Everything about him was
gray: his thin, concave face, his expressionless eyes, his sparse hair
and straggling moustache, his clothes, and his hands, knotted on the
back like the roots of trees. His grayness and the bleak remoteness of
his air made him seem unreal as a spirit come back to haunt the scene of
long-ago triumphs or defeats. Mary could almost have persuaded herself
that he did not exist, and that the pale form and glassy eyes were
visible to her alone.
She took her purse from a bag of gold and silver beads she had bought in
the Galerie Charles Trois, and counted her money. She had a little more
than five hundred francs, and wondered what could be done with that sum
at roulette. Even the sound of tinkling gold and silver did not attract
the dead gray eyes to Mary; but perhaps it broke some dreary dream, for
the old man got up stiffly as if in protest, and walked away with the
gait of an automaton.
"Heaven be praised!" murmured in French the weary white rose on Mary's
other side; "he brings bad luck. But perhaps he will take it away with
him."
Mary realized that her neighbour was speaking to her, and turned with a
smile of encouragement, thankful to find some one who looked kind, and
would perhaps tell her things.
The pretty woman went on, without waiting to be answered: "He is like a
galvanized corpse; and indeed, he may be one, for he ought to have died
long ago. Have you ever heard his story?"
"No," Mary said. "I have only just come here.
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