Tazewell Republican. [volume] (Tazewell, Va.) 1892-1919, 1902-06-12
Mojave's
"SureT hing''
Game
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
sURE-THING man never had

dock, who used to conduct eating
houses at various points along the
line of the Santa Fe.
Barney Heating didn't know this
when he got along with his layout in
the fall of 's7. He hadn't an idea of
the chance he was taking in trying
to give Mojave the phony end of it.
"He began on that line right from
the jump. He showed the boys that
he had bank roll of $4,000 pat, and
told them to come along. His faro
box was one of those foxy Chicago
made contraptions that enables the
dealer to do about every old thing
except play casino with himself in
sliding the cards out, and his roulette
wheel was another hot piece of
mechanism that permitted him to
ioggle the marble into any hole he
wanted it to drop in by the employ
ment of little footwOrk.
"Well, from the minute that this
lead-pipe man uttered his first All
set he went right after everything
in the way of currency that Mojave
possessed. They didn't say much
about it on the first night that Keat-
ing opened up and started after it
with q butterfly net, but they
scratched their heads a lot and
looked each other over a-plenty out
of the corners of their eyes.
"'How'd you make out" asked
one of the boys on the morning after
Heating opened up.
"'So-so,' he replied, quietly, giving
me a Enthusiastically conservative
answer. 4 lost two hundred and a
half right sudden
"'Nice game, that said 1. Lucky
game, too. Did it look all right?'
"He pushed his vaquero hat back
scratched his head refectively, rolled
q cigarette, and vouchsafed no reply.
Men out there learn not to express
any positive convictions until they
know they're right.
"Keating hadn't been tipped off
about the state of public opinion,
and he was in fine feather the second
evening over the initial killing he
had made and in anticipation Of
other ones to follow. About II
o'clock, when most of the men around
the bank table were about all in,
'Honk' Curtis. Mojave's boss fighter,
and a pretty well-to-do man, strolled
in. He bought $3.50 worth Of yellows
they were worth $3.50 apiece-and
started in to play bank.
"Honk had played bank all the way
from the Columbia to the Rio Grande,
and he knew how. Heating began to
devote himself almost exclusively to
sweeping those yellow checks of Cur
It's into his rack, and the expression
of surprise that mounted to Honk's
red countenance when he began to
see that he wasn't picking more than
one or two winners to the deal would
have been funny if the face had be-
longed to any other man-but there
wasn't anything funny about Honk's
personality.
"'This don't nachully pear to be
my night remarked Curtis, pushing
his chair back when his $3.50 worth
of yellows had all passed over to
Keating's side with only few re-
bates in the whole play. 'Mebbe I'll
measure up some better on pickin'
the MARBLE and he got up and
walked over to the roulette wheel.
Curtis bought another $3.50 worth
of yellows wherewith to find out il
there was going to be anything do
ing on his style of wheel play. He
found out from. the falling of the
mouchoir that there was going to be
nothing doing whatever. Keating's
arranged wheel might just as fitting
w have been a we'll dug on the prem
ises for the reception of Honk's
money, and long before he had got
to the bottom of his roulette stack
Honk knew it.
Curtis put his last pair of yellowf
on a number, while we all stood
about watching to see if Heating was
going to get diplomatic and give hin
any kind of show at all for his
white alley. Heating wasn't The
pea slid into a hole on the other side
of the wheel, and Heating, with e
bland and totally unsuspicious grin
hoed in the final brace of yellow
chips.
"When Heating looked up after de
posting the checks in the rack he
found himself gazing into the bar
rels Of a pair of very steadily-helt
forty-fves. Heating knew by the way
the guns were held that the man be
hind them could shoot. The man be
hind them was Honk Curtis.
"'Ombrey,' said Honk to Heating
keeping his guns beaded on the sure
thinger's pair of eyes-and things
were a heap quiet in that room while
Honk spoke-'Ombrey, Pm not airy
in to hurt your feelin's up none
when I tell you that you're about The
C10cultSb plCCC Olh AOliCU up lhC'
the shape of a horn that ever
clapped a eye upon, and I've beer
pilin' along in the neighborhood o
tin-horns for longer time thai
there's any sense in thinkin' about.
"'I'm only a-tellin' you what's ;
fact. I never seen white man, no
nor even a greaser, come a-lopin
after the money like you do; ant
there amt no manner O doubt what
somever that you're a crook, and ;
crook right. Eff you amt I'm a-goin
to give you chanel to prove it.
"'Cole,' he went on, addressing
Cole Farrand, the station agent
without so much as turning his head
I've got little extra work FIR you
and you're in on the divide if thu
game comes your way. You know
how to deal 'em. Likewise, you know
how to spin the medicine ball arounC
this yere wheel thing.
"I'm a-goin' to let this ombrey g
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