in the act of picking up her cards, "it
seems as if this had happened a great many times before! What do you
say, Mr. Fossell, to staking half-a-crown on the rubber, just to
enliven the game? You don't object on principle, I know, to playing for
money."

"No, indeed, ma'am," answered Mr. Fossell. "I am content if the others
are willing--not that for me the pleasure of playing against you needs
any such--er--adventitious stimulus."

Miss Gabriel appealed to Mr. Rogers.

Mr. Rogers thought it would be great fun. "Come along, Vigoureux," he
almost shouted, "you can't refuse a lady's challenge!"

What could the poor Commandant do? Almost before he knew he had nodded,
though with a set face, and by the nod committed himself. He felt his
few coins burning in his breeches' pocket against his thigh, as if they
warned him.

But, after all, Fossell was an excellent player. With the smallest
luck, he and Fossell ought to be more than a match for a pair of whom,
if one (Miss Gabriel) was wily, the other played a game not usually
distinguishable from bumble-puppy.

They won the first game easily.

They had almost won the second when a devastating seven trumps in Mr.
Rogers's hand (which he played atrociously) saw their opponents almost
level--the score eight-seven. In the next hand, Miss Gabriel--for this
was old-fashioned long whist--held all four honours, and took the game.

The Commandant looked at Mr. Fossell. But a financier is not disturbed
by the risk of half-a-crown.

Only half-a-crown!--but for the Commandant a week between this
half-a-crown and another.

He wondered what Fossell would say--Fossell, sitting there, so
imperturbable, with his shiny bald head--if he knew.

"Game _and_!" announced Mr. Rogers.

By this time the players at the second table, aware of the half-a-crown
at stake, were listening in a state of suppressed excitement--suppressed
because the Vicar, being deaf, had not overheard Miss Gabriel's
challenge, and the others feared that he might disapprove of playing
for money.

The Vicar, who played against Mr. and Mrs. Pope, with Mrs. Fossell for
partner, had a habit of soliloquising over his hand on any subject that
occurred to him. The rest of the table deferred to this habit, out of
respect or because by experience they knew it to be incurable, since
only by conscious effort could he hear any voice but his own.

By such an effort, holding his hand to his ear, he had listened to Miss
Gabri