Whilst he was getting ready for the second deal, the lady asked me why I did not play.  I whispered to her that she had made me lose my appetite for money.  She repaid this compliment with a charming smile.

After this declaration, feeling myself entitled to play, I put down forty louis, and lost them in two deals.  I got up, and on the banker saying very politely that he was sorry for my loss, I replied that it was a mere nothing, but that I always made it a rule never to risk a sum of money larger than the bank.  Somebody then asked me if I knew a certain Abbe Gilbert.

“I knew a man of that name,” said I, “at Paris; he came from Lyons, and owes me a pair of ears, which I mean to cut off his head when I meet him.”

My questioner made no reply to this, and everybody remained silent, as if nothing had been said.  From this I concluded that the abbe aforesaid must be the same whose place I had occupied at dinner.  He had doubtless seen me on my arrival and had taken himself off.  This abbe was a rascal who had visited me at Little Poland, to whom I had entrusted a ring which had cost me five thousand florins in Holland; next day the scoundrel had disappeared.

When everybody had left the table, I asked Le Duc if I were well lodged.

“No,” said he; “would you like to see your room?”

He took me to a large room, a hundred paces from the inn, whose sole furniture consisted of its four walls, all the other rooms being occupied.  I complained vainly to the inn-keeper, who said,

“It’s all I can offer you, but I will have a good bed, a table, and chairs taken there.”

I had to content myself with it, as there was no choice.

“You will sleep in my room,” said I to Le Duc, “take care to provide yourself with a bed, and bring my baggage in.”

“What do you think of Gilbert, sir?” said my Spaniard; “I only recognized him just as he was going, and I had a lively desire to take him by the back of his neck.”

“You would have done well to have satisfied that desire.”

“I will, when I see him again.”

As I was leaving my big room, I was accosted politely by a man who said he was glad to be my neighbour, and offered to take me to the fountain if I were going there.  I accepted his offer.  He was a tall fair man, about fifty years old; he must once have been handsome, but his excessive politeness should have made me suspect him; however, I wanted somebody to talk to, and to give me the various pieces of information I required.  On the way he informed me of the condition of the people I had seen, and I learnt that none of them had come to Aix for the sake of the waters.

“I am the only one,” said he, “who takes them out of necessity.  I am consumptive; I get thinner every day, and if the waters don’t do me any good I shall not last much longer.”

So all the others have only come here for amusement’s sake?”