Yet, on the other hand, there was the little Bulgarian princess with rooms just across the corridor from his own, and the rightful possessor of the plain little diamond with which he had just cut his way into this more sumptuous chamber.

For a week past now, down at the Casino, she had been losing steadily, as of course the vast and undirected majority always must lose.

Even her solitaire earrings had been taken to Nice and pawned, Durkin knew.

Three days before that, too, her maid--and who is ever anybody on the Riviera without a maid ?--had been reluctantly and woefully discharged.

At the Trente et Quarante table, as well, Durkin had watched the last thousand-franc note of the Princess wither away.