THE GAMBLER'S PENANCE
As they went toward the card room, the organizer of the banquet said:
“You must not be surprised if I have to employ force to get him out, for
he must go whether he wants to or not. It would never do in the world to
allow the morals of our place to become contaminated by the presence of
such creatures, so come on.”
As they neared the card room they heard female voices raised in
entreaty, saying: “Oh, Mr. Edwards, please do show us. We are at the
mercy of all the society people and they put on such airs. We do not
know how to play poker, and they cannot see what kind of training we
have had. If you do refuse we shall never be happy, for we shall be
forever shut out of good society.”
Much more and in many different voices was said, until it seemed that
the person to whom the appeals were made consented. Then there was a
chorus of thanks. By this time the leader of the smart set and the
newspaper man were in the room.
They stood and gazed at the scene before them. There were tables all
around the room. Players were seated at nearly all of them. The young
man noted that some played whist, others preferred euchre, while still
others played seven-up and beggar-my-neighbor and other old and
innocuous games, but many were playing poker. The cards were all right
but there was a total absence of chips or money. All the betting was
done with pebbles. The players were totally oblivious to everything
going on around them.
The professional gambler was pointed out to the director of the
ceremonies and he stood a little while looking at the man he was to put
out. He was by all odds the biggest ghost there. His shoulders were
broad and his arms long and massive. The leader stood thinking whether
it would be quite safe to argue with him. He had always been a man of
peace, and the only battles he had ever fought were those pertaining to
matters of dispute in the social ranks above ground. He had been
peacemaker there so often that he sometimes wondered that they had not
killed each other off like Kilkenny cats. So he watched the gambler, and
waited until he should do something which he might claim to be against
the rules governing the conduct of affairs in this card room.
One or two of the oldest whist players came to him and endeavored to
convince him that it was his duty to interfere before the professional
gambler had contaminated the minds of the lady ghosts by his presence.
These ladies were preparing to learn to play poker. But each time that
he looked at the giant proportions of this ghost the leader felt that it
was not his business to interfere. If they wanted to learn what did it
matter to him? Finally, at the urgent requests of the others, he plucked
up courage and strode over to Edwards with all the superhuman dignity of
a hopelessly small man, and with an air that admitted of no discussion,
said:
“Sir; I hear that you are a professional gambler. If that is so I must
request you to retire from the presence of these ladies. This is a very
exclusive part of the underground world—”
“Are you St. Peter?” asked Edwards, quietly.
“No: but I have been requested to see that nobody of questionable
antecedents is admitted, as it is intended for the best class—I hope you
will go quietly. There are ladies present and I do not wish to proceed
to extreme measures. Otherwise I shall be obliged to put you out.”
“Did you say that to me?” asked Edwards with ominous politeness. “For,
if you did, I have this to reply. I am not in the habit of taking orders
from anyone. But, if you still desire to try, I advise your friends to
bring a basket. For, if you lay a hand on me there won't be a bone of
you left big enough to make a toothpick of. Now, run along, little man
and don't bother me. I am at the service of these ladies, and don’t you
forget it.”
Saying this the big ghost of Edwards turned his back on the pompous
little man, giving his undivided attention to the ladies who had asked
him to teach them the noble and elevating game of poker. After one more
comprehensive glance at the massive proportions of the man before him,
the leader concluded that discretion was the better part of valor. He
scarcely saw how he could back down from the position he had taken
without a loss of dignity. His distress was so evident that the
newspaper man felt really sorry for him. He knew that this man held a
high position in the esteem of the ghosts and wished to help him. So he
came to his rescue in this way:
“I do not think he will do much harm, and if a sort of private watch is
kept on him, why, then, if he does anything offensive to good taste it
will be time to act. If you are willing I will stay here and if anything
is wrong I can report to you. What do you think?”
“So well of it that I will at once retire to the smoking room at the
right of the entrance, and there you will find me if anything
objectionable occurs.”
Saying this the little great man went out and the reporter prepared
himself to be amused beyond anything he had ever felt. He even expected
to get more fun out of the affair than Edwards himself.
There were six lady ghosts, and they crowded around the big gambler
endeavoring to console him for the unpleasantness that had just
occurred. All, with one accord agreed that the society leader would do
well to mind his own business. He was well enough to plan the banquet
and get up the decorations but when he undertook to spy on them and
dictate what they should do, they wanted him to understand that they
were not of the wonderful 400 and didn’t want to be. They thought
themselves too good, so there!
The six ladies then took seats at one of the tables.
