The Butte inter mountain. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1901-1912, 1901-09-17
DISCARDED AN ACE
SUPPOSED VICTIM OF SWINDLERS
WORKS A SUCKER"
; AN EXPENSIVE EXPERIENCE
Kind Hearted Man Of Wealth Sym
pathizes With Apparent Card Shark
Bait and Is Caught for Two
Thousand Dollars.

| A party of travelling men We're swap
ping yarns in the lobby of the Finlen
hotel last night and after several good
ones had been exchanged the trend IF
the story telling drifted to poker eX-
periences, some genuine and the others
of the usual drummer story variety.
One of the party was T. B. Gray of San
Francisco, who travels for we'll known
playing card manufacturing firm of the
| Golden Gate city. In the course Of the
narrating 1t came his turn TO entertain
the rest and he told a story of poker
! experience in Victor, Colo that is worth
repeating.
According to Gray, he was in the Colo
RADIO mining camp several years ago,
and awOke one morning to find that he
was showed in. with no chance CT get
| ting a stage out. He took the matter
philosophicafly and decided to make the
best Of a bad job, as did a stranger quar-
tered at the same hotel, If such t.1e place
where they were stopping could be
termed.
"The stranger seemed like a pretty
decent sort of fellow" said Gray, "and
|
me his name was Evarts. and that he
was interested in some gold mines He
seemed to have unlimited capital at his
disposal and impressed me as being
gentleman Of refinement and wealth. He
and l We're idly conversing when
rather we'll dressed chap asked If we
would join in game of poker. He
wanted one more hand, he said. We de-
| clined, and a chap who was sitting near
us, looked up from his paper and said
| he would be glad of an opportunity to
break the monotony OF the day. He ac-
companied the inviter to a rear room.
LAS the man who did the inviting
moved away he suggested to Evarts and
myself that we come in and look on, az
1t would hven things up a little. We
| thanked him for the invitation and a
little while later went in to watch the
| game. The stranger who had accepted
the invitation to play was losing. He
lost steadily and heavily, and finally it
! became apparent that he was up against
a swindle. The three men with whom
he was playing were robbing him as they
| pleased.
Both Evalts and I knew better than
| to say anything, and all we could do was
| to secretly sympathize with the victim.
we uONcu dTOulIu the taUlc, mentally
noting the different hands, and as there
was no objection we supposed the trio
would play honestly for awhile to dissi-
pate any suspicious we might have.
Finally, after Cooking at the hands OF
| the three sharks just after a deal, we
saw that the heavy loser held four aces.
! We also noted that his wealth had
dwindled to almost nothing, ana Uha5
| though he held winning hand would be
! able to get little on it. He noticed our
! sympathetic glances and remarked on
| his hard luck. The result was that
| Evarts told him he would back his hand
| for anything up to a thousand dollars,
| that being all the cash he had at hand.
There was no objection from the trio
| and the game went on. Mind you there
| had been no draw as yet. The first man
! to take cards drew three, the second one,
ond the last two. The victim was the
third to draw. and he Of course pushed
only one card from his hand, which was
lying, face down, on the table.
Then the betting began. 1t would
be useless to describe 1t in detail. Let
it suffice to say that an four stood few
raises and then two dropped out the
| first putting down queens and flves ami
the second three mines. With the game
between the victim and only one of the
sw-indlers the betting became more
spirited until finally the victims pile
and the Thousand dollars of Evarts' were
in the pot. Evarts was greatly excited
| and wanted to back the hand of tn.
victim further. He offered a check, and
| strange as it may seem 1t was accepted.
| The check was for another thousand
and went into the pot in short order.
Then came the call, and the swindler
Evarts jumped for JOY, and the man he
had backed WAS naturally elated. 1, too,
was joyful 1t looked grand to Evarts
| and me. 1t looked as though the
sw1ndlers had failed at their own game.
| 1--WE have you beaten!' exclaimed
Evarts, We have four aces here!'
IAN right rejoined the swindler.
You needed something good to win.
Show up
Well gentlemen" said Mr.. Gray;
here is where the story comes in.
Evarts himself turned the cards over.
/ They were still lying on the table, never
I; having been raised in the hand after the
! draw. You should have seen the look
of blank anna cement on his face. Would
| you believe it, there were but three aces
in the hand. The supposed victim was
one of the swindlers, and he had pur-
posely discarded an ace after catching
Evarts for a sucker OF course he tried
! to explain how he had made mistake,
! but Evarts would not listen. He simply
said as he turned away: 1t was pretty
extensive. blIt il is good lesson -