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"Oh, but mother, he would be so delighted to know. I always share everything with Basil."

"No doubt," said Mrs. McMahon, "but in this case I want you to do nothing of the sort. You will know why in a moment. Basil, dear fellow as he is – I am sorry I made some petulant remarks about your engagement a few minutes ago – is an Englishman. Apart from his high scientific attainments, which have yet to be proved, by the way, Basil has all the Englishman's solidity and caution. He is not imaginative. He is not a man to risk anything upon a supreme chance. Now, regard the situation in which we are."

"We are free from all debt, at any rate," Ethel answered wonderingly; "and we shall have a nice little surplus in hand."

"You must look farther than that, my dear," said her mother, with the odd brightness in her eyes growing more marked than ever. "A hundred pounds is all very well. We may buy shares in other lottery tickets. We may even buy a whole ticket, but that is a single chance, and means a great deal of waiting. Since Fortune is smiling upon us there is another and surer way to court her favours. I have been thinking quickly, as I generally do when there is something important to be decided. With this money" – she began to speak slowly and impressively – "you and I can go to Monte Carlo. We can go by the slow train, third class. It will take us twenty-four hours, and not be very comfortable. But that I can endure, and if I can, then so can you. I know the Principality of Monaco very well. At Monte Carlo itself all the hotels and places are terribly expensive, and far beyond our means, but only a quarter of a mile away, in that part known as the Condamine, there are lots of quite inexpensive pensions which would serve our purpose very well."

"But what on earth are we to do in Monte Carlo? and how can I leave the school?"

"The school, my dear Ethel, is of minor importance. Nothing venture, nothing have. What we are to do at Monte Carlo is to turn what will remain of our hundred pounds into such a sum as will make us independent for the rest of our lives – a sum that will allow me to go to Switzerland, as the doctor ordered, that will start you comfortably in your married life with Basil Gregory."

The last shot told, and set the girl's pulses throbbing furiously.

"Oh, mother," she said, "if it were only possible!"

"It is perfectly possible, my dear Ethel," Mrs. McMahon returned, and there was such calm certainty in her tone that the eager girl, carried off her feet by the arrival of the lottery cheque, and the brilliant vista which was beginning to unveil itself, hardly questioned her mother's wisdom at all.

"I know Monte Carlo very well," said the old lady. "I was there often enough with your poor dear father. On one occasion he lost every penny he had at the tables there, and we were compelled to apply to the Administration for what they call the viatique– that is, a sufficient sum to pay our expenses back to Paris, from whence we had come. It is never refused. But, on looking back, I see how foolish both your father and I were. We played recklessly. We ignored the most elementary rules of chance. We were rightly punished. For many months now I have been dreaming of just such a chance as has come to us at last. I have been studying the new book written by a professor, who won large sums of money at Monte Carlo, in the interests of mathematics, on the Theory of Probabilities. I have gained much knowledge from it. I propose to utilise that knowledge very shortly."

"Then you have definite plans?" Ethel asked.

"Perfectly definite, my dear. I have only been waiting to put them into execution. The time has now arrived. We will get the necessary clothes – for in order to obtain the entrée to the Casino, one must be decently dressed – and we will go to Monte Carlo at once. Three days' careful play at roulette – for I do not intend to go near the trente-et-quarante tables – will either see us with a sufficient fortune for our needs or take all we have got. Even if it does, we shall be little worse off than we are at present. Nothing can take my hundred a year from me, and you will easily find another post. It may even be that you can obtain a week's leave of absence from those old cats. It is worth while trying, at any rate. If not, you must resign the whole thing. For my part, I feel fully confident that you will never have to go back to such dreary drudgery."

Confidence expressed in an authoritative tone by an elder is infectious. Confidence already backed up by an initial proof is more infectious still. Ethel McMahon's scruples, doubts and hesitations vanished utterly, and she threw herself wholeheartedly into her mother's scheme.

