Robert Asprin - Dragons Wild

“But yah changed your mind?” Little Joe smirked.

“Correct.” Griffen smiled. “Giving the money back would be as much as admitting that we cheated him out of it. I’d be out the money and still have it being talked around that I run a crooked operation. There’s a different solution I’ve come up with.”

He patted the side of his jacket.

“I’ve got Willie’s four hundred right here,” he said. “What I propose is that you and I play for it. We both know you’re a better card player than Willie. I figure if I can prove to you that I’m a better card player than you are, it will convince you that Willie lost the money honestly.”

Little Joe eyed him narrowly.

“You’re carrying four hundred dollars in cash? Alone? In a place like this? What makes you think I won’t just take it away from you without bothering to play for it?”

“That wouldn’t prove much of anything, would it?” Griffen said. “Except maybe that you’re tougher than I am. If I read you right, you’d rather take it away from me with cards. Besides, I never said I was alone.”

Little Joe’s eyes darted around the room, then he raised an eyebrow.

“Waiting outside,” Griffen said. “Just in case I read you wrong.”

Little Joe nodded slowly.

“I don’t have no four hundred dollars on me,” he said. “If I did, I wouldn’t risk it all in a game against a player I don’t know.”

“How much do you have?”

“Lil’ over a hundred.”

“Fine.” Griffen nodded. “You put up a hundred and I’ll do the same. If you can take my hundred before I take your hundred, I’ll pass you the other three hundred as a bonus.”

Moving slowly, he pulled a new deck of cards out of his pocket and tossed it on the table.

“You seem real confident ’bout this,” Little Joe said, not reaching for the cards. “It occurs to me you’re asking me to risk a hundred of my own dollars using your deck.”

“I don’t think there’s enough light in here to see the marking if it was a rigged deck,” Griffen said drily. “If it will make you feel better, though, we can see if the bartender has a deck, or we can wait while you send someone out to buy a new deck from a place of your choice. It shouldn’t make that much difference, though. I’m going to insist that you do all the dealing. We’ll just take turns calling what the game is.”

Little Joe frowned.

“You still seem awfully sure.”

“I think I’m a better card player than you,” Griffen said with a shrug. “You don’t give away much, but it’s enough for me to beat you.”

“Then you probably know I’m still thinking it might be a better move for me to just take the money.” Little Joe smiled.

Several of the others around the bar turned around meaningfully. Though no one actually reached for anything, Griffen could clearly see bulges under coats and shirts. A trained gambler, he knew not to bet that the bulges were cell phones, not guns. Of course, there was what Little Joe had said about his reputation to handle himself.

Griffen sighed, then reached over and took Little Joe’s cigar from the ashtray. He blew on the glowing end until it was red hot, not flame, just stoking the embers. Then keeping eye contact with his opponent, he slowly ground it out in his own palm.

“I think you’d be wiser to play cards,” he said.

It took Griffen less than an hour to win Little Joe’s hundred.

The two men shook hands when they parted company.

It is surprising, for an area that comes close to worshipping food, just how understocked its average grocery is. True, the physical confines of the Quarter were prohibitive. A massive chain supermarket simply would not fit in one of the refurbished old buildings that were the norm. So small groceries and delis stocked the basics, as well as an erratic supply of specialty goods and ingredients. And, like so many other Quarter businesses, many were open 24/7.

Valerie had finished her morning jog earlier than usual, and found herself more in the mood to cook up something than stop into one of the early morning restaurants. No, she realized, it was more than that.

The run had done very little to relieve her frustrations. She was worried about Griffen, and what had him distracted that he obviously wasn’t up to telling her. Sitting in a restaurant when she was still restless would be torture. But beating a few eggs into submission? Yeah, that could work.

Unfortunately, that meant she needed to get some eggs. Like so many people visiting and living in the area, her fridge held very little in the way of supplies. A few leftovers, some soda and favorite snacks, and a bottle of good wine, because one never knows when it could come in handy.

So, she stopped at the local A&P, the closest thing to a proper grocery, just a few doors down from Yo Mama’s. As she approached, she saw some of the average early morning crowd on the street. A drunk passed out in a doorway, a few musicians and street performers resting against a building and sharing a cigarette, and a few shopkeepers in the process of hosing down the sidewalk and opening up their fronts. There always seemed to be more people who hadn’t gone to bed yet than there were early risers.

She was just about to enter the store when she caught the rank smell of too many cocktails and not enough bathing. She started to turn abruptly, but before she could finish found a hand palming her rump. Valerie stiffened, letting out a hiss that was as much rage as shock, and finished her turn.

“Hey, baaaaby.”

The man before her was dressed in filthy jeans and a shirt that seemed more a collection of stains than actual cloth. His matted hair and almost black fingernails would have suggested he was homeless, but his shoes and watch were both high quality. All this was a secondary observation to Valerie. First was the fact that even facing him he was trying to maintain his balance and his grip on her behind.

Valerie grabbed the man’s wrist and jerked hard enough to fling him into the wall. He stumbled and cracked his face against the brick, long scratches embedding in his cheek. Whirling, back to the wall and braced, he jerked out a knife that even Valerie knew was substandard. A little pocket knife that probably couldn’t open an envelope.

“I am not your baby,” she said.

“Bitch, I kill you for that!”

“Baby, no. Bitch. I can do that.”

She reached out as if to grab the knife, and he slashed at her hand. While he was focused solely on the weapon, she took a half step forward, and slammed her other foot into his crotch. He sank to the ground, eyes shut and groaning. She ripped the knife out of his hand blade first, reversed it, and pressed it under his nose. His eyes popped wide again.

Which was, of course, when two police officers stepped out of the A&P with a bag of groceries.

“Now, there’s something you don’t see every day,” one said, looking at the man on the ground with Valerie standing over him with a knife.

“Miss, could you drop the blade! Now!” said the other, one hand resting on the butt of his gun.

Valerie did as she was told, and stepped away from him. The man gratefully shut his eyes again and rolled into a ball. The police stepped forward, guns still in holsters but clearly ready to clear the leather.

“Whoa, whoa. You best be holdin’ it.”

The officers and Valerie glanced to the side, and one of the street performers had stood up and was striding across the street to join them. He was a tall, thin man with very dark skin and very white clothes. Bleached so well they practically shone. The police saw his approach, and actually relaxed marginally. One nodded his way.

“Slim, you see what happened?” the officer said.