as all attention for the
fair Marseillaise, and I could see that she was not displeased. I
sincerely wished to see her in love with someone, and I liked her too
well to bear the idea of her burying herself in a convent. She could
never be happy till she found someone who would make her forget the
rascal who had brought her to the brink of ruin.

I seized the opportunity, when all my guests were engaged with each
other, to open Possano's letter. It ran as follows:

"I went to the bank to change the piece of gold you gave me. It was
weighed, and found to be ten carats under weight. I was told to name the
person from whom I got it, but of course I did not do so. I then had to
go to prison, and if you do not get me out of the scrape I shall be
prosecuted, though of course I am not going to get myself hanged for
anybody."

I gave the letter to Grimaldi, and when we had left the table he took me
aside, and said,--

"This is a very serious matter, for it may end in the gallows for the man
who clipped the coin."

"Then they can hang the biribanti! That won't hurt me much."

"No, that won't do; it would compromise Madame Isola-Bella, as biribi is
strictly forbidden. Leave it all to me, I will speak to the State
Inquisitors about it. Tell Possano to persevere in his silence, and that
you will see him safely through. The laws against coiners and clippers
are only severe with regard to these particular coins, as the Government
has special reasons for not wishing them to be depreciated."

I wrote to Possano, and sent for a pair of scales. We weighed the gold I
had won at biribi, and every single piece had been clipped. M. Grimaldi
said he would have them defaced and sold to a jeweller.

When we got back to the dining-room we found everybody at play. M.
Grimaldi proposed that I should play at quinze with him. I detested the
game, but as he was my guest I felt it would be impolite to refuse, and
in four hours I had lost five hundred sequins.

Next morning the marquis told me that Possano was out of prison, and that
he had been given the value of the coin. He brought me thirteen hundred
sequins which had resulted from the sale of the gold. We agreed that I
was to call on Madame Isola-Bella the next day, when he would give me my
revenge at quinze.

I kept the appointment, and lost three thousand sequins. I paid him a
thousand the next day, and gave him two bills of exchange, payable by
myself, for the other two thousand. Whe