About This Book
A calculating young officer becomes obsessed with learning an elderly noblewoman's rumored secret for winning at cards. Social evenings and family anecdotes introduce the legend, after which he engineers access to the woman's household, employs deceit, and witnesses a disturbing collapse that blurs psychological and uncanny elements. Armed with the supposed formula he stakes everything in a climactic gambling scene, suffers a shocking reversal, and descends into compulsion and madness. The tale examines chance, avarice, the hollowness of social ambition, and the perilous boundary between cold calculation and irrational fixation.
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