, as that _beau joueur_ of the Guards, Godolphin, always
did.

Luck had been dead against the man who spoke ever since they had
deserted the mess-room for the _cartes_ in the privacy of Harry's rooms.
If Fortune is a woman, he ought to have found favor in her eyes. His age
was between thirty and thirty-five, his figure with grace and strength
combined, his features nobly and delicately cut, his head, like
Canning's, one of great intellectual beauty, and by the flash of his
large dark eyes, and the additional paleness of his cheek, it was easy
to see he was playing high once too often.

Five minutes passed--he lost still; ten minutes' luck was yet against
him. A little French clock began the Silver Chimes that rang out the Old
Year; the twelfth stroke sounded, the New Year was come, and Waldemar
Falkenstein rose and drank down some cognac--a ruined man.

"A happy New Year to you, and better luck, Falkenstein," cried
Godolphin, drinking his toast with a ringing laugh and a foaming bumper
of Chambertin. "What shall I wish you? The richest wife in the kingdom,
a cabal that will break all the banks, for Mistletoe to win the Oaks, or
for your eyes to be opened to your sinful state, as the parson phrases
it--which, eh?"

"Thank you, Harry," laughed Falkenstein. (Like the old Spartans, we can
laugh while the wolf gnaws our vitals.) "You remind me of what my
holy-minded brother wrote to me when I broke my shoulder-bone down at
Melton last season: 'My dear Waldemar, I am sorry to hear of your sad
accident; but all things are ordered for the best, and I trust that in
your present hours of solitude your thoughts may be mercifully turned to
higher and better things.' Queer style of sympathy, wasn't it? I
preferred yours, when you sent me 'Adelaide Meran,' and that splendid
hock I wasn't allowed to touch."

"I should say so; but catch the Pharisees giving anybody anything warmer
than texts and counsels, that cost them nothing," said Tom Bevan of the
Blues. "Apropos of Pharisees, have you heard that old Cash is going to
build a chapel-of-ease in Belgravia, to endow that young owl Gus with as
soon as he can pull himself through his 'greats?' It is thought that the
dear Bella will be painted as St. Catherine for the altar-piece."

"She'll strychnine herself if we're all so hard-hearted as to leave her
to St. Catharine's nightcap," laughed Falkenstein.

"Why don't _you_ take up with her, old fellow?" said a man in
Godolphin's tro