Hard Rain Falling - Don Carpenter [25]
“Why fuck around?” Case said, tossing his hair back out of his eyes. His girlish mouth was white around the edges.
Denny threw himself into a chair. “There goes the fuggin poker game,” he said disgustedly.
“Is there a poker game?” Kol Mano asked politely.
“There was. Gimme a cigarette, will you? No, wait a sec, I got a pack. Hey, you guys wanna come? We’re gonna have a party. You got a car?”
“Sure I have a car,” Mano said. “What did you think I was, a bum like yourself?”
Denny winked at Jack, and said to the other, “You been in the black market. Maybe you’re the guy to handle this deal.”
“What deal?”
Denny explained his idea, and Mano listened thoughtfully. “Sounds okay to me,” Mano said.
Jack was a little surprised. Actually, Denny’s plans had sounded just a degree or two crazy to him. “Hey, you think it’s really okay?”
“Why not?” Mano said. “We have a little party, then steal some shit. What’s wrong with that?”
“What about the cops?” Jack said lamely, and wished he hadn’t. He did not want to lose Mano’s good opinion.
“Cops. Balls. If I worried about cops, I’d have to lock myself in my room and do nothin. Fuck the cops.”
Watching the slow, chesslike moves of the one-pocket game, Jack decided that Billy was going to win the money, and he liked him for that. Although Bobby Case was the better player, Bobby was letting something bother him; he was playing angrily, contemptuously, as if to show that he could beat this nigger without half trying. His movements were more rapid than cautious, and he shot before taking enough time to size up the lay of the balls; his face was rigid, attempting to mask the anger in his eyes. Every time he tried a shot that would have been stupendous if he had made it but only made him look silly when he didn’t, Billy Lancing would step up, take his time, walk all around the table—idly, nervelessly, calmly—make his decision and then shoot either a tight, frustrating safety or plunk a ball into his pocket. Even when he shot to make a ball, he left the cue ball tight, not caring whether he had another good play or not; and although Bobby Case—due to a lucky run early in the game—had five balls to Billy’s two, Jack felt with intuitive certainty that Billy would win. He pointed a finger at Kol Mano and said, “Ten dollars on Billy.”
Billy was on the other side of the table, chalking his cue, and he looked up with unveiled surprise into Jack’s eyes. “You bettin on me?”
“Sure. You gonna win, aint you?”
They continued to look at each other, and Jack felt something unidentifiable passing between them, an unexpected warmth, a communication—and he felt himself forced to break his eyes away from the contact. He looked over at Mano. “How about it?”
“You’re on,” Mano said. `He took his finger off his throat and made a farting sound.
Of course Jack did not have ten dollars. He was betting on his guts. But that didn’t make any difference; if there was a fuss, Mano just wouldn’t pay off. No harm done. Jack was suddenly sure Billy would win.
He did. He never made two balls in a row, but he never scratched, either, and while Bobby Case made runs, he also scratched and left Billy wide open. The game ended 8-7, and Case racked rapidly and angrily for the next contest. Billy stood and waited, the new twenty tucked down into his pocket.
Mano handed Jack two fives. “Again?”
“Shore.”
Denny went, “Ahem!” and Jack gave him a secret look which implied, wait, and you’ll share all the profits. Denny replied with an expression of utter disbelief.
“Bobby was foolin around,” Mano said. “This time he wins the money.” Mano had been circulating in the crowd, getting down bets, and now that Billy had won the first game, he found takers for all his money.
But Billy won again. He broke safe, and Bobby saw a chance to make a circus shot, took it, and missed, and Billy slowly but surely, carefully, ran eight balls and won the game in less than five minutes.
“Some hustle,” he said. “Are you ready to take the wraps off, raise the price, an lock me up?”
Bobby wiped his mouth, tossed his hair back,