It often happened, that, after a game was over, at which the dupes had lost a hundred louis (£80), when they came to divide, there were only sixty forthcoming.
Every one of the players agreed that there ought to be more, but no one acknowledged to having taken the missing money.
They looked at each other, and even made a personal search (for in such company delicacy is needless), but found nothing.
At length they hit on an idea; they agreed to request Tête d'Or to make a secret investigation, in order to discover which was the culprit.
Andréas, flattered at being selected to fill so delicate a post, put all his zeal and intelligence in requisition, and soon detected the two delinquents, as well as the tricks they had employed to cheat the society.
It appeared, that one of these men gave orders to his servant, to come towards the end of every evening, to ask his master for a key, or for some other trifling errand. Whilst giving him the key, he also handed over to him a rouleau of the louis he had gained. If the winnings were considerable, the servant, at a sign from his master, returned with the key, and in giving it back received a second rouleau.
Another, more modest, contented himself with sticking a few louis under the table with small bits of wax, collecting them after the division of the spoils was over.
A third, a sort of human ostrich, swallowed the money, and afterwards took an emetic to recover it.
These double-faced thieves, once known, were expelled, as not being worthy to belong to an association, which boasted of being proof against all temptation.
It occasionally occurred, that false money was mixed up with the genuine coin. But the author of this fraud could never be discovered; so no notice was taken of the circumstance, as the false money was so good an imitation, that none of the party had any scruples about circulating it amongst their trades-people.