Vanno guessed, with a mingling of relief and
regret, that Mary must have gone to live at the Villa Bella Vista.
The ball spun round, rested in the pocket of number 11, and all Mary's
stakes were swept away.
"That's the eighth time in succession she's lost maximums round
twenty-four," mumbled a man close to Vanno's shoulder, in a young, weak
voice.
"She deserves it, for being an idiot," petulantly replied a woman, in
French, though the man had spoken in English. "I was her mascotte. I
showed her how to play and how to win; but I was not good enough for her
when she began making grand friends. Some women are so disloyal! She has
hurt me to the heart."
Vanno glanced down impatiently, and saw the woman who had been with Mary
on her first night at the Casino. He remembered the faded, white-rose
face, with its peevish crumples that were not yet lines, and the false
little smile that tried to draw attention away from them. He noticed
that she was no longer shabby, but wore a smart new dress and hat, with
a huge boa of ostrich feathers half covering her thin, bare neck. There
was a glint of jewels about her as she moved. The man with the young,
weak voice gazed at her admiringly, with a half-pitiful, half-comic air
of pride in being seen with so _chic_ a creature.
"Never you mind. We men ain't disloyal, anyhow," he consoled her. She
smiled at him pathetically, and his pale blue eyes, like those of a
faded Dresden china shepherd, returned her look with ecstasy.
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