Stanley Abbott: Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 30, No. 13, Mid-December, 1985

Nygaard won the hand with three kings, being distracted enough by Fields not to overplay his nonchalance, his usual giveaway to a good hand.

Later, when Pederson was dealing seven card stud, he remarked as he began the last round of cards, “Down and dirty.”

“I love it when you talk poker to us,” leered Balstad, and Fields’s rich chortle contrasted pleasantly with Pederson’s high yelp of laughter.

But Fields’s play remained erratic, and Nygaard, while chuckling at Balstad’s comeback, could not have told anyone who challenged him what it had been, so interested was he in watching Fields. He wondered what Fields was up to; the man was slipping red chips through his heavy fingers — his second buy-in of the afternoon. He’d been losing steadily, and making some novicelike plays. But he knew the jargon of the regular poker player, and he was good at bluffing.

Nygaard consulted his hole cards. He’d managed to weave his covert study of the newcomer into his game now. He had four kings, two of the wild cards — Pederson liked the excitement of wild cards — but still, a very good hand. Shaking his head as if in serious doubt, he shoved a blue chip and a red chip towards the middle, raising five. He wanted badly to raise ten, but if he did, he might scare Pederson off.

Fields had had to buy more chips again. But if he was hanging in there, so were his fidgets. When he wasn’t fooling with his cards, he was messing with his chips. He was full of “tells,” licking his lips and shifting in his chair as if anticipating a big win, or wiping an eye as if concerned about the poverty of his cards. Yet these motions rarely connected with how he played a hand, or its results. Nygaard had about given up, deciding that so long as Fields was losing, he was easy to put up with.

About four thirty, Fields asked, “How about we bring it up to pot limit on raises? I mean, I don’t want to quack, but I’d like to get well before we go home — I’ve had to buy back in twice already.”

He sure knows a lot of poker terms for a man who plays that poorly, thought Nygaard. But Fields was grinning with just that hint of embarrassment that meant sincerity, and Nygaard shrugged. “Dealer’s choice.”

Draxten glanced down at the stacks of chips in front of him — he’d been playing stolid, consistent, winning poker all afternoon — and said, “Fine.”

“That can get a little rich for my blood,” said Balstad uncomfortably.

“I’m for it,” said Pederson — boldly, considering how far behind he was. “If you’re scared, Balstad, you can change it back when it’s your deal.”

“Well—” said Balstad.

“Oh-kay,” said Fields, with an air of rubbing his hands together. “Five card draw, gentlemen, nothing wild.”

He took that pot, which amounted to nearly a hundred dollars, folded when Pederson dealt, lost a small amount on the hand Nygaard dealt, folded after the draw on Balstad’s deal, and won handily from Draxten.

He called for pot limit again on his deal. After the draw, Nygaard, who failed to improve a pair of queens, summoned his considerable acting ability and bluffed so well everyone but Fields folded. Fields just grinned and kept raising back, and won with three fives. Nygaard frowned; three fives was a poor hand to back that heavily. Why had he been so damn sure he had Nygaard beat? He thought that over as the deal moved around the table twice. Fields was playing very well indeed right now, winning when he stayed, folding when he should. He again folded promptly when it was Pederson’s deal. Nygaard’s frown deepened: Fields seemed to fold every time Pederson dealt. And Pederson always announced that deuces or one-eyed jacks or even deuces and treys were wild. What did Fields have against wild cards?

“Grimby, bring us another deck, will you?” asked Nygaard when the deck came to him. “I’ve been drawing too many runts with this deck.”

“Sure.”

Nygaard opened the box, removed the jokers, and shuffled thoroughly. Pederson cut and Nygaard announced, “Five card draw, five dollar limit on raises—” he was approaching the sum he would allow himself to lose and did not want to be forced out of the game just yet — “nothing wild. Ante up.”

Fields’s mannerisms seemed to gain new vigor with this game. He fiddled incessantly with his cards, rearranging their order again and again. He pursed his lips and whistled softly, glanced at the other players frequently, and when he caught Nygaard’s eye on him, he began to break down and restack his chips with an air of impatience. Not impatience to bet; he stayed with apparent reluctance, not raising. When Nygaard called for discards, Fields pulled three random cards from his hand. “Three, please,” he said, tossing them down.

“Give me two good ones,” begged Balstad.

“One,” said Draxten.

“I’ll take three,” said Pederson.

“And dealer takes two,” said Nygaard, handing around replacements. “What do you bet, Larry?”

Fields picked up some chips without looking, counting them as he dropped them into the middle. “One, two, three, four dollars,” he said, and began again to rearrange his cards.

“Possible straight, possible flush: Nothing,” muttered Balstad, putting his cards down. “I’ll fold.”

“I’m in,” said Pederson, adding his four chips to the pot.

Draxten said, “Eight,” raising the bet four dollars.

Nygaard saw the eight and raised five. He had barely any idea of what was in his hand; he was too busy keeping covert eyes on Fields’s every fidget. “Up to you, Larry,” he said.

Fields glanced at Nygaard, then at Draxten. “Oh, I think I’ll fold.” He closed his cards like a fan and dropped them.

“I’ll see Thor’s five and—” began Pederson.

“Hold it,” said Nygaard. He reached out and picked up Fields’s cards, including his previous discards. “I want to take a look at something.”

“Hey, you can’t do that; the hand isn’t over!” said Pederson.

“Anyhow it’s against the rules to look at a folded hand,” chimed in Balstad.

“Which rules? Ours, or the ones this joker’s been playing by?” The atmosphere in the room abruptly altered.

“Careful, Thor,” cautioned Draxten.

“You’d better not be saying what I think you’re saying,” blustered Fields.

Nygaard called across the room, “Grimby, where’s our old deck?”

Grimby, looking scared, went behind the bar and produced it.

Nygaard took the old deck and went quickly through it, pulling out the aces and face cards. He handed them to Balstad. “Mark, shuffle these and lay them out face down on the table for me.”

“Sure, all right. But I hope to God you know what you’re doing.” Balstad riffled them a couple of times and laid them out on Nygaard’s side of the pot.

Meanwhile, Nygaard examined the cards Fields had handled in this last hand. “You threw away an ace, jack, queen, I see,” he said. “That wasn’t very bright.”

“So?” said Fields, but he sounded wary.

“And you drew another queen. And a ten and a trey.”

“Yeah, I kept my two hearts; I was after a flush, see?”

The players frowned; that was so stupid even a beginner wouldn’t do it.

Nygaard turned the ace, jack, and queens over and got very interested in their backs, and then in the long edges of the cards from the old deck. After a while he straightened and smiled. “Want to see a magic trick?” he asked. He reached out and touched the backs of four cards in the set Balstad had laid out.

“Those are the queens,” he said, and turned them over to prove himself correct.

“Jesus sufferin’ Christ!” exclaimed Balstad.

Nygaard said to Fields, “All those wriggles and fussing were to cover your marking of the cards, right? And you switched from fooling with your cards to fooling with your chips whenever you saw me paying attention to you.”