Lying on the Couch (44 page)

A lot of money was being bet on the hand. Marshal started to edge closer to the table for a better look when Dusty, the pit boss, a sandy-haired, cigarillo-smoking, Alan Ladd look-alike who needed no assertiveness training whatsoever, strode briskly over and looked Marshal up and down, focusing especially on his air-inflatable basketball sneakers.

"Hey buddy boy," he said to Marshal, "what are you doing here? Halftime?"

"Watching," Marshal replied, "until my friend gets here and then we plan to play."

"Watching? You gotta be kidding! You think you can just stand here and watch? Ever think about how the players might feel about it? See, we worry about feelings here! What's your name?"

"Marshal."

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"Okay, Marshal, when you're ready to play, come to me and I'll put your name on the waiting list. All the tables are full now."

Dusty started to walk away, but then turned back and smiled: "Hey, glad to have you here, Sheriff. No kidding. Welcome to Avocado Joe's. But, meanwhile, until you play, you want to do something, anything . . . don't do it. Come to me first. If you want to watch, go back there," he instructed, gesturing toward the distant gallery behind a glass partition, "or the Asian room—go there; plenty of action and it's hip to watch."

As he walked away. Marshal heard Dusty say to one of the dealers leaving a table for a break: "He wants to watch! Can you believe it.^ Surprised he didn't bring his camera!"

Feeling sheepish. Marshal stepped back unobtrusively into the gallery and surveyed the scene. At the center of each ten-player table sat the dealer, dressed in the house uniform of dark trousers and bright floral vest. Every few minutes Marshal saw the winner of each hand toss the dealer a chip, which the dealer clicked crisply on the table before dropping it into his inner vest pocket. A custom. Marshal figured out, meant to signal to the floor manager that the dealer was putting his personal tip money, rather than house money, into his pocket. It was an archaic custom, of course, since the action at each table was being fully televised for later scrutiny if any irregularities arose. Ordinarily not a sentimental man. Marshal welcomed this one tiny obeisance to ritual in Avocado Joe's fast-paced click-clacking temple of materialistic expediency.

At the onset of each hand of Texas Hold 'em, three of the ten players, in rotation, were forced to ante. The dealer divided the ante into three parts: one part stayed in the hand, one part was deposited into the house slot—that was the house rental fee for the game—and the third went into the jackpot slot, which, according to a wall poster, was paid when someone had a hand that could beat a full boat of aces over tens. The jackpot was in the neighborhood of ten thousand dollars, most of which went to the winner and the second-best hand, but some of which was shared by the other players at the table. Every twenty minutes or so the dealer took a break and a replacement took over. Marshal saw players who had done well during a dealer's shift slip him a few extra chips as he was going on his break.

Marshal coughed and tried to fan some of the cigarette smoke away from his nostrils. Wearing a gym suit to Avocado Joe's was

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ironic, since the casino was a shrine to bad health. Everyone looked unhealthy. All around him were sallow, shadowy faces. Many of the players had been at it ten or fifteen consecutive hours. Everyone was smoking. The flesh of several obese individuals poured through the slats in their chairs. Two anorexic waitresses flitted by, each fanning herself with an empty tray; several players had miniature electric fans set before them to blow away the smoke; a number of players wolfed down food as they played—shrimp with jellied lobster sauce was the dinner special. Dress code was casual-bizarre: one man with a scrag-gly white beard wore Turkish slippers with curled, pointed toes and a red fez; there were others with hefty cowboy boots and monstrous Stetsons; someone was in a Japanese sailor suit, circa 1940; many were in blue-collar work clothes; and several elderly women wore tidy, floral, 1950s-style dresses, buttoned up to the chin.

Everywhere, gambling talk. Couldn't get away from it. Some talked about the California state lotto; Marshal heard someone entertaining a small group by describing how the El Camino stakes had been won that afternoon by a ninety to one long shot who finished the race on three legs. Nearby, Marshal saw a man give a roll of bills to his girlfriend and say, "Remember, no matter what I do, no matter what—if I beg, threaten, curse, cry, whatever—tell me to fuck off, knee me in the balls, use your karate if you have to. But don't give this roll back to me! This is our Caribbean holiday. Run outta here and take a taxi home first." Another yelled to the floor manager to put the Shark's hockey game on. There were a dozen TV sets, each showing a different basketball game, each surrounded by clients who had action on that game. Everyone was betting on something.

