"Whiz-z-z-z" started the ball from the fingers of the coupeurs—"click" dropped the ball into a black department of the board; "clink! tingle!" cried the money, changing hands; but not a word said Auburn Risque, standing like a stalagmite with his eyes upon ten francs.
"Whiz-z-z!"—"click!" "click!" "tingle!"
Did he see the fifteen francs at all, half trance-like, half corpse-like, as he stood, waiting for the third revolution, and waiting again, and again, and again?
His five francs have grown to be a hundred; his cold hand falls freezingly upon them; five francs replace the hundred he took away—"Whizz!" goes the ball; "click!" stops the ball; the coupeur seizes Mr. Risque's five francs, and Mr. Risque walks away like a somnambulist.
V.
BURIED IN THE COMMON DITCH.
It would have been a strange scene for an American public, the street corridor of the lofty house near the church of Saint Sulpice, on the funeral afternoon.
The coffin lay upon a draped table, and festoons of crape threw phantom shadows upon the soiled velvet covering. Each passing pedestrian and cabman took off his hat a moment. The Southern Colony were in the landlady's bureau enjoying a lunch and liquor, and precisely at three o'clock they came down stairs, not more dilapidated than usual, while at the same moment the municipal hearse drove up, attended by one cocher and two croquemorts.[D]
[D] Literally, "parasites of death."