"Hundred up--five pounds a game?"
Peter Gee agreed.
"With the lurch double, of course, ten pounds?"
"All right," said Peter Gee.
At another table four of the others sat in at bridge. Captain
Stapler, who was no card-player, looked on and replenished the long
glasses of Scotch that stood at each man's right hand. McMurtrey,
with poorly concealed apprehension, followed as well as he could what
went on at the piquet table. His fellow Englishmen as well were
shocked by the behaviour of the Australian, and all were troubled by
fear of some untoward act on his part. That he was working up his
animosity against the half-caste, and that the explosion might come
any time, was apparent to all.
"I hope Peter loses," McMurtrey said in an undertone.
"Not if he has any luck," Andrews answered. "He's a wizard at
piquet. I know by experience."
That Peter Gee was lucky was patent from the continual badgering of
Deacon, who filled his glass frequently. He had lost the first game,
and, from his remarks, was losing the second, when the door opened
and David Grief entered.
"In Guvutu they merely drink between drinks," he remarked casually to
the assembled company, ere he gripped the manager's hand. "Hello,
Mac! Say, my skipper's down in the whaleboat. He's got a silk
shirt, a tie, and tennis shoes, all complete, but he wants you to
send a pair of pants down. Mine are too small, but yours will fit
him. Hello, Eddy! How's that _ngari-ngari_? You up, Jock? The
miracle has happened. No one down with fever, and no one remarkably
drunk." He sighed, "I suppose the night is young yet. Hello, Peter!
Did you catch that big squall an hour after you left us? We had to
let go the second anchor."
While he was being introduced to Deacon, McMurtrey dispatched a
house-boy with the pants, and when Captain Donovan came in it was as
a white man should--at least in Goboto.
Deacon lost the second game, and an outburst heralded the fact.
Peter Gee devoted himself to lighting a cigarette and keeping quiet.
"What!--are you quitting because you're ahead?" Deacon demanded.
Grief raised his eyebrows questioningly to McMurtrey, who frowned
back his own disgust.
"It's the rubber," Peter Gee answered.
"It takes three games to make a rubber. It's my deal. Come on!"
Peter Gee acquiesced, and the third game was on.
"Young whelp--he needs a lacing," McMurtrey muttered to Grief. "Come
on, let us quit, you chaps. I want to keep an eye on him. If he
goes too far I'll throw him out on the beach, company instructions or
no."
"Who is he?" Grief queried.
"A left-over from last steamer. Company's orders to treat him nice.
He's looking to invest in a plantation. Has a ten-thousand-pound
letter of credit with the company. He's got 'all-white Australia' on
the brain. Thinks because his skin is white and because his father
was once Attorney-General of the Commonwealth that he can be a cur.
That's why he's picking on Peter, and you know Peter's the last man
in the world to make trouble or incur trouble. Damn the company. I
didn't engage to wet-nurse its infants with bank accounts. Come on,
fill your glass, Grief. The man's a blighter, a blithering blighter."
"Maybe he's only young," Grief suggested.
"He can't contain his drink--that's clear." The manager glared his
disgust and wrath. "If he raises a hand to Peter, so help me, I'll
give him a licking myself, the little overgrown cad!"
The pearl-buyer pulled the pegs out of the cribbage board on which he
was scoring and sat back. He had won the third game. He glanced
across to Eddy Little, saying:
"I'm ready for the bridge, now."
"I wouldn't be a quitter," Deacon snarled.
"Oh, really, I'm tired of the game," Peter Gee assured him with his
habitual quietness.
"Come on and be game," Deacon bullied. "One more. You can't take my
money that way. I'm out fifteen pounds. Double or quits."
McMurtrey was about to interpose, but Grief restrained him with his
eyes.
"If it positively is the last, all right," said Peter Gee, gathering
up the cards. "It's my deal, I believe. As I understand it, this
final is for fifteen pounds. Either you owe me thirty or we quit
even?"
"That's it, chappie. Either we break even or I pay you thirty."
"Getting blooded, eh?" Grief remarked, drawing up a chair.
The other men stood or sat around the table, and Deacon played again
in bad luck. That he was a good player was clear. The cards were
merely running against him. That he could not take his ill luck with
equanimity was equally clear. He was guilty of sharp, ugly curses,
and he snapped and growled at the imperturbable half-caste. In the
end Peter Gee counted out, while Deacon had not even made his fifty
points. He glowered speechlessly at his opponent.
