"Say no more, my dear fellow," said Frank, shaking him warmly by the hand, "half a crown will be abundance, I only want to try the red once. I'm really obliged to you for the offer of the loan, and shall accept it with pleasure. Now-a-days one does not often meet with such a trump! If ever you should run low, you know, in me you will always find one ready to reciprocate a civility."
The smiling gentleman rubbed his whiskers and filled his nose with snuff; but he concluded by slipping the half-crown into Frank's hand, who instantly threw it on the red.
Cecil had thrown his last five pounds upon the red, and with straining eyeballs watched the falling cards.
"Black wins," said the dealer.
Frank saw the croupier rake away his half-crown, and with it Cecil's five pounds.
A low cry burst from Cecil, as he learned his fate; and, leaning his elbows on the table, he let his head fall into his hands, and sobbed aloud.
The dealers and croupiers, accustomed to every expression of grief, sat with immoveable, expressionless faces, pursuing their routine with an indifference which was quite ghastly. The players looked upon him with different feelings: some with compassion, some with contempt, some with sympathetic fear. But above his wretched sobs were heard the unvarying tones of, "Gentlemen, make your game; the game is made."
Frank touched Cecil on the shoulder, and beckoned him to come away. Mechanically Cecil did so, and they stepped together out into the dull, dismal, November evening, and walked through the mist and lightly falling snow, without uttering a word.
At Park Lane they parted; a pressure of the hand was the only expression of their feelings which passed between them. Sick at heart, they both felt that nothing could be said to comfort them.
The lights glimmered dimly through the dirty air of that November evening, and the snow fell, and the rain, and the whole scene was drear and desolate, as Cecil wandered on, crushed in spirit, savage from remorse, exasperated by his impotent efforts to shake off the galling remembrance that he was now Heath's debtor—that he had taken his money, and could not throw it back at him.