CHAPTER IV

At six o'clock Basil came for Ethel. Mrs. McMahon greeted him rather more kindly than usual, and he noticed it with some surprise, for he was always conscious that the old lady did not care much for him. A humble-minded man, and bitterly conscious of his unsuccessful life, he was certain that such a radiant being as Ethel was a thousand times too good for him, and was even inclined to acquiesce in the old lady's estimate in a way that provoked his fiancée enormously.

He noticed also that in addition to the access of kindliness, there was a distinct patronage in Mrs. McMahon's manner. Her usual despondency seemed to have disappeared. She spoke largely and vaguely of "the future." He could not understand it at all.

"What on earth has happened to your mother?" he asked Ethel, as they descended the stone stairs towards the street. "I never saw her so chirpy, darling."

Ethel hesitated for a moment. She was bright and animated herself, and she pressed his arm affectionately before replying. She was so accustomed to share her every hope and thought with her lover that she found it difficult to frame a suitable reply. "Oh, well, you know, mother has ups and downs like the rest of us," she said at length. "To-day she is in particularly good spirits."

Basil sighed. "I wish I had the recipe," he said; "try to get it from her. It would be particularly useful just now."

"Are you depressed, dear?" the girl asked.

"Horribly; things seem worse than ever. Oh, Ethel, darling, it is dreadful to say so, but I do not think we shall ever be married!"

"You are not to talk like that, Basil; it is perfectly ridiculous, and I won't have it. Look at me. Am I depressed?"

"No," the man answered, looking wonderingly at her. "You have caught your mother's mood. But the last time we were out together, if you remember, you were as sad as I. We walked about the Luxembourg Gardens for an hour bewailing our lot."

"Yes, and after dinner we were as happy as possible, and made all sorts of plans. We furnished the drawing-room that evening, I think – or was it the dining-room?"

Basil laughed, but there was no mirth in his laughter. "It doesn't matter much," he replied, "but to-night I do not think I could take any interest in the attics of our Castle in Spain. For that's what it is, dearest, at present, and that's what I am sure it will remain."

"I have told you before, Basil, that you are not to talk like that. I simply won't have it. Entend-tu? Has anything happened to make you feel more despondent than usual?"

"Well, not exactly, and yet in a way there has, though it is only a little thing."

"Tell me, dear."

"Oh, only that Deschamps has suddenly grown quite extraordinary in his manner. You know what absolute friends we were?"

"I know," she nodded. "Have I not been horribly jealous of you two at times, sitting correcting exercises in that dreadful school in the evening, and thinking of you two men talking away together without anyone to interrupt?"

Man-like, Basil Gregory did not quite appreciate the underlying feeling in this remark.

"It has simply kept me alive," he went on, "and kept hope burning within me to be with Emile Deschamps. You see, our invention is just as much his as mine. We have worked it out together as if with one mind. Our interests are absolutely identical."

"But I don't exactly understand what has happened, Basil."

"His manner has absolutely changed ever since last night, when we had quite an adventure, he and I."

"An adventure?" she asked quickly. "And what was that?"

In reply Basil told her the whole history of the fantastic night. He told it well, warming to the work as he did so, and she saw the picture unfold itself – the queer, bird-like little men, the huge workshop with its strange implements, the welcome hospitality.

"And then," he concluded, "it turned out that they were hereditary makers of the roulette wheels for the gambling at Monte Carlo. They have made them for ever so many years, and they were just employed upon the last wheel of all on that very night. They are going to resign their position. They have made sufficient money upon which to live, and a young nephew of theirs, who gambled at Monte Carlo with money that was not his own, and afterwards committed suicide, has disgusted them, very naturally, with the whole thing."

Ethel's reply amazed him.

They were approaching the Rue Crois de Petits Champs, and she stopped upon the pavement and positively clutched his arm.

"And will the wheel you saw actually be used at Monte Carlo?" she asked in a voice that had suddenly become almost breathless.

He nodded, too surprised to speak.

"And you touched it?"

"Oh, yes; I twirled the beastly thing round, if that's what you mean. But why all this interest?"

Again for a moment she answered nothing, though her face had grown suddenly pale from excitement.

"I cannot tell you," she said at length, "though it may seem strange to you. It is a sudden thought, that is all. And, oh, Basil, dear, I somehow believe that it is a good omen, that it means fortune for both of us. Oh, I'm certain of it."

"What a queer little darling you are!" he said, with a laugh at her earnest manner. "But we must not block up the pavement like this. Come along."

They went onwards to their destination, a quaint little restaurant known as the "Restaurant de l'Universe et Portugal," which they had discovered some weeks before, and where one could get a really excellent dinner for two francs fifty a head.

For the remaining three minutes of their walk neither of them said anything. Every pulse in Ethel's body was leaping with excitement.

The coincidence was too strange. She was not more superstitious than most people, though like most people she had an undefined though real belief in premonitions and omens. And in this case the wish was indeed father to the thought. She had been so carried away by the minor success of the ticket in the first instance, and by her mother's plan in the second, that Basil's story seemed almost a direct and miraculous confirmation of her hopes. When they were seated at their accustomed table in the corner of the quiet little restaurant, and a delicious pot au feu was before them, she began to ply her lover with eager questions, making him recount every detail of the previous evening. He told her all that she wished to know, but suddenly she noticed that his face was still sad, and his eyes dreamy and introspective.

She remembered with a pang of accusation what he had been saying about Emile Deschamps.

"Oh, Basil," she said with pretty penitence, "here am I bothering you about last night, and you have not even told me what you were going to about Monsieur Deschamps. You said something had depressed you – some change in him?"

"Well, it has," the young man replied. "When we got home in the early morning to our hotel we neither of us wanted to go to bed, so we lit the stove and sat up in my room. I could not get Emile to say a word. He absolutely refused to discuss the events in the Rue Petite Louise. He scowled at me when I tried to draw him into conversation, as if I were trying to do him some injury. I have never known him like that. After about an hour I lay down on the bed and went to sleep, till they brought our morning coffee.

"About ten we walked to the works together. We have been there all day till just before I came to fetch you. Upon the way Emile was just as moody and brusque as ever. As he did not want to talk about those two kindly little men, I thought I would try another tack, and I began to discuss a detail of our invention. It is an improvement upon what we have already done, and at ordinary times such a thing would never fail to interest him."

"And didn't he rise to that?" Ethel asked.

"Never a bit. And that disturbed me more than ever, for it is so unlike him. All day he has been the same. We usually go to déjeuner together at a little café close to the works. This morning he positively refused to come with me, and, when I asked why, he insulted me. He was like a bear with a sore head."

"And you went alone?"

"Yes, and I have been alone ever since, and have been brooding over the position and got myself into a thoroughly depressed state of mind."

"Well, never mind, dear," Ethel replied, "get out of it now. How good this omelette is! And the wine, too; really, I think the vin ordinaire here is better than anywhere else in Paris. Cheer up, old boy, because I am perfectly certain that everything is going to come right, and more quickly than you have any idea of."

She spoke the last words with meaning, and Basil looked at her, trying to read her face.

"Have you got something at the back of your mind, sweetheart?" he asked.

She nodded. She could not help it.

"There is something," she said – "a little something. I cannot tell you now, because it is not my secret, but wait and see. You will know more before long. For my part, I feel more happy and hopeful than I have been since our engagement."

For a moment he caught something of her gaiety. He lifted his glass, and drank. "To the future," he said, but the momentary animation flickered out, and it was a silent and sorrowful young man who kissed her farewell about half-past nine, at the corner of the street in which was the establishment for young ladies of the Demoiselles de Custine-Seraphin.

CHAPTER V

Gregory arrived at his hotel in the Latin Quarter about ten. Loneliness oppressed him, and he went to the couple of attics upon the top floor tenanted by himself and Deschamps. He hoped that the latter was in, and in a better mood. He wanted an explanation from him, and he was haunted by some half-formed fear that the Frenchman knew of some calamity that might be about to overtake them – that something had gone wrong, perhaps, with the great invention, or that their positions at the Société Générale Electrique were jeopardised.

There was no one in Deschamps' room as he switched on the electric light, so he crossed the landing and entered his own.

