“Because if you do not possess the 175,000 francs I reclaim, you must have lent them to your friends, and M. Debray is one of your friends.”

“For shame!” exclaimed the baroness.

“Oh, let us have no gestures, no screams, no modern drama, or you will oblige me to tell you that I see Debray leave here, pocketing the whole of the 500,000 livres you have handed over to him this year, while he smiles to himself, saying that he has found what the most skilful players have never discovered⁠—that is, a roulette where he wins without playing, and is no loser when he loses.”

The baroness became enraged.

“Wretch!” she cried, “will you dare to tell me you did not know what you now reproach me with?”