said I.

'And the game?'

'I leave it to you.'

'Ecarte, then--the best of three.'

I could not help smiling as I agreed, for I do not suppose that there
were three men in France who were my masters at the game. I told the
Bart as much as we dismounted. He smiled also as he listened.

'I was counted the best player at Watier's,' said he. 'With even luck
you deserve to get off if you beat me.'

So we tethered our two horses and sat down one on either side of a great
flat rock. The Bart took a pack of cards out of his tunic, and I had
only to see him shuffle to convince me that I had no novice to deal
with. We cut, and the deal fell to him.

My faith, it was a stake worth playing for. He wished to add a hundred
gold pieces a game, but what was money when the fate of Colonel Etienne
Gerard hung upon the cards? I felt as though all those who had reason to
be interested in the game--my mother, my hussars, the Sixth Corps
d'Armee, Ney, Massena, even the Emperor himself--were forming a ring
round us in that desolate valley. Heavens, what a blow to one and all of
them should the cards go against me! But I was confident, for my ecarte
play was as famous as my swordsmanship, and save old Bouvet of the
Hussars of Bercheny, who won seventy-six out of one hundred and fifty
games off me, I have always had the best of a series.

The first game I won right off, though I must confess that the cards
were with me, and that my adversary could have done no more. In the
second, I never played better and saved a trick by a finesse, but the
Bart voled me once, marked the king, and ran out in the second hand. My
faith, we were so excited that he laid his helmet down beside him and I
my busby.

'I'll lay my roan mare against your black horse,' said he.

'Done!' said I.

'Sword against sword.'

'Done!' said I.

'Saddle, bridle, and stirrups!' he cried.

'Done!' I shouted.

I had caught this spirit of sport from him. I would have laid my hussars
against his dragoons had they been ours to pledge.

And then began the game of games. Oh, he played, this Englishman--he
played in a way that was worthy of such a stake. But I, my friends, I
was superb! Of the five which I had to make to win, I gained three on
the first hand. The Bart bit his moustache and drummed his hands, while
I already felt myself at the head of my dear little rascals. On the
second, I turned the king, but lost two tricks--and my score was four to
his two. When