“How often have I heard you talk in that way,” said the Baron de Vergins. “All the same, you could not resist the temptation to play if you were in front of the baccarat-table a single quarter of an hour!”
“Come along, then, and you will see.”
They passed into the large room. Beneath the ceiling floated a grey mist of tobacco smoke, like a fog.
On either side of the room was a green table, around which thronged a crowd of sour-visaged punters.
“Ah! You have two baccarat-tables now,” remarked Marcel.
“Yes; it is an innovation. At the one the minimum stake is a louis; at the other, it is ten francs. So that, when a punter has had a run of ill-luck at the large table, he goes to the small one to try and recoup, with the privilege of returning afterwards to the other, to lose once more what he may have won.”
“Very ingenious. A double sieve from which nothing escapes!”
He approached the large table, and his look immediately became fixed. In front of him, dealing the bank, he had just recognized Agostini. Impassive and smiling, a flower at his buttonhole, he gracefully distributed the cards at both tables. He did not see Marcel. With his sing-song voice he called out—
“Cards!”
Marcel, addressing the Baron de Vergins, asked—