This room also was untenanted, but the light was full on. He started, for it could not have been turned on by him, and electric lights burning at unnecessary hours were viewed with great disfavour and the subsequent result in the monthly bill by the hotel proprietor. Almost immediately, however, he understood, for a note in Deschamps' handwriting, and addressed to him, lay upon the table.

He picked it up, and tore open the flimsy envelope, his hand trembling as he did so.

For some reason or other he felt strangely excited, and he experienced the feeling that something is about to happen which comes to everyone at certain times. The note was quite short. It stated that Deschamps had gone again to the Rue Petite Louise to visit the Carnet brothers, and told Basil, in terms that were imperative, to proceed there immediately upon his return. That there might be no doubt whatever of Deschamps' meaning, the letter concluded by saying, "The matter is most urgent. I can say no more, but come."

As Basil walked the considerable distance towards the woods quarter, he was ill at ease and also in a bad temper. It was impossible to disregard such a summons, but he saw no use nor meaning in it, while it seemed to him almost an impoliteness to trouble the kindly entertainers of the night before so soon again. He found his way to the long, narrow street of the wood-sheds and wood-workers without much difficulty, only once having to ask the way. As before, the street was ill-lit, and perfectly quiet, though this time he could see it much more plainly owing to the absence of fog and the light of a watery moon. He entered the little passage, and rapped on the counter. Almost immediately that he had done so the door behind flew open and Brother Charles came out.

The little man was apparently delighted to see him. He was cordiality itself.

"Monsieur Deschamps is within," he said. "Enter, monsieur. We have been expecting you."

Greatly wondering what this might mean, Basil Gregory passed through into the workshop, where he found Edouard Carnet and Deschamps sitting by the fire.

On this occasion one of the principal workbenches had been cleared of lumber, and a white cloth was spread upon it, with a salad and boned chickens from some neighbouring restaurant, flanked by several bottles of that execrable sweet champagne beloved by the unsophisticated Parisian at times of festival – the Parisian being at once the most accomplished gourmet, and the worst judge in Europe of sparkling wines.

Deschamps, who rose with his hosts as Basil entered, was no longer surly or depressed. On the contrary, Gregory saw at once that he was in a state of intense excitement. There was a high colour upon his swarthy face, and the big black eyes were glittering.

In fact, there was an unusual atmosphere of excitement about everyone present in the workshop, and insensibly, in the first few moments even, it began to communicate itself to the Englishman.

"We were waiting for you to begin supper," said Brother Edouard in his twittering voice. "Afterwards we will tell you – what we have to tell."

Basil was not hungry, but he sat down with the others. Both Deschamps and the Carnets ate quickly and said very little. It was as though they wished to be done with the meal, but when the first bottle of champagne was opened and the sweet wine creamed in the glasses Brother Charles rose and lifted his glass on high. "To the success of the greatest scheme that human genius ever evolved!" he piped. "To the ruin and overthrow of that vast and evil power whose slaves and victims we have been!" With a sudden gesture, he drained his glass and flung it on the floor, where it crashed into a hundred pieces.

Then he stood there trembling, his bird-like face twisted into a grotesque mask of hatred, which was reflected by his brother.

Gregory looked at one and the other with amazement and then turned to Deschamps. He saw that the latter's face was more deeply flushed than before, the whole expression was one of quivering eagerness and almost ferocious hope. Gregory leant back in his chair and very deliberately lit a cigarette.

"I do not want to be unduly inquisitive," he said, in a quiet and measured voice, "but if one of you gentlemen would kindly give me the slightest inkling of what you are talking about, and why you are all so excited, then perhaps I shall feel a little less bewildered than I do at the moment."

At this Deschamps broke into a torrent of words.

"My friend," he said, "our troubles are at an end! As Monsieur Charles has just said, one of the most stupendous schemes that has ever entered the human brain has come to me. By its means we shall all become fabulously wealthy in a short time if all goes well."

Basil was staring at his friend, wondering whether he had taken leave of his senses, when Charles Carnet interposed. "We shall not all become wealthy," he said. "Edouard and I have enough; we want no more. You will become wealthy, and we shall have our revenge."

"I am listening," said Gregory rather stolidly.

As if by common consent the other three rose from the table. "Come to the fire," Deschamps said, speaking now in a low voice, "and you shall hear everything."

They sat round the fire very close together, and, looking round as if to be quite certain that there was no one lurking in the recesses of the workshop, Deschamps began:

"Mon ami," he said, putting his hand upon Basil's arm, "we are going to take a journey, you and I."

"A journey?" Gregory said.

"To Monte Carlo," Deschamps replied.

Then there was a silence; Basil felt his brain whirling. "What do you mean?" he said at length.

"I mean this," Deschamps answered, "that fortune is within our grip at last, that we can now make as much money as we like, enough to conduct all our experiments and get out perfect models of our invention to place before the world. I will explain."

He threw away the cigarette which he had been smoking and began to outline a plan so novel, a conspiracy so absolutely without precedent in the history of the world, that his three listeners remained spell-bound.

"Chance, and chance alone," he began, "has placed the opportunity for the most sensational coup of modern times in our hands. In the first place, chance – the Spirit of Fortune, or what you will – led us to this room in which we are sitting. The Messieurs Carnet, as you know, have for years been employed in making roulette wheels for the Casino at Monte Carlo. As you have also heard, they have resolved to give up their occupation. The tragedy which has saddened their lives has been directly due to the existence of the great gambling establishment. Both our friends would give anything to be revenged upon the organisation which has wrecked their hopes, and owing to the existence of which their so beloved nephew met his untimely death."

A low mutter of assent broke from both the little Frenchmen.

"Very well, then," Deschamps continued, "you have wondered at my abstraction during the last twenty-four hours. I could not speak to you. I was absorbed. I hardly heard anything you said. The whole forces of my intellect were focussed upon one thought, one aim. The germ of an idea came to me. It was like a lightning flash, illuminating with sudden splendour the dark skies of night. The flash came and went, but the germ of the idea remained behind. Since then I have been working unceasingly at it, and now I believe I have it perfected. You, yourself, my dear friend, will be able to seize on any flaw, to improve upon my original idea. Very well, then; I came to our friends here, and told them that I believed I could, if I would, deal the Administration of Monte Carlo an almost fatal blow. It was, I explained to them, by means of science, and more especially of your and my new invention, that this could be done. I pointed out to them that it would require their co-operation. I think I may say" – here he looked interrogatively at the Carnets – "that directly I made my proposal they agreed."

"We welcomed it with joy," said Brother Edouard instantly. "To us also it came as a lightning flash, illuminating the dark and showing the word 'Revenge' in letters of fire upon the horizon!"

Basil leant forward, deeply interested. As yet he had not the slightest idea of what was coming. Nevertheless, he was so impressed by Deschamps' firm and confident manner that hope was beginning to rise high within him, and an excitement to which he had been a stranger for many days, began to flow over him like a tide.

Moreover, he knew Deschamps so well that he was certain that this was no vision. The Frenchman was a Southerner, it is true, given to pictorial flights of fancy in many ways. But when he began to speak of any matter connected with science or their invention, he never made the slightest overstatement. Science was his life and his religion.

"As yet," Deschamps said, "Monsieur Edouard and Monsieur Charles know nothing of the actual means I propose to employ. I am going to divulge my plan in such a way that they, knowing nothing of electricity and its powers, will be able to understand my project in every detail. I shall not use any technicalities beyond what are absolutely necessary. But you, mon ami, will understand everything from the scientific point of view, and you will see how perfectly feasible and likely of success is what I propose to do."

He paused, and going to the table, poured out a little water into a glass and drank it off. He did not sit down again, but walked up and down a measured beat of four yards, talking with intense earnestness.

"You know, gentlemen," he said to the two wood-carvers, "what wireless telegraphy means?"

"But, yes," said Brother Charles, "have they not just installed the Marconi system in the Eiffel Tower? Of course, we know, but not, I think, more than any ordinary member of the public."

