New Title 1 by Patrick Lestewka Read Free Book Online

initial grubstake when I catch the dream holeshot: red aces, diamonds and hearts.
    Betting opens to me. I toss in thirty, Ezzard folds, Rocky gooses to fifty, Archie chases it to seventy-five, George calls. Flop’s the king of clubs: no help, no harm. I open with fifty, Rocky ups to seventy, Archie matches with a look that says he’s throwing good coin after bad, the mortician calls.
    Six-sixty in the pot and the Turn’s the king of diamonds. Now everyone’s got a high face pair—but I’ve got two dynamite pairs. A brief scan tells me Archie’s set to fold but Rocky’s still a gamer. I bet a hundred, knowing Archie’s tapped but hoping to buffalo Rocky, and maybe George, into throwing down. Rocky, prototypical dick-swinger, chases the ante to one-fifty. Archie folds. The mortician lays his cards face-down and looks ready to follow suit but, with a sideways look at Len, matches at one-fifty.
    Len says, “Down and dirty, gentlemen.”
    The River is the ace of spades. I’ve caught the strongest possible full house, aces and kings. The lock. The nuts. I pour another shot of C.C.—hands shaking, stop shaking, stop —touch my thumbtips together to form a plow with my palms, and push all my chips into the pot.
    “What the hell. It’s getting late.”
    Rocky consults his meager stack and must admit his finances are not the equal of his bravado. “I’m out,” he says in disgust.
    It’s me and the mortician. My guess is he’s holding the final ace, giving him a knockout double pair, but not enough to sink my full boat. He lifts the edges of his cards, flattened to the table under his left hand, as if expecting them to have changed since the last consultation. Then, with careful, precise movements, he stacks his chips in the pot.
    “Yes,” he says, “it is getting late.”
    The mortician’s stake outclasses mine by over three-hundred dollars. I fish the pistol from my waistband. “The piece is worth a thou.”
    “Pokerface—” Len starts.
    “Don’t call me that.”
    “Fine, Neil . Brand new that gun wasn’t worth a thou.”
    “It’s reliable,” I counter. “Shoots straight.”
    “I don’t need a gun,” the mortician says.
    “Who made it,” Rocky says, “the Krauts?”
    Len says, “It’s worth three bills at this table.”
    “Was it the Ko– reens ? Liable to shoot your pecker off with one of those.”
    “I already have a gun. A B.B.-gun. It’s a Daisy.”
    “It’s settled,” Len says. “Gun’s worth three bills.”
    “Fine,” I say, flipping my aces and reaching to rake the pot…
    …until the mortician turns over his pocket kings.
    Archie and Ezzard say “Bad beat” simultaneously. Rocky sucks air through his teeth. I can’t draw air into my lungs.
    “Four kings beats a full house.” Len shrugs expansively, as though to suggest the karmic absurdity of it all. “You can’t win every day, Pokerface. Otherwise it’d be no fun when you did.”
    The chips and cards shimmer out of focus, clean edges disintegrating, colors blurring. I reach for the gun. It’s suddenly very important— crucial —I hold it.
    “What are you doing?” Len says.
    I find myself backing out a door. Not the door I entered: this one flimsier, unvarnished pressboard rather than oak. The others follow me into a dimly-lit hallway.
    “Hey,” the mortician says. “Hey.”
    The hallway empties into a coffin showroom. In the muddy light I glimpse caskets resting on crushed-velvet catafalques. Pachabel’s “Canon in D” pipes in through recessed speakers. Each casket is affixed with a nametag: Sweet Hereafter , Heavenly Chariot , Eternal Bliss .
    “Give the man his gun, Neil.”
    Rocky says, “Nobody likes a sore loser, fella.”
    I stumble and grab hold of an Everlasting Salvation to avoid horizontality. The mortician strides forward, his spindle neck cabled with veins.
    “I can’t abide welshers.”
    “You don’t need another gun,” I remind him.
    The mortician removes his glasses. His eyes look