is left hand. De Caylus kept nervously crumbling a note in his
fingers. Dalrymple sat motionless as a man of bronze, and, except to
throw down a card when it came to his turn, never stirred a finger.
There was, to my thinking, something ominous in his exceeding calmness.

"At what game are they, playing?" I asked a gentleman near whom I was
standing.

"At _ecarte_," replied he, without removing his eyes from the players.

Knowing nothing of the game, I could only judge of its progress by the
faces of those around me. A breathless silence prevailed, except when
some particular subtlety in the play sent a murmur of admiration round
the room. Even this was hushed almost as soon as uttered. Gradually the
interest grew more intense, and the bystanders pressed closer. De Caylus
sighed impatiently, and passed his hand across his brow. It was his turn
to deal. Dalrymple shuffled the pack. De Caylus shuffled them after
him, and dealt. The falling of a pin might have been heard in the pause
that followed. They had but five cards each. Dalrymple played first--a
queen of diamonds. De Caylus played the king, and both threw down their
cards. A loud murmur broke out instantaneously in every direction, and
De Caylus, looking excited and weary, leaned back in his chair, and
called for wine. His expression was so unlike that of a victor that I
thought at first he must have lost the game.

"Which is the winner?" I asked, eagerly. "Which is the winner?"

The gentleman who had replied to me before looked round with a smile of
contemptuous wonder.

"Why, Monsieur de Caylus, of course," said he. "Did you not see him play
the king?"

"I beg your pardon," I said, somewhat nettled; "but, as I said before, I
do not understand the game."

"_Eh bien_! the Englishman is counting out his money."

What a changed scene it was! The circle of intent faces broken and
shifting--the silence succeeded by a hundred conversations--De Caylus
leaning back, sipping his wine and chatting over his shoulder--the cards
pushed aside, and Dalrymple gravely sorting out little shining columns
of Napoleons, and rolls of crisp bank paper! Having ranged all these
before him in a row, he took out his check-book, filled in a page, tore
it out and laid it with the rest. Then, replacing the book in his
breast-pocket, he pushed back his chair, and, looking up for the first
time since the close of the game, said aloud:--

"Monsieur le Vicomte de Caylus, I have this eve