Уолтер Тевис - The Color of Money

When Boomer gave him the last pair of fifties, he looked at Eddie coldly and said, “If you want to play me anymore, my friend, you’re going to have to give me some weight.” He had dropped the wild-country-boy act and spoke quietly.

Eddie was finishing his supper—a bacon and tomato sandwich. He took the paper plate over and set it on the bar and then came back. The crowd silently made way for him. “What do you need?”

“I’ll take the break,” Boomer said.

Eddie looked at him, at his strange face with the look of crazy, mean intelligence; the veiled threat in his cool eyes; the small hands now holding his thin, delicate cue. “I won’t give you the break but I’ll bank the eight ball. If we play for five hundred a game.”

“I’ve heard of guys like you,” Boomer said.

“I bet you have, Boomer.”

Boomer stared at him a moment and then gave a small grin. “I’ve got to make a phone call.”

“Go ahead.”

He went to the pay phone at the end of the bar while Eddie got himself a cup of coffee. His shoulder had begun to ache, and now that Boomer was calling his backer or whatever, he felt the tightness in his stomach again. That was something else he had forgotten over the years: the goddamned fear .

The backer showed up surprisingly soon. He was a small man in a tight gray suit and dark necktie. The men leaning against one of the empty tables made room for him and he stood there, not leaning, and watched while Eddie racked up the balls and Boomer broke them. He made one on the break. It was going to be tough. For a moment Eddie felt like a fool giving such odds. Banking the eight could be ruinous. You couldn’t afford to miss against a player like Boomer and on tables like this. Boomer ran three of the stripes and then played safe. Eddie did not try anything fancy this time but played a safety back. It went back and forth like that for several shots, but then on a draw shot, Eddie did not pull the heavy cue ball back as far as he had meant to and he left Boomer a piece of the eleven. Boomer said nothing, but zeroed in and cut it into the side. He ran out. Eddie took five hundred out of his wallet. Boomer nodded over toward the man in the suit and said, “Just pay my friend.” Eddie walked over and handed the little man the bills. He took them silently, smoothed them out and began counting. Eddie walked back over to the table and racked the balls. Then he went to the bar and finished his coffee, watching the table as he drank. Boomer swung his bat of a cue into the break ball and spread the rack. A stripe and a solid dropped in. He began running the solids. Eddie walked back over to the table. His feet and his shoulder were hurting, and the coffee hadn’t really helped. What was he doing, saying he would bank the eight on this man’s own table, with his own crowd, here in some town in North Carolina whose name he had already forgotten? Haneyville. That was it—the first name on the list from Fats. “Some high rollers there,” Fats had said. Well, there one of them was, making balls like a machine. Plop, plop they went, into the big pockets of the little table. Plop . The last was the eight ball. Eddie got another five hundred and gave it to the dapper little man. He was now, after four hours of pool, three hundred dollars behind. And quite a few quarters. He put another quarter in, telling himself he had better bear down; when the balls came rolling through the chute he took them out and racked them, eight ball in the center, for Boomer.

And Boomer boomed them open, dropping three. He was getting hot now. Maybe he had been holding back before. Eddie watched him, for a moment feeling some of the helplessness he had felt against Fats in Miami and Cincinnati, with a tight, painful sensation in his stomach. Boomer was moving around the little table faster now, sliding balls into pockets quietly while the whole crowded barroom full of men in working clothes watched him, fascinated. The gray smoke above the cone of light over the table was nearly solid; men sipped their drinks silently; no one played the jukebox or talked. The sound of Boomer’s boot heels when he moved from shot to shot was like footsteps in a library. He made all the striped balls, shot the eight in the side, and Eddie paid the man in the suit.

“I may never find out if you can bank that eight ball,” Boomer said as Eddie was bent near him, getting the balls from the rack.

Eddie froze and stared at him a moment. “Let’s play for a thousand,” he said. He had twelve hundred dollars with him.

“You’re on,” Boomer said.

He finished racking them, surprised at his own steadiness. He had not planned to play for that much money. Boomer might run out without giving him a shot. Boomer had gone over to the nearby table and was whispering with his backer, whose face was impassive. Eddie looked at him and immediately knew he would miss soon.

Boomer stepped up to the table, drew back his cue and slammed into the rack of balls. They spread out, but nothing fell in. “Son of a bitch!” he said, this time meaning it.

The balls were wide, and the eight was an inch from the side pocket. After making the others, Eddie could bring the cue ball near it for a simple cross-side bank. First, he would have to cut the seven thin, slip it into the bottom corner, and let his cue ball roll the length of the table to sit down by the three. It wasn’t easy. He glanced up at Boomer, who was standing a few feet from the table.

“Don’t miss,” Boomer said.

Eddie stared at him a moment. “Boomer,” he said, “you’re scared of me.”

He bent down, stroked smoothly, and cut the seven ball in. The cue ball rolled up the table and sat down sweetly behind the three. He shot it in, and then the four ball and the two and the others, finally giving himself position for the bank on the eight ball. He stopped a second to chalk his cue and then bent, stroked, shot. The eight ball struck the cushion smartly, rolled across the table and fell into the pocket.

Boomer got the money from his backer, handed it to Eddie. This time Eddie did not take out his wallet. He folded the bills and pushed them down into his pants pocket while Boomer stood watching. “You’re not quitting, are you?” Eddie said pleasantly. He liked the way his voice sounded.

Boomer shook his head.

“Then rack the balls,” Eddie said.

He got her number from long-distance information and dialed from the phone by his bed. It was a little before one. He had woken up at noon, showered, and ordered coffee from room service.

“Pat told me you were living alone,” she said. Her voice did not sound friendly, but at least she was willing to talk.

“I sure am.”

“Where are you?”

“In the Holiday Inn in Haneyville, North Carolina.”

“What in god’s name are you doing in North Carolina?”

“Playing pool for money.”

“I thought you didn’t do that anymore.”

“Sometimes I even surprise myself.”

“Is that what you called to tell me?”

“I’ll be at Bluegrass Airport at six. If you’ll pick me up, I’ll take you to the Japanese place for dinner.”

“Eddie,” she said, “I don’t know….”

“I know,” he said, looking at the stack of over four thousand dollars he had won from Boomer. “Pick me up at the airport. We ought to be together.”

She was there waiting for him, looking terrific in a black wool sweater and blue jeans, her gray hair freshly washed and fluffy around her face, like a movie star on her day off. He was carrying his cue and nylon bag, and they didn’t kiss. She shook his hand, looking him over. Neither of them spoke. Finally she said, “We don’t know each other very well at all.”