sation of
gambling. You do lose just a little something of the proper tremors
before a coup, the proper throes during a coup, the proper thrill of
joy or anguish after a coup. You're bound to, you know," he added,
purposely making this bathos when he saw me smiling at the heights to
which he had risen.

"And to-night," I asked, remembering his prosaically pensive demeanor
in taking the bank, "were you feeling these throes and thrills to the
utmost?"

He nodded.

"And you'll feel them again to-night?"

"I hope so."

"I wonder you can stay away."

"Oh, one gets a bit deadened after an hour or so. One needs to be
freshened up. So long as I don't bore you--"

I laughed, and held out my cigarette-case.

"I rather wonder you smoke," I murmured, after giving him a light.
"Nicotine's a sort of drug. Doesn't it soothe you? Don't you lose
just a little something of the tremors and things?"

He looked at me gravely.

"By Jove!" he ejaculated, "I never thought of that. Perhaps you're
right. 'Pon my word, I must think that over."

I wondered whether he were secretly laughing at me. Here was a man to
whom--so I conceived, with an effort of the imagination--the loss or
gain of a few hundred pounds could hardly matter. I told him I had
spoken in jest. "To give up tobacco might," I said, "intensify the
pleasant agonies of a gambler staking his little all. But in your
case--well, I don't see where the pleasant agonies come in."

"You mean because I'm beastly rich?"

"Rich," I amended.

"All depends on what you call rich. Besides, I'm not the sort of
fellow who's content with three per cent. A couple of months ago--I
tell you this in confidence--I risked virtually all I had in an
Argentine deal."

"And lost it?"

"No; as a matter of fact, I made rather a good thing out of it. I did
rather well last February, too. But there's no knowing the future. A
few errors of judgment, a war here, a revolution there, a big strike
somewhere else, and--" He blew a jet of smoke from his lips, and then
looked at me as at one whom he could trust to feel for him in a crash
already come.

My sympathy lagged, and I stuck to the point of my inquiry.

"Meanwhile," I suggested, "and all the more because you aren't merely a
rich man, but also an active taker of big risks, how can these tiny
little baccarat risks give you so much emotion?"

"There you rather have me," he laughed. "I've often wondered at that
myself.