"I—I started with a hundred, Renie. I had to have it; I had to, I tell you. You remember that night I—I wanted you to go over and ask Aunt Beck for it? I had to have it. Pa—. I—I couldn't excite him any more about it; and—and I had to have it, I tell you, Renie."
"Yes; then what?"
"And I—I borrowed it without asking. I—I fixed it on my books so—so
Uncle Isadore wouldn't—couldn't—. I—I fixed it on my books."
"Oh-oh, Izzy! Oh—oh—oh!"
"I was trying out a system—a new one—and it worked, Renie. I tried it out on the new wheel down at Sharkey's and the seventeen system worked like a trick. I won big the first and second nights, Renie—you remember the night I brought you and ma the bracelets? I paid back the hundred the first week, Renie; and no one knew—no one knew."
"Oh-h-h-h!"
"The next Friday my luck turned on me—I never ought to have played on Friday—turned like a toad one unlucky Friday night. I got in deep before I knew it, and deeper and deeper; and then—and then it just seemed there wasn't no holding me, Renie. I got wild—got wild, I tell you; and I—I wrote 'em checks I didn't have no right to write. I—I went crazy, I tell you. Next day—you remember that morning I left the house so early?—I had to fix it with the books and borrow what—what I needed before the banks opened. I—I had to make good on them checks, Renie. I fixed it with the books, and from that time on it worked."
"Oh, Izzy—Izzy—Izzy!"
"I kept losing, Renie; but I knew, if my luck just changed from that unlucky Friday night, I could pay it back like the first time. All I needed was a little time and a little luck and I could pay it back like the first hundred; so I kept fixing my books, Renie, and—and borrowing more—and more."
"How much?"