I

If men seen their wives play poker previous to the nuptial bonds they’d be a large fallin’ off in marryin’ and givin’ in marriage. Speakin’ for myself personally, the Missus would still be livin’ in her parental mansion o’ concrete buildin’ blocks at Wabash if I’d knew in advance that her and George W. Hoyle was such perfect strangers. And I and all my male friends would be callin’ each other up, from noon on, to decide on the most advantageous location to start gettin’ paralyzed that night.

The best female poker player I know is Mrs. Hatch. She don’t never come into a pot and she never antes without a court order. Say she buys two dollars’ worth o’ dime chips at the beginnin’ o’ the evenin’. Our game generally ’most always runs about four hours. So when it comes time for the lettuce sandwiches she’s still got $1.60 in front of her yet and ain’t mad at nobody.

So Hatch has got it all over the rest of his gentlemen friends. He can generally keep his mind on the game, instead o’ puzzlin’ all evenin’ about the most cuttin’ thing he can say to his wife on the way home.

I’ve often said to the Missus: “If you can’t set over on one corner o’ the lounge and do your mendin’, if you think you must take a hand, why don’t you play like Mrs. Hatch?”

“Play!” she says. “She don’t play! She just sets there like a dummy.”

“Well,” I says, “I’d rather have a dummy wife that costs me forty cents an evenin’ than a female philanthropist that thinks every night is Christmas and the rest o’ the people round the table is the slums.”

“But she don’t have no fun,” the Missus says.

“Who expects to have fun for forty cents?” I ask her.

“But she can’t never win,” says the Missus.

“That’s right!” I says. “I forgot that part of it. It’s the feminine plungers that grabs all the coin. What do you say if I and you take all your winnin’s o’ the last two years and go downtown some evenin’ and buy a fountain-pen filler?”

They’s six of us that usually gets together two or three nights a week at our house or the Hatches’ or Tuttles’. Nothin’s ever said about card playin’ when the invitation’s issued. For instance, Mrs. Tuttle calls up Mrs. Hatch and my wife along in the afternoon and asks ’em to come over that evenin’ and bring their keepers and listen to the new records Joe brought home yesterday. So we go and set round a while, expressin’ admiration o’ “Poor Butterfly” and “Wackie Hickie” and “My Honolulu Hop-Eater,” till Hatch can’t stand it no longer.

“How about a little friendly game?” he says.

“Maybe the rest don’t feel like playin’,” says Mrs. Hatch.

Then I say:

“What’s the use o’ concealin’ the hellish purpose for which this party was got up?”

So then we all beat it to the dinin’ room, where they keep the other table, and Mrs. Tuttle brings along a ten-cent deck o’ the papes, and a box o’ checks, half o’ which is missin’ on account o’ little Joe and Millicent havin’ either bit em’ in two or rolled ’em under the piano.

Then the argument comes up about how much the checks’ll be worth.

“Let’s have ’em a nickel apiece,” says Mrs. Hatch, figurin’ that that way she’ll only lose twenty cents instead o’ forty.

“Oh, that’s a pikers’ game,” her husband’ll say. “Ten-cent chips and twenty-cent limit’s the right dope.”

Then Joe Tuttle passes out stacks o’ twenty chips each and the husbands settle.

Next, it’s whether we’ll play straight poker, with a buck, or straight jacks. That’s Mrs. Tuttle’s cue to horn in.

“Let’s do like we usually do,” she says: “Straight poker except when the dealer’s got the buck; then a jackpot.”

“With deuces wild in the jackpots,” says my Missus.

Now I’ve learned by experience that it’s just wastin’ my breath; but I can’t never resist makin’ a speech at this point.

“If poker’s a rotten game,” I tell ’em, “why don’t we play somethin’ else? The guy that built the first deck o’ cards meant for deuces to be the dregs o’ the game. The guy that invented poker kept deuces in their proper place, somethin’ to be laughed at. I claim poker’s the best game o’ cards, without no garnisheements. You don’t see the American League passin’ a rule to make the infielders play blindfolded so’s to improve baseball. The billiard experts never think o’ stickin’ three more object balls on the table so’s it’ll be easier to score. The colleges ain’t never considered supplyin’ the halfbacks with motorcycles to increase their speed. When you put wild cards in a poker game you blow the brains out of it. It’s an insult to the man that got it up. You might as well add the story o’ the two Irishmen to the Declaration of Independence, to make it funny.”

And then we start playin’, with deuces wild in the jackpots.

