He left the Casino. He would never come back again: he swore it!
Castro, whom he had seen from a distance gambling at one of the tables, returned to Villa Sirena at the dinner hour. He was in a bad humor; but he forgot his own misfortune long enough to console himself by relating Alicia's mishaps:
"After losing everything in trente et quarante, she appeared at a last minute with more money: a roll of thousand franc notes. And she, who never felt any special inclination for roulette, began to play the wheel. And how she played! At first she won a few long shots, two or three; but after that nothing: she kept losing and losing! She left everything on the table. I did not see her go out, but they told me she looked like a corpse, leaning on Valeria's arm. They say she suffers from heart trouble. All I say is: it isn't every one who pretends to be a gambler that is one; you need a strong constitution. The 'General' doesn't play so much, but she is cooler and doesn't lose her head."
Michael slept badly. He was angry with Alicia. Instead of lamenting her misfortune he considered it logical. Imagine a woman trying to make money! Women can only get it from men's hands, and it is useless for them to try and get it for themselves, even by appealing to gambling. Gambling also is an enterprise for men.
In the mental twilight when one is half asleep and half awake, the Prince, lying on his bed, remembered a scene from his happier days, when his yacht was anchored in the harbor of Monaco. It was one night when he was coming from a banquet in the Hôtel de Paris. He was slightly intoxicated and was leaning in a sort of a mental haze on the arms of two pretty women, who, smiling and unsuccessful, were competing to see which one would get him. Behind him, like a retinue, came his friends, his brilliant parasites, and various women guests, his entire court. They had entered the Casino. He was not a gambler; it bored him to sit motionless at a table; he considered it childish to get interested in the whirling of a little ball of bone, or the combinations of little colored cards. There were so many more interesting pleasures in life! But that night, proud of his power, he felt a desire to fight a battle with fortune. Fortune is a woman, and he was determined to conquer it by the power of wealth, as he had conquered many another woman. The rich finally defeat even destiny with all its mysteries. He placed in front of him an enormous quantity of money to begin the struggle, and fortune refused it; or rather, began to give him money of her own, with scornful prodigality. The multi-millionaire wanted to lose and he could not. He varied his game capriciously, committed voluntary errors, and success always came forward to meet him. Finally he grew tired. It was before the war, and instead of with bone chips representing a hundred francs, they played with handsome gold coins of the same value. In front of him he had numerous and dazzling columns of this metal; and packages of bank notes.
"Who wants money?"
He began to fling it about in an enchanting rain. All except the most aristocratic women came running, tense and pale, swarming around the table, struggling for a single louis. They shoved one another, rolled on the carpet, bruising each other with hands and feet, to gain a single drop of this golden manna. Some of them struck and scratched each other, while their right hands clutched the same thousand franc note, tearing it. Hats rolled about on the ground; the hair of some of the women fell down their back, or was scattered in a cloud of false curls.
"Me, Prince! Me!"
And with clutching fingers they danced about him, in a body, as though possessed.