The ludicrous scenes of the evening danced before my eyes; the smoke-filled, sordid room, the ignoble faces round the table, the foolish hullaballoo, the collapse of Anastasius, my melodramatic intervention, and the ironical courtesy of the fleshy Captain Vauvenarde.

Also, in the small hours of the night, Anastasius's gigantic combinations assumed a less trivial aspect.

What lunatic scheme was being hatched behind that dome-like brow?
His object in taking me to the club was obvious.

He could not have got in save under my protection.
But what he had reckoned upon doing when he got there Heaven and Anastasius Papadopoulos only knew.

I was also worried by the confounded little pain inside.
On the following afternoon I went down to meet the steamer from Marseilles.