THE COMPLETE WORKS OF ÉMILE ZOLA. Эмиль Золя

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      CHAPTER XIII

      THE GAMBLING-HOUSES OF MARSEILLE

      BEFORE relating the next episode of this drama, before showing Marius a prey to all the anxieties of the gambler, it is necessary to explain the causes which led to the increase of gambling-houses in Marseille. The writer of these lines would like to display, in all its hideous nakedness, the festering sore which preyed upon one of the wealthiest and liveliest cities of France. The reader will pardon his short digression in consideration of its usefulness.

      It is to be observed that the passion for gambling plays the most havoc in the great centres of commerce. When a whole population is given over to unbridled speculation, when all classes in a city are trafficking from morn to eve, it is almost impossible that this throng of dealers should not plunge into the keen emotions of gambling. Gaming then becomes an additional speculation to be added to the others; people speculate on chance, and continue during the night the occupation of the day; during the daytime they have been trying to increase their fortune by selling no matter what, and, at nighttime, they seek to add to the profit by risking it at the gaming-table. If it is true that trade is often a game, the traders may believe that they are not going out of their element when they pass from their counters to the neighbouring gambling-houses.

      The commercial fever, too, is contagious. In the face of certain great fortunes accumulated in a few years, there is not a young man at Marseille who does not dream of similar luck. Everyone wishes to go into business, the whole city is an enormous bank in which one lives merely for the sake of making money. Go down to the port, walk into all the places where the crowd is densest: you will find everyone talking of money, and will fancy yourself in some immense office where all conversations are about figures. The important business is, when one has ten francs in one’s pocket, to turn them into twenty, thirty, forty. Those with large capital gamble at the Stock Exchange, buying and selling. But folks who only possess a few francs, have recourse to gaming; not having sufficient to engage in vast enterprises, they satisfy their craving by tempting chance; it is a means of gaining fortune or meeting ruin which is within everyone’s grasp, a prompt and easy method, a new style of trade, full of keen emotions. The gambler is a speculator who lives a whole panting existence in a night, and experiences the hope, anxiety, and despair of a stock-jobber. In a city like Marseille, where money reigns as sovereign king, where the inhabitants are under the influence of a terrible commercial fever, gambling becomes a necessity, a sort of bank open to all, in which each one, both rich and poor, can risk his coppers or his gold.

      Add to this the fact that the wealthy, those who shovel gold about, who gain enormous sums in a day, set little value on that gold they pile up so easily. A workman looks with reverence at the five-franc piece which is paid him in the evening; he has toiled and moiled to earn the coin, it represents to him an exhausting labour, long hours of fatigue; and he has to live on it. But a trader, a stock-jobber who, whilst remaining seated in his office, finds at evening that he has gained several hundreds of francs, does not fear, when pocketing his profit, to let a few twenty-franc pieces fall to the ground. He knows that on the morrow he will no doubt earn as many more; he is still young, and wishes to enjoy life; as he has been shut in during several hours, he requires, in the evening, some noisy pleasures and strong emotions. So he squanders his money in the restaurants and cafés, and at the gaming-table, spending it as easily as he earned it.

      A commercial city is therefore forcibly dissolute and given to gambling. In this ebb and flow of fortunes, in this scorching breath of trade which penetrates throughout every house, there are hours of madness, imperious needs for enjoyment. At certain times, these people are blinded by the dazzle of the gold: they plunge into debauchery the same as they plunged into business. And the fever lays hold of the town from one end to the other, little and big, rich and poor, are agitated by the same emotion, the same need to lose or win gold, down to ruin or up to millions.

      One can understand the existence of, I was almost saying the necessity for, gambling-houses at Marseille. At the time of this story there were more than a hundred of them, and the number was increasing daily. The police were vanquished by the passion of the gamblers. Whenever a gambling-house was discovered and closed, two others were opened in its immediate neighbourhood. To cut off the evil at the root, it was necessary to remove the fever that was agitating the whole population. But to my mind the evil was irremediable: one may kill man, but not his passions.

      The police, who have a direct action on gambling-houses, close all those they discover. But their action is difficult to apply in the clubs which, at times, become changed into veritable houses for gaming. Gamblers are inventive when it is a question of satisfying their passion; they endeavour to have the law on their side. Understand well, however, what I mean to say; I have no idea of attacking certain honourable clubs at Marseille; I wish merely to be the historian of those scandalous clubs, frequented by sharpers and sometimes terribly stained by the blood of suicide.

      This is how a club is founded. A few persons ask for an authorization to meet of an evening in a certain place, for the purposes of conversation and refreshment, and even to play at lawful games. Each member pays a subscription, and it is forbidden to admit strangers, that is to say to keep a gaming-table open to the public.

      And now, this is what happens. After a few months, conversation and drinking cease, and whole nights are spent around the green baize; the stakes, at first very small, gradually increase in amount, so much so that it is easy to ruin oneself in a few nights. The management is no longer so strict, anyone is free to enter, there are more strangers in the club than members, even women are admitted, sharpers soon put in an appearance for the purpose of fleecing inexperienced players, and this state of things lasts until the police make a raid and close the premises. Two months later the club reopens some distance off, the farce is played over again with the same ending.

      This is one of the open sores of Marseille, a festering sore which spreads every day. The clubs have always a tendency to become gambling-houses, abysses which swallow up the fortunes and honour of those imprudent enough to venture therein. And once one has tasted the keen delights of play, all other pleasures seem to cloy; the fever seizes hold of one’s whole being and the table claims the last coin in one’s purse. Not a week goes by without some fresh disaster or complaint to the authorities.

      One time it is merchants who have been ruining themselves at the gaming-tables. They come there and jeopardize the money deposited with them, first dissipating their own profits, and then breaking into the funds that have been entrusted to their commercial probity; after that they are obliged to go into bankruptcy, and they drag down in their ruin those who have had faith in their honesty.

      Another time it is small clerks with appetites for luxury and fast living, and whose modest salaries are insufficient for the gratification of their passions. They see around them wealthy people wallowing in the lap of luxury, surrounded by lovely women, reclining in carriages, in short tasting of all the dissolute joys of life; they are seized with jealousy, and feel a keen desire to lead a similar existence of pleasure and festivity. So they seek to obtain the necessary money at the gaming-table; they first of all risk their salaries; then, when luck is against them, they rob their employers, СКАЧАТЬ