They went out slowly into the hall. “Never mind, Gerard,” said the Baroness, still in that ill-used tone, “it’ll be all right soon. Come back this evening and settle about going to the Horst to-morrow. Oh, will that music never stop!”
It followed him down the street in a reckless jingle and crash of feverish discord, as if all the notes of the instrument together were dancing a devil’s saraband.
He went to the club, and, from sheer nervous vexation, boisterously got together a game of vingt-et-un. He won nearly a thousand florins in a couple of hours. As a rule, however, gambling was not one of his weaknesses. He had plenty of others.
Then he treated the whole mess to champagne, declaring it was his birthday, and when somebody denied that, he turned almost fiercely on the caviller. “My death-day, then!” he said. “It don’t make any difference in the wine.”
They were all surprised at his irritability, and concluded that the extent of his winnings was vexing him. That would be quite like Van Helmont, who was free-handed and free-hearted to a fault. He was the most popular man in the regiment.
“‘THERE HAS BEEN NO QUARREL THAT I KNOW OF, MEVROUW’”
It was half-past eight when he again rang at the Van Trossarts’ door. He was flushed with excitement and champagne. The piano had ceased; the whole house lay steeped in silence. Almost immediately, as he hesitated under the hall-lamp, the Freule’s maid came forward with a note. He took it and glanced through it on the spot. It was very brief:
“Yes, I have read Maupassant; all night I sat up reading him. Go back to the house-maid. Thank Heaven, Jeanne is not married yet.”