"Looks like a lurch," said Grief.
"Which is double," said Peter Gee.
"There's no need your telling me," Deacon snarled. "I've studied
arithmetic. I owe you forty-five pounds. There, take it!"
The way in which he flung the nine five-pound notes on the table was
an insult in itself. Peter Gee was even quieter, and flew no signals
of resentment.
"You've got fool's luck, but you can't play cards, I can tell you
that much," Deacon went on. "I could teach you cards."
The half-caste smiled and nodded acquiescence as he folded up the
money.
"There's a little game called casino--I wonder if you ever heard of
it?--a child's game."
"I've seen it played," the half-caste murmured gently.
"What's that?" snapped Deacon. "Maybe you think you can play it?"
"Oh, no, not for a moment. I'm afraid I haven't head enough for it."
"It's a bully game, casino," Grief broke in pleasantly. "I like it
very much."
Deacon ignored him.
"I'll play you ten quid a game--thirty-one points out," was the
challenge to Peter Gee. "And I'll show you how little you know about
cards. Come on! Where's a full deck?"
"No, thanks," the half-caste answered. "They are waiting for me in
order to make up a bridge set."
"Yes, come on," Eddy Little begged eagerly. "Come on, Peter, let's
get started."
"Afraid of a little game like casino," Deacon girded. "Maybe the
stakes are too high. I'll play you for pennies--or farthings, if you
say so."
The man's conduct was a hurt and an affront to all of them.
McMurtrey could stand it no longer.
"Now hold on, Deacon. He says he doesn't want to play. Let him
alone."
Deacon turned raging upon his host; but before he could blurt out his
abuse, Grief had stepped into the breach.
"I'd like to play casino with you," he said.
"What do you know about it?"
"Not much, but I'm willing to learn."
"Well, I'm not teaching for pennies to-night."
"Oh, that's all right," Grief answered. "I'll play for almost any
sum--within reason, of course."
Deacon proceeded to dispose of this intruder with one stroke.
"I'll play you a hundred pounds a game, if that will do you any good."
Grief beamed his delight. "That will be all right, very right. Let
us begin. Do you count sweeps?"
Deacon was taken aback. He had not expected a Goboton trader to be
anything but crushed by such a proposition.
"Do you count sweeps?" Grief repeated.
Andrews had brought him a new deck, and he was throwing out the joker.
"Certainly not," Deacon answered. "That's a sissy game."
"I'm glad," Grief coincided. "I don't like sissy games either."
"You don't, eh? Well, then, I'll tell you what we'll do. We'll play
for five hundred pounds a game."
Again Deacon was taken aback.
"I'm agreeable," Grief said, beginning to shuffle. "Cards and spades
go out first, of course, and then big and little casino, and the aces
in the bridge order of value. Is that right?"
"You're a lot of jokers down here," Deacon laughed, but his laughter
was strained. "How do I know you've got the money?"
"By the same token I know you've got it. Mac, how's my credit with
the company?"
"For all you want," the manager answered.
"You personally guarantee that?" Deacon demanded.
"I certainly do," McMurtrey said. "Depend upon it, the company will
honour his paper up and pass your letter of credit."
"Low deals," Grief said, placing the deck before Deacon on the table.
The latter hesitated in the midst of the cut and looked around with
querulous misgiving at the faces of the others. The clerks and
captains nodded.
"You're all strangers to me," Deacon complained. "How am I to know?
Money on paper isn't always the real thing."
Then it was that Peter Gee, drawing a wallet from his pocket and
borrowing a fountain pen from McMurtrey, went into action.
"I haven't gone to buying yet," the half-caste explained, "so the
account is intact. I'll just indorse it over to you, Grief. It's
for fifteen thousand. There, look at it."
Deacon intercepted the letter of credit as it was being passed across
the table. He read it slowly, then glanced up at McMurtrey.
"Is that right?"
"Yes. It's just the same as your own, and just as good. The
company's paper is always good."
Deacon cut the cards, won the deal, and gave them a thorough shuffle.
But his luck was still against him, and he lost the game.
"Another game," he said. "We didn't say how many, and you can't quit
with me a loser. I want action."
Grief shuffled and passed the cards for the cut.
"Let's play for a thousand," Deacon said, when he had lost the second
game. And when the thousand had gone the way of the two five hundred
bets he proposed to play for two thousand.
