There is a class of amateur gamblers who are always ready to fasten themselves upon men whom they discover to be professionals, with a view to induce or to compel them to divide their winnings. They are wont to claim that without their assistance the blackleg would not have been able to have won anything. These men are as essentially dishonest as any confidence man either inside or outside the penitentiary, but they are not usually particularly astute. I was once playing in a poker game in an Indiana town, where one of these gentry sat directly over my left hand. As the game progressed and the gentleman from the rural district perceived that I was winning largely, he began to kick me under the table. I at once perceived what he wanted and returned his kicks with great vigor. When the play was over and we had left the room, the unsophisticated individual approached me and inquired how much I thought was his share of the money which I had won. I was not at all surprised, and answered him in the blandest tone, “nothing.” “Why,” said he, “didn’t I kick you under the table that I was in with you?” “Yes,” I replied, “and didn’t I kick you right back that you weren’t?”
FIVE EQUAL HANDS.
One evening, while I was running a saloon at Columbia, Missouri, in the absence of business I began carefully to study the characteristics of the loungers about the place. They were all broken-down “bums,” men who claimed to be gamblers, but who were never known to have a dollar in their pockets. As I have said, trade during the day had been very quiet, and I felt that something must be done to enliven the proceedings. Taking the gamblers apart, one by one, I lent each one of the four two dollars, with which to sit in a poker game which I told them I was about to open and in which I proposed to take a hand myself. To an old and penniless gambler, the prospect of enjoying all the excitement of poker playing without any risk is an alluring prospect. After I had “staked” them all, I produced a deck of cards and we all sat around the table to play. I had previously prepared a “cold deck,” with precisely similar backs, by taking all the aces from five packs, and abstracting sixteen cards from the original deck, to make the correct number. After playing a few rounds, the deal coming to me, I gave to each man at the table, including myself, four aces. To see the smile of satisfaction which lighted up each one of those four faces was worth all the money that it cost. Every man believed that he had a “sure thing.” Betting began and the limit of each man’s pile was soon reached. One player became so excited that he took off his coat and vest, and placing them on the table said, “let ’em go for what they’re worth; I’ll bet all I’m worth on this hand.” When the hands were “shown down” each man around the board displayed four aces. It did not take long for the true inwardness of the situation to dawn upon the minds of the crowd. A general “guffaw” followed, and I invited all hands to repair to the bar and indulge in a little liquid refreshment. My joke had cost me just $8.00, but the story was soon noised about town, and the following day I did the largest saloon business on record in the town since the first white man erected the little log cabin which marked the site of the present thriving city.
A CHANGE OF DEMEANOR.
Once, while I was in partnership with a gambler named Martin, to whom I have frequently referred, I received a telegram from a lawyer in Jefferson City, Missouri, urging me to come to the latter place with a view to winning some money at poker. The source from which the invitation proceeded, left no doubt in our minds that it was possible to make a snug little sum, and we accordingly went. My partner represented himself as a drummer for a wholesale liquor house, while I posed as a traveling representative of a concern engaged in the manufacture of playing cards. We were introduced into the poker party without difficulty and with but very little ceremony. We found that there were seven players, and that the ante was five cents. They called it “playing for amusement.” We concluded that it would not be policy on our part to manifest the slightest anxiety to sit in the game, and therefore when invited to play we declined. One of the party repeatedly urged me to take a hand, saying that “it was only a five cent ante game which they were playing just for fun.” By way of reply I told him of an infatuated card player who had once entered a gaming house and was accosted with a similar invitation. Shivering and trembling, he declined the invitation, saying that a previous indulgence in the same sort of “fun” had compelled him to wear his summer clothes all through the winter.
Among the players was an individual whose dignified mien I shall never forget. When I was introduced to him he recognized my existence only by the most distant nod. I at once made up my mind that he was a member of that numerous class who, having a little money in their possession, consider themselves the superiors in point of wealth, intelligence and respectability to all the rest of mankind. I made no effort to force my company upon him, nor did I seek to cultivate his acquaintance.
Within a day or two, after much solicitation, Martin and I consented to play. Day by day the demeanor of the arrogant stranger became more and more cordial toward me. At first he condescended to speak to me by name, gradually he so far forgot himself as to offer me his hand, and finally grew so familiar that he used to slap me on the back on any and all occasions, however inopportune. The secret of this change of conduct on his part was that my partner and myself had succeeded in winning between $800 and $1,000.
This sum, however, did not represent a net gain to us, inasmuch as we were obliged to pay the distinguished member of the bar who had introduced us into the game, the sum of $200 as a commission for his services. The limb of the law was so elated over his sudden acquisition of this ill-gotten wealth that in a moment of confidence induced by a too free indulgence in the cup that both cheers and inebriates, he disclosed the secret. The result of this imprudence on his part was that an icy barrier was raised between him and his acquaintances. The stilted individual to whom I have already referred assured me that the attorney little thought that his fingers were “involuntarily contracting in a desire to grasp his throat in a suffocating clutch.” Martin and I left Jefferson City with damaged reputations, but with tolerably well filled pockets. We afterwards learned that the lawyer had been “barred out” from playing poker in any decent circle. This may have proved to have been a blessing in disguise, inasmuch as of all the poker players that I ever saw I think that he knew the least about the game.