Once every six or seven weeks I win enough to pay for what the Missus loses. Hatch breaks even once out o’ ten times. The other nine times he quits ahead. Mrs. Hatch, as I told you, loses just the amount we’ve forced her to ante. Joe Tuttle’s in about the same boat as me. When his wife’s got an off night, and don’t lose over two or three bucks, he has a chance to beat the game.

After we’ve played about a half hour, the two women makes up their mind that they ain’t losin’ fast enough the way things is; so it’s moved and supported and carried that, from then on, everything’s a jackpot with deuces loose. That’s when Hatch begins his real cleanup, and I and Tuttle start plottin’ wifeicide, or whatever you call it.

If the host and hostess happens to be pretty far behind at midnight, we keep goin’ till two o’clock or worse. But if they’re winners, or anywheres near even, the sandwiches and coffee’s served round twelve bells. After that, the two couples that don’t live where the pastime was at goes home separate, so’s each couple can quarrel without the other overhearin’ it. The scrappin’ lasts till the party o’ the second part opens up the tear ducks. Then you have to pretend like you didn’t mean none of it.

II

But I was goin’ to tell you about Harry Quinn. He’s a boy about twenty-three or twenty-four years old and he’s been down to the office about a year and a half. He come there as a bookkeeper at twelve a week, but they just couldn’t keep him down; and six months ago they made him fourth assistant head shippin’ clerk at a salary o’ sixteen.

To show you what kind o’ taste he’s got, he took a likin’ to me; and every time he come past my desk he’d have to stop and chin a while. At first I didn’t mind, because it was fun to kid him. He never knew nothin’ about nothin’ and you could tell him almost anything and get by with it. Finally I run out o’ junk to feed him and when I’d see him comin’ I’d pretend I was too busy to talk.

But one day, along last February, I looked up and seen him standin’ beside me, simply bubblin’ over with some big news.

“Well, Harry,” I says, “spill it.”

“You’re married, ain’t you?” he ast me.

I told him I was.

“Do you mind tellin’ me,” he says, “how much it costs to live when you got a wife?”

“Practically nothin’,” I says. “Everything’s so reasonable these days.”

“Why,” he says, “I been readin’ a lot about high prices, and so on.”

“That’s a lot o’ bunk,” I told him. “Beefsteak’s only forty cents a pound; and if you’re well acquainted round the neighborhood you can get a potato for half a buck. And you get a rate of about $6 apiece on shoes if you buy two at once.”

“Could a man and wife live on sixteen a week?” he says.

“Live!” says I. “You could wallow in luxury.”

“I’m glad to hear you say so,” he says. “Marion’s father and mother was afraid that maybe I wasn’t gettin’ enough to support her.”

“Who’s Marion?” I ast him.

“The sweetest girl in the world!” he says.

“But you don’t have to support her just on that account,” says I.

“I’m goin’ to marry her,” he says.

“What ails her?” I says.

“What do you mean⁠—what ails her?” he ast.

“Has she got a stigmatism or somethin’?” says I.

“No,” he says, “she comes from some o’ the best people. I never heard a word against any o’ them.”

“When was you figurin’ on gettin’ married to Marion?” I says.

“In April,” he says.

“Well,” says I, “maybe you’ll be drawin’ sixteen-fifty by that time, and then you’ll be on Easy Street.”

The next day he called again.

“Her mother and father’s fixed,” he says. “I told ’em what you said.”

“About the stigmatism?” says I.

“O’ course not,” he says. “I told ’em about the cost o’ livin’ bein’ all bunk.”

“Oh, you needn’t of told ’em that,” I says. “They probably knew it already. What did they say?”

“They says they seen it wasn’t no use to try and stop us,” says the kid; “but they insisted on us boardin’ with ’em for a while after we’re married.”

“Are you goin’ to do it?” I ast him.

“Sure,” he says. “We’ll board with ’em as long as they’ll keep us. Then Marion won’t be afraid while I’m here workin’.”

“Afraid o’ what?” I says.

“Gettin’ robbed,” says he.

“Well,” I says, “if I was Marion and married to you, that’s one thing I certainly would be scared to death of. Because, o’ course, you’ll keep all your savin’s in the kitchen cabinet.”

“I don’t expect we’ll have much savin’s at first,” he says.

“How much are they goin’ to soak you for board?” I ast him.

“Four dollars a week,” he says. “That includes three meals a day for Marion and two for me, and, o’ course, our lodgin’.”

“Either they are some o’ the best people,” says I, “or else they’re off their nut, or else they’s somethin’ about you that you leave home when you come to the office.”

He kept up his daily visits to me right along to the week o’ the ceremony. Four days before it was scheduled he ast me where I and my Missus had spent our honeymoon.