"Very well," said Deschamps. "Now I must tell you that Monsieur Gregory here and myself have for years been at work upon a system of transmitting messages without wires, which, we believe, and indeed are certain, surpasses the invention of Signor Marconi as a modern battleship surpasses an ancient wooden frigate. It is this system of ours that I propose to employ in the secret war against the Administration at Monte Carlo. By its means we shall be able to win an enormous sum of money at roulette. We shall be able to win exactly how much, and when, we please. Every detail is perfectly clear in my mind, and discovery is almost impossible with the precautions I shall take. You must remember that the capital of Monte Carlo is unlimited. You know nothing of the place, Basil?"

Gregory shook his head.

"Then, pardon a short digression," Deschamps continued, looking at the Carnets. "The gambling rooms of Monte Carlo pay the Prince of Monaco a yearly subsidy of eighty thousand pounds for permission to carry on their business in his territory. There are no rates and taxes in Monte Carlo, the Casino pays them all. Education is free. The Casino itself is a glittering white palace upon the edge of the Mediterranean, erected at an enormous cost, and decorated with the most lavish splendour. Few kings have such vast halls and salons in their palaces as those in the temple of the Goddess of Chance. The Casino is free to all the world, though, of course, the Administration reserves the right of declining admission. The gardens that surround this palace are the most beautiful in the world. Sometimes, as if by touch of an enchanter's wand, the thousand gardeners steal out in the night, and in the morning vast parterres of flowers, which had been all red and gold as the sun sank, are changed to blue and white. In addition to this – and the expenses of the Principality are incalculable – the company pays a revenue to its shareholders of over twenty-five million francs!"

Basil had been listening with absorbed interest. He started now. "Twenty-five million francs!" he said, in an awed voice. "Clear profit after those colossal expenses? A million English pounds!"

"Exactly," Deschamps returned, "and I have told you this so that you can see that the resources of the company are practically unlimited. The amount of their funds no one knows, but many a national bank could not equal it. So you see, the authorities are pledged for the sake of their own continuance to pay any player his winnings, however enormous they may be. There have been several cases of players quite recently winning sums of two and a half million francs – a hundred thousand pounds of your English money. But we" – here his voice for the first time began to tremble with excitement – "we can win whatever we please! And now to the way in which it is to be done."

Deschamps stopped short in his walk up and down. He leant against the work-table upon which were the remains of the supper.

The eyes of the other three were fixed upon him with an intense regard.

"You understand," he said to Basil, "the principle of roulette, do you not?"

"Roughly," Basil answered; "the little ivory ball about the size of a large marble is spun as you spun it the other night, and falls into a numbered slot. The people who have placed their money upon a square of the table with a number corresponding to that of the slot into which the ball falls are the winners of varying amounts."

"That is more or less it," Deschamps replied. "I am not concerned at the moment with anything but the bare mechanical operation. The whirling of the wheel at the bottom, the opposite course of the ball, and the triangular silver stars which break it, all make it a pure matter of chance into which apartment upon the wheel the ball is going to fall. It is obvious, therefore, that if by some means the player could determine into which slot the ball is to fall, he would have the bank at his mercy."

"Precisely," Basil said.

"Very well, then. It is a means by which this may be attained that I have discovered. Of course, you, as an electrical engineer, can easily see that a roulette wheel might easily be constructed by the bank by which it could control the falling of the ball and so prevent players who had backed a particular number from winning. This has often been done by dishonest people who run private gambling hells. Upon the surface everything appears all right, but, of course, an expert examination would very speedily result in the discovery of the secret mechanism – generally, by the way, electrical. Wires can be hidden in the leg of the table upon which the wheel stands, and controlled by the foot of the croupier who spins it. But never before – and I wish you to keep this point most carefully in mind – has it been possible for the player to control the wheel in action without the connivance of the croupier or the bank. Now listen." He began to address himself now more particularly to the Carnet Frères.

"The first detail in my plan is that the little ivory ball, while remaining to all appearance a solid ball of ivory, is not really so. It will contain a core or heart of steel. The very finest workmanship alone could accomplish this without any possibility of detection. I assume – am I right in assuming? – that our friends, Messieurs Charles and Edouard, could make a ball or balls of this description."

The two little men, who had been listening with rigid attention, spoke to one another rapidly for a moment or two, using technical terms which the others could not understand.