One might think that these six ghosts might look exactly alike, but not
so, for every one had as distinct a personality as though she had not
been dead so long that nothing remained but bones. But there was a sort
of emanation of some indefinable kind; an atmosphere of some occult
property that took the place of flesh and body. In some curious and
inexplicable way this gave to each skeleton a separate individuality.
Even the lay mind could understand this, and the newspaper man could
tell the ghosts apart perfectly well.
One of these women was very small, and was clearly as pugnacious as a
sparrow and as tenacious as one. The next one was a woman of the stately
kind. The third was quite an old one, judging by her teeth, and sitting
beside her was one with such beautiful teeth as he had never seen but
once, and the sight quite unnerved him, too, for they belonged to the
young girl whose wedding had brought him to this strange carnival of
ghosts. The sight gave him an agonizing wrench of pain. He wondered how
long it would be before she would be like these women, with nothing left
of her sweet young beauty but her white and even teeth.
This ghost had a way of holding her head to one side and raising her
hollow eyeless sockets in what was once a most effective attitude, but
it was now but the travesty of itself. The sight filled the young man
with deep pity. This ghost was a widow.
“Did you say that to me?”
The fourth was as tall and angular as any of the two men ghosts without
one redeeming trait. She was an old maid. It was easy for the young man
to know all these things for some new and occult quality in his nature
hitherto unknown gave him a new insight into the personality of the
ghost and he saw them as they must have been in life, yet saw them only
as ghosts. He sensed these things without knowing how he did so.
The old maid ghost told the widow that she had heard that Edwards had
been a sad dog in his day, and that gave him added interest, for it must
be admitted that women do admire sad dogs.
When they were all seated they waited for their teacher to make a
beginning. He squared his shoulders, and tried to put his hands in his
pockets when he was suddenly brought to a realizing sense that there are
no pockets in shrouds. He also began to realize that he had undertaken a
greater task than he had thought. He had no money nor chips, and so
could not play poker. He looked the picture of misery.
He was thinking how he could get out of the place decently.
It was the practical old maid who suggested that they should play with
beans. She had heard that that was sometimes done. Edwards stifled a
groan.
When all the other women said that it was impossible to find beans, and
that it would be better to use pebbles as the others were doing, the old
maid told them to wait a moment, and almost before they missed her she
was back with at least a peck of beans of different colors tied up in
her shroud.
She tripped along in such a funny, affected manner that the newspaper
man could not help smiling, though of course he hid that fact. For
Edwards was a much larger man than he was, and he thought that a blow
from one of those bony fists would make a ghost of him too. And he was
not hankering after immortality just then.
The old maid emptied out all the beans, and they sorted the different
colors into different piles. Edwards counted them and divided them all
around into equal parts. Then he produced the cards and said: “We must
have something to represent money and these beans—”
“Oh!” cried the sparrow ghost, “we must not bet. It is wicked to bet.”
“Then you cannot learn to play poker,” replied he.
“I don’t see why,” responded she pugnaciously.
“All right. Have it your own way. You will have to give up your poker
lesson right now, for the betting is all there is to it.”
There was a whole chorus of exclamation from the rest. The old maid
ghost said that after so much trouble had been taken, and as none of the
rest had any scruples against betting beans, she did not see why the
rest could not go on, and Mrs. Fogg stay out. The big gambler waited
with what patience he could muster, for the game had little zest to him
without money.
He put the pack of cards back somewhere in his shroud and waited. On
seeing this the other five took an anxious cry that he must not desert
them. Quiet was restored on the promise that the betting with the beans
should be regarded solely in a Pickwickian sense. So the beans were
distributed. The black beans stood for fifty cents each, and the white
ones for a dollar each, and the big red ones for five dollars.
“That is high enough for beginners, isn’t it?” asked the old lady
benignly.
The big professional gambler took a severe fit of coughing and shook so
hard that the newspaper man thought surely he would fall in pieces, but
he rallied and said:
“Now, ladies, I deal you each five cards. Your object will be to see how
many of a kind you can get together.”
“What kind?” asked the sparrow woman.
“Why, two aces, or three deuces, trays, fours or face cards all the way
up. Aces are the highest.”
“Which one?” asked the little woman.
“Higher than a ten?” asked the widow.
“I said the ace is the highest card in the pack,” replied he.
“That is not answering the question, sir. I wish to know which one.”
“Oh, any one,” answered the man wearily.
“But I can't see how four aces can all be the highest,” said the
sparrow.