“Oh,” I says, “we spread ourself a little. We took in Niagara and Yellowstone and the Grand Canyon and the Canal, and wound up at Honolulu.”

“Goodness!” he says. “I couldn’t never afford that.”

“I couldn’t of, neither,” says I, “only for my father-in-law stakin’ us. He was a wealthy plumber in Wabash. But haven’t you thought about your honeymoon yet?”

“No,” he says; “I been too busy to think.”

“Busy with what?” I ast him.

“Bein’ in love,” he says, blushin’ prettily. “But do you know of any inexpensive trip we might take?”

“Sure!” I says. “The Theodore Roosevelt applies between here and Michigan City. You can go and come back the same day without entirely exhaustin’ a five-case note.”

“Oh, I want to go a little stronger’n that,” says he.

“Well,” I says, “why not hire a barge and drift down the drainage canal? Or rent a motorcycle with a tub on the side and bounce to Alton or East St. Louis?”

“I’m afraid o’ boats and I can’t ride a motorcycle,” says Quinn. “We was thinkin’ some o’ runnin’ over to Detroit and takin’ in some o’ the big factories.”

“I’ve heard ’em sing about honeymoons amongst the flowers,” says I, “and I suppose plants is just as good.”

“I and Marion’s both interested in machinery,” he says.

“Listen, then,” says I: “I got a friend that’s engineer on the Michigan Central and maybe he’ll let you ride the engine clear to Detroit.”

“That wouldn’t hardly do,” the kid says. “The dirt and grease and stuff’d spoil Marion’s new clothes.”

“Oh, that’s different, if she’s goin’ to have some new clothes,” I says.

“That reminds me,” says Quinn: “What is a man supposed to wear to get married?”

“It varies,” says I. “You wear somethin’ that’s appropriate to your father-in-law’s occupation. For instance, I was married in overalls and a jumper.”

“But Marion’s father’s retired,” says the kid.

“Take your choice, then,” says I, “between pyjamas and a nightgown.”

III

I was hopin’ that, in honor of his weddin’, Harry’d take at least a month off. But no; he was back amongst us in five days.

“Hello, there!” I says, shakin’ hands with him. “You didn’t take much of a trip.”

“The little girl got homesick,” says he.

“What little girl?” I says.

“My wife,” he says.

“Where was you?” I ast him.

“All over,” he says. “We went to Rockford first, and then Lake Geneva, and then Milwaukee and Kenosha.

“Which place made her homesick?” I ast.

“Oh, it wasn’t no particular place,” he says. “I guess it was when we was comin’ from Milwaukee to Kenosha; and she says, ‘Dearie, I wonder how father and mother’s gettin’ along.’ ‘Why, dearie?’ I ast her. ‘Well, dearie,’ she says, ‘you know this is the first time I ever been away from them for more’n two days, and they must be missin’ me.’ ‘Tell me the truth, dearie,’ I says to her. ‘Let’s not have no secrets from each other: Are you homesick yourself?’ So then she ’fessed up and says, ‘Well, dearie, I am, a little.’ So I says we would go straight home from Kenosha, but we better stop there, because I’d made reservations at the hotel; and besides, they got a big automobile works. She was tickled to death, and says, ‘Dearie, are you always goin’ to do what I want?’ So I told her she could just bet I was as long as I lived.”

“Do you ever call each other pet names?” I ast him.

“Sure, all the while,” he says. “I don’t think we’ve used our regular first names back and forth since we got engaged.”

“How many factories did you visit, all told?” I says.

“Oh, I couldn’t keep track o’ them all,” he says. “Besides, I don’t think neither one of us really paid any attention to them. We was thinkin’ of each other all the time.”

“Yes,” I says, “and probably figurin’ on some new pet name to spring. What was you doin’ when you wasn’t inspectin’ machinery?”

“Just walkin’ round, drinkin’ in the fresh air,” says Quinn.

“Did you drink in the breweries at Milwaukee?” says I.

“Drink!” he says. “We didn’t need no liquor; we got intoxicated just lookin’ into one another’s eyes.”

“I’ve looked in your eyes a lot o’ times,” I says, “without even feelin’ like I wanted to sing tenor.”

“You ought to see her eyes!” Quinn says. “They’d intoxicate you, all right.”

“She must have regular bourbon eyeballs,” says I. “If I ever do want a cheap jag I’ll come out and call.”

“We’d be tickled to death to have you,” he says. “Only, o’ course, not for a while. We want to be left entirely to ourselves for a few weeks.”

“I suppose that’s why you come home from Kenosha,” says I. “The townspeople there must of just bothered the life out of you.”

