Josiah was a young man of varied accomplishments, all of which were practised for the purpose of transferring other people’s cash from their pockets to his own. He called himself a sportsman, and no doubt the operation alluded to was sport, to him. Arriving about Christmas time, when holiday making was general, he gleaned a little at the game of skittles, at which many of the agriculturists round about thought they were somewhat proficient; but cunning as he was he could not go on disguising his game for ever, and so directly he saw that the yokels were growing shy of playing with him, he gave it up. The Sunday pitch-and-toss and card assemblages were also a source of profit to him. Marriner thought he could cheat, and had indeed stolen money in that way from his companions, and there was nothing Josiah Slam liked better than dealing with a weaker member of his own fraternity. He allowed Marriner to cheat him a little, and pretended not to discover it; played at being vexed; drew him on, and fleeced him of his ill-gotten gains.
But it was apparent that he played too well at these amusements also, so then he showed them a game at which everybody might win, except himself. Where it was all chance, and skill could not interfere. Roulette, in short. The room in which Professor Wobbler had given his boxing lessons had a table fitted up in it, and on this table the wheel-of-fortune, with its black and red compartments, and its little ivory ball to rattle round and finally fall into one of them, was placed, with a cloth marked in compartments answering to those in the wheel for the gamblers to stake their money upon. This game proved very fascinating to the dissipated amongst the farmers’ sons round about, and to some of the farmers too, and money which ought to have gone to buy stock, or for the rent, was lost at that table. Of course some of them won occasionally, and considerable sums, for them, too; that formed the fascination of it.
But the agricultural interest was depressed, and ready money not forthcoming to the extent Josiah Slam desired; so upper servants of the neighbouring gentry were admitted, under strong vows of secrecy, and more than one gamekeeper’s and huntsman’s family was short of coals and meat that winter, because the money to provide such necessaries was left on that satanic, innocent-looking table. Every night this gambling went on, and Josiah made a good deal of money by it, being prepared, however, to clear out of the neighbourhood at the first symptom of the police having caught scent of the affair.
Ready money was waning and business growing slack when the Weston boys came back from the Christmas holidays, and Josiah, who knew that some of them frequented his father’s yard, saw a fine opportunity of augmenting his gains by setting his little ball rolling in the daytime for their especial benefit. The scheme was nearly stifled by its own success; on the very first occasion a boy won four pounds, and could not conceal the triumphant fact from two or three intimate friends, who each whispered it to two or three others, and the consequence was that on the next Saturday afternoon no fewer than thirty Westonians came to Slam’s yard seeking admittance. This alarmed old Slam, who saw a speedy prospect of discovery, and of that hold upon him which the authorities had long been seeking, being afforded them, to the consequent break up of his establishment. Better small safe profits which should last, he thought, than a haul, which after all must be limited to the amount of the school-boys’ pocket-money, and be shared with his son, and the stoppage of all his little sources of profit. Not to mention the prospect of legal punishment. So the thirty had to go away again grumbling, with their money in their pockets. O fortunati, si sua bona norint.
But small parties of the initiated were still admitted, amongst them, of course, Saurin and his shadow, Edwards. The latter, who, as was said in a former chapter, had a peculiar fondness for games of chance, was positively infatuated with this device of young Slam’s. It interfered with his studies by day, and he dreamed of it by night, so much did it engross his thoughts. He was never easy unless staking his shillings on that table, and watching eagerly whether the little ball would drop into a red hole or a black one. Saurin did not take half the interest in it at first, the principal attraction for him lying in the illegality, and the tampering with what he had heard and read of as having been the ruin of so many thousands. And he thought what fools they must be. There were many ways in which he could well imagine anyone spending his last penny, but not over a toy like this. But one day he came away a winner of a couple of sovereigns, and there was something in seeing the shillings and half-crowns gathering into a pile before him which caused him to catch the sordid fever with which his friend was infected. Hitherto he had made his stakes carelessly, but now he took a deeper interest in the thing. Sometimes he had won a few shillings and Edwards had lost, and at other times it went the other way, but the winner’s gains were never so great as the loser’s losses, and it was evident that the difference must remain with the conductor of the game, Josiah Slam.
“Why, we have been practically playing against each other for that rogue’s benefit!” exclaimed Saurin, when he made this discovery. “In future we must always stake our money the same way.” And this they did.
Then Saurin had another bright idea. It was an even chance each time whether red or black won, just the same as heads or tails in tossing, so it could not go on very long being one or the other in succession. Then, supposing they staked on red, and it turned up black several times, they had only to persevere with red and increase the stake and they must win their losses back, while if it was red several times they would have a clear gain.
This appeared to Edwards as a stroke of genius, and he was in a state of fever till they had an opportunity of putting it in practice. And it answered at first; but presently one colour, the wrong one, won so many times running that all their united capital went into Josiah’s bank.
They looked at one another in blank dismay; there was an end to their speculations for the rest of that term, and by the next Mr Slam junior would have decamped from the paternal abode, for when the racing season commenced he flew at far higher game than the purses of rustics and school-boys.
“Can’t come no more, can’t yer?” said Josiah. “I’m sorry for that, though I expect I should be a loser, for you play well and knows a thing or two, you do. But it’s the sport I care for more than the money, and I should have liked yer to have another chance. I know what I did once when I were in that fix; I just took and pawned my watch, and with the money I got on it I won back all I’d lost and more on the back of it, in a brace of shakes, and then took the ticker out again all comfortable.”