“If your husband ever starts drinkin’ hard,” I says, “you can support yourself by sellin’ some o’ your horseshoes to the Russian government.”
It wasn’t no lie, neither. I never seen such hands as that woman held, and Messenger’s was pretty near as good. In the four deals they grabbed two rubbers and a couple o’ little slams, and when they left our table they had over nine hundred to our nothin’.
Mr. Collins and another woman was the next ones to set down with us. The rules was to change pardners and Collins took the one I’d been playin’ with. And what does she do but get lucky and they give us another trimmin’, though nothin’ near as bad as the first one. My pardner, this time, was a woman about forty-eight, and she acted like it was way past her bedtime. When it was her turn to say somethin’ we always had to wait about five minutes, and all the other tables was through a long w’ile before us. Once she says:
“You’ll have to excuse me tonight. I don’t somehow seem to be able to keep my mind on the game.”
“No,” I says; “but I bet you’d perk up if the lady’s prize was a mattress. When you’re goin’