Queer Luck: Poker Stories from the New York Sun

“Poker has often been called the national game,” said the gray-haired young-looking man in the club smoking-room, “but I fancy there are few citizens who fully appreciate how much influence it has exerted on the destinies of the nation in one way and another. We hear stories now and again of the winning and losing of fortunes, and sometimes how large estates and mining properties have been staked on the chances lying between two hands. And every lobbyist in the country is familiar with the old device of losing large sums in a friendly game with a legislator whose vote is desired on one side or the other. Such things, naturally enough, sway public interests as well as private to no small extent, but I have seen a seat in the United States Senate lost on four queens.”

“Of course you are not talking seriously,” said one of the party.

“But I am,” was the answer, “seriously and literally. It happened in Minnesota soon after the war. Political conditions in that part of the West were very different to what they are now, and in fact all other conditions were, too. It was at about the beginning of the real growth of the North-west. The value of the wheat fields had been learned, but the Swedish and Norwegian immigration was in its infancy, and the lumber industry, that afterward grew to such enormous proportions, was then making comparatively few men rich. Minneapolis was a small town on the south side of the river, and St. Anthony was a town of the same size on the other side. Now it’s all one city, but at that time nobody dreamed of St. Paul being eclipsed in size or importance.

“I was knocking about late one summer at that period, and had made many friends around St. Paul and Minneapolis, some of whom were State officials, and I had heard much talk of the struggle there was to be in the next Legislature over the election of a Senator. Two men were in the race, and as they were both popular the contest was likely to be a close one. Party questions did not enter in, for the State was strongly Republican, and no Democrat stood a show. But which of the two Republicans would carry the Legislature was a matter of great doubt, and I saw bets made on the issue as early as the first of September. As the time of election drew near, it was evident that the choice for Senator was going to govern the nomination of candidates for the Legislature, and as both the Senatorial aspirants were long of head as well as long of purse they were using all the influence they had in the county conventions which were to be held early in October.

“Right there was where the importance of the lumber industry came in. The money on which the lumbermen in the upper counties lived came to them mostly through Minneapolis and St. Anthony, and the perfectly legitimate business relations between them and the business men of those two cities naturally gave the latter much influence among the former. There was a rollicking, happy-go-lucky man in Minneapolis whom everybody called Doc Martin, for no reason that I could discover except that he wasn’t a doctor. He was part owner of a saw-mill, and spent the most of each winter in the woods with his men. He was credited with being as influential as any one there was, among voters, but he had a rival in another man named Gilmartin, who was a logger himself, but had for a dozen seasons been foreman of one gang or another. Martin was a rich man, but Gilmartin was seldom flush, excepting in the spring, when he had drawn his winter’s pay. These two men were known to be strong partisans, one favoring one of the would-be Senators, and the other the other, and it was generally thought that they would both go electioneering when the county conventions were held.

“The week before that was to happen I was one of a party who drove from Minneapolis to a road-house on the Fort Snelling road near the Minnehaha Falls, partly for the enjoyment of the moonlight and partly for a game supper such as the house was famous for providing. Martin was one of the party, and as there were two or three other high rollers with us, I had made up my mind that it would be daybreak before we would get back.

“I was right, but before the night was over we had more excitement than I had expected. We had had the supper and an abundance of good wine with it, and were sitting around the table enjoying some rarely good punch when somebody proposed poker. No one objected, and in a few minutes there were two games in progress, for there were eleven in the party. Six played at one table, and Martin and I and three others were at the other. The game was a fairly stiff one, ten dollars being the limit, and the cards ran well enough to build up some heavy pots. We had all indulged freely enough to give ourselves thoroughly to the enjoyment of the hour, though we had not been drinking heavily, and there wasn’t a man there under the influence. Altogether it was a delightful occasion. Suddenly the door opened, and Gilmartin looked in.

“‘I don’t want to “rough in,” boys,’ he said, ‘but I stopped here to get supper on the way home, and the landlord told me you were here, so I thought I’d ask you to drink with me.’

“He was greeted heartily, for everybody knew and liked him, and a bumper of punch was poured out for him forthwith, his invitation being peremptorily laid on the table. Then, as a matter of course, it was suggested that he take a hand in the game, and he being more than willing, he sat at our table.

“‘We’re playing ten-dollar limit, Gil,’ said one of the party, who knew that money was not always plentiful with the big fellow. But he laughed carelessly and said: ‘That’s all right,’ as he pulled out a hundred-dollar bill and bought chips.

“Martin looked at him rather keenly, as I thought, for an instant, and said:

“‘Been out to St. Paul to-night, Gil?’

