dn't. He
cleaned me out of twenty-five hundred dollars----"

"How?" asked Aristide, sharply.

"Ecarte."

Aristide brought his hand down with a bang on the table and uttered
anathemas in French and Provencal entirely unintelligible to Eugene
Miller; but the youth knew by instinct that they were useful,
soul-destroying curses and he felt comforted.

"Ecarte! You played ecarte with Lussigny? But my dear young friend, do
you know anything of ecarte?"

"Of course," said Miller. "I used to play it as a child with my
sisters."

"Do you know the _jeux de regle_?"

"The what?"

"The formal laws of the game--the rules of discards----"

"Never heard of them," said Eugene Miller.

"But they are as absolute as the Code Napoleon," cried Aristide. "You
can't play without knowing them. You might as well play chess without
knowing the moves."

"Can't help it," said the young man.

"Well, don't play ecarte any more."

"I must," said Miller.

"_Comment?_"

"I must. I've fixed it up to get my revenge this afternoon--in my
sitting room at the hotel."

"But it's imbecile!"

The sweep of Aristide's arm produced prismatic chaos among a tray-full
of drinks which the waiter was bringing to the family party at the next
table. "It's imbecile," he cried, as soon as order was apologetically
and pecuniarily restored. "You are a little mutton going to have its
wool taken off."

"I've fixed it up," said Miller. "I've never gone back on an engagement
yet in my own country and I'm not going to begin this side."

Aristide argued. He argued during the mechanical absorption of four
glasses of _vermouth-cassis_--after which prodigious quantity of black
currant syrup he rose and took the Gadarene youth to Nikola's where he
continued the argument during dejeuner. Eugene Miller's sole concession
was that Aristide should be present at the encounter and, backing his
hand, should have the power (given by the rules of the French game) to
guide his play. Aristide agreed and crammed his young friend with the
_jeux de regle_ and _pate de foie gras_.

The Count looked rather black when he found Aristide Pujol in Miller's
sitting room. He could not, however, refuse him admittance to the game.
The three sat down, Aristide by Miller's side, so that he could overlook
the hand and, by pointing, indicate the cards that it was advisable to
play. The game began. Fortune favored Mr. Eugene Miller. The Count's
brow grew blacker.

"You are bringing