"Thanks, Spadoni, you may count on my gratitude. Go ahead and decide what you want, a house, a yacht, or perhaps a piano with golden keys."
Michael listened in amazement. She was speaking in all sincerity: as though her fortune had turned her mind.
But the pianist left them. He felt he must be alone. By the Duchess' side he was obliged to share his glory, contenting himself with but a fragment of it. And he went off to join the English people from Beaulieu, who, proclaiming him the most interesting phenomenon they had met in all their travels, were anxious to meet and share a bottle of champagne with him.
Alicia and the Prince walked toward the cloak room.
"I have deposited my winnings with the cashier of the Club," she said, showing him the receipt. "I am not going to carry so much money home at night. To-morrow I shall come to take it to the bank. I need some one to accompany me. Send me the Colonel: he is a fighter and must have a revolver."
Then, remembering something important, her features took on a grave look.
"I need not say that to-morrow we will straighten our account. Don't think I have forgotten what I owe you: the twenty thousand francs from the other day, and your mother's three hundred thousand. It will all be paid."
Michael showed the astonishment which this promise caused him by a prolonged laugh. Really, her winning had affected her brain. A piano with golden keys for the other man, and now hundreds of thousands of francs for him. The fortune recently acquired in two hours seemed to her as extraordinary and limitless as her good luck itself had been.
"What I want," he added, in a low tone, ceasing to laugh, "what I want from you, you know very well."
She stopped him with a caressing look and a discreet whisper which was equivalent to a promise.