It's a popular game among nobles and commoners alike, and always played for stakes. 

"Oh, yes. But when I complained of my poverty, I'm afraid I was being rather literal."

She realized halfway through dismissing what she'd taken to be false modesty about his writings. "All the more reason to play with Charles-Louis, then. My poor brother must be cursed, the way he loses money at cards."

Of course, it would be terribly rude to refuse to play – unless he had an established reputation for asceticism, which he certainly does not – and unthinkable not to play for money. 

"I'll play a hand, then. But just a hand – for your brother's sake."

"How about this - you play a hand, two, three - however long your luck and patience last you - and if good fortune deserts you, I will cover your losses up to, say, two hundred dollars. It would, after all, be unseemly for my family to profit from the further impoverishment of Isarn's literary masters."

Masters? She is laying it on a bit thick. He wonders what she's after – there's nothing he has to offer her family except mild notoriety, and that's free.

"My lady is much too generous."

"Oh, nonsense." She leads him around the dance floor to where she sees Charles-Louis. "My lord, may I introduce Julien, our latest monsieur intelligent. Julien, this is my brother the Comte de Artenay. Julien is a writer, he wrote - " Charles-Louis shakes his head slightly "- some very nice things..." She blinks and trails off.

Aretenay is tall, aristocratic, blond unlike his sister, and, indeed, carrying a faintly ridiculous cane capped with a gilded unicorn head. "I am pleased to meet you, Julien - I do hope you will forgive Jérôme the nickname, I'm afraid he finds less joy than I do in my support for Isarn's itinerant artists."

The cane is, somehow, sillier in real life. He wonders how Artenay came to know of him. Gabriel's right, there must be a secretary – he doesn't think the man in front of him looks careless enough for a copy of La Galt Libre to have ever entered this house. 

"Monsieur de Artenay. I'm grateful to your sister for giving me the opportunity of thanking you for your gracious invitation – and grateful to Jérôme for puncturing my pretensions before I had the chance to bore you with them." 

"It is always a joy to welcome artists such as yourself to my home. I dare say that I must be more grateful for the contributions of people like you to the culture of our nation - an invitation to an evening's festivities really is the least I can do."

Julien is starting to develop the really alarming suspicion he's been mistaken for someone whose opinion matters. 

"Then I must do my best to merit your regard."

"I am sure that you do already, and will only merit it more if you continue as you have been. I do adore the arts. Tell me, Julien, do you play cards?"

"Badly, but with enthusiasm." 

"My dear sister, I am sure, would say the same is true of me. Can I tempt you with a game? The card room is this way."

"A hand can't hurt." Because what can Artenay do if he loses, send him to debtor's prison? He's already a wanted heretic. 

"I am afraid," says Artenay as he deals the first hand, "That I have had some troubles with my banker of late - a small thing, of no real importance and soon to be resolved, but it means that at the moment I only have Absalom money to bet with. I ask that you will forgive me."

Julien can't imagine a banking problem that would produce that particular result. Absalom pounds are hard to get these days – they're more valuable than Chelish dollars, at least on the black market. In other words: he's being bribed.

"I have no objections."

(The trouble with the banker is that the banker is a Mammonite and Artenay does not want to deal with him. It really has left him short on Chelish dollars until he gets it sorted out.)

They play a few hands. As one might expect for a moderately veiled bribe, Julien takes two hands out of the first three and comes out ahead by a couple hundred pounds, though Artenay shows no inclination towards stopping there.

Julien does! If the bribe gets big enough Artenay might be liable to expect something in return. 

"Forgive me, my lord, but I don't usually play for such high stakes." 

Artenay smiles, making no sign of exasperation. "Surely you will at least give me a chance to win it back."