“I mean that they all count higher than any other card. After ace comes
king, then queen, then jack, then ten and so on. Four aces make the best
hand except a royal flush or straight. Two of a kind are good, three
better, four best. I will explain the rest as we go along. Now I deal
you each five cards—”
“You said that before,” remarked one of the ghosts.
“So I did. Now you must decide upon your limit.”
“I have five cards. I thought you said that was the limit,” said she of
the pretty teeth.
“I mean, how much do you want to bet? As you are beginners, suppose you
make it a half a dollar.”
“You said there was to be no betting,” cried Mrs. Fogg, at the same time
trying to match a pair of a jack of diamonds and a four of spades that
she had spread out on the table before her.
“Oh, you each are to put a black bean on the middle of the table, and,
madam, please never show your cards until you are called.”
“Sir!”
“Oh,” groaned the gambler, “what I mean is this. I will explain as we go
along when someone calls for you to show down, but it is or should be
your object to hide your hands—cards—as completely as possible from all
the others.”
“I don’t see how I am going to find out if I don’t look,” grumbled the
little woman.
The newspaper man was enjoying this mightily, and from time to time he
cast pitying eyes at the unfortunate big ghost, for once he had had the
pleasure of teaching three women to play the noble game, and he fully
sympathized with the suffering man.
The ghostly gambler gathered himself together and said:
“Now, ladies; there are a number of complications in this game, and as
they arise I will explain them.”
“I would prefer to know them all at once,” said she of the pretty teeth.
“I am sure that I could remember.”
The poor man began to look as if he thought that this was a job put up
against his peace of mind, but he courageously continued:
“As I said, your object is to get as many pairs or cards of the same
number of spots into your hand as possible, and if you have two pairs,
or only one pair, you can draw three cards from the pack putting as many
of those as you hold in your hand back—discard, they call that—and try
and make up a full hand that way. Now each of you has five cards. Please
look at them, and, well, as this is the first, perhaps it would be
better for you to show them, and I will advise you what to do.”
“You just told me not to show mine.”
“Now, wouldn't that come and fetch you?” muttered the wretch under his
breath.
“What’s trump?” asked she whose teeth were so pretty.
The old maid scored a hit by putting her cards, hand and all, into the
big paw of the gambler, and letting it lie there innocently.
“I'll scrape the pot,” cried the old lady ghost, at the same time
triumphantly showing two deuces and three trays.
“I—I—beg your pardon?” said the bewildered man.
“Isn’t that what you say when you get better than anyone?” she asked
defiantly.
“Oh, yes,” murmured he faintly; “but we must wait and see what the
others have got.”
One lady had two queens, two jacks and a tray, and another had four
fives and an ace. Mrs. Fogg had a four, a seven, a jack and two nines.
She was highly indignant when she discovered that her hand did not count
beside the others.
“If there is going to be such favoritism shown, I don’t care to play,”
she said, pouting.
The woman with the pretty teeth had a pair of aces and three kings, and
the old maid had a royal flush. It was a task beside which that of
Hercules sunk into ignoble insignificance to explain just why a royal
flush was higher than the pairs on which he had just laid such stress,
while he had not even mentioned the royal flush at all. He made up his
mind that he would not mention a straight even if one turned up every
hand. The miserable man was nearly exhausted before they all understood,
and he never thought of looking at his own hand at all. The chair where
he sat was one of those old-fashioned kind, made of horsehair, and he
kept slipping down, and by his gyrations alone anyone could have seen
his uneasiness.
Finally, after much explanation they got down to a real game. Each got
her cards, examined them defiantly and every one bet with a recklessness
that had no limit but the amount of beans on hand. The last bean was on
the table. After about forty-five different attempts, each prefaced and
followed by explanations from the miserable ghost they had drawn and
discarded.
“I did not need anything more,” said the old lady, “but I thought I
might get something better than four aces, so now I will stand squat.”
“I—I beg your pardon?” gasped he.
“That is what you said, isn’t it, Lavinia? I mean when you have all you
want.”
“Oh, pat, madam. I said pat.”
“If you had meant pat, why did you say squat? Was it meant to confuse
me?”
“What is trump, please,” said the widow plaintively.
“There is no trump in poker, madam,” said Edwards for the twentieth
time.
The old maid leaned over and whispered confidentially:
“I won't play if such favoritism is shown”
“Please, dear Mr. Edwards; is mine a good hand?”
“I only wish that I might always be sure of holding one as good. Why,
madam, it is simply gorgeous—a regular beauty.”