“Old man,” he says, “I do want you to see her. I got the sweetest wife in the world!”

“What’s your idear in tryin’ to get me dissatisfied?” I ast him.

“I don’t mean it that way,” says Quinn. “O’ course I suppose everybody likes their own wife best.”

“You’re a fine supposer,” I says. “If what you suppose was true, a whole lot o’ private detectives would starve to death.”

“Anyway,” he says, “I’ll never look at another woman.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that,” says I. “Just because you’ve made one girl happy is no reason all the rest o’ them should be miserable.”

The next mornin’ he was layin’ for me when I blew in.

“Old pal,” says he, “I wisht I had a job that would keep me home.”

“That makes it unanimous,” I says.

“It certainly is tough, havin’ to be away from her ten or eleven hours a day,” he says. “She’s the best little wife a man ever had!”

“If I was you,” says I, “I’d kind o’ keep that quiet. You might get overheard by some unscrup’lous homewrecker, and, first thing you know, he’d steal her.”

“He’d have to kill me first!” says Quinn.

“They’d never hang him for that,” says I.

“Besides,” he says, “they couldn’t nobody take her away from me. She’s as true as steel! She’s the best little wife a man ever had.”

Now I figured, o’ course, that this sort o’ thing would wear off. I’d had other acquaintances with the same symptoms, but they’d been cured by time, along with plenty of exercise and cuttin’ fats and starches out o’ their diet. In about a month, I thought, he’d be back to normal.

But no. May come and went and we was halfway through June, and no change for the better. For over seventy days, altogether, on an average o’ five times a day, I received the straight inside information that Mrs. Quinn was the best little wife a man ever had. It looked like he’d never get over thinkin’ it was news.

I’m not a nervous guy, as a rule. I take life easier than pretty near anybody I know. But I leave it to you if the calmest fella in the world wouldn’t be affected by a thing like that if it went on long enough.

It got so’s my hands begin to shake and my teeth begin to grind when I seen him comin’. And I’d wake up five and six times a night and start bitin’ the sheets. And a couple o’ times, in my sleep, I hollered out: “She’s the best little wife a man ever had!” My own Missus, all smiles, would tell me about it in the mornin’.

When I caught myself orderin’ a Swiss ess for lunch one noon, I figured it was time to take immediate steps. First, I thought o’ pickin’ a quarrel with him and tellin’ him to keep away from me. But it’d of been just like slappin’ a baby. Then I thought o’ quittin’ my job and lookin’ for another. But I’m in pretty soft where I’m at and I’ll be in better when a couple o’ the fossils dies off. O’ course I could of framed it so’s he’d get fired; but I’m too good-hearted to pull anything like that.

I knew it wasn’t only a question o’ time when she’d say somethin’ or do somethin’ that’d result in him bein’ able to look in her eyes without gettin’ stewed. When that come off, he might still think she was maybe the best little wife, but they’d be enough doubt about it so’s he’d keep it to himself. Considerin’, though, the thickness o’ the shell of his bean, this probably wouldn’t happen for a year or more; and by that time I’d be fightin’ with the guards and claimin’ I was the Kaiser’s sister.

I says to myself:

“If he only played poker! If I could only get him and her mixed up together in a game o’ deuces wild!”

But connectin’ him with any game o’ cards, even flinch or authors, seemed so ridiculous that I’d of dropped the idear entirely if he hadn’t give me the openin’ himself.

The mornin’ after I’d ordered the liquid lunch he says:

“I wonder if you could spare me eats money today?”

“I suppose so,” I says. “But where did you squander your week’s salary?”

“Oh,” he says, “we always put most of it in the savin’s bank, keepin’ just enough for my lunches and carfare and incidentals. But I was out o’ luck last night and the father-in-law trimmed me of a dollar and a half.”

“Doin’ what?” I ast.

“Playin’ rhummy,” says he.

“I didn’t know you played cards,” says I.

“We play every night,” he says.

“Always rhummy?” I ast him.

“Oh, no,” he says. “All the different kinds.”

“How about poker?” says I.

“No; not poker,” he says. “They’s only four of us and that don’t hardly make a good game. But I like it better’n any o’ them. Before I met Marion, I and some o’ the boys where I boarded had a little session o’ penny ante every other evenin’. Just a little friendly game, with deuces wild.”

“Does your wife play?” I ast.

“She knows how,” he says, “because I’ve showed her the value o’ the cards. She picks everything up quick.”

“Well,” I says, “if you two could make up your mind to leave home some night, we’d simply love to have you come out and get in our game.”

“Maybe your game’s too big,” says he.

“No, indeed,” I told him. “Just dime chips, with a twenty-cent limit.”