“‘Yes, I have,’ said Gilmartin, and I was sure that I saw a half-laughing look of defiance on his face as he answered. It puzzled me at the moment, but I understood the question and answer afterward. Martin, it seemed, suspected that Gilmartin had perfected his arrangements to go electioneering, and that he had the money in his pocket with which he was expected to do his work. It was this that he had asked by implication, and Gilmartin, understanding him perfectly, and knowing that he could not keep his secret long from the other, had admitted it. As it proved, he had five thousand dollars in greenbacks with him.

“The game went on without any special development for perhaps half an hour before I noticed that Martin was playing against Gilmartin as heavily as he could, and only trying to hold his own against the rest of us. Gilmartin held his end up fairly, and was not far from even when Martin got his first good chance at him. It was a pretty play, too, for Gilmartin thought, as the rest of us did, that Martin was bluffing when he stood pat, and contented himself with coming in without a raise every time it came his bet, until the rest of us had dropped out. Then he raised Gilmartin the limit. Gilmartin had a jack-high flush and was confident, so they had it back and forth till Gilmartin called and gave up four hundred dollars to an ace flush.

“That was the heaviest pot for a long time, but presently the two got together again, and Gilmartin lost two hundred more. Then he grew a little nervous and Martin grew cooler. Then Gilmartin became angry, though he controlled himself tolerably well, and I was sure that Martin would beat him. So it proved. It came my deal soon after in a jack-pot, and Gilmartin opened it. We all came in, standing Martin’s raise. I had aces, but didn’t better in the draw, so I laid down after one raise. Martin drew three cards, as did each of the others, excepting Gilmartin, who drew two. He bet the limit, and the next man laid down. Martin raised it the limit, and another man and myself dropped out. Gilmartin raised, and the fourth man threw down his cards. That left the two alone again, and Martin raised back.

“‘Ten better than you,’ said Gilmartin savagely, and then with a short laugh he added, ‘You won’t get away with me this time.’

“‘If you think so,’ said Martin quietly, ‘what do you say to taking off the limit?’

“‘That will suit me exactly,’ said Gilmartin, and Martin pushed up his last blue chip and a hundred-dollar bill.

“‘I’ll see that and go you five hundred better,’ said Gilmartin eagerly, and he skinned the bills off from a big roll that he drew from an inside pocket.

“‘Does my check go?’ asked Martin. ‘I haven’t so much money with me.’ “‘It’s good for fifty thousand, and you know it,’ said Gilmartin.

“‘I raise you a thousand,’ said Martin.

“‘And I’ll go you a thousand better,’ exclaimed the other. He was getting excited, but nobody dared to speak. It was a serious matter to interfere in a game like that.

“‘A thousand better,’ was the response.

“Gilmartin hesitated. He looked at his cards and thought for a moment. Then he counted his money.

“‘I’ll have to call you,’ he said finally, ‘for I’ve only got twelve hundred left.’

“Martin’s face was perfectly impassive. He, too, hesitated a moment, and then he spoke.

“‘I’ll put up five thousand more, if you want to play for it,’ he said.

“‘But how can I? I tell you I haven’t any more money,’ said Gilmartin, looking puzzled.

“‘If you will give me your promise to go as far south as St. Louis for sixty days, and tell nobody that you are going, I’ll take that as an equivalent for the five thousand,’ said Martin very slowly and distinctly.

“Gilmartin flushed. He knew that everybody in the room understood the proposition. He was asked to sell out his honor, for going away in that fashion meant betraying his employer and running away with his money, as well as leaving him in the lurch. I expected to hear an indignant outburst of invective and abuse, and indeed the man was about to speak when another thought seemed to strike him, and he grew deathly white. The gambling fever had seized him, and he looked at his cards again.

“While he was hesitating Martin spoke again, and the devilish coolness of his speech made me shudder.

“‘I need not say anything to impress on the minds of all the gentlemen present that this is a private party,’ he said, ‘and that nothing which happens here can be told outside while it can by any possibility work injury to any one concerned.’

“Gilmartin looked round at every man in the room, and seeing by our faces that we all recognized the obligation, he seemed nerved, as Martin had meant that he should be, to take the risk.

“‘I’ll take the bet,’ he said at length, and he spoke desperately. ‘But God help you, Martin, if you win it. I don’t believe you can, for I’ve got almost a sure hand.’

“‘If you lose,’ said Martin, ‘you have no cause of quarrel with me. I am not forcing you to play. But if you mean enmity, all right. I’ll gamble your friendship, too, along with the rest, if you like.’

“‘So be it,’ said Gilmartin. ‘It’s a call, then. If you lose you pay me five thousand. If I lose I leave.’

“‘Correct,’ said Martin, and the hands were shown.

“Martin had drawn to kings and caught the other two. Gilmartin had drawn to three queens and drawn the other.

“His face as he left the room was such a picture as I hope never to see again, but he kept to his bargain. At least, I imagine he did, for he was not seen again in that part of the country while I was there. I never spoke to Martin again, but his friend was elected Senator at the next session of the Legislature by a majority of two votes. Both men are dead, or I would not have told the story.”