“Simple as two and two,” replied Nick softly. “After shuffling the deck, the dealer takes the wide end of the cards between his thumbs and middle fingers, and with a movement so rapid as to defy detection, he strips them apart. Then he holds in one hand the cards corresponding to the ends of the layout, and in the other those comprising the middle. After putting them together, and placing them in the box, he knows almost to a certainty which cards are to win and which to lose throughout the deal.”
“The devil you say!” muttered Chick. “Then there must, indeed, be something coming off here.”
“Wait and see.”
Now, a word concerning the brace game Nick had partly described. Suppose that a player bets heavily upon an end card of the layout to win.
The dealer sees that the bet is placed correctly, and for him to win the amount wagered it is necessary for him to reverse the combination of the cards. What does he do? He presses down on the secret plate in the box, and in making the turn, instead of dealing two cards, a winner and a loser, he deals three, and so adroitly that the deception is not observed. This reverses the combination, and the player referred to must lose. It is called “taking a card.”
But it is necessary, also, that the cues should show correctly at the end of the deal. The cuekeeper watches the dealer attentively. The latter, after taking a card, signs by prearranged signals to the former, who raps once with a chip against the side of the cue-rack, which signifies that the card taken is recorded, and at the end of the deal the cues are right.
Sometimes the cards are marked also, that the dealer may know each turn before making it. This is called “dealing at sight.”
What is all this that has been described? It is one way by which men thrust their hands into their brother’s pocket and rob him. It is more ignoble than stopping one in the darkness, and commanding him, at the point of a weapon, “Stand and deliver!” It is one of the methods by which is dealt the perfidious “brace faro!”
Such was the box and such the cards which Moses Flood had placed on the table before him.
The goggle eyes of Humpty Green began to open wider, his ungainly face to grow pale and grave. He had never known of such in the place, but the master had commanded and the menial would obey. He drew his chair closer to the table.