"Why, they are oil lamps!" Ethel said in a low voice to her mother. "How strange and antiquated!"
"If they had electric lights immediately over the tables," she said, "or even gas, some of the gangs of bad characters who infest Monte Carlo would find means to cut the pipes or wires, and in the confusion anybody could take what money he pleased." She clutched her daughter's arm tightly. "Child," she said, in an impressive voice, "at any one of these tables at the present moment, lying about, unprotected, in notes and gold, there is at least fifty thousand pounds!"
At that moment the major drew their attention to the fact that at a table immediately ahead of them there was a little stir and movement.
A very tall and handsome young man had risen from his chair. His face was a little flushed and his eyes sparkled, while he tried in vain to conceal the smile of pleasure and excitement upon his lips. Several of the other people at this table, who all appeared to know him, rose also and began to congratulate him in low voices.
"That is the Archduke Theodore," the major said in a husky whisper. "He is a cousin of the Tsar. For the last week he has been winning enormous sums, and apparently he has done so again to-night. His pockets are simply bulging with notes!"
Mrs. McMahon looked significantly at Ethel. Then she saw her chance. "Come," she said, "we can sit down at this table. This is a very fortunate chance." They went to the table and found two chairs unoccupied, slipping into them quickly in the momentary diversion created by the Archduke's success, and for the first time Ethel McMahon sat actually a guest of the unknown goddess of Fortune, and about to woo her.
To the girl's unaccustomed eyes the scene was bewilderingly strange. The long expanse of green baize cloth stretched away on either side of her. It was marked with numbered squares and triangles, while at one end were two huge diamonds of red and black in either corner. She faced a row of people, men and women in correct evening costume, save that the women, like herself, wore the large hats which are _de rigueur_ in the Casino. Jewels gleamed bewilderingly almost everywhere. Exactly opposite her was a woman who was simply plastered with diamonds, and yet next this gorgeous vision with the painted face and laughing eyes, with a king's ransom round her throat and in her hair, sat an elderly yellow-faced woman in a black dress and without a single ornament--more quietly and even shabbily dressed than Mrs. McMahon herself. There were two fresh-faced English boys, who looked like soldiers, there was an enormous black-bearded Bulgarian, with eyes like black velvet and hands like fat claws.
