Hearts In Atlantis

“How are you playing? Game over at a hundred, all losers pay the winner?”

“Yeah. And if you come in, I’ll kick back half what I win. Plus I give back what you lose.” He sunned me with a saintlike smile.

“Suppose I beat you?”

Ronnie looked momentarily startled, then smiled wider than ever. “Not in this life, shweetheart. I’m a scientist at cards.”

I glanced at my watch, then in at Ashley and Hugh. They really didn’t look much like real competition, God love them. “Tell you what,” I said. “One game straight up to a hundred. Nickel a point. Nobody kicks back anything. We play, then I study, and everyone has a nice weekend.”

“You’re on.” As we went back into the lounge he added: “I like you, Pete, but business is business—your homo boyfriends back in high school never gave you a fucking like I’m going to give you this morning.”

“I didn’t have any homo boyfriends in high school,” I said. “I spent most of my weekends hitching up to Lewiston to ass-bang your sister.”

Ronnie smiled widely, sat down, picked up the deck of cards, began to shuffle. “I broke her in pretty good, didn’t I?”

You couldn’t get lower than Mrs. Malenfant’s little boy, that was the thing. Many tried, but to the best of my knowledge no one ever actually succeeded.

6

Ronnie was a bigot with a foul mouth, a cringing personality, and that constant monkey- fungus stink, but he could play cards, I give him that. He wasn’t the genius he claimed to be, at least not in Hearts, where luck is a big part of the game, but he was good. When he was concentrating full on he could remember almost every card that had been played . . . which was why, I suppose, he didn’t like three-handed Hearts, with that extra card. With the kicker card gone, Ronnie was tough.

Still, I did all right that first morning. When Hugh Brennan went over a hundred in the first game we played, I had thirty-three points to Ronnie’s twenty-eight. It had been two or three years since I’d played Hearts, it was the first time in my life I’d played it for money, and I thought two bits a small price to pay for such unexpected entertainment. That round cost Ashley two dollars and fifty cents; the unfortunate Hugh had to cough up three- sixty. It seemed Ronnie had won the price of a date after all, although I thought the girl would have to be a real Bogart fan to give him a blowjob. Or even a kiss goodnight, for that matter.

Ronnie puffed up like a crow guarding a fresh piece of roadkill. “I got it,” he said. “I’m sorry for guys like you who don’t, but I got it, Riley. It’s like it says in the song, the men don’t know but the little girls understand.”

“You’re ill, Ronnie,” I said.

“I wanna go again,” Hugh said. I think P. T. Barnum was right, there really is one like Hugh born every minute. “I wanna get my money back.”

“Well,” Ronnie said, revealing his dingy teeth in a big smile, “I’m willing to at least give you a chance.” He looked my way. “What do you say, sporty?”

My geology text lay forgotten on the sofa behind me. I wanted my quarter back, and a few more to jingle beside it. What I wanted even more was to school Ronnie Malenfant. “Run em,” I said, and then, for the first of at least a thousand times I’d speak the same words in the troubled weeks ahead: “Is this a pass left or pass right?”

“New game, pass right. What a dorkus.” Ronnie cackled, stretched, and watched happily as the cards spun out of the deck. “God, I love this game!”

7

That second game was the one that really hooked me. This time it was Ashley instead of Hugh who went skyrocketing toward one hun-dred points, enthusiastically helped along by Ronnie, who dumped The Bitch on Ash’s hapless head at every opportunity. I was dealt the queen only twice that game. The first time I held it for four consecu-tive tricks when I could have bombed Ashley with it. Finally, just as I was starting to think I’d end up eating it myself, Ashley lost the lead to Hugh Brennan, who promptly led a diamond. He should have known I was void in that suit, had been since the start of the hand, but the Hughs of the world know little. That is, I suppose, why the Ronnies of the world so love to play cards with them. I topped the trick with The Bitch, held my nose, and honked at Hugh. That was how we said “Booya!” in the quaint old days of the sixties.

Ronnie scowled. “Why’d you do that? You could have put that dicksnacker out!” He nodded at Ashley, who was looking at us rather vacantly.

“Yeah, but I’m not quite that stupid.” I tapped the score sheet. Ronnie had taken thirty points as of then; I had taken thirty-four. The other two were far beyond that. The question wasn’t which of Ronnie’s marks would lose, but which of the two who knew how to play the game would win. “I wouldn’t mind seeing those Bogie movies myself, you know. Shweetheart.”

Ronnie showed his questionable teeth in a grin. He was playing to a gallery by then; we had attracted about half a dozen specta-tors. Skip and Nate were among them. “Want to play it that way, do you? Okay. Spread your cheeks, moron; you’re about to be corn-holed.”

Two hands later, I cornholed him. Ashley, who started that last hand with ninety-eight points, went over the top in a hurry. The spectators were dead quiet, waiting to see whether I could actually hit Ronnie with six—the number of hearts he’d need to take for me to beat him by one.

Ronnie looked good at first, playing under everything that was led, staying away from the lead himself. When you have good low cards in Hearts, you’re practically bulletproof. “Riley’s cooked!” he informed the audience. “I mean fucking toasty!”

I thought so, too, but at least I had the queen of spades in my hand. If I could drop it on him, I’d still win. I wouldn’t make much from Ronnie, but the other two would be coughing up blood: over five bucks between them. And I’d get to see Ronnie’s face change. That’s what I wanted most, to see the gloat go out and the goat come in. I wanted to shut him up.

It came down to the last three tricks. Ashley played the six of hearts. Hugh played the five. I played the three. I saw Ronnie’s smile fade as he played the nine and took the trick. It dropped his edge to a mere three points. Better still, he finally had the lead. I had the jack of clubs and the queen of spades left in my hand. If Ronnie had a low club and played it, I was going to eat The Bitch and have to endure his crowing, which would be caustic. If, on the