The Victorian Rogues MEGAPACK ®. Морис Леблан
and other exciting post-prandial topics; while the magazine editor cut in now and again with a pertinent inquiry or a quaint and sarcastic parallel instance. It was clear he had an eye to future copy. Only Algernon Coleyard sat brooding and silent, with his chin on one hand, and his brow intent, musing and gazing at the embers in the fireplace. The hand, by the way, was remarkable for a curious, antique-looking ring, apparently of Egyptian or Etruscan workmanship, with a projecting gem of several large facets. Once only, in the midst of a game of whist, he broke out with a single comment.
“Hawkins was made an earl,” said Charles, speaking of some London acquaintance.
“What for?” asked the Senator.
“Successful adulteration,” said the poet tartly.
“Honours are easy,” the magazine editor put in.
“And two by tricks to Sir Charles,” the poet added.
Towards the close of the evening, however—the poet still remaining moody, not to say positively grumpy—Senator Wrengold proposed a friendly game of Swedish poker. It was the latest fashionable variant in Western society on the old gambling round, and few of us knew it, save the omniscient poet and the magazine editor. It turned out afterwards that Wrengold proposed that particular game because he had heard Coleyard observe at the Lotus Club the same afternoon that it was a favourite amusement of his. Now, however, for a while he objected to playing. He was a poor man, he said, and the rest were all rich; why should he throw away the value of a dozen golden sonnets just to add one more pinnacle to the gilded roofs of a millionaire’s palace? Besides, he was half-way through with an ode he was inditing to Republican simplicity. The pristine austerity of a democratic senatorial cottage had naturally inspired him with memories of Dentatus, the Fabii, Camillus. But Wrengold, dimly aware he was being made fun of somehow, insisted that the poet must take a hand with the financiers. “You can pass, you know,” he said, “as often as you like; and you can stake low, or go it blind, according as you’re inclined to. It’s a democratic game; every man decides for himself how high he will play, except the banker; and you needn’t take bank unless you want it.”
“Oh, if you insist upon it,” Coleyard drawled out, with languid reluctance, “I’ll play, of course. I won’t spoil your evening. But remember, I’m a poet; I have strange inspirations.”
The cards were “squeezers”—that is to say, had the suit and the number of pips in each printed small in the corner, as well as over the face, for ease of reference. We played low at first. The poet seldom staked; and when he did—a few pounds—he lost, with singular persistence. He wanted to play for doubloons or sequins, and could with difficulty be induced to condescend to dollars. Charles looked across at him at last; the stakes by that time were fast rising higher, and we played for ready money. Notes lay thick on the green cloth. “Well,” he murmured provokingly, “how about your inspiration? Has Apollo deserted you?”
It was an unwonted flight of classical allusion for Charles, and I confess it astonished me. (I discovered afterwards he had cribbed it from a review in that evening’s Critic.) But the poet smiled.
“No,” he answered calmly, “I am waiting for one now. When it comes, you may be sure you shall have the benefit of it.”
Next round, Charles dealing and banking, the poet staked on his card, unseen as usual. He staked like a gentleman. To our immense astonishment he pulled out a roll of notes, and remarked, in a quiet tone, “I have an inspiration now. Half-hearted will do. I go five thousand.” That was dollars, of course; but it amounted to a thousand pounds in English money—high play for an author.
Charles smiled and turned his card. The poet turned his—and won a thousand.
“Good shot!” Charles murmured, pretending not to mind, though he detests losing.
“Inspiration!” the poet mused, and looked once more abstracted.
Charles dealt again. The poet watched the deal with boiled-fishy eyes. His thoughts were far away. His lips moved audibly. “Myrtle, and kirtle, and hurtle,” he muttered. “They’ll do for three. Then there’s turtle, meaning dove; and that finishes the possible. Laurel and coral make a very bad rhyme. Try myrtle; don’t you think so?”
“Do you stake?” Charles asked, severely, interrupting his reverie.
The poet started. “No, pass,” he replied, looking down at his card, and subsided into muttering. We caught a tremor of his lips again, and heard something like this: “Not less but more republican than thou, Half-hearted watcher by the Western sea, After long years I come to visit thee, And test thy fealty to that maiden vow, That bound thee in thy budding prime For Freedom’s bride—”
“Stake?” Charles interrupted, inquiringly, again.
“Yes, five thousand,” the poet answered dreamily, pushing forward his pile of notes, and never ceasing from his murmur: “For Freedom’s bride to all succeeding time. Succeeding; succeeding; weak word, succeeding. Couldn’t go five dollars on it.”
Charles turned his card once more. The poet had won again. Charles passed over his notes. The poet raked them in with a far-away air, as one who looks at infinity, and asked if he could borrow a pencil and paper. He had a few priceless lines to set down which might otherwise escape him.
“This is play,” Charles said pointedly. “Will you kindly attend to one thing or the other?”
The poet glanced at him with a compassionate smile. “I told you I had inspirations,” he said. “They always come together. I can’t win your money as fast as I would like, unless at the same time I am making verses. Whenever I hit upon a good epithet, I back my luck, don’t you see? I won a thousand on half-hearted and a thousand on budding; if I were to back succeeding, I should lose, to a certainty. You understand my system?”
“I call it pure rubbish,” Charles answered. “However, continue. Systems were made for fools—and to suit wise men. Sooner or later you must lose at such a stupid fancy.”
The poet continued. “For Freedom’s bride to all ensuing time.”
“Stake!” Charles cried sharply. We each of us staked.
“Ensuing,” the poet murmured. “To all ensuing time. First-rate epithet that. I go ten thousand, Sir Charles, on ensuing.”
We all turned up. Some of us lost, some won; but the poet had secured his two thousand sterling.
“I haven’t that amount about me,” Charles said, in that austerely nettled voice which he always assumes when he loses at cards; “but—I’ll settle it with you tomorrow.”
“Another round?” the host asked, beaming.
“No, thank you,” Charles answered; “Mr. Coleyard’s inspirations come too pat for my taste. His luck beats mine. I retire from the game, Senator.”
Just at that moment a servant entered, bearing a salver, with a small note in an envelope. “For Mr. Coleyard,” he observed; “and the messenger said, urgent.”
Coleyard tore it open hurriedly. I could see he was agitated. His face grew white at once.
“I—I beg your pardon,” he said. “I—I must go back instantly. My wife is dangerously ill—quite a sudden attack. Forgive me, Senator. Sir Charles, you shall have your revenge tomorrow.”
It was clear that his voice faltered. We felt at least he was a man of feeling. He was obviously frightened. His coolness forsook him. He shook hands as in a dream, and rushed downstairs for his dust-coat. Almost as he closed the front door, a new guest entered, just missing him in the vestibule.
“Halloa, you men,” he said, “we’ve been taken in, do you know? It’s all over the Lotus. The man we made an honorary member of the club today is not Algernon Coleyard. He’s a blatant impostor. There’s a telegram come in on the tape tonight saying Algernon Coleyard is dangerously ill at his home in England.”
Charles gasped a violent gasp. “Colonel Clay!”