Stone Junction

‘Every heater burns out,’ Daniel said, repeating one of Bobby’s axioms.

‘All right. What’s the game?’

Daniel thought fast. ‘Nomlaki Stone Gambling.’

‘And I suppose you wrote the official rule book.’ Bad Bobby was clearly dubious.

‘As a matter of fact, it’s the oldest gambling game on the North American continent.’

‘I thought Indian Stick Gambling was.’

‘Well, yes,’ Daniel gulped, ‘that’s right, too. See, stone gambling is just like stick gambling, except you use stones instead of sticks.’

‘Makes sense,’ Bobby noted.

Daniel continued, ‘You use a white stone and a black stone. You mix them hand to hand behind your back and then hold your fists out to the other person, who can choose the hand that has either the black or white stone.’

‘Little more complex than stick gambling, but the same idea. I gotta think you chose it because you think it’ll neutralize my vast card-playing experience. Which was smart of you.’ He draped his arm fraternally around Daniel’s shoulders. ‘But you’re gonna be in a world of hurt, Daniel. I beat Tony Big Elk so bad stick gambling that he retired, and he was supposed to be the best.’

Daniel hadn’t heard that story before, so wasn’t sure if it was fact or intimidation. ‘Maybe we shouldn’t waste our time playing. I’ll just give you the ten grand and listen to you call the shots for another year.’

‘Probably be efficient,’ Bobby chuckled, ‘but it wouldn’t be as much fun. I haven’t played sticks in about fifteen years now and I’m kinda looking forward to it. You want to do it here, or in one of our rooms?’

Daniel feigned dismay. ‘Inside? Bobby, this is Indian gambling. We do it outside. Naked. Right on the beach. First one to a hundred wins.’

Bad Bobby plainly didn’t like this. He blinked slowly, took his arm from Daniel’s shoulder, and crossed his arms on his chest. ‘I assume you have the stones?’

‘In my pocket.’

Bad Bobby glanced at his watch, then at his personal hostess hovering nearby. ‘It’s nine-thirty. I’ll meet you here at midnight. I’ve got to stash my roll, wash off the smoke, get something to eat.’

‘Midnight’s perfect,’ Daniel told him. ‘I was going to suggest it myself.’

Naked, Daniel and Bad Bobby faced each other at the surf’s edge, the waxing half-moon spilling phosphorescence on the wet sand.

‘Okay,’ Daniel said, ‘let’s get our wager straight. If I win, I’m free to go, to do as I please; if I lose, I stay, and it costs me ten grand for the fun of getting beat.’

‘That nails it.’

‘I have a little proposition,’ Daniel said, ‘a side bet.’

Bobby said, ‘I won’t know what it is if you don’t tell me.’

‘First, I want you to know why I’m offering it. You see, all I can win is leaving you, and as a matter of fact you’re good company, a fine teacher, and the best cardplayer I’ve seen in my brief career – including Guido. So I want to bet you another ten grand on the side, straight up, no odds. That way I at least stand to win something besides leaving, and if I lose I want you to take my whole roll.’

‘You want to give it away, I’ll take it.’ A wave crashed a hundred yards out. Bobby glanced at it.

‘Good thing you’ve got a deal with the ocean,’ Daniel said.

‘You gonna talk this game or play it?’

‘Play it.’ Daniel put his hands behind his back and began rapidly shifting the stones back and forth. ‘You’re the champion,’ he told Bobby, ‘so you get to go first.’ He kept trading the stones till he didn’t know himself which hand held what. He thrust his fists out to Bad Bobby.

Instead of choosing, Bobby lifted his grizzled face heavenward and began a high, rhythmic chant: ‘Hiya-Ya-Yee-Ah-Yah––’

‘Hey,’ Daniel said sharply, ‘what the fuck are you doing.’

Bobby stopped chanting and looked at Daniel with plain surprise. ‘Why, I’m singing my gambling song. That’s the most important part of the stick game, your song. You need it to open your circuits and mess up the other guy’s. See, you probably think you don’t know which hand holds which stone, but you do.’ He touched Daniel’s left hand. ‘Black.’

Daniel opened his hand. It held the black stone.

‘One for the old guy,’ Bobby said, beaming as he accepted the stones from Daniel.

It was a slaughter. Daniel beat him one hundred to forty-seven, and that after trailing twenty-eight to twelve. When it had reached eighty to forty-four Bad Bobby had groaned, which was about as close as he ever came to sniveling. ‘You’re hotter than a cheap pistol and I’ve turned colder than penguin shit.’

It didn’t help Bobby’s concentration that – as Daniel had foreseen – the literal tide turned at five minutes past midnight, or that at about the time the surf began surging around their ankles, Daniel got an erection he was unaware of until Bad Bobby said, ‘Why don’t you put that thing away?’

‘Boy,’ Daniel said, ‘Nature sure makes you jumpy. Why don’t you see if you can make it a deal?’

But what really hastened the rout was Daniel’s discovery that if he emptied his mind, concentrated through instead of on, he could feel the black stone in one of