Marshal's Rolex showed five minutes before eight. Mr. Merriman was due to arrive momentarily and Marshal decided to wait for him in the restaurant, a small, smoky room dominated by a large oak bar. Imitation Tiffany glass everywhere: lamps, ashtrays, glass cabinets, panels. One corner of the room housed a pool table around which a large crowd of betting spectators watched an intense game of eight ball.

The food was as unhealthy as the air. No salads on the menu; Marshal studied the offerings again and again, searching for the least toxic dish. The anorexic waitress responded only "Huh?" when Marshal inquired about the possibility of steamed veggies. And "Huh" again when he asked about the type of oil used in the

shrimp and lobster sauce. Finally he ordered roast beef without gravy and sHced tomatoes and lettuce—the first beef he had had in years, but at least he would know what he was eating.

"Hey, Doc, how ya doin'? Hey, Sheila," Shelly said as he bounced in, blowing a kiss to the waitress, "bring me whatever the Doc's eating. He knows what's good. But don't forget the gravy." He leaned over to the next table and shook hands with a diner reading the racing form. "Jason, do I have a horse for you! Del Mar derby in two weeks. Save up. I'm gonna make you rich—and all your descendants, too. Catch you later; got some business with my pal here."

This was definitely his element. Marshal thought. "You look buoyant tonight, Mr. Merriman. Good tennis tournament?"

"The best. You're breakin' bread with half the California doubles championship team! But, yeah, I'm feeling good. Doc, thanks to tennis, thanks to my friends, and thanks to you."

"So, Mr. Merriman ..."

"Shh, Doc. None of this 'Mr. Merriman.' Gotta blend in. Gotta pass. 'Shelly' here. 'Shelly' and 'Marshal'—okay?"

"Okay, Shelly. Shall we proceed with our agenda tonight? You were going to brief me about my duties. I need to tell you that I have patients starting early tomorrow morning, so I can't stay till all hours. Remember: two-and-a-half-hour limit, a hundred and fifty minutes, and I'm off."

"Got ya. Let's get to work."

Marshal nodded as he cut away every nodule of fat from the roast beef, made a sandwich, covered it with sliced tomato and wilted lettuce, poured on ketchup, and munched while Shelly outlined the evening's activities.

"You read the booklet I gave you on Texas Hold 'em?

Marshal nodded again.

"Good. Then you understand enough to get by on. Mainly all I want is for you to know enough not to call attention to yourself. I don't want you to focus on your own cards, and I don't want you to play: I want you to watch me. Now there's a twenty-forty-dollar table coming open soon. Here how it works: the ante rotates—three guys have to put up money each hand. One guy puts up five dollars—that's called the 'butt' and that's the house cut: the rental on the table and the dealer. Another guy, the 'blind,' puts up twenty dollars. The guy next to him, the 'double blind,' puts up ten bucks. Capisce so far?"

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"Does that mean," Marshal asked, "the twenty-dollar guy then gets to see the flop without putting more money?"

"Right. Unless there's a raise. That means you've paid for the flop and should get to see it once a round. There'll probably be nine players—so once every nine hands. The other eight you fold— do not call the first bet. I repeat, Doc, do not. This means that on every round you'll have to ante up three times for a total of thirty-five bucks. The entire round of nine hands should take about twenty-five minutes. So you should lose seventy bucks an hour, max. Unless you do something stupid and try to play a hand.

"You want out in two hours?" Shelly continued, as the waitress brought his roast beef floating in rich gravy. "Tell you what. Let's play for an hour and thirty or forty minutes and then talk for a half-hour after. I've decided to cover all your losses—I'm feeling generous today—so here's a hundred bucks." He fished a hundred-dollar bill out of his wallet.

Marshal took the bill. "Let's see . . . one hundred . . . does that compute?" He took out a pen and scribbled on the napkin. "Thirty-five dollars every twenty-five minutes, and you want to play for an hour and forty minutes—a hundred minutes. That comes out to one hundred forty dollars. Right?"

"Okay, okay. Here's another forty. And, here, here's a couple hundred more—a loan, only, for the evening. Best to buy three hundred worth of chips to start with—it looks better, won't call attention to yourself as a local yokel. You'll cash 'em in when we leave."

Shelly continued, wolfing down his roast beef and gravy-soaked bread. "Now listen carefully. Doc: if you lose more than one hundred forty, you're on your own. 'Cause the only way that can happen is to play your cards. And I wouldn't advise that—these guys are good. Most of 'em play three, four times a week—many of them make their living doing this. Plus, if you play your cards, you can't watch what I'm doing. And that's the point of this caper. Right?"

