Уолтер Тевис - The Color of Money

He left the room at six-thirty and was at the door of the Faculty Club, carrying his cue case, when the old man opened it up.

After such little sleep, his energy at the table was surprising. He had the room to himself, hearing only the occasional clink of dishes from the dining room below; and he shot the balls with concentration and force, hardly missing at all for hours. The pockets were a shade too easy—wider open than they should have been, and a bit filed down so that doubtful shots would fall in. But he didn’t mind that; it might help his confidence, and his confidence needed help. He kept making balls, setting up difficult shots for himself and pocketing them remorselessly. He felt sharp and clear, and the fact that he wore glasses seemed now to mean nothing.

For the rest of the week he came in every morning, after walking across the campus at dawn. He would drive out South Broadway, the wide avenue nearly devoid of traffic that early, and leave his car in the university lot marked for visitors. Then he would walk across the campus to the Faculty Club, following a long, curved concrete pathway under high dark trees, crunching underfoot the leaves from overnight. It was too early for students, but he would pass glum maintenance men in dark uniforms, puffing on cigarettes, or nurses on their way to the university hospital with white uniforms half covered by jackets. Few people talked at that time of day; something deep in Eddie responded to the silence. He liked the early-morning life of this big place, with it brick classroom buildings, the new high-rise dormitories off to the east, the solid old library that he walked by every morning. He wore his leather bomber jacket with the collar turned up against the chill, carried his cue case under his arm and walked briskly. It felt like a new life.

By Wednesday he had developed a routine. He would spread the fifteen colored balls out at the foot of the table, place the cue at the other end, pick the ball he would break the next rack from, and then try to run the other fourteen. He gave himself a difficult shot to begin with so the exhilaration from making it would carry him on through the rest of the rack. If he made it. When he missed, he set it up again and kept trying until he got it. It was painful at times to miss repeatedly, since the opening shots he set for himself were tough ones, but he needed that too. His game might look good to a person like Skammer, as the punches of a professional fighter would feel devastating to a street punk; but he wasn’t preparing himself for street punks. He would be playing Fats again in a week. It was time he started beating him. He could run a rack of balls easily enough, if he made the first one. But that wasn’t enough. This was an easy table and there was no pressure; he should be running in the seventies and eighties. As a young man he would never have missed on a table like this.

Every now and then people would come in to watch him shoot. Young professors, sometimes carrying their coffee cups from breakfast. They would stand around quietly for a half hour or so and then leave. No one asked to play and he was glad of that. He did not feel like an interloper at the Faculty Club after the first week; he felt he belonged there. Increasing the length of his runs was uphill labor, and there was a suspicion it might be hopeless, that whatever fire he once possessed had been extinguished; but he kept shooting pool. The difference between now and the way it had been before the tour with Fats was that now he could see the alternative more clearly.

At their next match, in St. Louis, he did better but Fats still beat him. One fifty to one forty-two.

“I don’t know what the hell to do,” Eddie said afterward. “There’s no money in this tour. When it’s over I’ll have less than I started with.”

“People won’t pay to watch pool games. We’re not rock singers.”

“That’s the fucking truth.” Eddie lit a cigarette. “I don’t know how to make a living, Fats. I have to get another poolroom.”

“I’ve already told you all I have to tell.” Fats stood up from his bleacher seat and walked over to the table where the game had just finished. They were waiting for a car to take them to the airport and the car was late.

“I remember what you told me,” Eddie said. He got up and came over. There were still a dozen or so people in the bleachers, but they were not watching Fats and Eddie anymore. “You told me I need balls. There’s truth in that, Fats, but no money.”

“That’s debatable.” Fats picked up the three ball and sent it spinning around the table. It went three rails and fell in the corner pocket. In the parking lot a car began honking in short bursts, then stopped. “I also told you to play in tournaments.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Eddie said. “The World Open in in New York this winter and first prize is eight thousand. The entry fee is five hundred, and you have to stay in New York for two weeks. There’s only money in that if you come in first.”

“Then come in first,” Fats said.

“Against Seeley and Dorfmeyer? You couldn’t beat them, and I can’t beat you.”

“Don’t tell me who I can’t beat, Fast Eddie.” Fats took the seven ball and did the same three-rail toss, this time plunking it into the corner pocket on top of the three.

“Then you play the World Open.” Eddie looked up into the stands a moment, where a group of people was finally getting up to leave. It had been a dull crowd and their applause had been light, even for Fats’ final run of forty and out.

“I don’t need to play the World Open. When I finish this tour next month, it’ll be the last game of pool I’ll play. I don’t need it anymore. You’re the one who needs it.”

“I’ve never played tournaments, Fats. A hustler didn’t do that. You didn’t want to come out of the closet.”

“The times have changed, Eddie. Straight pool is out of style. You could stay in that closet and starve.”

“Or sell real estate.”

Fats looked at him thoughtfully. “The money’s in nine-ball.”

“I don’t play nine-ball.”

“You can learn.”

“Nine-ball is a kid’s game. It’s what they play in those bars where you put a quarter in the table and another in the jukebox.”

“They play for a lot of money in some of those bars.”

“In Cincinnati you said I wasn’t good enough.”

“You got better.” Fats looked at him. “Do you know what Earl Borchard made last year in nine-ball tournaments?”

“No.”

“Sixty thousand. And I don’t know what he made hustling on the side. They say he plays the bar tables.”

“How would you know how much money he makes?”

“In Billiards Monthly .”

Eddie got the magazine at the poolroom but never did more than flip through it. It was mostly ads for pool-table and cue-stick manufacturers, or books on trick shots. There were “profiles” of young players—usually a few lines of praise under a glossy photograph of somebody holding a pool cue. It made him vaguely sick to look at it. There were also ads for nine-ball tournaments, in places like Asheville and Chattanooga and Lake Tahoe. “Sixty thousand?”

“That’s in seven tournaments. About ten weeks’ work.”

He’d had no idea there was that much money in it. “He’s got to pay expenses.”

“You paid expenses when you were on the road. Did you ever make sixty thousand?”

“Borchard’s the best. What does the second-best make?”

“Don’t ask.” Fats turned back to the table. “If you don’t trust your eyesight, those bar tables are better. Smaller.” He looked at Eddie. “They play eight-ball on them too. A man can make a good living at eight-ball in bars.”