I sighed, glancing over to the flight of steps before us, where the gay wintering world in summer toilettes were passing up and down. He was possessed of common sense and spoke the truth. Inside those rooms the perspiring, perfumed crowds were fluttering around the tables as moths around a candle, going headlong to ruin both moral and financial. “Yes,” I observed reflectively, “I suppose you’re right. Thousands have been ruined within that place.” “And thousands have ended by committing suicide,” he added. “The average number of suicides within this tiny Principality of Monaco is more than two a day!” “More than two a day!” I exclaimed incredulously. “Yes. Of course, the authorities bribe the press and hush it all up, but the authentic figures were published not so long ago. The Administration of the Casino find it cheaper to bury a corpse than to pay a ruined gambler’s fare to St. Petersburg, London, or New York. That’s why the poor devils who are cleaned out find the much-talked-of viatique so difficult to obtain. Human life is held very cheap here, I can tell you.” “Oh, don’t talk like that,” I protested. “You make one feel quite nervous. Do you mean that murder is often committed?” “Well--not exactly that. But one must always remember that here, mixing with the best people of Europe, are the very scum of the world, both male and female. Although they dress elegantly, live well, play boldly, and give themselves airs and titles of nobility, they are a very queer and unscrupulous crowd, I can assure you.” “Do you know any of them by sight?” I inquired, much interested. “Oh, one or two,” he answered, laughing indifferently. “Some of them, of course, are eccentric and quite harmless characters.” Then a moment later he added: “Do you see that tall, thin old man just ascending the steps--the one with the soft, white felt hat? Well, his is a curious story. Twenty years ago he came here a millionaire, and within a month lost everything he possessed at trente-et-quarante. So huge were the profits made by the bank, that instead of giving him his viatique to London they allotted him a pension of a louis a day for life, on the understanding that he should never again enter the Rooms. For nearly twenty years he lived in Nice, haunting the Promenade des Anglais and brooding over his past foolishness. Last year, however, somebody unexpectedly died and left him quite comfortably off, whereupon he paid back to Monte Carlo all that he had received and returned again to gamble. His luck, however, has proved just as bad as before. Yet each month as soon as he draws his income he comes over, and in a single day flings it all away upon the red, his favorite color. His history is only one of many.” With interest I looked at the tall, thin-faced old gambler as he painfully ascended the steps, and even as I watched he passed in, eager to fling away all that stood between himself and starvation. Truly the little world of Monte Carlo is a very queer place.