"'If you want to play a nice quiet game,' remarked the promising clerk, 'you can take that card and go up there any evening, or come with me to-night and see how the whole thing is done, but whatever you do don't lose that card, for you can't get in without it.'
"Suspecting the nature of this 'quiet little game,' the reporter agreed to meet the banking clerk that evening.
"'You will find a very nice set of fellows in this party,' remarked the clerk. 'There's none of those toughs or men you see in regular gambling houses there, but young men like myself and some of the best business men in this town. Why, I have seen young fellows there whose fathers have got loads of rocks. They lose a good pile once in a while, but don't mind that, because a fellow's no blood who cries just because he drops from ten to fifty dollars of a night.'
"The house was one of a row of French flat buildings, the ground floor of which is occupied by stores. The clerk, on entering the vestibule, gave an electric button a familiar push with the index finger and almost immediately the hall door swung itself open. As soon as the head of the first flight of stairs was reached, a colored man, wearing a white tie, was met standing near a door. To him the clerk gave a card, and the reporter following the example, both were ushered into what happened to be a reception-room. Two heavy and rich Turkish curtains at one end of this room were quickly pushed aside and the front or card parlor was then entered. There were five round and oblong baize-covered tables in different parts of the elegantly furnished apartment. A number of costly oil paintings hung on the frescoed walls and a well-stocked buffet at one side completed the furniture. The adjoining rooms consisted of two sleeping apartments and a rear connecting kitchen, in which a colored cook seemed quite busy.
"At the center table, where a game of draw poker was in full blast, was noticed two celebrated professionals, a couple of race-horse owners and two clerks in a public department office down-town. At a side table were the sons of a prominent Hebrew merchant and property owner, two college students and several young men whose appearance would indicate they were employed in mercantile houses. Another side table was surrounded by a gathering of Broadway statues and gambling house hangers-on, who were engaged in a game called 'hide the heart,' and the last table had a circle of big, heavy-bodied and solid-looking men about it who were putting up on a game known as 'stud-horse poker.' The reporter and the clerk were quickly accommodated with seats at the center table, where 'draw poker' was in operation. The colored attendant with the white tie was at hand, and pulling out a ten-dollar bill the clerk gave it to the negro with the request to get him that amount of chips in return. The reporter followed suit with a crisp five-dollar bill. The colored man went away with the money to the further end of the room, where he passed it over to a clean-shaven and well-dressed young man with a big diamond in his shirt front. This, the clerk informed him, was the proprietor of the place, who sat at a separate table, and, after receiving the cash, handed out to the waiter several stacks of white and red ivory chips, which were then brought back for the money. The play or 'ante' to the game was fifty cents, with no limit. The white chips represented half a dollar each and the red ones just double that sum. In the first two hands of cards the clerk lost his ten dollars, while the reporter made a profit. A short time convinced the reporter the two professionals were hard to beat.
"While an extremely close game was carried on, the house was certainly sure never to lose, as it put up no money and as 'banker' reaped a steady percentage deducted from the chips of all winners who cashed in.
"The clerk was broke in two hours' sitting and confessed he had lost sixty dollars, more than three weeks' salary, and while he wore a gold chain over his vest, he had left his watch in pledge with the game-owner for twenty dollars' worth of chips besides. As the reporter and his guide reached the sidewalk, one of the young men who had been in the place was asked what he thought of the place. Not suspecting the reporter's motive, the player answered glibly: 'Oh, that racket in French flats is getting to be all the go now, and I tell you it's immense. The police can't get on to it, and now as all the faro games are closed or not making expenses, and afraid to open, it is doing well. Then there is such a better class of people that go to these places, people who would not care to be seen or caught in a regular concern. Now up in Harry's you see how nice it is. There's your parlor to play in. Then if it's an all-night play you can sleep in turns or lay off during the day, and get anything you want to eat right there. 'Get pulled?' Why, there ain't the ghost of a show for that in those flats. In the first place, no one is let in without he is known or has a card; then a 'copper' can 't go in without forcing an entrance or a warrant, and if he does, what evidence can be produced to show the place is a gambling house? Why, gambling in the Fifth Avenue clubs is no better protected. No one in the house up-stairs suspects what's going on. The halls are all carpeted and so are the stairs, and you never can hear any one pass up and down. Then if any raid is made, can't a man swear he was only having a game of cards in his own house with a party of friends?' In society, next to progressive euchre, poker comes the highest.
"'Are there many of these private flat games?' asked the reporter. 'Oh, yes; there's at least half a dozen I know of. There's one on Fifty-ninth street, one on Forty-fifth street, and several more on Sixth Avenue and Broadway, and any quantity now in other private houses run as social club rooms. You see, no games but poker—draw, stud-horse and straight, and hide the heart—are allowed to be run. Now if you never was in Harry's before, and you were seen to be all right, you would be given some cards to pass around to your friends confidentially, which would tell them where to go for play and would get them in without bother."