A Desperate Game

By BARRY PAIN

SAT down in an easy-chair in the library of my club with a copy of a monthly review, which contained an extremely interesting article on something which I have forgotten. I was just becoming absorbed in it, when

Suddenly I was in the card-room. I stood by one of the tables with Dawes, Simpson, and Colonel Stocker, and we were on the point of cutting for partners. I knew I had merely been brought in to make up a four. These three men do not think that my bridge is quite their class. There may be two opinions as to that, but they think so. I hoped, of course, that I should cut with Dawes. Without being absolutely courteous, he was still, as a rule, more sympathetic than the other two. Simpson has a nasty tongue. But the worst of the three—the man whom I most hate to have as partner—was unquestionably Stocker.

Do not for one moment think that I am afraid of him. I am afraid of nothing. Nervousness is not the same thing as fear, or anything like it. Now, Colonel Stocker makes me nervous. He is admitted to be a good player, but no player on earth is quite so good as Colonel Stocker thinks he is. He is a big man, three times my size, and his voice is loud and penetrating. He always lectures his partner, and to me he is invariably and persistently rude. I have often thought, after a game of bridge, that I simply should not have permitted Colonel Stocker to speak as he did. As I loathe the man and detest having him as a partner, it naturally follows that I cut with him. But I am thankful to say that I know how to behave myself, and I did not permit even the expression of my face to show my annoyance. The Colonel himself was less tactful.

"Got you again!" he groaned. "If there's a fool in the room, I always get him for a partner!"

"So does your partner," said Simpson cheerfully. It sometimes happens that Simpson says things that I wish I had said myself.

"Try to be a shade less absurd in your declarations than you were yesterday," said the Colonel to me. And then the game began.

Simpson dealt and declared a diamond with his usual amazing rapidity. I wiped my spectacles, carefully adjusted them, and examined my hand. I had nothing better than two unprotected knaves, and I passed. The others also passed, and it became my turn to lead.

I examined my hand again before leading, and to my horror found that it had completely changed. Its principal feature now was eight spades, including all the honours. There were no diamonds at all. The game proceeded, my partner writhing with every card I played, and my opponents looking wonderingly at one another. Not one of my spades made, as the declarer had none, and the other side made thirty-five below the line and twenty-eight above.

"If you'll kindly allow me to explain" I began.

But Colonel Stocker interrupted me, as I knew he would. He said that he had never expected me to play bridge, or to be able to count, but he had hoped that I now knew the difference between the suits. It would be better in the future if I kept out of the card-room. My place was in the nursery, where I might play "snap" with the babies, who would certainly beat me at it. Was I aware that, if I had declared royals, we should have made the game and scored ninety above the line? Was I aware of anything? Could I blow my own nose? Did I know what my name was?

"There is really no occasion to take that tone," I said. "My mistake—which I have never made before, and shall never make again—was purely one of eyesight. The light is not good, and I think I have my wrong glasses. I assure you that, when I first looked at my hand, it was worthless. No one could have been more surprised than I was to find all those spades there."

"I have always noticed," said the Colonel, "that the fools who make the worst mistakes always invent the worst excuses for them."

"Oh, let's get on with this alleged game," said Simpson wearily.

It was now my deal, and on picking up my hand I received another surprise. It was, card for card, exactly the same hand that I had just held—one of those extraordinary coincidences that do sometimes happen. Naturally I was determined that there should be no mistake this time. Without hesitation I declared two royals and was left to play it. Dawes, on my left, led the king of diamonds. The Colonel and Simpson played under it, and I took the trick with a small trump.

"Not having a diamond," said the Colonel fiercely. "Diamonds, you will observe, are coloured red and are diamond-shaped. Hence the name. Look through your hand again."

I looked through my hand with the utmost care. "Not having a diamond," I repeated icily.

I then led the ace of spades. I looked at it twice before I drew it out. I am as certain as any man can be of anything that it was the ace of spades. But it turned into the ace of diamonds when it fell on the table. In absolute agony I examined my hand again. I found that the spades had now all vanished, and that I held five more small diamonds. It was not really my fault. Nobody can play a hand when the cards are doing conjuring tricks on their own and changing suits under your very eyes.

My opponents scored above the line for that game nine hundred and thirty-six. Colonel Stocker did not say a word. His lips were pressed tightly together, and his eyes seemed to be bulging out of his head. For a few awful moments nobody spoke. Then Dawes stood up.

"Look here, Simpson," he said, "we can't take money for this kind of thing."

