He went every morning to his office and for a while he took a certain amount of satisfaction in merely sitting there, reading the local papers, smoking a cigar, now and then taking down one of his text books and reading a little. But study as such had absolutely no appeal to him. He might have dug at the dry case books to good purpose if he had been driven by need, but as it was he would begin to yawn in ten or fifteen minutes, and then would put the book away. He went home to a noonday dinner rather early and came back in the afternoon, feeling sleepy and bored. Now the office, and indeed the whole town, seemed a dreary place to him. At this season of the year there were often high winds which mantled the town in a yellow cloud of sand, and rattled at every loose shutter and door with futile dreary persistence. Ramon would wander about the office for a little while with his hands in his pockets and stare out the window, feeling depressed, thoughts of his disappointment coming back to him bitterly. Then he would take his [pg 206] hat and go out and look for some one to play pool with him. Often he took an afternoon off and went hunting, not alone as formerly he had done, but with as large a party as he could gather. They would drive out into the sand hills and mesas twenty or thirty miles from town, where the native quail and rabbits were still abundant as automobiles had just begun to invade their haunts. When they found a covey of quail the sport would be fast and furious, with half a dozen guns going at once and birds rising and falling in all directions. Ramon keenly enjoyed the hot excitement and dramatic quality of this.
At night he was usually to be found at the White Camel Pool Hall where the local sporting element foregathered and made its plans for the evening. Sometimes a party would be formed to “go down the line,” as a visit to the red light district was called. Sometimes the rowdy dance halls of Old Town were invaded. On Saturday nights the dance at the country club always drew a considerable attendance. There was also a “dancing class” conducted by an estimable and needy spinster named Grimes, who held assembly dances once in two weeks in a little hall which had been built by the Woman’s Club. This event always drew a large and very mixed crowd, including some of the “best people” and others who were considered not so good. Usually two [pg 207] or three different sets were represented at these gatherings, each tending to keep to itself. But there was also a tendency for the sets to overlap. Thus a couple of very pretty German girls, who were the daughters of a local saloon keeper, always appeared accompanied by young men of their own circle with whom they danced almost exclusively at first. But young men of the first families could not resist their charms, and they soon were among the most popular girls on the floor. This was deplored by the young women of more secure social position, who were wont to remark that the crowd was deteriorating frightfully. Some of these same superior virgins found it necessary for politeness to dance with Joe Bartello, the son of an Italian saloon owner, and a very handsome and nimble-footed youth. In a word, this was a place of social hazard and adventure, and that was more than half its charm. It finally became so crowded that dancing was almost impossible.
The back room at the White Camel, where poker games were nightly in progress, also afforded Ramon frequent diversion. He played in the “big” game now, where the stakes and limits were high, and was one of the most daring and dangerous of its patrons. He had more money back of him than most of the men who played there, and he also had more courage. If he [pg 208] started a bluff he carried it through to the end, which was always bitter for some one. He had been known to stand pat on a pair and scare every one else out of the game by the resolute confidence of his betting. His plunges, of course, sometimes cost him heavily, but for a long time he was a moderate winner. His limitations as a poker player were finally demonstrated to him by one Fitzhugh Chesterman, a man with one lung.
Chesterman was about twenty-six years old and had come from Richmond, Virginia, about two years before, with most of one lung gone and the other rapidly going. He was a tall, thin blond youth with the sensitive, handsome face which so often marks the rare survivor of the old southern aristocracy. He was totally lacking in the traditional southern sentimentality. His eye had a cold twinkle of courage that even the imminent prospect of death could not quench, and his thin shapely lips nearly always wore a smile slightly twisted by irony. He established himself at the state university, which had almost a hundred students and boasted a dormitory where living was very cheap. Chesterman sat before this dormitory twelve to fourteen hours a day, even in relatively cold weather. He made a living by coaching students in mathematics and Greek. He never raised his voice, he seldom laughed, he [pg 209] never lost his temper. With his unwavering ironical smile, as though he appreciated the keen humour of taking so much trouble over such an insignificant thing as a human life, he husbanded his energy and fought for health. He took all the treatments the local sanatoria afforded, but he avoided carefully all the colonies and other gatherings of the tubercular. When his lung began to heal, as it did after about a year, and his strength to increase, he enlarged his earnings by playing poker. He won for the simple reason that he took no more chances than he had to. He systematically capitalized every bit of recklessness, stupidity and desperation in his opponents.
When Ramon first encountered him, the game soon simmered down to a struggle between the two. Never were the qualities of two races more strikingly contrasted. Ramon bluffed and plunged. Chesterman was caution itself, playing out antes in niggardly fashion until he had a hand which put the law of probabilities strongly on his side. Ramon was full of daring, intuition, imagination, bidding always for the favour of the fates, throwing logic to the winds. He was not above moving his seat or putting on his hat to change his luck. Chesterman smiled at these things. He was cold courage battling for a purpose and praying to no deities but Cause and Effect. Ramon [pg 210] thought he was playing for money, but he was really playing for the sake of his own emotions, revelling alike in hope and despair, triumph and victory, flushed and bright-eyed. Chesterman stifled every emotion, discounted every hope, said as little as possible, never relaxed his faint twisted smile.
Ramon made some spectacular winnings, but Chesterman wore him down as surely as a slow hound wears down a deer despite its astounding bursts of speed. Ramon was sure to lose in the long run because he was always piling up odds against himself by the long chances he took, while his bluffs seldom deceived his cool and courageous opponent. The finish came at one o’clock in the morning. Chesterman was pale with exhaustion, but otherwise unchanged. Ramon was hoarse and flushed, chewing a cigar to bits. He held a full house and determined to back it to the limit. Chesterman met him, bet for bet, raising every time. Ramon knew that he must be beaten. He knew that Chesterman would not raise him unless he had a very strong hand. But he was beaten anyway. At the bottom of his consciousness, he knew that he had met a better man. He wanted to end the contest on this hand. When Chesterman showed four kings, Ramon fell back in his chair, weak and disgusted. The other players, most of whom had long been out of the game, [pg 211] got up and said good night one by one. Only the two were left, Ramon plunged in gloomy reaction, Chesterman coolly counting his money, putting it away.
“I seem to have made quite a killing,” he remarked, “how much did you lose?”
“O, I don’t know … about five hundred. Hell, what’s five hundred to me … I don’t give a damn … I’m rich.…”
Chesterman glanced at him keenly.
“Well,” he remarked, “I’m glad you feel that way about it, because I sure need the money.”