“You three play,” said Marlowe, “I will look on.”
“As usual——” began Bartol.
“With only the dregs of a once full bottle,” muttered Marlowe, finishing his friend’s remark.
A CLASH OF STEEL.
I know, sir, what it is to kill a man;
It works remorse of conscience in me;
I take no pleasure to be murderous,
Nor care for blood when wine will quench my thirst.
—II Tamburlaine, iv.
Though in the trade of war I have slain men,
Yet do I hold it very stuff of conscience
To do no contrived murder. I lack iniquity
Sometimes to do me service.
—Othello, i, 2.
The excitement of watching the game of hazard, in which Frazer and the two actors had become engaged, was not sufficient to absorb the thoughts of the man who was simply an observer. At each lucky throw of the dice, he longed to become a participator in the game; and at length, smothering his early fears of being left penniless, he placed a sum of money upon the table, and was soon rising and sinking with the vicissitudes of chance.
His one angel rapidly grew into a brace of gold pieces, and with the increase of his success the stakes were raised in proportion. Still sweet fortune breathed her hot breath upon his cheeks and the other players muttered morosely and swore savagely at each rattle of the cup and roll of the cubes.
The business of the tapster had not been stayed by reason of the excitement of the play, but on the contrary it led him back and forth from the bar, to the round table under the lit lamps, with movements which were scarcely interrupted by an interval of rest. All of this was quietly observed by Dodsman, who, having lighted a pipe of long-leaf and ensconced himself, with almost closed eyes, in a tilted chair near at hand, kept repeating to himself the lines: