The colonel burst out with a laugh, "Ha, ha! he owes it me," he said.
"I don't know that that's a reason with Frank for paying," Strong answered. "He owes plenty besides you."
"Well, he gives it me because he is so fond of me," the other said, with the same grinning sneer. "He loves me like a brother; you know he does, captain. No?—He don't?—Well, perhaps he don't; and if you ask me no questions, perhaps I'll tell you no lies, Captain Strong—put that in your pipe and smoke it, my boy."
"But I'll give up that confounded brandy-bottle," the colonel continued, after a pause. "I must give it up, or it'll be the ruin of me." "It makes you say queer things," said the captain, looking Altamont hard in the face. "Remember what you said last night at Clavering's table."
"Say? What did I say?" asked the other hastily. "Did I split any thing? Dammy, Strong, did I split any thing?"
"Ask me no questions, and I will tell you no lies," the chevalier replied on his part. Strong thought of the words Mr. Altamont had used, and his abrupt departure from the baronet's dining-table and house as soon as he recognized Major Pendennis, or Captain Beak, as he called the major. But Strong resolved to seek an explanation of these words otherwise than from Colonel Altamont, and did not choose to recall them to the other's memory. "No," he said then, "you didn't split as you call it, colonel; it was only a trap of mine to see if I could make you speak; but you didn't say a word that any body could comprehend—you were too far gone for that."
So much the better, Altamont thought; and heaved a great sigh, as if relieved. Strong remarked the emotion, but took no notice, and the other being in a communicative mood, went on speaking.
"Yes, I own to my faults," continued the colonel. "There is some things I can't, do what I will, resist: a bottle of brandy, a box of dice, and a beautiful woman. No man of pluck and spirit, no man as was worth his salt ever could, as I know of. There's hardly p'raps a country in the world in which them three ain't got me into trouble."
"Indeed?" said Strong.
"Yes, from the age of fifteen, when I ran away from home, and went cabin-boy on board an Indiaman, till now, when I'm fifty year old, pretty nigh, them women have always been my ruin. Why, it was one of 'em, and with such black eyes and jewels on her neck, and sattens and ermine like a duchess, I tell you—it was one of 'em at Paris that swept off the best part of the thousand pound as I went off. Didn't I ever tell you of it? Well, I don't mind. At first I was very cautious, and having such a lot of money kep it close and lived like a gentleman—Colonel Altamont, Meurice's hotel, and that sort of thing— never played, except at the public tables, and won more than I lost. Well, sir, there was a chap that I saw at the hotel and the Palace Royal too, a regular swell fellow, with white kid gloves and a tuft to his chin, Bloundell-Bloundell his name was, as I made acquaintance with somehow, and he asked me to dinner, and took me to Madame the Countess de Foljambe's soirées—such a woman, Strong!—such an eye! such a hand at the pianner. Lor bless you, she'd sit down and sing to you, and gaze at you, until she warbled your soul out of your body a'most. She asked me to go to her evening parties every Toosday; and didn't I take opera-boxes and give her dinners at the restaurateurs, that's all? But I had a run of luck at the tables, and it was not in the dinners and opera-boxes that poor Clavering's money went. No, be hanged to it, it was swep off in another way. One night, at the countess's, there was several of us at supper—Mr. Bloundell-Bloundell, the Honorable Deuceace, the Marky de la Tour de Force—all tip-top nobs, sir, and the height of fashion, when we had supper, and champagne, you may be sure, in plenty, and then some of that confounded brandy. I would have it—I would go on at it—the countess mixed the tumblers of punch for me, and we had cards as well as grog after supper, and I played and drank until I don't know what I did. I was like I was last night. I was taken away and put to bed somehow, and never woke until the next day, to a roaring headache, and to see my servant, who said the Honorable Deuceace wanted to see me, and was waiting in the sitting-room. 'How are you, colonel?' says he, a-coming into my bedroom. 'How long did you stay last night after I went away? The play was getting too high for me, and I'd lost enough to you for one night.'