"That's progression," McMurtrey warned, and was rewarded by a glare
from Deacon. But the manager was insistent. "You don't have to play
progression, Grief, unless you're foolish."
"Who's playing this game?" Deacon flamed at his host; and then, to
Grief: "I've lost two thousand to you. Will you play for two
thousand?"
Grief nodded, the fourth game began, and Deacon won. The manifest
unfairness of such betting was known to all of them. Though he had
lost three games out of four, Deacon had lost no money. By the
child's device of doubling his wager with each loss, he was bound,
with the first game he won, no matter how long delayed, to be even
again.
He now evinced an unspoken desire to stop, but Grief passed the deck
to be cut.
"What?" Deacon cried. "You want more?"
"Haven't got anything yet," Grief murmured whimsically, as he began
the deal. "For the usual five hundred, I suppose?"
The shame of what he had done must have tingled in Deacon, for he
answered, "No, we'll play for a thousand. And say! Thirty-one
points is too long. Why not twenty-one points out--if it isn't too
rapid for you?"
"That will make it a nice, quick little game," Grief agreed.
The former method of play was repeated. Deacon lost two games,
doubled the stake, and was again even. But Grief was patient, though
the thing occurred several times in the next hour's play. Then
happened what he was waiting for--a lengthening in the series of
losing games for Deacon. The latter doubled to four thousand and
lost, doubled to eight thousand and lost, and then proposed to double
to sixteen thousand.
Grief shook his head. "You can't do that, you know. You're only ten
thousand credit with the company."
"You mean you won't give me action?" Deacon asked hoarsely. "You
mean that with eight thousand of my money you're going to quit?"
Grief smiled and shook his head.
"It's robbery, plain robbery," Deacon went on. "You take my money
and won't give me action."
"No, you're wrong. I'm perfectly willing to give you what action
you've got coming to you. You've got two thousand pounds of action
yet."
"Well, we'll play it," Deacon took him up. "You cut."
The game was played in silence, save for irritable remarks and curses
from Deacon. Silently the onlookers filled and sipped their long
Scotch glasses. Grief took no notice of his opponent's outbursts,
but concentrated on the game. He was really playing cards, and there
were fifty-two in the deck to be kept track of, and of which he did
keep track. Two thirds of the way through the last deal he threw
down his hand.
"Cards put me out," he said. "I have twenty-seven."
"If you've made a mistake," Deacon threatened, his face white and
drawn.
"Then I shall have lost. Count them."
Grief passed over his stack of takings, and Deacon, with trembling
fingers, verified the count. He half shoved his chair back from the
table and emptied his glass. He looked about him at unsympathetic
faces.
"I fancy I'll be catching the next steamer for Sydney," he said, and
for the first time his speech was quiet and without bluster.
As Grief told them afterward: "Had he whined or raised a roar I
wouldn't have given him that last chance. As it was, he took his
medicine like a man, and I had to do it."
Deacon glanced at his watch, simulated a weary yawn, and started to
rise.
"Wait," Grief said. "Do you want further action?"
The other sank down in his chair, strove to speak, but could not,
licked his dry lips, and nodded his head.
"Captain Donovan here sails at daylight in the _Gunga_ for
Karo-Karo," Grief began with seeming irrelevance. "Karo-Karo is a
ring of sand in the sea, with a few thousand cocoanut trees.
Pandanus grows there, but they can't grow sweet potatoes nor taro.
There are about eight hundred natives, a king and two prime
ministers, and the last three named are the only ones who wear any
clothes. It's a sort of God-forsaken little hole, and once a year I
send a schooner up from Goboto. The drinking water is brackish, but
old Tom Butler has survived on it for a dozen years. He's the only
white man there, and he has a boat's crew of five Santa Cruz boys who
would run away or kill him if they could. That is why they were sent
there. They can't run away. He is always supplied with the hard
cases from the plantations. There are no missionaries. Two native
Samoan teachers were clubbed to death on the beach when they landed
several years ago.
"Naturally, you are wondering what it is all about. But have
patience. As I have said, Captain Donovan sails on the annual trip
to Karo-Karo at daylight to-morrow. Tom Butler is old, and getting
quite helpless. I've tried to retire him to Australia, but he says
he wants to remain and die on Karo-Karo, and he will in the next year
or so. He's a queer old codger. Now the time is due for me to send
some white man up to take the work off his hands. I wonder how you'd
like the job. You'd have to stay two years.
