We know the result of the calculations and computations of Voisin Raymond,—the inevitable fate of all gamesters who count on benefiting by the favours of fortune.
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It took Raymond some days to narrate to me the above story, as, when the clock struck the hour for beginning to play, he immediately quitted me, and thought of nothing but his hypothetical combinations.
He was trying a new system, about which, by-the-bye, he would never tell me a word, but I had little doubt that it would prove as fallacious as the former one, and leave him nothing but his own bright dreams as his reward.
When I quitted Baden, he was penniless, and I had to add to the loan I had already made him.
Since his conversion, I had had good proof, that he preferred suffering the most severe privations, rather than have recourse to his skill in sharping; and this it was which made me advance him a larger sum.
When we parted, I left Raymond overjoyed with the hopes of being able to repay me all he owed, in a very short space of time, and even of being able to break the bank with the money I had lent him.
These golden visions, alas! were never destined to be realised. Soon afterwards, I went to Paris to resume my "séances," and whilst there, I received a letter from Raymond, making a last appeal to my generosity, to enable him to live until he got a situation he was trying for.
Wishing to prevent a recurrence of similar appeals, I did not answer his letter, but wrote to one of my friends at Strasbourg, to send the wretched man fifty francs, without telling him the name of his benefactor.
A whole year passed without my hearing any more of Raymond. I thought it very probable he had died of want, when one day, on returning home in a cab, I could not drive up to my own door, as an elegant brougham, which had just driven up, was standing opposite to it.