"I'm worried, though," Little Nick said. "Let's take a look outside."
We went outside and Little Nick tromped all around under our shack and the rest room, kicking at the pilings and looking at the floor beams. He was still shaking his head. "Look over there," he said, pointing out at the water and sky. "That's quite a storm coming up. If you sold your place now, you wouldn't have to worry about it maybe blowing down in the storm."
"It's real nice of you to go to all this bother about us," I said. "But this is just a regular Gulf storm and not what you would call a hurricane, and our place will stand up to it."
Little Nick said to Blackie, "I tried again, didn't I?"
"The trouble is," Blackie said, "the basic idea don't get across."
I said, "You fellers have been mighty nice to worry about us, and I'd like to do something in return. It's not our shack that's likely to get in trouble in this storm but that barge you got out there for driving the pilings for your dock. If that barge busts loose in the storm it might sink, and that would hold up your dock. Or it might wash in and knock down them piles it has already drove in."
Little Nick shrugged. "It takes a big motorboat to tow that thing, and the guys who own the barge are back at Gulf City with the motorboat. We can't move it anywhere else."
"You could pull it in close to shore in case the waves get big out there," I said. "Then if the wind swings around and starts blowing the water out from the beach, so that it gets shallow and the barge starts pounding on the bottom, you could pull her out again."
"I don't know how the hell anybody can pull that barge around," Little Nick said.
"Oh, they got a winch on the barge, and a little gas engine that works it that anybody can start up," I said. "I watched them at it. What they do is run a heavy line to some of them little pilings they put in for the dock, and winch the barge in toward shore until they get close enough to put in more pilings. Then there is two big pilings out where the barge is anchored now, and they tie a heavy line to them outer pilings and winch the barge back out when they're ready."
Blackie said, "This begins to sound interesting."
"The only thing is," I said, "them dock pilings look a mite thin to take the winching if there is a lot of wind and waves. So you ought to run a heavy line to a couple of the big pilings of your building, on account of they will take a real strain."
Little Nick looked at Blackie and Blackie looked at Little Nick. "What more could a guy ask?" Little Nick said.
"I wouldn't believe it if I hadn't heard it," Blackie said.
"Well, thanks," Little Nick said to me. "If the storm gets a lot worse tonight, we might go for that. Can we rent one of your rowboats, so we can get out to the barge if we need to?"
"Oh sure," I said. "I wouldn't even want to charge you for it."
"And you don't want to sell your place?"
"No, I reckon not."
"Nobody ever tried harder to be nice than I tried," Little Nick said to Blackie. "Let's get back and make sure Al and Carmine can run a gas engine and a winch."
It come on to blow real hard that night, so after we got the twins to bed, Pop and Holly and me went over to the Browns to keep them company and make sure their place held up good. Round about eleven the south-wester was blowing thirty mile an hour, and I took a walk to our dock to make sure our boats was riding all right. They was all in good shape but one that was gone, but when I looked out in the pass I seen lights on the barge which meant them folks next door had borrowed the rowboat to get out to the barge. When I started walking away from our dock I tripped over something in the dark. It was a heavy line, maybe two inches thick. I took hold of it and give a tug and found it warn't just lying loose. One end went out into the water toward where the barge was anchored. The other went up the beach toward our shack.
I followed it and found where it was tied around one of the pilings of our shack near the top, and then coiled around one of the floor beams and over to the piling at the other corner. It was knotted there to another big line, and the other big line went to the pilings of our rest room and around one of its floor beams and then down across the beach and out into the water again.
So of course I knowed them fellers next door was going to use them two heavy lines to winch the barge in closer to shore if they had to. Well, that was near about what I had told Little Nick and Blackie to do, except I had said to use their own pilings. There warn't nothing wrong with them using our pilings but one thing, which I reckon they didn't see on account of never having much to do with boats. If they winched the barge straight in to their place, that would keep the bow of the barge pointing into the waves. But if they winched it in to our place, that would swing the barge sideways, and if the waves was big enough that barge might take on a lot of water over the side and swamp itself.
