Evening star., 1901-04-02
GAMBLING IN PARIS
There Has Been a Great Revival
Since the Exposition.
CLUBS ARE NOW RUN Wide OPEN
Ali Sorts of Games, but Most of
Them Are Crooked.
PLUCKING THE PIGEON S

| Special Correspondence or The Evening Star.
PARIS, March 20. 1901
| Only at this late day Parisians are be-
| ginning to learn the amount of general
| "cuSsedneSs' developed by the exhibition.
| Certainly one of the most picturesque of
| these developments was the reopening Of
| the closed gambling clubs of Paris. For
ten years past, following on the scandals
| of the Bertrand combination and the
| Cercle de la Presse, the hells had been Z
closed so tightly that willing victims who
| tried failed to get admission to them, while
| the experts were reduced to preying on
| each other They opened again in the
| loosening-up of the exhibition summer, and
when the exhibition closed they remained
| open. Today any man who looks as If he
! had SIS may walk into them accompanied
| by any man who has been there once be-
| fore The walking in of new victims has
become again the lucrative industry of the
| tout. No tourist need despair.
The excitement afforded by these clubs Is
| all the greater because the chances are
| twofold-those of the cards and those of
! being robbed by bankers and croupiers.
| The fact that when one Greek more skilled
| or lucky than his fellows gains a fortune,
he is set upon regularly and robbed by his
! old friends, ought to be a sufficient warn
! ing to the tenderfoot not to take a bank
at baccarat with them, at least The
| career of one man, who still hangs about
| the c. Cafe, is eloquent of the worldly
| truth that dog will eat dog.
Worked a Sharp Game.
! This man, a Hungarian adventurer, ar
| rived in Paris without money, credit or
! friends Beginning, some say on the trans
| atlantic steamers, some say on the oriental
liners of the Messageries Martimes, his
! light hand and Industrious practice gained
| for him facility at poker. At the less
mechanical tricks of the trade Of making
| acquaintances, gaining confidence, winning
! softly and getting away gently, he deVel-
| oped remarkable tact. When and how he
| came to take on baccarat nobody knows;
| but 1t was not long after his first appear
ance in the Cercie de fEscrime Cor 'F'e2c-
ing Club for every gambling club must
! have correct name) that he had MS ar
! Tangements made to win.
His speciality was the tarot. an art that
necessitates the patient sorting of hun
| dreds of packs of cards to find a few packs
| the figured design en- whose backs, by the
| regularity and irregularity of their print
| ing, will show a difference between the
| eights and mines and all the other cards. 1t
| is a marked pack, yet not marked. At
| baccarat. to know the top card is an eight
| or nine constitutes an entering advantage
| of more than 20 per cent. This was all the
| advantage the Hungarian and his friends
needed. He made a fortune. He had a
| palatial apartment in the Avenue de
| TOpera; he filled it with the most costly
| furniture; he even had a library full of
| valuable bOoks-he, the illterate adven-
| turer who never read. nervous, dry, un-
! easy little fellow, they say he would stride
| through the handsome rooms hour after
| hour saying in a kind of eXultation: 'All
| this is mnew The poor Hungarian @oTld
scarcely realize his good fortune. Perhaps
it turned his head. because it was not long
| before his old comrades organized a plot
| against him and his fortune.
| The s'Partie Double"
| 1t was what they call ''partie double,
TO a
! cheat a third party, the real plan being
| that the third party should cheat you. The
| Hungarian fell into the trap which was
| planned elaborately. Somewhere or other
| they picked up fine old man, a ruined
| nobleman-the real thing. He looked q
| proper pigeon, as, indeed. he had been
| years before. The II nsarian and MS pals
| played the old fellow and won from him
| The decisive partie was to be tbat night.
| The packs of cards were ready he CON
! federate croupiers were at their posts. The
| old noble took the bank. The Hungarian,
| calling "Banco," lost again and again.
| They whispered to him hurriedly to stop
| there must be a mistake "Th3Y'Te got the
wrong pack, one fixed for the bank to win.
! Do you outbid him? Take the bank!'' 1t
| was all over in half an hour. The Hungarl-
! an took the bank. He lost again aud again,
a little fortune each trip. Too late it dawn
| ed him he was betrayed. Rising, pale
and haggard, he saluted and deoarted. He
| never spoke to his old friends again. They
did not care. They laughed together.
| Ignoble, treacherous and gceedy, unfit
compa Mons even for the diShOnorabie old
| noble stool pigeon, their next thought was
to rob him of the price Of his shame. the
profits due him out of the adventure. They
would better have kept him. being gentle
man by birth and education, AM having
Cnce been genuine loser, lie made an ideal
| stall" But no; with the busy malice, the
tricky mischievousness of criminal desen-
crates, they must amuse themselves by
cooking him in his own 1t was
Setting ,0rpfpn1pI
in the person Of a new member of the band.
the partie double was begun again: only
this time it was the old nObleman tmn to
lose all he had. In his turn, he rose from
the table pale and haggGrd, saluted and
departed. And they laughed together again.
| Thanks to this yellow streak Of treachery,
the band is powerless and penalties; today.
Its old members, out of habit. hang togeth-
| er at the c. Cafe, squab billing over two
| franc games of ecarte
The Secret DivuIged.
| Such one willing to talk for the price
of a mug of beer and sausage betrayed
| this secret of the trade the other evening:
Should any confrere come to me with a
proposition to join him in bleeding third
party. represented IS being pigeon or
tenderfoot, | should accept only on the con-
dition that we-that I-should win from the
| start. Should he propose we lose a little
at the start to gain the pigeons confidence
| | would refuse to marcher | should have
pickeled feet. ! should know the plan was
to betray me- for it is principle that the
proper loser, the chambre, the 'roomed-n
one must lose from the start And it re-
poses solid observation of human ma
ture. Players have courage only In losing
Once winner no matter of how small a
sum, the type is capable of quitting the
game; but let him begin losing and he is
likely to hang on to get that money back.
| Even II he quits We are always that much
ahead. know that a great deal has been
written and said about the chevalier din
dustrie who leads his victim on by losing
to him at the start. but it would not do
among the people l know.
Fleeing an Old Sport.
A great old American sport of the name
of j, a man today possessed of a real
fortune which had its beginnings In Paris
baccarat during the last days of the second
empire, never comes to Paris now without
being feeced by men less capable than h M
| self. The word goes round the clubs that
| j is on his way to Paris and there is
a general rejoicing. How is it that he the