Page:Tales of Today.djvu/172

156 scarcely anything left. To get together a stake sufficient to allow me to return to the place that evening, and I felt that I could not avoid returning, I should have to borrow from the picture-dealer; sell some of my studies for what they would bring. I could scrape together fifty louis in this way, and out of those fifty louis I was going to divert ten for that drone, that sot, that liar!–for I wished to prove to myself that his letter was nothing more than a tissue of falsehoods; I took it up and reread it. Ah! its accents again penetrated my heart. But no; I would not listen to that voice, and I jumped hurriedly from my bed to write a note of refusal–and I made it curt and cold, so that the breach between my old comrade and my pity might be irreparable. Once the note was dispatched I experienced a feeling of shame and remorse, but I stifled it as well as I could among the occupations that the day had in store for me. 'Besides,' I said to myself, by way of quieting my conscience, 'if I win there will be plenty of time to send Ladrat the money to-morrow–and win I shall.

"And you won?" I said to him as he ceased.

"Yes," he replied, in a voice that was quite unlike his own; "but the next day it was too late. Immediately upon receiving my note Ladrat, who had not been lying to me, was doubtless seized with the madness of despair. He and his companion formed the fatal resolution of suffocating themselves. They were found dead in their bed; and it was I–do you understand, I,–who gave the order to break down the door. I had come there with the two hundred francs. Yes, it was too late. That is how it is that you remember having read that name of Ladrat in the newspapers.