He wouldn’t leave off till he had won it, every penny; on that he was determined. None of your beggarly ten or fifteen thousands for him! Twenty thousand pounds down was the goal he set before him. After that—well, who knows? He might perhaps stop . . . or—why this moderation?—he might perhaps go on, if he chose, and double it. In such heroic mood, like a winner already, Franz mounted the broad steps of the great white Casino. Its magnificence for a moment abashed and daunted him. He had never yet entered so splendid a building; never trod so fine a room as that gorgeous atrium. However, he reflected next instant that he came there that day armed with the passport which makes a man welcome wherever he may go the wide world over—the talismanic passport of money in his pocket. Regaining his usual swagger as he mounted the steps, he followed the crowd into the office where cards of admission were issued, and gave his name boldly once more, in a very firm voice, as Herr von Forstemann of Vienna. Then, provided with the necessary pasteboard which ensures admission to the rooms, he still followed the stream into the vast, garish hall which contains the gaming tables. Its size and its gorgeousness fairly took the man’s breath away. Though the hour was still early, as Franz now reckoned time in his cosmopolitanised avatar, he was surprised to find so immense a crowd of players gathered in deep rows round table after table, opening into long perspective of saloon after saloon in the farther distance. He drew up to the first roulette-board, and watched the play carefully for several minutes. Though he had studied the subject beforehand with books and diagrams, and had made sure, as he thought, of the truth of his System by frequent imaginary trials, it interested him immensely to see at last in real life, and with tangible actors, the scene he had so long contemplated in his feverish day-dreams.