Page:The plastic age, (IA plasticage00mark).pdf/257

Rh “I’m sitting pretty,” Allen remarked casually, picking up the five cards that he had laid down before he dealt.

The betting began, Hugh nervous, openly excited, Mandel stonily calm, Allen completely at ease. At irst the bets were for a dollar, but they gradually rose to five. Mandel threw down his cards.

“Fight it out,” he said morosely. “I’ve thrown iway twenty-five bucks, and I ’ll be damned if I’m
 * oing to throw away any more to see your fourlushes.”

Allen lifted a pile of chips and let them fall ightly, clicking a rapid staccato. “It ’ll cost you en dollars to see my hand, Hugh,” he said quietly.

“It ’ll cost you twenty if you want to see mine,” Hlugh responded, tossing the equivalent to thirty lollars into the pot. He watched Allen eagerly, nit Allen’s face remained quite impassive as he aised Hugh another ten.

The four boys who were n’t playing leaned for¬ ward, pipes or cigarettes in their mouths, their tomachs pressed against the table, their eyes narrowed and excited. The air was a stench of stale moke; the silence between bets was electric.

The betting continued, Hugh sure that Allen was luffing, but Allen never failed to raise him ten dollars on every bet. Finally Hugh had a hundred lollars in the pot and dared not risk more on his hand.