"Hold on! I've not finished. You've talked frequently of action
this evening. There's no action in betting away what you've never
sweated for. The money you've lost to me was left you by your father
or some other relative who did the sweating. But two years of work
as trader on Karo-Karo would mean something. I'll bet the ten
thousand I've won from you against two years of your time. If you
win, the money's yours. If you lose, you take the job at Karo-Karo
and sail at daylight. Now that's what might be called real action.
Will you play?"
Deacon could not speak. His throat lumped and he nodded his head as
he reached for the cards.
"One thing more," Grief said. "I can do even better. If you lose,
two years of your time are mine--naturally without wages.
Nevertheless, I'll pay you wages. If your work is satisfactory, if
you observe all instructions and rules, I'll pay you five thousand
pounds a year for two years. The money will be deposited with the
company, to be paid to you, with interest, when the time expires. Is
that all right?"
"Too much so," Deacon stammered. "You are unfair to yourself. A
trader only gets ten or fifteen pounds a month."
"Put it down to action, then," Grief said, with an air of dismissal.
"And before we begin, I'll jot down several of the rules. These you
will repeat aloud every morning during the two years--if you lose.
They are for the good of your soul. When you have repeated them
aloud seven hundred and thirty Karo-Karo mornings I am confident they
will be in your memory to stay. Lend me your pen, Mac. Now, let's
see----"
He wrote steadily and rapidly for some minutes, then proceeded to
read the matter aloud:
"_I must always remember that one man is as good as another, save and
except when he thinks he is better._
"_No matter how drunk I am I must not fail to be a gentleman. A
gentleman is a man who is gentle. Note: It would be better not to
get drunk._
"_When I play a man's game with men, I must play like a man._
"_A good curse, rightly used and rarely, is an efficient thing. Too
many curses spoil the cursing. Note: A curse cannot change a card
sequence nor cause the wind to blow._
"_There is no license for a man to be less than a man. Ten thousand
pounds cannot purchase such a license._"
At the beginning of the reading Deacon's face had gone white with
anger. Then had arisen, from neck to forehead, a slow and terrible
flush that deepened to the end of the reading.
"There, that will be all," Grief said, as he folded the paper and
tossed it to the centre of the table. "Are you still ready to play
the game?"
"I deserve it," Deacon muttered brokenly. "I've been an ass. Mr.
Gee, before I know whether I win or lose, I want to apologise. Maybe
it was the whiskey, I don't know, but I'm an ass, a cad, a
bounder--everything that's rotten."
He held out his hand, and the half-caste took it beamingly.
"I say, Grief," he blurted out, "the boy's all right. Call the whole
thing off, and let's forget it in a final nightcap."
Grief showed signs of debating, but Deacon cried:
"No; I won't permit it. I'm not a quitter. If it's Karo-Karo, it's
Karo-Karo. There's nothing more to it."
"Right," said Grief, as he began the shuffle. "If he's the right
stuff to go to Karo-Karo, Karo-Karo won't do him any harm."
The game was close and hard. Three times they divided the deck
between them and "cards" was not scored. At the beginning of the
fifth and last deal, Deacon needed three points to go out and Grief
needed four. "Cards" alone would put Deacon out, and he played for
"cards." He no longer muttered or cursed, and played his best game
of the evening. Incidentally he gathered in the two black aces and
the ace of hearts.
"I suppose you can name the four cards I hold," he challenged, as the
last of the deal was exhausted and he picked up his hand.
Grief nodded.
"Then name them."
"The knave of spades, the deuce of spades, the tray of hearts, and
the ace of diamonds," Grief answered.
Those behind Deacon and looking at his hand made no sign. Yet the
naming had been correct.
"I fancy you play casino better than I," Deacon acknowledged. "I can
name only three of yours, a knave, an ace, and big casino."
"Wrong. There aren't five aces in the deck. You've taken in three
and you hold the fourth in your hand now."
"By Jove, you're right," Deacon admitted. "I did scoop in three.
Anyway, I'll make 'cards' on you. That's all I need."
"I'll let you save little casino--" Grief paused to calculate.
"Yes, and the ace as well, and still I'll make 'cards' and go out
with big casino. Play."
"No 'cards,' and I win!" Deacon exulted as the last of the hand was
played. "I go out on little casino and the four aces. 'Big casino'
and 'spades' only bring you to twenty."