The game was well known. Some said it had been going for weeks and that so many players had come and gone that no one was certain who had been involved, or what they had lost. But word had filtered through the streets that someone had wagered his ship; a pretty Gulf-Cutter that had made port only two days before.
The owner, a man named Ferron Swink had come to the game drunk. Despite advise from associates, he quickly lost the few thousand dollars he had brought in his wallet, then several checks had been written. Now, finally, one of his top-of-the-line ships was at risk. The table held six men, and only one of them was smiling.
“Sir,” Ferron Swink attempted to push his weight around again. He was staring at the young man with most of the chips. The man seemed positively jovial, as if he knew something no one else was in on. “I fail to see the humor in the situation. These are serious stakes. You could at least show some sense of decorum.”
“That would require me to be a gentleman, Mr. Swink. I’m not, much to my mother’s disappointment.” The young man pushed everything out to center table and smiled wider. “I’m all in, though…”
Talk inside the room came to a halt. No one spoke as the spell of big money held. For just about everyone in the room, this was the largest poker pot they had ever seen. Fortune was about to change for one of the two men left staring at one another. Side bets sputtered around as the watchers pulled closer still.
~
People walking several blocks down from the Saloon turned to look when the roar exploded from the building, and several men and young boys scattered; their faces shone with excitement. Something big had happened. Something good. Those faces did not get excited about much of late. Reformation was squeezing Alabama, and the rest of the South, dry.
When Jeb Dawes and his boys rolled down the street in the old mule-drawn wagon, the shouting confused them. His curiosity almost rose high enough to equal his anger. Donovan, his middle (of five) son had been trusted with the family money three days ago. He was to take it to the Federal bank and make a deposit in the account Jeb had finally opened. It had taken him years to trust those Yankee banks enough to actually put money into one. No sooner had he relented and sent his son with the mission, than the boy pulls up missing. Jeb was fit-to-be-tied about it, and meant to give Donovan to worst comeuppance of his life, once he was found. For now, Jeb was trying to decide where to house his boys for the night, before they set out to find the wayward Donovan.
“…I can’t believe he did it!” A man passing by shouted to his companion. Both men were glowing with drink. “A ship! The boy won a damn ship! What’s he gonna do with it?”
That news got Jeb Dawes to thinking. He flagged down the next pair of walking, talking revelers. “What happened over yonder?”
“Young man won the big poker game.” A man in checkered pants replied. He pushed his bowler hat back on his sweaty brow. “Sure was something. That boy sat in there for three days straight. No telling how much he won. But, he just won that new Cutter they got parked down at the Warf.
“Cutter?” Jeb said.
“Ship…you know…sailing vessel?”
That made Jeb’s heart beat a bit faster. He had lived through the war, managed to hold onto enough gold to pay his back taxes and keep the little bit of land twenty miles outside of Mobile. The family had held that land since Andrew Jackson had marched on New Orleans and all the Indians had been chased off or killed.
“What’s the matter, Daddy?” Thomas Dawes said. He was the oldest of his sons, and also the strongest.
“Not sure, son… just a hunch.”
A few seconds later, they spotted Donovan walking across the street in front of them. He had half a dozen people around him, including a redheaded whore. The boy was holding and kissing a folded paper while he kept tight hold on the cash bag under his right arm. A moment later, Donovan saw his father and stopped. He pushed the whore away, then waved off the others. The mob turned reluctantly, but walked away into the dark.
“Explain yourself, boy.”
“Hello, Daddy.”
“Is my money in Mr. Gaddis’ bank?”
Donovan smiled and patted the bag under his arm. “I’m taking good care of it, sir.”
“Good care would be that the money went in the bank on Friday, like I done tolt you to do. You running round the big city, cavorting with whores and thieves don’t look like good care to me, boy.”
“I’ll see that it is in the bank first thing in the morning, Daddy.”
“I think you’ll just get up on this wagon and hand over my money, boy.”
Donovan Dawes bristled and glanced at anyone who might be watching them. “I haven’t lost your money, sir.”
“Then hand over that bag.”
“I will, I’ll need to make a quick count first.”
“A count of what? I gave you fifty-five hundred dollars to put in the bank. Why should you need to count it?”
Jeb Dawes watched as his son pulled the satchel from his shoulder and opened it. He pulled a large tangle of cash out, dropping even more back down into the bowels of the bag. “Here’s your money back, with interest, Daddy.”
Thomas took the cash from Donovan and began to sort it. “Looks like… there’s over eight thousand here, Daddy.”
All of his brothers stared at Donovan along with their father. An explanation was due, but Donovan didn’t feel like making one just at the moment. He felt too good for all that. The game had given him more than the winnings; it had given him the freedom he had been after so long. He always hated life on the family land. Farming was not for him. Still, he suffered a tinge of guilt at having risked his father’s money, the family fortune, such as it were. Life in Alabama, as in most of the South, had become too restrictive. Donovan Dawes wanted to breathe the rarified air of a man of means. A ship, along with the several thousand dollars he now possessed, gave him just that.
“Are you satisfied that I’ve taken care of your money, Daddy?”
“No, I am not, son. I believe you have used this money to gamble. You’ve tainted it. This was hard-earned money, before you defiled it in that…that…whore house.”
Donovan turned and started walking.
“Where do you think you’re going, boy!” Jeb Dawes shouted at his son’s back.
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