Bohemian Days | Page 8

at a
little distance from Wisbaden, enters the grand saloon of the Kursaal,
and turning to the right, sees before him a perspective, to which not all
the marvels of art or nature afford comparison: a snug little room, with
a table of green baize in the centre of the floor, and about the table
sundry folks of various ages and degrees, before each a heap of
glittering coins, and in the midst of all a something which moves
forever, with a hurtle and a hum--the roulette.
Mark them! the weak, the profligate, the daring. There is old age,
watching the play, with its voice like a baby's cry; and the paper
whereon it keeps tremulous tally swimming upon eyes of perpetual
twilight.
The boy ventures his first gold piece with the resolve that, win or lose,

he will stake no more. He wins, and lies. At his side stands beautiful
Sin, forgetting its guilt and coquetry for its avarice. The pale defaulter
from over the sea hazards like one whose treasure is a burden upon his
neck, and the roué--blank, emotionless, remorseless--doubling at every
loss, walks penniless away to dinner with a better appetite than he who
saves a nation or dies for a truth.
The daintily dressed coupeurs are in their chairs, eyeless, but
omniscient; the ball goes heedlessly, slaying or anointing where it stays,
and the gold as it is raked up clinks and glistens, as if it struck men's
hearts and found them as hard and sounding.
Mr. Risque advanced to the end of the table, and stood motionless a
little while, drinking it all into his passionless eyes, which, like sponges,
absorbed whatever they saw, but nothing revealed. At last his right
hand dropped softly to his vest pocket, as though it had some interest in
deceiving his left hand.
Apparently unconscious of the act, the right hand next slid over the
table edge, and silently deposited a five-franc piece upon the black
compartment.
"Whiz-z-z-z" started the ball from the fingers of the coupeurs--"click"
dropped the ball into a black department of the board; "clink! tingle!"
cried the money, changing hands; but not a word said Auburn Risque,
standing like a stalagmite with his eyes upon ten francs.
"Whiz-z-z!"--"click!" "click!" "tingle!"
Did he see the fifteen francs at all, half trance-like, half corpse-like, as
he stood, waiting for the third revolution, and waiting again, and again,
and again?
His five francs have grown to be a hundred; his cold hand falls
freezingly upon them; five francs replace the hundred he took
away--"Whizz!" goes the ball; "click!" stops the ball; the coupeur
seizes Mr. Risque's five francs, and Mr. Risque walks away like a
somnambulist.

V.
BURIED IN THE COMMON DITCH.
It would have been a strange scene for an American public, the street
corridor of the lofty house near the church of Saint Sulpice, on the
funeral afternoon.
The coffin lay upon a draped table, and festoons of crape threw
phantom shadows upon the soiled velvet covering. Each passing
pedestrian and cabman took off his hat a moment. The Southern
Colony were in the landlady's bureau enjoying a lunch and liquor, and
precisely at three o'clock they came down stairs, not more dilapidated
than usual, while at the same moment the municipal hearse drove up,
attended by one cocher and two croquemorts.[D]
[Footnote D: Literally, "parasites of death."]
The hearse was a cheap charity affair, furnished by the Maire of the
arrondissement, though it was sprucely painted and decked with
funeral cloth. The driver wore a huge black chapeau, a white cotton
cravat, and thigh-boots, which, standing up stiffly as he sat, seemed to
engulf him to the ears.
When the croquemorts, in a business way, lifted the velvet from the
coffin, it was seen to be constructed of strips of deal merely, unpainted,
and not thicker than a Malaga raisin box.
There was some fear that it would fall apart of its own fragility, but the
chief croquemort explained politely that such accidents never
happened.
"We have entombed four of them to-day," he said; "see how nicely we
shall lift the fifth one."
There was, indeed, a certain sleight whereby he slung it across his
shoulder, but no reason in the world for tossing it upon the hearse with

a slam. They covered its nakedness with velvet, and the cocher, having
taken a cigar from his pocket, and looking much as if he would like to
smoke, put it back again sadly, cracked his whip, and the cortege went
on. The croquemorts kept a little way ahead, sauntering upon the
sidewalk, and their cloaks and oil-cloth hats protected them from a
drizzling rain, which now came down, to the grief of the mourners,
walking in the middle of the street behind the body. They were seven in