Рекс Стаут - Her Forbidden Knight

The little Frenchman waved Driscoll to a chair on the other side of the table and seated himself on the piano stool. Booth threw down a book he had been pretending to read, and Jennings yawned ostentatiously. All looked expectantly at Dougherty as he pounded on the arm of his chair for attention.

“I guess it’s time to kill the cat,” said the ex-prizefighter gloomily. “For your benefit,” he turned to Driscoll, “we’ve held off on the dope. I will now tell the sad story of my life. Heaven knows I wish it was different. Maybe I was wrong, but we’ve only lost two hundred—”

“Come on, cut your mutton,” Driscoll interrupted.

Dougherty glared at him, sighed, and began:

“I hate to tell it. There’s not much to tell. At exactly four-fifteen this afternoon I took a seat at a table of five at Webster’s on Thirty-sixth Street and bought a stack of blues. For an hour I fed the kitty, then it began to come.

“I helped every pair I drew to. I couldn’t lose. At about seven o’clock I’d cashed in four hundred and had a stack about the size of the Flatiron Building in front of me.

“If I’ve ever played poker I played it then. But it began to turn. They wouldn’t come. I couldn’t get better than a pair, and they were never good enough. I boosted twice on a one-card draw to four pink ones, but couldn’t get the filler.

“I prayed for ’em and tore ’em up and tried to run away with one or two, but they called me. And then — I had four ladies topped by a little guy on his first pot!”

A universal groan came from the audience.

“That finished me. I fought back as hard as I could, but they rushed me off my feet. At a quarter past eleven I cashed in exactly fifty dollars. Here it is.”

There was complete silence as Dougherty held up five ten-dollar bills and sorrowfully returned them to his pocket. Then everybody began talking at once.

“Anyway, you kept your fifty.”

“It could have been worse.”

“Zat pokaire is zee devil of a game.”

“Come on — who’s next? Go on with the story!”

This last from Driscoll.

Dougherty motioned to the little Frenchman.

“Me?” said Dumain. “I am worse yet than Dougherty. I got nozzing. I lost zee fifty.”

“But how?”

“Zee race ponies,” answered Dumain, with a fling at the jargon. “I play nozzing but écarté, and there is not zat here. I had a good what you call eet teep for Peemlico. Zee fourth race — zee name of zee horse was Parcel-Post.”

“How did you play him?”

“Straight. To win. A friend of mine got a telegram from zee owner. It was certain he should win.”

“And I suppose he got the place?” asked Booth.

“What does zat mean?”

“It means he came in second.”

The little Frenchman shook his head sorrowfully.

“Oh, no. He came een last.”

There was a shout of laughter from the others, but it was soon stopped by Dougherty, who turned to Jennings with a gesture. He wanted to get the thing finished.

“I’m in the same class with Dumain,” said Jennings. “I tried your game, Dougherty, and I thought I was some poker player — but good night! They took my fifty so quick I didn’t have time to tell it good-by.”

“Where’d you go?”

“Pearly’s, on Sixth Avenue. I’ve sat in there once or twice before, and about six months ago I made a clean-up. But tonight — don’t make me talk about it.”

“We’re a bunch of boobs,” Dougherty groaned. “We’d better all go out in the morning and sell lead pencils. Your turn, Driscoll.”

But Driscoll said that he would prefer to follow Booth, and since Dougherty was not inclined to argue the matter, he turned to the typewriter salesman instead.

“I’m willing,” said that gentleman, “though my tale contains but little joy. Still, I guess we’re about even.

“It doesn’t matter exactly where I went. It’s downtown, and it’s in the rear of a two-by-four billiard hall. At any hour of any afternoon you may find there a number of gentlemen engaged in the ancient and honorable game of craps.

“I’ll spare you the details — at least, most of ’em. The game is a big one: there’s lots of real money there for the man that knows how to get it, and I figured it out that I was just about the man.

“I rolled the bones till my fingers ached and my knees were stiff, and my voice sounded like a Staten Island ferryboat in a fog — I have a little habit of talking to the ivories.

“Well, to cut it short, I played in all directions. At one time I had six hundred dollars. At another time I had fifteen dollars. At half past eleven tonight I had an even hundred, and it was time to go.

“I had the dice, and I decided on one more throw. My hundred — I played it all — was faded before I put it down, and I threw a natural — a seven. I stuck the two hundred in my pocket and said good night.”

“Well, we’ve got our two hundred and fifty back, anyway,” observed Jennings.

“And what good will that do?” growled Dougherty.

“You never can tell. Tomorrow’s another day.”

“It seems to me,” put in Driscoll, “that I remain to be heard from.”

“Shoot your head off,” said the ex-prizefighter, “and hurry up about it. This is awful!”

Driscoll blew his nose with care and deliberation, cleared his throat three times, and arose to his feet. There was something in his manner that caused the others to sit up straighter in their chairs with an air of expectancy. Noticing this flattering increase of attention, he smiled grandly and surveyed them with a leisurely eye.

“In the first place, gentlemen,” he began, “I wish to say that I do not regard myself as a genius, in any sense of the word. At poker I am worse than helpless. The race ponies, as Dumain calls them, are a mystery to me. Nor have I that deft and subtle touch required to roll dice successfully.”

There came a chorus of cries:

“Cut it!”

“Cheese the guff!”

“Talk sense!”

“Go on with the story!”

Driscoll waited for them to finish, then resumed calmly:

“Do not be impatient, gentlemen. As I say, I am well aware of the fact that I am no genius. Therefore, I realized that if my fifty dollars grew to the desired proportions it would be only by the aid of miraculous chance. I made my plans accordingly.

“When I left you in front of the Lamartine at four o’clock I went straight to my own room. There I procured a piece of paper, and marked on it with a pen the figures from one to thirty-five, about an inch apart.

“I then tore the paper into thirty-five pieces, so that I had each figure on a piece by itself. I placed these in my hat, mixed them around, and drew one forth. It was the figure thirty-two.”

Again there came cries of impatience from the audience, who began to perceive that this lengthy preamble meant an interesting conclusion, and again the speaker ignored them and continued:

“That operation completed, I threw myself on my bed for a nap. At six o’clock I rose, went to a restaurant for dinner, and from there to my work at the theater. My first action there was to borrow fifty dollars, thereby doubling my capital.

“At the end of the play I dressed as hurriedly as possible, leaving the theater at exactly a quarter past eleven, and made my way to a certain establishment on Fiftieth Street, conducted by a Mr. Merrifield.

“It is, I believe, the largest and finest of its kind in New York. They have there a contrivance commonly known as a roulette wheel, which has numbers and colors arranged on it in an unique fashion. I stood before it and placed my hundred dollars on the number thirty-two.”

The speaker paused, turned, and took his overcoat from the back of the chair on which he had been sitting, while his audience looked on in breathless silence.