A Woman-Hater-第20章

"And," says Vizard, "there is a French proverb founded on _experience:_"C'est encore rouge qui perd, Et encore noir. Mais toujours blanc qui gagne.'"Severne, for the first time, looked angry and mortified; he turned his back and was silent. Vizard looked at him uneasily, hesitated a moment, then flung the remainder of his cigar away and seemed to rouse himself body and soul. He squared his shoulders, as if he were going to box the Demon of play for his friend, and he let out good sense right and left, and, indeed, was almost betrayed into eloquence. "What!" he cried, "you, who are so bright and keen and knowing in everything else, are you really so blinded by egotism and credulity as to believe that you can invent any method of betting at _rouge et noir_ that has not been tried before you were born? Do you remember the first word in La Bruy'ere's famous work?""No," said Ned, sulkily. "Read nothing but newspapers.""Good lad. Saves a deal of trouble. Well, he begins 'Tout est dit'--'everything has been said;' and I say that, in your business, 'Tout est fait'--'everything has been done.' Every move has been tried before you existed, and the result of all is that to bet against the bank, wildly or systematically, is to gamble against a rock. _Si monumenta quoeris, circumspice._ Use your eyes, man. Look at the Kursaal, its luxuries, its gardens, its gilding, its attractions, all of them cheap, except the one that pays for all; all these delights, and the rents, and the croupiers, and the servants, and the income and liveries of an unprincipled prince, who would otherwise be a poor but honest gentleman with one _bonne,_ instead of thirty blazing lackeys, all come from the gains of the bank, which are the losses of the players, especially of those that have got a system."Severne shot in, "A bank was broken last week.""Was it? Then all it lost has returned to it, or will return to it to-night; for gamblers know no day of rest.""Oh, yes, they do. It is shut on Good-Friday.""You surprise me. Only three hundred and sixty-four days in the year!