Thomas Ochiltree (26 page)

“The bank feels like recuperating its energy with a little champagne,” Wroclinski said, “and champagne this good demands one’s full attention. Perhaps my friend Captain von Falkenburg could fill in for me, if you gentlemen do not object. The Captain is a player of renown.” Von Falkenburg had told him of his desire to play with von Lauderstein.

Von Lauderstein glared at von Falkenburg with hate-filled eyes. Von Falkenburg could see struggle within him the desire for revenge at what he falsely believed was von Falkenburg’s abduction of Hanna, and the realization that whatever his reason for being here, von Falkenburg could not be up to any good.

“Normally, I would be honored,” he said slowly. “But I have business which makes it difficult for me to stay. However, one consideration could induce me to do so.”

“And what is that, Colonel?” von Falkenburg asked.

“I believe you are well acquainted with a female singer named Adèle d’Églantine,” von Lauderstein continued, clearly exerting all the self-control in his possession. “I would be willing to play with you if you could do me the favor of introducing me to her – in the company of a third party, of course.”

Von Falkenburg thought for a moment. He did not think Hanna – who was still voluntarily in hiding with Helena – would wish to go back to von Lauderstein. But if von Lauderstein had a chance to meet with her, it would hardly be possible to keep him believing that she was being held captive. Von Falkenburg’s only real hold on him – namely that belief – would be broken.

That was one side of the question. The other was that von Falkenburg knew he simply
had
to get von Lauderstein to agree to play with him.

“I tell you what, Colonel,” von Falkenburg said, “let’s make a side bet. If you can win five thousand crowns between now and midnight, I will introduce you to the young lady under the conditions you set. If you fail to do so, you will pay me an additional thousand crowns.”

“Done!” said von Lauderstein through clenched teeth.

“I say,” von Plugge remarked, “must be quite a girl for an introduction to her to be worth that kind of money. I suppose you don’t mind if I continue to make a third?”

“Not at all,” von Falkenburg said, “although the offer regarding the young lady applies only to the colonel.” Even though baccarat was a three-handed game, it was important to keep this evening to a confrontation between himself and von Lauderstein.

“Oh, very well,” von Plugge said with a touch of disappointment in his voice, for he was clearly intrigued by strange bet. “But midnight really will have to be the end of play.”

“Let’s get on with it, then,” von Lauderstein said. “The bank has retired. I believe that it is my honor to replace it.”

Von Lauderstein set up a large bank. Putzi’s money? von Falkenburg wondered. Wroclinski stood nearby, sipping a glass of Moët et Chandon.

Von Plugge put in a large stake. Von Falkenburg did likewise.

The cards were dealt.

“Natural,” von Falkenburg said, turning over his hand and showing a five and a four – which together totaled a perfect nine.

Von Lauderstein was unable to restrain his lips from curling back to reveal his teeth as his money was shoveled in the direction of von Falkenburg.

That was an easy win, von Falkenburg realized, and one which he could by no means count on repeating in the future. But psychologically, it had its use. The more enraged von Lauderstein was, the worse he would probably play.

The game sawed back and forth for a number of hands, with von Lauderstein slowly losing and von Plugge and von Falkenburg gradually adding to the piles of glittering gold coins in front of them. Von Plugge had a waiter bring more champagne and he offered it to the other two. Von Lauderstein drank thirstily, which pleased von Falkenburg. But von Plugge sipped with moderation.

“Carte,”
von Falkenburg said. He already had a four and an ace. From the standpoint of the odds, it was essentially an even chance whether he drew or stood.

Von Lauderstein dealt him a deuce. That made a total of seven, only two points away from the perfect nine. Not a bad hand at all.

“Content,”
von Plugge said.

Von Lauderstein dealt himself a card – an eight. Von Falkenburg heard him suck his breath in.

“Seven,” von Falkenburg said, turning over his other two cards.

“Likewise,” von Plugge said.

Without a word, von Lauderstein turned over his two face-down cards. They were both sevens. He had gone over nineteen by three points, which mean his hand was counted against the equivalent twenty-nine, from which it was separated by seven points.