“That ain’t bad,” he says.

“I wisht you would come out,” says I. “I know from what you tell me about your wife that my Missus would be crazy over her. And besides, it’s a good thing for a young couple to get away from the house once in a while. And we don’t only live twenty minutes’ ride from your place.”

“By George!” he says. “I’ll ask Marion. For one thing, I want to show her to you.”

“I’m wild to see her,” says I. “Tomorrow night?”

“I’ll call her up and then let you know,” says he.

And in fifteen minutes it was fixed.

IV

Well, I didn’t give the plot away to the Missus. I just told her I wanted her to know a young friend o’ mine from the office, and that he was just married, and they didn’t know many people or go round much, so I thought it’d be nice to show ’em a good time. And, o’ course, we’d have a little friendly game, because Quinn was crazy about poker.

We decided to ask the Hatches and Tuttles, and the Missus was goin’ to look on from the sidelines, because eight’s too many. But, as luck would have it, the night we picked was the one when Mrs. Tuttle’s maid went out, and she had to stay home and take care o’ little Joe and Millicent. Big Joe, though, said he’d come alone.

Him and the Hatches was already there when Quinn and the best little wife a man ever had blew in. Now I always give people whatever they got comin’. Mrs. Quinn’s a mighty pretty girl. If I’d met her when we was both young and single, I might of fell in love with her myself, provided I hadn’t heard her talk. In the first place, she’s got a voice just like one o’ them air whistles that the flagman keeps pullin’ when they’re backin’ the Limited in. In the second place, all her conversation’s so sweet that when she winds up a sentence you feel like you got to eat a pickle. And besides that, she’s in the last and worst stage o’ giggleitis.

She tee-heed when she was introduced to Tuttle and the Hatches; and while, o’ course, they’s plenty o’ provocation for that, still, it’d be manners to try and keep a straight face. She laughed some more when she set down, and she pretty near had hysterics when Tuttle ast her if she’d lived here long. If she was a theater audience, you could put Frances Starr in this here play, Justice, and call it a minstrel show.

Well, the usual stallin’ was done, and then the Missus says:

“Maybe you folks’d like to play cards.”

“O’ course not,” I says. “We want to blow soap bubbles.”

“They’s seven of us here,” says Hatch. “Poker’s about the only game seven can play.”

“Oh, I adore poker!” says the bride, gigglin’. “Old sweetheart was learnin’ me the fine points of it last night.”

“Who’s old sweetheart?” I ast her.

“My own husband,” she says. “He told me we might play poker here tonight and he thought I better brush up my game.”

“We don’t play much of a game,” says the Missus. “Just ten-cent chips and a twenty-cent limit, and deuces wild in the jackpots.”

I didn’t make my speech on this occasion, because I’ve noticed that the wilder the deuces is, the wilder the women plays. So I says:

“To make it livelier, why not play nothin’ but jackpots and let the deuces run amuck all evenin’?”

The Missus looked at me like she thought I’d gone crazy.

“I thought that’s just what you didn’t like,” she says.

“I’m willin’ to sacrifice my own preferences,” says I. “I know the majority is against me.”

“I haven’t been in a real game for a long time, myself,” says Quinn, “and probably I won’t play very good. And we can’t afford to lose a whole lot. So, if luck runs against us, you won’t mind if we quit early.”

“Certainly not,” says Hatch.

“No fear,” I says. “You won’t never hear Hatch kickin’ about anybody quittin’, so long as they quit behind.”

We all moved to the dinin’ room table. Two chairs was brought in from the parlor and one from the kitchen, so’s none o’ the guests would have to stand. Proceedin’s was delayed while Cutie examined the wall paper and furniture.

“I think your apartment is dear!” she says.

“Thirty-five a month,” says I.

“Is that all!” she says. “Why, I and old honey boy could pretty near afford that.”

“But then you’d be left alone all day,” I says.

“Mother’d come over and stay with me,” she says; “and then, when it was time for old sweetheart to get back from the horrid old office, I’d send mother away so’s I could be alone with him.” She giggled some more.

“What are you laughin’ at?” I says. “I’m alone with him pretty near an hour every day and it’s no joke.”

“I’m afraid you’re a tease,” she says, and laughed so hard that she had to set down.

Hatch was passin’ out the checks.

“The usual number, eh?” he says.

“How many do you generally take?” ast Quinn.

“Twenty apiece; two dollars’ worth,” says Hatch.

“Mercy!” says Mrs. Quinn. “We don’t want that many. Dearie,” she says to her husband, “let’s just take twenty between us.”

