Game

The first time Johnny wasn’t sure; sometimes punters do have a run of luck. 

The second time I watched his play. He wasn’t hand mucking, though. Even if I didn’t have the Eye, I can still tell. Whatever he was doing to bring in those wins, there were no cards being palmed.

The third time, though, he came in in a bloody disguise. A good one too, nothing obvious. Just a change of clothes, from flash to quiet elegance, plus a new haircut and a pair of glasses. If he didn’t keep raking in the wins, it could have passed for a makeover. 

That kind of thing pisses me off. 

So I looked. I could see the bones under his skin, I looked so hard. I could see the flicker and flash of ideas thunderstorming around inside his skull, and let me tell you, there was nothing lively enough in there to make counting cards a possibility. We bounce the counters, yeah, but I don’t have any hard feeling towards them. We play the game our way, they play the game theirs, and when I’m playing, it’s them that lose. I respect the play, though. It takes skill, counting, and if there’s anything in the world I love more than Johnny, it’s skill.

But this little bastard – he was colluding. Once I’d seen it I couldn’t believe I’d missed it before: the lines of sight between him and Rob – who I’d said to give a chance when Johnny didn’t want to hire him, and I wasn’t about to forget that – well, those lines were so charged you’d think they’d scorched a path in the air between them. I could smell it: the watching, the nerves, a stink like burned rubber. 

A glance, and Rob sauntered over so innocent. This punter wasn’t a hand-mucker, but Rob pulled the switch neat as a showgirl. 

A marked deck.

‘I can’t fucking believe it took me three nights,’ I said to Johnny. ‘Fucking Rob.’

Johnny wasn’t a man who got excited. He didn’t need to. 

‘I can take him downstairs,’ he said. ‘Break a few of his fingers and he’ll get the point. Rob needs more than a few fingers breaking, mind.’

‘Oh no you don’t,’ I said. ‘I’m too pissed off for breakages. Let me have the decks.’

‘You sure, love?’ Johnny said. He wasn’t arguing. He didn’t, with me. ‘You’ll be tired.’

‘I’ll do it with a song on my fucking lips,’ I said. ‘I’m going to sort those little fuckers.’

The guy wanted to wait a bit before he pushed his luck again, I could tell that, but I was impatient. I let a real hand-mucker slip an ace up his sleeve where Rob could see it, and when he reported it, the two-faced little bastard, I acted all grateful like I couldn’t see my nose in front of my face without his help. I sang a few siren songs out my window after midnight too; the spa-day scent of the sea followed the guy home.

Soon enough he was back. I was ready. I’d rallied the pips.

He sat at the table. New dye job on his hair, new glasses. Insulting my fucking intelligence. 

First hand, he lost. Cautious. 

Strangest thing, though: he lost the second too. You’d think he wouldn’t, the deck marked up as it was. But he bet a good amount, and then he blinked and rubbed his eyes. The cards before him weren’t what he’d thought they’d be. 

He blinked hard. He must have made a mistake, right? 

So he played another round, pushing his luck a bit; he couldn’t be wrong twice in a row. The marks on the cards were there, clear as day, and now he needed to get back the bit of his stake he hadn’t meant to drop.

Oh dear for him. He lost that hand too.

He looked at his drink. Pushed it away. I could taste that he was starting to get nervous. Had we spiked him? Was something wrong with his eyes? Because for just a minute, I think he saw it happen.

But what they don’t believe, they don’t see. And everyone knows the spades don’t flick their ends under and dive off the cards like springtails. 

Now he was playing cautious. Small stake, just to test the waters. 

I considered fucking with him again, but no; one of us knew when not to overplay our hand. So I let it fall out the way he’d expected, and that got him ready to place a bigger bet again.

There went half his stake. 

He was getting white now. Everyone knows the clubs don’t hunch up like grubs and pop out more fat little specks to turn a three into a nine. 

If he’d been a proper sharper he would have known something was wrong. Not what, of course, but he’d have quit before he lost anything else. 

Bad luck for him, he wasn’t a sharp. He was a gambler. 

So he was sweating as he put down his next bet. Rob, I saw, was getting edgy; he wasn’t quite so stupid he couldn’t see that it was going wrong. Johnny stopped him at the door, put his big, heavy arm around Rob’s shoulders, walked him back to the table. ‘You’re still on shift, mate,’ he said.

And wouldn’t you know, Rob’s little gambling pal lost that one and all. Everyone knows the diamonds don’t grow razor-wire legs and scuttle off like crabs, but here we were.

It was just me and the gambler at the table now. Or rather, that’s all anyone could hear. We keep the place dim-lit, the tables in little puddles of light. Now we were marooned in ours, me and the gambler, with Rob held under Johnny’s arm. The rest of the world was black as the middle of the ocean in the middle of the night. Beyond the shadows of our little game, you could hear the winds of the outer realms singing their knife-edged song.

‘Put your bet down, sir,’ I said. 

He looked at me. I could see the blood beating under his skin, so fast you’d think it was trying to break free. ‘I need to leave now,’ he said.

‘Oh, you do,’ I said. ‘But funny thing about our little establishment. What you want? Not a problem, if you play by the rules. But what you need? That,’ I tapped a red, glinting nail on the cards, ‘is not our problem.’

‘Please,’ he said. ‘I’ll go. I won’t come back.’

I looked at Rob. Johnny had a blade against his jugular now. ‘It’s a shame,’ I said. ‘Thought I could trust you. Guess you could say I had too much heart.’

And under my hand, the pips began to pulse. 

It was a drumbeat, that sound, striking the world. It knocked through us. 

‘Brace yourself, Johnny love,’ I said, and then I let the card fall.

You ever see a man’s heart explode inside his chest? Well, it’s not much from the outside, actually. A little blood coughed up, a bit of a nosebleed from the impact, maybe. But if you can see through the skin, well, my goodness. The brightest, most beautiful red in the world. 

A wet firework, trailing glory against the ribs.

It was a shame Johnny couldn’t see it, but he got to watch the pips explode as I played the Two of Hearts. A pretty ink splash, staining the card like a pair of blooming roses. 

I always had a weakness for the Two of Hearts. Call me sentimental. 

Then I brought the light back. The outer reaches would feed on Rob and the gambler, so I didn’t need to worry about clean-up there, but the ink from the cards was right under my nails, and the pack was useless. We’d have to throw it out – but then again, a marked-up pack’s no good to anyone. Not unless they want to play games they really, really shouldn’t play.

posted by Kit Whitfield  # 12:52 pm