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would
be: what are you doing here in this state? But he didn´t do that.
She was right, it had nothing to do with him. He helped her sit
down. Judith accepted the favor without looking at him directly,
almost as if she was embarrassed.
    “ I thought the same as you.” Dante said.
“But we need her here so all of this has a little style. Don´t try
and be a gentleman with her. Just concentrate on what we´ve come
here to do.”
    Alvaro was losing his temper with Dante. He
would have liked to tell the bald old bastard what he could do with
his advice, but he kept it in check.
    “ Of course.” He said forcing a smile, as he
sat down on the empty chair and put the packet that was in the
center of the table in his hands. “Well, let´s begin.”
    He undid the wrapping, took the cards out of
their wooden box and began to shuffle. “Let´s play poker!”
     
     
    * * * * *
     
     

CHAPTER THREE
     
     
    “Why are you dealing?” Dante asked.
“Shouldn´t we draw for the highest card?”
    Alvaro smiled, knowing why Dante was
complaining. He wanted to show how powerful he was, to stamp his
authority right from the beginning, to intimidate them. A lot of
gamblers did that. He´d met plenty of them.
    “Of course.” Alvaro answered. “You´re right.
I´m a little nervous, that´s all. I´m glad you brought it up. All
of us want a fair game.”
    He pushed the pack of cards across to Dante.
The old man cut the pack in two and Alvaro put it back together
again and slid it across to the centre of the table. He invited
them all to choose a card with an elegant wave of the hand.
    Dante turned the king of hearts over. Judith
sat up straighter on the chair, her stomach resting on the edge of
the table, stretching her arm out. Alvaro pushed the cards towards
her. She looked so weak and defenseless. She pulled a seven of
diamonds out.
    “Eh, you!” Dante shouted gruffly. “How about
paying attention to the game?”
    It was almost as if Hector hadn´t heard him.
He was still looking at the girl.
    “ Say something to that
stinkpot ” Dante told
Alvaro. “If he doesn´t want to play. . .”
    Hector extended his arm without taking his
eyes off the little girl. He turned the top card over. He didn´t
even bother to look at the five of spades.
    Alvaro turned another five over, then
collected the cards together and gave them to Dante.
    “Your deal.”
    Dante began to shuffle. Alvaro and Judith
studied the circular plastic chips in three colors that were piled
in front of them. Most were red, quite a lot green, and a few
yellow.
    “I can see that red is worth less.” Judith
said, thinking aloud.
    Alvaro ran his hand over his pile and looked
at Judith, intrigued. “Exactly, and the yellow chips are worth the
most.”
    He didn´t know how she´d come to that
conclusion. But there was little doubt that she was right. He´d
been playing poker all his life. The value of the chips was clear.
It was impossible to confuse their respective value. And looking at
them piled in front of him he thought back to the operating
theatre, and remembered his urgent need to get to this table and
play this game. He knew the same thing had happened to the
rest.
    “Let´s play the first hand.” Dante said
dealing the cards.
    “Good luck.” Alvaro said, running his eye
around the table.
    Nobody answered.
    Dante finished dealing quickly as if he was
anxious to start.
    Alvaro picked his cards up but didn´t pay
them the least attention. He pretended to study them while he took
discrete glances at his opponents. He knew almost straight away
that none of them were professional. The way they held their cards
was proof enough of that. He´d been playing poker for more than ten
years, had sat at more serious tables than this, competed twice in
international championships, seen his fair share of poker
faces.
    Dante still looked tense, even though he was
trying to cover it up. Judith was obviously nervous, her long, thin
fingers trembling. Hector was harder to