Dames Don’t Care by Peter Cheyney Read Free Book Online

playin'.
    My party scram out of it, an' as I am sayin' goodnight to 'em, Periera comes over. He tells me that play will be startin' any minute now, an' that I know where the room is, the one at the top of the stairs. I tell him yes but I think I am goin' to have a walk around first. I go out the front way an' I walk around the place sniftin' the air. I am very funny about any sorta gamblin'. I like the game to get started before I bust into it.
    About twenty minutes afterwards I go back. One of the waiter guys is closing down the windows on the left hand side of the club. The band have packed up and most of the lights are down. I walk across the floor, up the stairs an' go into the room at the top. It is a fair sized room, with a big table in the middle. There are some guys playin' baccarat at this table, an' at another little table in a corner another three guys an' two dames are playin' poker.
    Maloney is at the baccarat table an' standin' near to him watchin' the play is Henrietta. All the guys up there are wearin' tuxedos, an' one or two of 'em at the baccarat table look plenty tough to me. It looks like everybody has been doin' some drinkin' too because there is that sort of atmosphere that comes when people get high.
    After a minute Periera comes along, looks in an' then goes off some place. I just stick around and watch.
    Maloney ain't doin' so well. He is losin' plenty an' he don't look so happy about it. Also he is lookin' a little bit puzzled as if he cannot quite understand somethin', an' I am wonderin' if somebody has been doin' a little fast stuff with the cards.
    After about ten minutes Maloney goes banco an' flops on it. He loses a bundle. He turns round an' he looks at Henrietta with a silly sorta grin.
    "It don't look anythin's comin' my way," he says. "I never seem to get any luck at all around here."
    She smiles, an' believe me her teeth match up with the rest of her, an' did I tell you that she had sapphire blue eyes. Me, I have always been very partal to sapphire blue eyes!
    "Why not give it a rest?" she says. "Or would you like me to play a hand for you?"
    On the other side of the table is a big guy. He is a broad-shouldered fellow with a thin face an' a lotta black hair. I have heard him called Fernandez. He is watchin' Maloney all the time whilst they are talkin'. Then he chips in:
    "It looks like both your luck's out," he says. "But," he goes on with a snicker, "maybe you always expect to win. Maybe you don't like losin'."
    Maloney goes red.
    "Whether I like winnin' or losin' is my business, Fernandez," he says, "an' I don't need any wisecracks outa you. I don't mind losin'," he goes on, "but I said that I've got a funny habit of always losin' when I play around here." He grins sorta sarcastic. "But maybe it is only my imagination," he says.
    "You don't say," says Fernandez.
    He gets up sorta very slow an' pushes his chair back. Then he leans across the table an' he busts Maloney a hard one right on the puss. You coulda heard the smack a mile away.
    Everybodys stops everything. Maloney does a swell back fall over the back of his chair. He gets up an' he is lookin' groggy. By this time Fernandez has walked around to the end of the table. He gets Maloney off his balance an' chins him again. This guy Fernandez is lookin' like a burned-up tiger. He is all steamed up an' I get the idea that he is a dope. I stand over in the corner an' light a cigarette. I am just beginnin' to get interested.
    Henrietta has gone back up against the wall. She is watchin' Maloney. Her eyes are glitterin' an' I know she is sorta prayin' that he can get up an' hand Fernandez something. In the corner one of the dames playin' poker, who is very high, starts cacklin'. She thinks it's funny.
    Maloney gets up. He is shook all right, but wades in at Fernandez. He swings a right which Fernandez blocks, an' before Maloney can do anythin' about it Fernandez gives him another haymaker. Maloney goes down again an' he is not lookin' pretty.