Ora pouted and looked like a naughty child.
“But I want to gamble. Give me my money. What have you to say about it?”
“I brought you here—and I shall not bring you again if you are going to gamble like that old Frankfurt banker over there. Why not follow the example of Mrs. Compton, who is decorously putting five franc pieces on the green at the next table?”
“Oh, Ida! I like the sensation of doing big things. You just said we enjoyed letting loose our primitive instincts.”
“Is that the way you felt? Well, here are three louis. Stake one at a time. I shall change the rest into notes and give them to you at the hotel.”
He kept his eye on her, and she staked her gold pieces one after another and lost.
“Now,” he said, “come into the bar and have a glass of wine or a lemon squash. I want to talk to you.”
They found seats in a corner of the bar behind a little table, and Ora demurely ordered a lemonade. “I suppose you are going to scold me,” she murmured, although her cheeks were still flushed and her eyes rebellious. “What difference did it make? I am not poor, and I had won nearly all that I risked, anyhow. You have seen women gamble all your life. One would think that you were a hayseed, yourself.”
“Shall I be quite honest? I fancy I was jealous. For the first time I saw you completely carried away. I had hoped to furnish that impulse myself!”
“It is a wonderful sensation,” she said provokingly. “I doubt if anything but gambling could inspire it.”