smoke a few cigars and have a game at bouillotte, it was not a very great
crime. The return of his usual friends to Paris and the resumption of
their receptions would bring him home again.

Serge now left Micheline about ten o'clock in the evening regularly and
arrived at the club about eleven. High play did not commence until after
midnight. Then he seated himself at the gaming-table with all the ardor
of a professional gambler. His face changed its expression. When
winning, it was animated with an expression of awful joy; when losing,
he looked as hard as a stone, his features contracted, and his eyes were
full of gloomy fire. He bit his mustache convulsively. Moreover, always
silent, winning or losing with superb indifference.

He lost. His bad luck had followed him. At the club his losses were no
longer limited. There was always some one willing to take a hand, and
until dawn he played, wasting his life and energies to satisfy his insane
love of gambling.

One morning, Marechal entered Madame Desvarennes's private office,
holding a little square piece of paper. Without speaking a word, he
placed it on the desk. The mistress took it, read what was written upon
it in shaky handwriting, and suddenly becoming purple, rose. The paper
bore these simple words:

"Received from Monsieur Salignon the sum of one hundred thousand francs.
Serge Panine."

"Who brought this paper?" asked Madame Desvarennes, crushing it between
her fingers.