So the Quinns’ original investment was two dollars, and so was Tuttle’s; while I and Hatch give up four each for ourself and lady.

“Remember, it’s all jacks,” I says, “and everybody’s got to ante every time.”

But when Tuttle started dealin’ they was only six checks in the center.

“Somebody decorate the mahogany,” says Hatch, just as if he didn’t know his wife was the slacker.

She happened to be busy smoothin’ her hair at the time and, o’ course, didn’t hear.

I didn’t have no deuce or nothin’, so I stayed out o’ the first pot. Mrs. Hatch tossed her cards face down, as usual. Quinn and his wife was settin’ next to each other, so’s they could hold hands durin’ the lulls. It was his turn after Mrs. Hatch, and he opened the pot.

“Oh, look, dearie!” says Marion. “I’ve got two tens and a jack and two deuces. Is that any good?”

“It’s good enough for me,” says Hatch, and throwed down a pat straight, face up.

My Missus and Tuttle passed, and Quinn gracefully yielded the pot to his bride.

“Goody!” she says, gigglin’. “Let’s see! I got eight checks more than I started with. That’s eighty cents. What can I get with eighty cents? Some stockin’s, maybe, if they’s a sale.”

“You might of got some for yourself and your husband, both,” I says, “if you hadn’t called your hand before Hatch had a chance to come in.”

“Didn’t I play right, dearie?” she says to Quinn.

“Sure, you did, dearie,” he says. “We don’t want to break nobody.”

“Wait,” I says to myself, “till they begin losin’ and he won’t take it so cheerful.”

It was my deal and again the pot was a dime shy.

“If somebody’s got to hold out their ante every time,” says I, “I should think it ought to be the host. I’m the baby that’s got to pay for the electric lights and the wear and tear, and the refreshments the Missus has cooked up.”

“Maybe I’m shy,” says Tuttle, winkin’ at me.

“I know I put in,” says Mrs. Hatch.

“That was last month,” I says.

“I don’t remember if I anteed or not,” says my Missus, and what does she do but come in again. And Mrs. Hatch never batted an eye.

Quinn opened this one.

“Shall I stay, dearie?” his honey girl ast him.

“I can’t advise you,” he says. “I’m in it myself.”

“Oh, I didn’t know you was in it,” she says. “O’ course I ain’t goin’ to play against my old sweetheart.”

She laid ’em down, face up. It was one o’ these here jump straights. You couldn’t of made a hand out of it if you’d drawed seven cards.

“I beg your pardon, Mrs. Quinn,” says I; “but, if old sweetheart hadn’t been in, what was you goin’ to hold up?”

“The seven and the nine,” she says. “We lived out on Seventy-ninth Street up to two years ago.”

Well, Hatch raised and the Missus and Tuttle and I all passed. Quinn raised Hatch right back. Hatch stood it and Quinn said he didn’t want no cards. Hatch took two. Quinn bet twenty cents and Hatch passed. Three jacks was what he throwed down. Quinn took the pot; and we wouldn’t of thought nothin’ of it, only Mrs. Quinn insisted on seein’ what Harry had. She looked ’em over carefully.

“What is it?” she says.

“A straight,” says Quinn.

“Oh, yes; sure!” she says, and showed ’em to all of us.

It wasn’t no more straight than a rabbit. Ace, deuce, four, five and six; that’s what she showed us.

I wish you could of seen Hatch. He went up a mile.

“Great stuff!” he says. “Very foxy! But you won’t get away with that very often. Wait a minute!” he says. “You couldn’t even open the pot.”

“Oh, yes, he could!” says I. “He had a pair of aces.”

“I thought sure I had a straight,” says Quinn. “I told you I was all out o’ practice.”

“Shut up!” says Hatch. “You thought nothin’!”

“Never mind the way he talks,” I says to Quinn. “He’s just jokin.”

“If I done somethin’ wrong, let’s play it over,” says Quinn; and that made Hatch all the sorer.

As a matter o’ cold facts, Quinn did think he had a straight. If Hatch had been as well acquainted with him as I was, he’d of knew he was incapable o’ trick stuff. Him and brains ain’t even stepbrothers.

On the next deal Mrs. Hatch passed out the whole fifty-two cards before we could stop her. When she mixed ’em up for another try, half o’ them was facin’ one way and half the other. She got ’em straightened out and then dealt only five hands. All o’ which added to her husband’s enjoyment o’ the evenin’. But we always allow for six minutes’ rest when she’s dealin’ and if her husband’s a winner he don’t notice the delay. But now he says:

“What the devil’s got into you? You better get a basket! You deal like you do everything else!”