"Your book," said Marshal, "says there are certain treasure hands that should see the flop every time: high pairs, ace-king same suit."

"Shit, no. Not on my time. After I leave, Doc, you have a ball. Play all you want."

"Why your time?" Marshal asked.

"Because I'm paying all your antes to see all those cards. And besides this is still my official therapy time—even though it's the last session."

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Marshal nodded. "Well, I guess so."

"No, no, wait. Doc. I see where you're coming from. Who understands better than me how hard it is to fold a good hand? That would be cruel and unusual punishment. Let's compromise. Any time your first two cards are a pair of aces, kings, or queens, you call the bet to see the flop. If the flop doesn't improve your hand—that is, if you don't hit three of a kind or two pair on the flop— then you fold: you do not see another bet. And then, of course, we go fifty-fifty on any winnings."

"Fifty-fifty?" asked Marshal. "Is it legal for players at the same table to split winnings? And are we fifty-fifty on any losses I incur?"

"Okay. Right. I'm feeling generous—you keep any winnings but you must agree to play only pairs of aces, queens, or kings. Fold every other hand. Even ace-king same suit! Do it any other way and the losings are all yours. We okay now?"-

"Okay."

"Now let's talk about the main thing—the reason you're here. I want you to watch me when I bet. I'm going to bluff a lot tonight, so watch to see if I give it away with some kind of 'tell'—you know, the kind of stuff you picked up in your office: foot moving, stuff like that."

A few minutes later Marshal and Shelly heard their names called on the loudspeaker to join the twenty-forty game. Everyone welcomed them courteously. Shelly greeted the dealer, "How ya doin', Al? Here, give me five hundred bucks of those round ones and take good care of my friend here—a beginner—I'm trying to corrupt him, and I need your help."

Marshal bought three hundred dollars' worth of chips—a stack of red five-dollar chips and a stack of blue-and-white-striped twenty-dollar chips. On the second hand Marshal was the "blind"—he had to bet twenty dollars on the two down cards and got to see the flop: three small spades. Marshal held two spades—a two and a seven— and thus had a flush on five cards. And the next up card, fourth street, was also a low spade. Marshal, dazzled by his flush, defied Shelly's instructions and stayed in for the rest of the hand, twice calling forty-dollar bets. At the end of the hand all the players turned their cards over. Marshal displayed his two and seven of spades and proudly said, "Flush." But three other players had higher flushes.

Shelly leaned over and said, as gently as possible, "Marshal, four spades in the flop—that means everyone holding even one spade has

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a flush. Your six spades are no better than anyone else's five spades, and your seven of spades is bound to get beaten by some higher spade. Why did you think the other players stayed in the betting? Always ask yourself that. They've got to have flushes! At this rate, my friend, I calculate you will lose approximately nine hundred dollars an hour of your" —Shelly emphasized "your"—"hard-earned money."

Overhearing these comments, one of the players who had been counting his chips—a tall black man wearing a gray Borsalino and a Rolex on his wrist—said, "Man, ah was about to cash in and check out... get some sleep . . . but. . . hmm, dude's playing seven-high flush ... ah just might stick around some longer."

Marshal reddened at the attention, and the dealer said in a soothing manner, "Don't let 'em get to you. Marshal. I got a feeling you'll get on to it reeaalll soon—and when you do, you're going to kick some ass." As Marshal was to learn, a good dealer was a group therapist manque and could always be counted on to soothe feelings and offer support: table tranquillity always meant greater tips.

After that Marshal played conservatively and folded every hand. A few good-natured jibes came his way for playing so tight, but Shelly and the dealer defended him and urged patience until he got the hang of it. Then, a half-hour later, he held a pair of aces and the flop was an ace and pair of deuces, giving him an aces full boat. Not many players called him on his hand, but still Marshal collected a two-hundred-fifty-dollar pot. The rest of the time Marshal watched Shelly like a hawk, occasionally jotting discreetly in a small notepad. No one seemed to mind his taking notes except a small Asian woman, almost completely hidden by towering stacks of winning chips, who stretched up, leaned over her pile of black-and-white twenty-dollar chips, and said to Marshal, gesturing toward his notepad, "And don't forget, a big straight beats a little teeny full boat! Hee-hee-hee."