He went to the Casino theater, to while away the time until midnight. He would not have been able to tell for a certainty with whom he talked during the intermission, nor with whom he shook hands. He was obliged to make an effort several times to recall the name and composer of the opera. The music made no difference to him. It was a lulling sound which rocked his thoughts to sleep, calming his emotion—an emotion made up of hope and of fear.
During the first act, he wanted Alicia to lose everything, absolutely everything, thus she would be his more completely, depending absolutely on him, in sweet bondage. Later, during the following act he thought of Alicia's despair after such a loss. She was full of temperament, and she felt the pride of an artist in her play. Perhaps more than the lost money, she would lament her personal defeat. No, it was better that she should win. But how long the music was lasting! How slowly his watch seemed to go! After eleven, when the lobby was lighted and the crowd was leaving the opera, Michael got into an elevator, which took him down into the bowels of the earth, and then he followed a subterranean passageway, the multi-colored stucco walls of which brilliantly reflected the electric lights. He was walking along under the square front of the Casino, where at that moment many carriages were passing back and forth. Another elevator took him up to a large room filled with columns. It was the great hall of the Hôtel de Paris. He saw women in evening gowns and gentlemen dressed in Tuxedos, the usual crowd of fashionable hotel people who put on uniforms for dinner, and then sit around in deep armchairs, to digest what they have eaten, looking at one another without talking, or else conversing in low tones, as though they were in church, until they are overcome by sleep.
He bowed distantly to various friends who arose, on seeing him, to begin a conversation. He pretended not to see certain ladies who smiled at him, motioning with their heads to call him. He entered another elevator, and descended once more underground. He found himself in a curving passageway, the walls of which were decorated with Pompeian paintings. It extended under two hotels and their gardens. Once more he entered an elevator, which brought him above the surface of the ground. He opened a glass door. An old lackey, in a blue livery, with knee breeches and white stockings, bowed, somewhat surprised at recognizing, after a moment's hesitation, Prince Lubimoff. He was in the Sporting Club.
He had not entered it for years, since before the war. He was not a gambler, and it was only because he had been interested in certain women that he had spent his nights amid elegant society in that place which, like many others of the same class, was merely a gambling den.
The drawing rooms were too small, after midnight; one walked along stepping on the trains of women's gowns. One had to be very dextrous to slip through between the various groups. Every one was smoking, the women more than the men, and the atmosphere grew thicker and thicker with tobacco smoke and the perfumes of the boudoir. The wealthy people scorned the crowds at the Casino, considering it a sign of distinction to be packed in together in this club. They gambled with their own set, considering themselves safe from bad neighbors at the tables, and from contact with suspicious characters who were so frequent in the public rooms. To get in here, it was necessary to give guarantees; some one must vouch for the honor of a person before he could be presented.
The Prince was well acquainted with this brilliant gathering. Here one might meet people of royal blood, heirs to thrones, who were passing through the Riviera, famous bankers, millionaires from all parts of the world, women celebrated for their nobility, their beauty, or their jewels, and many famous and aged cocottes and a few, young and fresh looking, who were anxious to grow old as soon as possible, as though that were a means of attaining celebrity. They had all appeared on the stage, at one time or another, in a trained-rabbit act, perhaps, or in some wretched dance, or with a song which they sang in spite of the fact that they had no voices. They were admitted to the Club under the rather vague classification of "artists."
Michael came forward through the atmosphere warm from the crowds and heavy with fading perfumes. He still had to watch where he stepped this time as he had done on his visit here before. Now, to be sure, women's skirts were very short, and their legs were shown uncovered, with a placid lack of shame. The war was shortening their skirts, as though the women, obliged to run in the open field, had taken as a model the ancient Vivandière. But almost all of them, in order not to break completely with a majestic tradition, had added to their stylish overskirts, a sharp and narrow tail, tongue-shaped, which dragged far behind as they walked.
A lady came forward to meet Lubimoff, and it was a moment before he recognized her. It had been so many years since he had seen Alicia in evening dress! Her gown dated back to pre-war times, but was of rich material and the Duchess wore it with the same smartness as in the days of her wealth. The long pearl necklace gained an air of genuineness on her person, as did her other ornaments. It was evident that she had made extraordinary efforts to present a proper appearance on her visit to the Club.
She came here seldom, the crowd composed of former friends talked too much, disturbing her in her gambling calculations. She preferred the Casino, with its large rooms and its motley crowd, talking in various languages. She was a proletarian in the matter of gambling: she had a superstition that fortune prefers to come where its devotees gather in large bands. Her intuition that she would be lucky at baccarat, a game to be found only here, had persuaded her to abandon her usual custom for this one night.
The Prince complimented her on her lovely appearance, her dress, her pearls....