The money was shoveled in the direction of von Falkenburg and von Plugge. Wroclinski had placed a bet
à cheval
and collected. Only the bank – von Lauderstein – had lost. It had been a heavy betting hand, and von Lauderstein’s declared bank was now depleted.

“I believe it is the Baron’s turn to bank, unless he would be kind enough to let me have that honor,” von Falkenburg said.

“I have no objection to your setting up a bank, Captain,” von Plugge replied. That came as no surprise to von Falkenburg, for von Plugge was clearly a cautious player as well as a good one.

Von Lauderstein won the first hand of von Falkenburg’s
coup,
shared the second with von Falkenburg against von Plugge, and won the third outright.

He was betting heavily in his impatience to reach the five thousand crowns total winnings that would get him a chance to see Hanna. Already there were over a thousand crowns in front of him.

Triumphant, he ordered more champagne. He gulped down three glasses of the stuff in quick succession.

Von Falkenburg hoped that that would make his play more erratic, but von Lauderstein won the next hand, too – a big one.

To his growing horror, von Falkenburg realized that luck was with von Lauderstein, sitting perched on his shoulder, whispering in his ear how to play his cards, magically summoning the numbers he needed from the shoe.

Von Falkenburg was anything but superstitious. But he had been in enough card games to know that however inexplicable it may be from a scientific point of view, the “run of luck” exists in the card room as surely as anything exists on earth.

It seemed to von Falkenburg as if the room was growing hot. Whether from the lights, or from his own nervous energy, he did not know. He could not resist downing a glass of champagne at one swallow. It was cool and delicious, and it took his remaining reserve of self-control to keep from accepting another.

“Carte,”
von Lauderstein said.

“Carte.”
That was von Plugge.

Von Falkenburg glanced at his hand. The cards totaled six. Laudertstein had drawn a ten. Von Falkenburg decided to stand.

Von Lauderstein had a total of seventeen points, von Plugge, six. That meant von Lauderstein was only two points from nineteen, while von Plugge and von Falkenburg were each separated by three points from the equivalent nine. It was von Lauderstein’s hand.

The money was shoved towards von Lauderstein. He added it to the neat piles of fifty-crown pieces he had in front of him which represented his winnings since the start of play with von Falkenburg in the game. Von Falkenburg could see that there were ten coins in each pile. And there were – von Falkenburg counted them rapidly – eight piles. Von Lauderstein had four thousand crowns in front of him.

Von Plugge placed a two hundred crown bet. But von Falkenburg knew what von Lauderstein would do, now that only a thousand crowns separated him from Hanna, and only a thousand crowns remained in von Falkenburg’s bank.

“Va banque,”
von Lauderstein said.

The croupier shoved von Plugge’s coins back to him. Von Lauderstein was betting against everything left in the bank, which meant that all other bets had to be withdrawn.

This hand could decide it, then, von Falkenburg realized. If von Lauderstein won, he would have gone well over the five thousand crowns he needed.

Von Falkenburg looked at Wroclinski, curious in spite of everything to see if his friend could maintain his legendary imperturbability in such a moment. It was not comforting for von Falkenburg to see that for the first time in the years he had known Wroclinski his friend’s face showed just the faintest trace of concern.

That could only signify profound worry, von Falkenburg knew. Worry for him, as Wroclinski had no money riding on the hand.

Von Falkenburg took the shoe and began to deal. It required a little effort to keep his hand steady, but he succeeded in doing so.

Von Lauderstein stood.

Von Falkenburg looked at his hand. It totaled sixteen.

Now for the decision. If he made the wrong choice, it was all over.

Logically, he knew, he should stand. Any card higher than a three would put him over nineteen.

Logically…logically…. But what did logic have to do with it, he realized. He looked across the table at von Lauderstein. The man was almost exploding with excitement and impatience. There was no doubting the look of triumph on von Lauderstein’s face. That could only mean that he had a very good hand: a better hand than a mediocre six or sixteen such as von Falkenburg.