“I told you this was just a friendly game,” says I to Quinn.

“You’re gettin’ smart too!” says Hatch to me.

“Listen, Jim!” I says. “Just because the kid made you lay down the best hand, with a little strategy, you don’t have to contract the hydrophobia and endanger the lives of hundreds o’ men, women and children. Didn’t you never run a bluff yourself?”

“Mind your own business!” says Hatch; and I could see that his wife was goin’ to have a pleasant trip home.

I don’t remember what happened when she finally did get seven hands dealt out right. But I do remember what come off on Quinn’s deal. I ought to.

Sweetness opened under the gun. My Missus and Tuttle stayed, and I tilted her with a four-straight flush. Mrs. Hatch was busy suppressin’ her tears and Quinn didn’t have nothin’. Mrs. Quinn just lingered, and so did the Missus and Tuttle.

“I don’t know how to draw,” says the bride. “I guess I’ll throw these three away and keep my two deuces.”

So she throwed three away; and, as usual, she throwed ’em face up. Her discards was the six, nine and ten o’ diamonds. She’d broke up a straight flush, pat. Even Quinn could see that when he noticed what she’d sloughed off; but her three new cards had already been dealt and they was nothin’ to be done, only feel sorry for her.

My wife and Tuttle each drawed to a pair and didn’t help. I had the three, four, and five o’ spades and a deuce, goin’ in. I catched the ten o’ spades, makin’ me a plain flush. Mrs. Quinn best and I raised. Actin’ on her husband’s advice, she raised back, and I called. She’d hooked three clubs to her two deuces, and my flush looked like last night’s supper dishes.

“Now,” says Hatch, “I guess that’ll hold you.”

“I ain’t goin’ to cry about it,” says I. “I can lose thirty or forty cents without breakin’ down entirely.”

Tuttle got his when Marion dealt. The Missus opened ahead of him and he just dallied. I quit and so did the silent partner on my left. Quinn stayed and his baby throwed hers in the ash heap, because she wouldn’t compete against him.

The Missus took three. Tuttle ast for one and Mrs. Quinn turned it over on him. It was a heart and he was drawin’ to four o’ them. He grabbed it and was goin’ to keep it.

“You can’t take that one,” says Hatch.

“Who says I can’t?” says Tuttle.

“That’s the rules,” says Hatch. “You can’t take no turned card on the draw.”

“Was it my fault she turned it?” says Tuttle.

“It don’t make no difference whose fault it was,” Hatch says. “The card was turned and you can’t take it.”

“I’m goin’ to take it,” says Tuttle.

“You take it and I quit,” says Hatch.

“I should worry if you quit!” says Tuttle. “You’re always makin’ up rules. You think you run every game you’re in; but you can’t run me.”

“Quinn,” I says, “I warned you this was just a little friendly game.”

Well, the pair o’ them almost come to blows; but finally Hatch convinced him that he couldn’t take the card. We’d always played that way.

And then what does Mrs. Quinn do but turn over another one; and it was another heart!

Ten minutes’ intermission, durin’ which Tuttle got his hat on and started home, and had to be coaxed back. The card he finally got was a club and Quinn copped the pot.

“I and the little girl’s certainly goin’ some,” he says. “I guess we’re rotten at this game!”

“Your guess is right!” says Tuttle. “You play like a boob, you and your wife both!”

Quinn give him a maddenin’ smile and sweetheart made it worse by gigglin’.

Mrs. Hatch lost her head on the next one and opened it for twenty cents, half cash. The Quinns couldn’t stick and the rest of us faded away. They’s no use participatin’ when Mrs. Hatch opens. If they’s anything better’n a royal flush, she’s got it.

At eleven o’clock I still had my temper and about ninety cents. At three minutes after eleven I didn’t have neither.

It was Mrs. Quinn’s deal. Hatch opened. I set there with four cold treys. My Missus stayed and Tuttle stayed, and I raised twenty cents. Mrs. Hatch and the bride and groom passed. Hatch raised me back and the Missus dropped out. Tuttle stuck and I raised again. We raised a couple o’ times more. Then Hatch called me.

He was pat. I ast for one. Hatch bet me twenty cents and I was just goin’ to come back at him when I happened to look at my hand. I had six cards; the world’s greatest wife had wrecked me with two cards when I called for one!

I guess I probably raved. I didn’t light into the guests of honor. That wouldn’t of been polite. But what I said to the Missus and Hatch and Tuttle and Mrs. Hatch was ample. And Hatch and Tuttle egged me on.

“Your own fault!” says Hatch. “You ought to of protected your hand.”

“You was a sucker to draw at all,” says Tuttle. “It’d of been poker to of stood pat.”

