roulette and the perpetual desire of increasing their capital--for the
worthy couple fell into the hands of a talented company, whose agents
robbed them at Frascati's in Paris, and again in Hamburg and various
health resorts, so that hardly a year had passed when Bodlevski one
fine night woke up to the fact that they no longer possessed a ruble.
But they had passed a brilliant year, their arrival in the great
cities had had its effect, and especially since Natasha had become a
person of title; in the course of the year she succeeded in purchasing
an Austrian barony at a very reasonable figure--a barony which, of
course, only existed on paper.

When all his money was gone, there was nothing left for Bodlevski but
to enroll himself a member of the company which had so successfully
accomplished the transfer of his funds to their own pockets. Natasha's
beauty and Bodlevski's brains were such strong arguments that the
company willingly accepted them as new recruits. The two paid dear for
their knowledge, it is true, but their knowledge presently began to
bear fruit in considerable abundance. Day followed day, and year
succeeded year, a long series of horribly anxious nights, violent
feelings, mental perturbations, crafty and subtle schemes, a complete
cycle of rascalities, an entire science of covering up tracks, and the
perpetual shadow of justice, prison, and perhaps the scaffold.
Bodlevski, with his obstinate, persistent, and concentrated character,
reached the highest skill in card-sharping and the allied wiles. All
games of "chance" were for him games of skill. At thirty he looked at
least ten years older. The life he led, with its ceaseless effort,
endless mental work, perpetual anxiety, had made of him a fanatical
worshiper at the shrine of trickery. He dried up visibly in body and
grew old in mind, mastering all the difficult arts of his profession,
and only gained confidence and serenity when he had reached the