“We 'll double, if you prefer it,” said he.
“What says my banker?” said I.
“He says, 'Credit unlimited,'” cried O'Kelly, gayly.
“Egad! I wish mine would say as much,” said the Prince, laughing, as he cut the cards for me to deal.
Although I had drunk freely, and talked excitingly, my head became suddenly calm and collected, just as if some great emergency had sufficed to dispel all illusions, and enabled my faculties to assume their full exercise. Of O'Kelly I saw nothing more; he was occupied in an adjoining room; and even this element of anxiety was spared me.
I will not ask my reader to follow me through the vicissitudes of play, nor expect from him any share of interest in a passion which of all others is the most bereft of good, and allied with the very lowest of all motives, and the meanest of all ambitions. Enough that I tell the result. After a long course of defeats and disasters, I rose, not only clear of all my debts, but a winner of two hundred pounds.
The Prince heartily congratulated me on my good fortune, saying that none could better deserve it. He complimented me much on my play, but still more on my admirable temper as a loser,—a quality which, he added, he never could lay claim to.
“I'm a bad beaten man, but you are the very reverse,” said he. “Dine with me on Saturday, and I hope to see how you'll comport yourself as a winner.”
I had but time to bow my humble acknowledgment of this gracious speech, when O'Kelly came up, saying,—
“So Canthorpe tells me you beat him, after all; but I always knew how it would end,—play must and will tell in the long run.”