“You’re a fine team to tell anybody how to play poker!” says I. “You,” I says to Tuttle, “you got as much license to win in any game o’ skill as I have to play Hamlet. And you,” I says to Hatch, “you wouldn’t never break even, only for your wife goin’ shy in every pot.”

“Don’t talk like that, dearie,” says the Missus.

“And don’t you call me ‘dearie’!” I says. “The best thing you can do is keep still!”

I said a whole lot more; and when I got through, Mrs. Quinn was laughin’ herself hoarse. Her bein’ a stranger was all that saved her from a spankin’.

At half past eleven the Quinns says somethin’ about goin’ home.

“Sure!” says Hatch. “You’re ’way winners. Sneak off, like a couple o’ pikers.”

“Oh, you mustn’t go yet!” says the Missus. “I got some sandwiches and coffee for you. We’ll stop playin’ right now and I’ll go out and get ’em.”

“You will not!” says I. “We’ll quit playin’ when we get a good ready.”

“But if Mr. and Mrs. Quinn has to go home,” she says, “we mustn’t keep ’em.”

“We won’t keep ’em,” I says. “Let ’em go home.”

And Mrs. Quinn giggled again.

If they was any diplomatic relations left between my wife and I, they was severed in the last few minutes o’ play. Hatch had suggested that we’d ought to raise the limit to half a buck. Mrs. Hatch and the Quinns and my Missus objected. Tuttle and I was for it. So the limit was raised to half a buck.

Mrs. Quinn opened a certain pot. Hatch raised half a dollar. My Missus had three queens. She just lingered. If she’d raised, Mrs. Quinn would of quit cold. But after the love birds had consulted a while she decided to stand Hatch’s tilt. She drew one card. Hatch took two; and somethin’ told me, while he was drawin’, that a pair was all he had. The Missus took a couple and didn’t help her queens.

Mrs. Quinn checked it. That’s somethin’ she’d just learned. Hatch shoved in five chips. I could see the Missus waverin’ and I was sure certain that she had Hatch trimmed. So I nudged her to call. She looked at me and I nodded my head. And then she tossed her hand away.

There was some whisperin’ between the dearies. It lasted two or three minutes. Then Mrs. Quinn called.

I’d been right about Hatch. I gathered his hand up from where he’d threw it, against the far wall. Two bullets was all he had. And the sweet young bride, with Harry’s full knowledge and consent, had called on fours and treys.

The final reckonin’ showed that Mrs. Hatch was seventy cents to the bad, beatin’ her former record by thirty cents. Hatch had lost seven bucks, Tuttle’d dropped six, and I and the Missus eight between us. The Quinns was about twenty-one dollars ahead and still speakin’ to each other; yes, and takin’ bites out of each other’s sandwiches.

“Well,” says Mrs. Quinn when they was ready to go, “we’ve certainly enjoyed this a whole lot and you was awful kind to have us over.”

“It was sweet o’ you to come,” says the Missus.

“You’ll have to come to our house sometime,” says Mrs. Quinn. “Maybe we’ll let you win some o’ that twenty-one dollars back. Won’t we, dearie?”

“I almost feel like givin’ it back now,” says her spouse.

Tuttle whispered in my ear.

“Get ’em out o’ here before I break some o’ your furniture over their bean!”

But, before they beat it, each one of us got a giggle and a few squeaks and a dainty handclasp from the fair one.

Hatch and his wife left right after ’em, Jim’s mouth all ready and open to begin ruthless warfare. Tuttle was the sad one. He had to wait till he got clear home before abusin’ anybody, and they was danger of his wife havin’ fell asleep.

As for the Missus and I, it only took me a half hour to bring her to tears; and then, o’ course, the sport was over.

V

I told you a while ago that if men seen their wives play poker before they was married they wouldn’t be married. Well, I believe that even if Mrs. Quinn had showed off her knowledge o’ the game to Harry when they was still engaged yet, he’d of gone through with it, anyway. He wouldn’t knew no better. He’s an exception to the rule, and to every other rule in the book.

Listen to what he had to say when he stormed my desk next mornin’:

“Did you ever see a girl like her! The first time she ever really played, and she cops most o’ the dough! I never seen anybody that picked things up so quick.”

“She certainly picked up most o’ the change,” says I.

“Old man,” he says, “she’s a wonder! The best little wife a man ever had!”

So my hands is still shakin’ and my teeth’s still grindin’, and I bite the sheets at night. The grand old game has failed me and Dame Nature’s workin’ far too slow. I must think up somethin’ else; somethin’ swift, sure, fatal!