"Of course not," said Simpson. "I must apologise to you, Colonel. When I brought this man down to make up a four, I did not notice that he was drunk. Another time I'll consent to play three-handed."

"It may be simply some form of brain mischief," said Dawes, who is always more polite than the other two.

Then he and his partner walked out of the room and, to my amazement, locked the door behind them. I heard the click of the lock distinctly, and wondered why they had done it.

I looked up at the Colonel. He no longer appeared angry, but his expression was one of marked gravity. It was the kind of expression that I should imagine he would wear for a complimentary attendance at the funeral of a man in whom he was not greatly interested.

"I'm exceedingly sorry, Colonel," I began "Nothing of this kind has ever happened to me in my life before, and I should have said it was impossible. The cards actually seemed to change their suits before my eyes. As for the insinuation that Simpson chose to make, I shall certainly write to the  committee. I have put up with a good deal in this club, but there am limits. Simpson knows as well as I do that I never take anything before dinner-time. But, still, of course, the fact remains that I have been the victim of some kind of optical illusion, and that may be serious."

"Very serious," said the Colonel quietly.

"Really, I think the best thing 1 can do is to go and consult a doctor at once."

"I'm afraid that is impossible," said the Colonel, with a horrible and unnatural politeness. "The door is locked." "One of Simpson's silly jokes," I said. "I'll just ring, and the waiter will unlock it."

"Have you," asked the Colonel, "observed the notice affixed to that bell?"

I had not, but I looked at it now. It was an official intimation that the bell was out of order.

"Then," I said, "the only thing to be done is to bang on the door. Somebody is bound to hear us and let us out."

"What makes you think you are going to be let out?" said the Colonel. He suddenly whipped out a revolver from his hip pocket and covered me with it. "Sit very still," he said. His voice was sepulchral.

"Look here, Colonel," I said, "you had better put that thing away. You had, really. One is always hearing of accidents."

I admit that I felt—well, distinctly nervous.

"There will be no accident" said the Colonel. "You may depend upon it that anything I do will be quite intentional. And now, charming though your conversation is, I think we will begin the game."

"But the other two men have gone. We have abandoned it."

"This is a different game. It is called duel-bridge."

"Afraid I don't know it."

"You will soon pick it up. It is quite simple. To begin with, you think of a card and tell me what it is. As you probably have a natural desire to live as long as possible, you will be quick about it."

The man had evidently gone mad, and I was still covered by his revolver. It seemed best to humour him. "Nine of diamonds," I said.

"Nine of diamonds," he repeated. "Known, I believe, as the Curse of Scotland. It's curious that you should have chosen that card. You now take the pack, which I have cut to you, and deal the cards out face upwards. When you come to the nine of diamonds, I fire and you die. What could be simpler?"

He lowered his revolver.

"In that case," I said, trying to smile, "I think I should prefer not to deal the pack at all"

"That, of course," said the Colonel, "must be just as you please. If you don't begin to deal at once, I fire now. You have got to die, because your bridge has now constituted itself a public danger, and it is only a question of when you will die. You may as well take the few moments that are left you."

I picked up the pack. As he said, I should be able to gain a few moments, and much might happen in a few moments. Somebody might come into the room. It was unusual for the card-room to be deserted at that time of the day.

I began to deal as slowly as I dared, so as to gain all the time I could. I wondered whereabouts in the pack the nine of diamonds would be. At each card I turned I expected it. I sweated with nervousness. The room was so quiet that the fall of every card could be heard. I had dealt half-way through the pack now, and taken over it a minute that was like a compressed lifetime, and still the nine of diamonds had not turned up.

"A little quicker, now," said the Colonel. "Just a little quicker."

I looked at him and saw that he had changed. His face had got much bigger and was still swelling. Its colour, ordinarily rubicund, had changed to a deep purple. Here was another faint chance for me. Before the nine of diamonds was reached, the brute might drop in an apoplectic fit.

I dealt a very little quicker, fumbling with the cards as much as possible. I went on and on, until there was only one card left in my hand, and I knew it must be the nine of diamonds. The Colonel raised his revolver. I prepared to drop on the floor as I turned the card, but he was too quick for me. There was a click and a loud report.

Yes, and then I woke up. I had fallen asleep in my chair in the library, and that ponderous review had dropped to the floor. By my side stood one of the club waiters.

"Colonel Stocker's compliments, sir," said the man, "and he will be glad if you will make a four at bridge."

"Tell him," I said, "that I am extremely sorry, but that I am busy just now."