“Oh, Mr. Edwards! You naughty man!”
“I see everyone and I make it five hundred better and I call,” cried
Mrs. Fogg, piling all her beans in a heap and then preparing one end of
her shroud to hold her winnings. The big gambler had somehow found a
pocketknife and this he jabbed surreptitiously into the chair as a
relief to his feelings, while the six women were quarreling over the
beans. They appealed to him, and the old lady said:
“Mr. Edwards, Mrs. Robinson hasn't anted at all for three hands, and
Miss Shookes puts a handful of beans of all colors in the pot every time
without counting them.”
“Oh, well; she knows that this is only to learn. She wouldn’t do that if
it were real money.”
“No, indeed; for I was always noted for my prudence about money. That is
how I died richer than some folks I know of, who had scarcely enough to
pay for their funerals.”
“I think, ladies, that you could all show your hands now.”
Mrs. Fogg triumphantly put six cards on the table. She had kept one of
her discards to make up three pairs. This caused much animated
discussion, particularly as Mrs. Washner had four fives.
“You said you had four aces,” whimpered Mrs. Fogg when the case was
decided against her.
“I did not, did I, Mr. Edwards?”
“I don’t remember,” replied he, wishing that he had had sense enough to
go into the billiard room and stay there instead of making such an idiot
of himself.
“I simply said that I drew that card to see if I could get anything
better than four aces. Now, isn’t that what you would call a bluff?”
“Yes; and it was a good one, too,” said he admiringly.
“Besides Mrs. Fogg had six cards, and—”
“Well she didn’t have the four aces, and that isn't half as honest as my
having six cards. You told me, and you know it very well, that I was to
get as many pairs as I could. She didn’t have the aces, and I did have
three pairs, and I am entitled to the beans, so now!”
The woman with the fine teeth looked dreamily at the gambler and
silently laid down her hand. There were four aces and a king. None of
the others had anything to beat this, and she smiled bewitchingly at him
as he awarded her the beans, whereat Mrs. Fogg flew into a violent
passion and sobbed tearlessly, until the poor man did not know what to
do. She continued until he was ready to throw up the whole affair and
leave as she said:
“I just don’t care! I am sure Mr. Edwards just picked those cards out on
purpose for her. I don’t want the old beans. I detest beans, only I
believe in standing up for principle, and I know that
gamblers—professional gamblers—do cheat at cards.”
“I think that a gambler—even a professional gambler—would have to be
very unprincipled to try to win with six cards when he knew that that
was the worst kind of cheating,” said the old maid, taking up the man’s
defense with such an air of having the right to champion his cause that
his jaw dropped and he made a movement as if for flight. At this point
quite a number of other ghosts who had gathered around them began to
clap their hands, and one said:
“Go in, little woman, and win. You will make a famous player in time.”
The little belligerent hurriedly arose and said angrily:
“If Mr. Fogg were only here, you would see what would happen. I won't
stay here to be abused. I was lowering myself anyway.”
“I think so, too,” said the old maid, “but it was by the way you have
acted and not from your association with anyone here. We can spare you
without sorrow.”
By this time several more had gathered, and the ladies, seeing that they
were attracting more attention than they desired, left the card room so
suddenly that the newspaper man could not tell which way they went. Then
he looked for the big ghost. He, too, had disappeared. So the reporter,
left to himself, decided to go and find the leader and tell him the
outcome of the affair.
The young man thought that it might be that this affair was a form of
punishment for former sins of omission or commission. But he must indeed
have been a very bad man to deserve such a punishment as this, and he
thought, too, that no other form of punishment could have been devised
so well calculated to break a real gambler’s heart. He felt sorry for
him.
The reporter then went to the billiard room in search of the leader of
the evening’s ceremonies. He was nowhere to be seen, and the young man
stood watching the billiard players. He thought they all seemed to be
playing in a perfunctory way, and there was no spirit in their play.
Spectators stood about watching the progress of the games, and
occasionally making remarks of approbation or derision.
There were several men there whom the young man felt sure he had seen in
life, but as none spoke to him he did not exactly like to press the
acquaintance. One of the men that he felt so positive that he had known
in life had been a rabid billiard player, and he neglected his family to
such an extent that the young reporter’s mother once said that she hoped
that when he died he would have to play billiards continually for a few
millions of years as a just punishment. He was one of those who did not
seem to be having a good time at all.
Thinking that there might be things of more interest going on in other
parts of the place, the young newspaper man went out to the main hall.
There were things to see there.