And then a queer and bitter smile came to John Bruce's lips. The god of money! Was he so sure that he was the god and not the worshiper? Was that it? Was that what Larmon counted upon?—that only a fool would risk the sacrifice of the Aladdin's lamp that had been thrust into his hands, and that only a fool but would devote body and soul to Larmon's interests under the circumstances!
The smile grew whimsical. It was complimentary in a sense. It was based on the premise that he, John Bruce, was not a fool. He shrugged his shoulders. Well, therein Larmon was right. It would not be his, John Bruce's, fault if anything short of death terminated the bond which had originated that tropic night on the moon-lit beach in Samoa three months ago!
He looked at his watch. It was nine o'clock. It was still early for play; but it was not so early that his arrival in the New York “branch,” where he had been a constant visitor for the last four nights, could possibly arouse any suspicion, and one's opportunities for inside observation were very much better when the play was desultory and but few present than in the crowded rooms of the later hours.
“If I were in England now,” said John Bruce, addressing the chandelier, as he put on a light coat over his evening clothes, “I couldn't get away with this without a man to valet me—and at times, though he might be useful, he might be awkward. Damned awkward! But in America you do, or you don't, as you please—and I don't!”
CHAPTER TWO—THE MILLIONAIRE PLUNGER
JOHN BRUCE left the hotel and entered a taxi. A little later, in that once most fashionable section of New York, in the neighborhood of Gramercy Square, he was admitted to a stately mansion by a white-haired negro butler, who bowed obsequiously.
Thereafter, for a little while, John Bruce wandered leisurely from room to room in the magnificently appointed house, where in the rich carpets the sound of footsteps was lost, where bronzes and paintings, exquisite in their art, charmed the eye, where soft-toned draperies and portières were eloquent of refinement and good taste; he paused for a moment at the threshold of the supper room, whose table was a profusion of every delicacy to tempt the palate, where wines of a vintage that was almost priceless were to be had at no greater cost than the effort required to lift a beckoning finger to the smiling ebony face of old Jake, the attendant. And here John Bruce extended a five-dollar bill, but shook his head as the said Jake hastened toward him. Later, perhaps, he might revisit the room—when a few hours' play had dimmed the recollection of his recent dinner, and his appetite was again sharpened.
In the card rooms there were, as yet, scarcely any “guests.” He chatted pleasantly with the “dealers”—John Bruce, the millionaire plunger, was persona grata, almost effusively so, everywhere in the house. Lavergne, the manager, as Parisian as he was immaculate from the tips of his patent-leathers to the tips of his waxed mustache, joined him; and for ten minutes, until the other was called away, John Bruce proceeded to nourish the already extremely healthy germ of intimacy that, from the first meeting, he had planted between them.