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Florian And Crescence
by
8.
FLORIAN LOSES MONEY AND WINS CRESCENCE.
He was brought to a pause by the sight of a gaming-table. He passed on, and inspected the tobacco-pipes in the next booth. Turning back, he resolved merely to look at the others who were playing. One was particularly fortunate with No. 8. Putting his hand in his pocket, he set a three-creutzer piece on the same number, and lost it. He tried again, and again he lost. He bit his lips until they bled, but immediately looked around with a smile, to conceal his vexation. He lost again. He felt his knees knocking, and his intestines boiled. With hot, trembling hand, he threw down his last coin, and looked another way. He won back all the money he had lost. He seized it hastily, thinking, “There! so much for playing with edged tools. I’ll hold on to you now, my darling!” Yet he remained rooted to the spot. It would not do to let people see how glad he was to walk off without being fleeced.
Then again he reflected that he must, somehow, raise money to pay Schlunkel. He would try one piece, and put the rest of his money into his right pocket, where he never put his hand.
He played: he did put his hand into his right pocket; and he walked away with empty pockets. With inexpressible grief and self-accusation, he now ran about the market: thousands of things were offered for sale, but he could not stretch forth his hand to take them. A terrible curse against the world rose to his lips: he longed to turn every thing topsy-turvy.
We might be tempted to ask, “What reason has a man like Florian to rave at the world? The world has done him no harm: he is himself the cause of his own distress.” But then people like Florian–whether they belong to the class of society which wears gloves, or to that which wears them not–are never ready to think: when in bad luck they scold.
His only comfort was that he was firmly resolved never to touch a die again as long as he lived. To-be-sure, it was easy to shut the stable-door after the horse was stolen: still, there was some comfort in a virtuous resolution.
He met his father looking very happy. “Have you any money, father?” said Florian, running up to him.
“Yes: I’ve earned three six-creutzer pieces, selling some oxen. See!”
“Give me two of them.”
Without waiting for an answer, he disappeared with the money. He now walked up and down among the booths in good spirits, sustained by the consciousness of possession. He no longer cast a look upon the gambling-tables.
But soon he began to think that he had been very stupid in skipping about from one number to another: how could he help losing them? Should the rascally sweat-cloth fellows have the satisfaction of keeping it? But then he had sworn never to touch a die again! Well, he would keep his vow: he would go where the croupier made the die roll through the coils of a snake, and where he might play without touching any thing.
At first he played for creutzers, like the others. He used great circumspection, taking care to remember the numbers which had won frequently, and betting upon the others. For some time he neither lost nor won. Finding this tedious, he staked larger pieces, and tried several numbers at a time, and with success. Seeing some of his acquaintances, he beckoned to them to come up and join him.
But the tide soon turned, and Florian lost. He now wandered about the board, passed every number, and changed his bet before the throw fell. When, at such times, the deserted number proved the winning one, he laughed aloud. Fortune frowned more and more, though he returned to his old system of remaining true to certain numbers. Taking his last groat, he laid it upon the table with such force as to make the table quiver,–and lost.