"
Without answering, Chester paid the couple of francs admission for
himself and his companion, and they walked slowly through the lower
rooms, threading their way through the crowd.
"You see, M'sieur, I was right! Madame Bailey is in the Club!"
"Very well. Let us go to the Club," said Chester, impatiently.
He was beginning, or so he thought, to understand. The Club was evidently
a quiet, select part of the Casino, with a reading room and so on. Sylvia
had probably made friends with some French people in her hotel, and they
had persuaded her to join the Club.
He was beginning to throw off his tiredness; the unaccustomed atmosphere
in which he found himself amused and interested, even if it rather
shocked him.
Ten minutes later he also, thanks to the kind offices of M. Polperro, and
by the payment of twenty francs, found himself a member of the Club; free
of that inner sanctuary where the devotees of the fickle goddess play
with gold instead of silver; and where, as even Chester could see, the
people who stood round the table, risking with quiet, calculating eyes
their twenty-franc pieces and bank-notes, were of a very different social
standing from the merry, careless crowd downstairs.
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