The joke was acceded to and was, indeed, thought to be in very good taste; only the friend laughed at the wrong side of his mouth as he watched the consumption of liqueurs, coffee and glorias. Every table was like a liquid volcano, with lava of punch flowing out of the middle of its flames. The tables filled up again and the new arrivals were invited by the amphitryon to choose whatever they liked from the carte; ices, liqueurs, syphons of lemonade, everything, even to soda-water. Finally, at three o'clock, when there was not a single glass of brandy left in the establishment, Gannot called for the bill. It came to eighteen hundred francs. What about the bill of exchange now?... The young man, feeling more dead than alive, mechanically put his hand into his pocket, although he knew very well that it did not contain more than fifteen hundred francs; but Gannot opened his pocket-book and pulled out two notes of a thousand francs, and blowing them apart-- "Here, waiters," he said, "the change is for your attendance." And, turning to his pupil, who was quite faint by this time, and who had been nudging his arm the whole night or treading on his toes-- "Young man," he said to him, "I wanted to give you a little lesson.... To teach you that a true gambler ought not to be astonished at his winnings, and, above all, he should make bold use of them." With the fifteen francs he had kept of his friend's money, he, too, had played, and had won two thousand francs. We have seen how they were spent. This was his miracle of the marriage of Cana. But, as may well be understood, this hazardous fortune-making had its cruel reverses; Gannot's life was full of crises; he always lived at extremes of excitement. More than once during this stormy existence the darkest thoughts crossed his mind. To become another Karl Moor or Jean Sbogar or Jaromir, he formed all kinds of dreadful plans. To attack travellers by the highway and to fling on to the green baize tables gold pieces stained with blood, was, during more than one fit of despair, the dream of feverish nights and the terrible hope of his morrows! "I went stumbling," he said, after his divinity had freed him from all such gloomy human chimeras, "along the road of crime, knocking my head here and there against the guillotine's edge; I had to go through all these experiences; for from the lowest blackguard was to emerge the first of reformers!"