"Two hundred and six, ninety-eight."
Rex heard a clock strike ten somewhere in the hall, then another
somewhere else, and another, and another; the house seemed full of
striking clocks. Then in the distance the stable clock chimed in. In
another hour they would all be striking eleven, and he would be listening
to them as a disgraced outcast, unable to pay, even in part, the wager he
had challenged.
"Two hundred and eighteen, a hundred and three." The game was as good as
over. Rex was as good as done for. He longed desperately for the
ceiling to fall in, for the house to catch fire, for anything to happen
that would put an end to that horrible rolling to and fro of red and
white ivory that was jostling him nearer and nearer to his doom.
"Two hundred and twenty-eight, a hundred and seven."
Rex opened his cigarette-case; it was empty. That at least gave him a
pretext to slip away from the room for the purpose of refilling it; he
would spare himself the drawn-out torture of watching that hopeless game
played out to the bitter end. He backed away from the circle of absorbed
watchers and made his way up a short stairway to a long, silent corridor
of bedrooms, each with a guests' name written in a little square on the
door.
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