Читать книгу Andrew Tresholm - Adentures of a Reluctant Gambler - E. Phillips Oppenheim - Страница 8

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The Blue Train, disturbingly early upon its return journey, just as it is usually outrageously late upon its arrival, came groaning round the bend from Mentone, snorting and puffing into the Monte Carlo station. Norah settled down sadly in her compartment while her brother made his way to the restaurant car to secure seats for dinner.

Then, glancing idly out of the window, she suddenly gave a little gasp. Very deliberately along the platform came Tresholm, calm and undisturbed. Behind him was a small boy carrying an enormous bouquet of roses.

She shrank beck in her place. Anything rather than see him! Before she could decide upon any means of escape, however, the roses were on the seat by her side, and Tresholm was standing bare-headed before her.

"A little farewell offering for you. Miss Bartlett which you must accept, and a farewell note here for you to read as soon as the train has started," he added, handing her a letter. "Will you shake hands?"

In her moment of indecision she forgot and she looked up at him. Directly her eyes met his, clear, gray and somehow compelling, she gave in. Her fingers rested for a moment in his. Then he raised them and brushed them with his lips.

"I am glad," he said gratefully, "that you did not carry your resentment too far. You will accept the roses, I hope, as an inadequate peace-offering, and think of me as kindly as you can."

Then he was gone, and it was not until after the train had passed through the first of the two tunnels that she remembered the note. She tore open the envelop and read:

Dear Lady of Angoulême,

I very much fear that your perceptions were keener than your brother's last night and that you realised the fact that I was playing with marked cards—part of the equipment of the professional gambler. The unexpected luxury of a qualm of conscience has, however, seized me, and I return your brother's check for his imaginary loss.

I still hold him, however, to the conditions of our bargain, and, if you will accept the advice of such an unprincipled person, keep him away from gambling in any shape or form, even though the odds should seem level. There are some men who are born winners. I am one of them. There are others who are born losers. Your brother is one of those.

Fate, alas, deals out other favors to the latter class, which she denies to the former.

Which is why I must sign myself,

Unhappily yours,

Andrew Tresholm."

Fragments of a torn check fluttered across the compartment. Even in her dazed state, even under the spell of that great throbbing joy with which she waited for her brother's return, there crept into her mind a faint, wonderful doubt— a doubt which sometimes, when she looked backwards, seemed to color those hours of agony with a little halo of romance. Was it altogether by chance, she wondered, in those moments of reflection, that the only possible means by which her brother could have been induced to return to England with that five thousand pounds were precisely those which Tresholm had employed?