Which meant, von Falkenburg realized, that he
had
to draw to have any hope of beating von Lauderstein, even though the odds were two to one against his getting the card he needed as opposed to getting a card which would put him disastrously over nineteen. Only an ace, deuce or trey would do. Four, five, six, seven, eight nine would spell catastrophe, because they would mean his hand’s value would depend on its closeness to twenty-nine, but would place it farther from twenty-nine than it now was from the equivalent nineteen. Only a ten would be harmless, as it would give him a twenty-six – equal in value to his present sixteen.

Two to one were not the kind of odds von Falkenburg like to take on – particularly since the only plan he had for saving his life depended on winning. He tried to think of which cards had been played. And then another glance at von Lauderstein decided him.

Von Falkenburg drew. The card that landed on the table face up was a trey.

“Natural,” von Falkenburg said quietly, turning up his other two cards to reveal a perfect total of nineteen points. He hoped the others in the room could not hear his heart beat the way he could.

With trembling hand, von Lauderstein turned over his cards. They totaled eighteen. He had lost the hand by one point.

As the croupier shoveled one thousand, two hundred crowns of von Lauderstein’s towards von Falkenburg, von Lauderstein stared at him with the desperate look of a stag at bay.

At that moment, von Falkenburg knew that von Lauderstein was lost. And he was sure that von Lauderstein knew it too. Theoretically, von Lauderstein could get up from the table and walk off with the money that remained to him. But for reasons that had nothing to do with Hanna, he would not. Von Falkenburg knew that as a gambler who had come within one point of total success, von Lauderstein would keep on playing in a desperate effort to summon back that lost opportunity.

For a moment, von Falkenburg actually felt himself feeling sorry for von Lauderstein. Then he remembered Lasky’s corpse lying in the dark alley and Helena at the mercy of von Lauderstein’s thugs.

“Shall I deal, gentlemen?” he asked calmly.

Von Lauderstein was now paying as much attention to the champagne bottle as he was to studying his cards. Was that why his play was disintegrating so rapidly, von Falkenburg wondered. Or had he unconsciously recognized that he could not escape his fate? Maybe he realized that only luck, blind, uncontrollable luck could save him now.

But luck seemed to have left Von Lauderstein for good, along with all shreds of basic gambling sense, as he placed one huge bet after another, and then made the kind of absurd decisions to draw or stand which some house rules prohibited.

By ten thirty, all his money was gone. Von Plugge now had the bank.

“I trust you will agree to accept my credit,” von Lauderstein said thickly. Von Falkenburg wondered whether it was defeat or the champagne that slurred his speech so.

“Of course your credit is acceptable,” von Plugge said. The credit of an officer in the Austro-Hungarian Army was something it never occurred to anyone to question, at least as far as gambling debts were concerned. For everyone knew what the price of failing to pay up was.

Von Falkenburg glanced at the clock. An hour and a half of play was left. He was getting anxious about the passage of time. How much longer would von Plugge have the bank?

Von Lauderstein continued to lose, while von Falkenburg watched the minute hand creep along the clock dial. It was useful – indeed indispensable – for von Lauderstein to be losing to von Plugge.
But it was not enough.

Finally, the shoe was empty, and von Lauderstein’s turn at the bank came, to von Falkenburg’s infinite relief. Up to now, von Plugge as banker had been accepting von Lauderstein’s credit in payment of the latter’s losses, and using his own money to pay von Falkenburg his winnings. But now that he had the bank, von Lauderstein would have to use his credit – that fatal officer’s credit which had done in Endrödy – to pay anything he lost
to his enemy von Falkenburg.

Von Lauderstein won the first hand, bet massively on the next and lost.

Desperately, he bet even more heavily on the following hand, and lost again. His debt to von Falkenburg – as opposed to the cash he had lost to him earlier – was six thousand crowns, counting the side bet Lauderstein would lose if he failed to win five thousand crowns before the end of play at midnight.

That was not enough, von Falkenburg decided as the clock chimed a quarter to twelve. Not enough for his purposes, for von Lauderstein might be able to scrape up that much money out of his own resources.

Von Lauderstein had already declared
“Rien ne va plus,”
however, so there was no chance for von Falkenburg to increase his bet on his hand.

It was tie hand between von Falkenburg and von Lauderstein anyway.

Von Lauderstein got ready to deal what would clearly be the last hand before midnight put an end to the game.