The Hell of It Read Online Free PDF Page A

bowl. “Then a cardsharp. Winning drinks in dock taverns.” The man shook his head at his own conjecture. “No, else you’d have two thin plugs to rub together. Must be a new life you plan to win. But with what?”
    The straw-boss lit his pipe and after chuffing several thick, sweet-smelling clouds of smoke, fell into quiet appraisal of Malen.
    One last time, he squeezed Marta’s nice things, and then untied them from his belt and stepped up to the table. Before explaining, he put out a hand, to shake, to have a sense of the straw-boss’s honor. Decent gamblers took a hand when it was offered. And the grip told you plenty about their intentions. This straw-boss stood. That was a good sign. And his grip: not too firm as to be compensating for something he might conceal; not too brief either, the way a man shakes when he’s already scheming in his head.
    â€œI’m Gynedo, straw-boss here on the River Queen . And you are?”
    â€œMalen.” And fully met, he gently emptied the bag on the table between them.
    Gynedo looked down, puzzlement rising in his face. “The exchanger—”
    â€œWould have robbed me blind on value,” Malen interrupted. “Which in these … isn’t obvious to the exchanger’s eye.”
    The man sat back down, gesturing for Malen to do the same. He puffed at his pipe. “Explain it to me, then.”
    So he did. He quietly gave the history of each item, why it was important to him, why it was important to his son, Roth. He exaggerated (a little) how much he’d miss these things if he were to lose them.
    â€œâ€¦ because here’s what I think,” Malen concluded. “You don’t need another thin plug. Or a thousand. Or even another River Queen .” He gestured around him to indicate the boat. “You don’t play to win anymore. You play to see others lose. You play for the grip a won-wager gives you over your opponent. You play for the value of the thing not to yourself, but to the player who loses it to you. You relish the toll it takes on them.” He paused, staring intently into Gynedo’s eyes. “Tell me I’m wrong.”
    After a long moment, the straw-boss smiled again. “And how should I counter bet? What do I put up against a used pen set that a would-be poetess never had the chance to use?”
    â€œThey are everything to me,” Malen answered evasively, looking down at Marta’s four nice things.
    â€œAnd the game you’d have us play?” The tone in the straw-boss’s voice sounded the way Malen did when he was placating Roth on some trivial request.
    â€œDouble Draw will do,” Malen suggested casually, though in truth it was his best game.
    Gynedo sat still for several moments, looking from the items on the table to Malen and back. And for all the man’s ability to keep a bettor’s expression, it was clear he was intrigued. Malen had in all likelihood just proposed a game (not the plack deal itself, but the stakes) that opened a new way for the man to take a thrill again from games of chance he’d clearly mastered long ago.
    â€œYou like your chances, then?”
    â€œI’m not wet, am I?” Malen said, referring to the joke of plungers thrown overboard. He then offered the first smile of his own.
    With an enthusiasm he guessed the straw-boss hadn’t felt in a very long time, the man said eagerly, “Let’s play.”
    Gynedo pulled out a fowl deck with which to play their hands of Double Draw. It added a layer of difficulty to the game. These plackards had been painted with the semblances of birds, each plack bearing one of five: quail, crane, grebe, vulture, and magpie. And each bird had one wing tucked neatly against its side, while the other was raised high, a clear number of feathers on display—one to twelve, to be exact.
    Games played with fowl decks, though, weren’t straight pairing games. With