Everybody had been playing fairly late and the ladies had gone to their rooms and “turned in” at about twelve o’clock. The men had played until about two. Shortly after this, the housekeeper, in making her final round of the house, was startled to hear the widow’s voice addressing somebody in an agonized and supplicating way.
As the door of the widow’s room was ajar, the housekeeper paused in some alarm, only to hear her call out: “My diamonds, my diamonds, why didn’t I protect them? I am lost, absolutely lost!”
The housekeeper, not knowing the intricacies of bridge and thoroughly alarmed by the idea of a burglar in the widow’s room, rushed to the host’s door and hastily summoned him to the rescue. After a somewhat noisy consultation between them, as a result of which some of the disrobing bachelors were attracted to the scene of conflict, a united descent was made upon the unfortunate widow’s stronghold. The net result of the sortie was that the widow was greatly annoyed, the host was unmercifully chaffed, and the housekeeper received her first lesson in bridge.
“It was,” said the Knickerbocker bridge fiend, “at the Hotel Splendide-Royale in Aix-les-Bains. I was playing twenty-cent points, which is just double my usual limit. I had lost six consecutive rubbers. I had cut, each rubber, against a peculiarly malevolent-looking Spaniard, who had a reputation at cards which was none too savory. There had been trouble about him only the day before at the Casino des Fleurs, where he had been mixed up in a somewhat unpleasant baccarat scandal. He was a crafty and sullen bridge player and I had conceived a most cordial dislike to him.
“Finally—it was hideously late and the card-room waiter was snoring in the service closet—my time for revenge arrived. It was my deal, and I saw at a glance that I had dealt myself an enormous hand. I could hardly believe my eyes. I held nine spades with the four top honors, the bare ace of clubs, the bare ace of hearts, and the king and queen of diamonds. Here was a certainty of eleven tricks at no trumps and very possibly twelve or thirteen. I looked at the Spaniard, whose turn it was to lead, and I smiled exultantly.
“‘No trumps,’ I said, the note of triumph quite perceptible in my voice. Quick as a flash the Spaniard had doubled—and quick as another I had redoubled.
“When, however, he had jacked it up to 96 a trick, I hesitated, but of course went at him again with 192. ‘Ah, ha!,’ I said to myself, ‘Mr. bird of ill omen, you are my prey, my chosen victim for the sacrifice.’