“Tighter than Dick’s hatband,” replied the latter.
“And then some! He ain’t bought once. Say, Bo,” he continued to me as I was striving to divine the drift of these comments, “have I got my fingers crossed or not?”
Seeing that he held one hand behind him I thought to humour him by saying, “I fancy so, sir.”
“He means ‘yes,’” said Cousin Egbert.
The other held his hand before me with the first two fingers spread wide apart. “You lost,” he said. “How’s that, Sour-dough? We stuck him the first rattle out of the box.”
“Good work,” said Cousin Egbert. “You’re stuck for this round,” he added to me. “Three rousing cheers!”
I readily perceived that they meant me to pay the score, which I accordingly did, though I at once suspected the fairness of the game. I mean to say, if my opponent had been a trickster he could easily have rearranged his fingers to defeat me before displaying them. I do not say it was done in this instance. I am merely pointing out that it left open a way to trickery. I mean to say, one would wish to be assured of his opponent’s social standing before playing this game extensively.
No sooner had we finished the drink than the Tuttle person said to me:
“I’ll give you one chance to get even. I’ll guess your fingers this time.” Accordingly I put one hand behind me and firmly crossed the fingers, fancying that he would guess them to be uncrossed. Instead of which he called out “Crossed,” and I was obliged to show them in that wise, though, as before pointed out, I could easily have defeated him by uncrossing them before revealing my hand. I mean to say, it is not on the face of it a game one would care to play with casual acquaintances, and I questioned even then in my own mind its prevalence in the States. (As a matter of fact, I may say that in my later life in the States I could find no trace of it, and now believe it to have been a pure invention on the part of the Tuttle person. I mean to say, I later became convinced that it was, properly speaking, not a game at all.)
Again they were hugely delighted at my loss and rapped smartly on the table for more drink, and now to my embarrassment I discovered that I lacked the money to pay for this “round” as they would call it.