I didn't know when they might start winching so I didn't want to waste time. I untied them two big lines where they was knotted together, and got them off our beams and pilings, and drug them down to the shore and out around the end of that new fence between their land and ours. It warn't no easy job hauling them two big lines, which was like dragging a couple of elephants around by the trunks. But finally I got the lines running straight in from the barge to Little Nick's and Blackie's place, and tied them real good onto a couple of their beams and pilings.
By then I was pretty much out of puff, and I set down to get my wind back before telling whoever was on the barge what I done. While setting there I heard the little gas engine on the barge start up. I tried to call out to the fellers on the barge about the new way the lines was fixed, but they was out maybe a hundred feet or more, and with the noise of the engine and the way the wind was blowing hard from them to me, I couldn't raise them. By that time the two heavy lines was starting to tighten as the winch took up the slack. I had to tell somebody about the new way them lines was fixed, because when they got real tight they would be up in the air, and if you didn't know you could run into them in the dark and get hurt.
The new building warn't near ready to live in yet, with just framing and floors done, and Little Nick and Blackie was still living in the trailer. So I went there to tell them. Blackie come to the door when I knocked and I told him.
Blackie looked real startled. He swung around and yelled, "Nick! Nick! This clown next door switched the lines from their place to ours!"
Little Nick come waddling out with just pants and undershirt on, which you would think would hardly be enough to keep a feller warm in a south-wester off the Gulf, but he had all that hair so it was maybe like wearing a black sweater under the undershirt. "He did, did he?" Little Nick said. "If things are gonna work out this way, maybe we need some direct action."
Blackie reached inside his coat, and said, "Yeah, you turned into a wise guy on us, Toby."
I reddened up a little at him saying a nice thing like that, and said, "Well, I reckon I was smart about it. I knowed if they winched in toward our place it would swing that barge sideways and it might swamp in the waves. What they need is a straight pull in toward your place, to keep the barge head on to the waves."
Blackie scratched a while at an itch he had found inside his coat. "Nick," he said, "we're off base."
"Yeah, it looks as if," Little Nick said. "Why don't you give Al and Carmine a quick hail? They might start that engine any moment."
I said, "Oh, they already got it started. I tried to call to them but the engine was making too much noise and the wind was blowing the wrong way."
"Jeez!" Blackie yelled. "Let's go, Nick!"
Him and Little Nick come out so fast they near about knocked me over, and ran around the trailer and down to the pilings of their building. When I got there, they was working on the knots where the two lines was joined together.
I said, "You don't have to worry about them knots pulling loose, because I tied them real good."
"Goddam it!" Blackie yelled, "we're trying to get the things untied!"
"What for, Blackie? They got a strain o
n them lines now, and if you slack off they won't be able to winch that barge in."
"We just remembered something!" Blackie yelled. "We forgot to tell Al and Carmine to slack off on the lines that go out to those two big pilings the other side of the barge! Look out there! The barge isn't moving. All they're doing is tightening up on all the lines. See if you can get these goddam knots off!"
Well, I went to work on them knots, because I could see that if they kept on tightening the lines, sooner or later a line would bust, and them two-inch lines cost money. I tried and tried but I couldn't do nothing. The knots was tied good to start with, and now with the strain on them the knots was like big rocks. The lines was starting to sing to themselves, too, with the wind playing on them like they was the strings on a hundred- foot banjo.
"Get a knife!" Little Nick screamed. "Get an axe or something! We're running out of time!"
"I got something better," Blackie called.
He reached inside his coat and yanked out a gun and took aim at one of them lines and let fly. I don't know if he ever hit it, because it is a real trick to hit a two-inch line that is strumming up and down, but if he did, that line warn't bothered at all.
"Hell of a shot you are!" Little Nick yelled.
"It's these lousy little thirty-two caliber bullets," Blackie said. "I hit the thing every time."
"Shut up and get the burp gun!" Little Nick screamed. "We only got seconds! We—"
"Run!" Blackie yelled. "Here she comes!"
It warn't until then that I seen what they was so upset about. Like Blackie said, here she come. Up above our heads there was a screeching like somebody had stepped on the tails of a couple hundred cats. That was nails starting to come out of the framing of their place. Then there was a lot of loud cracks, and that building reared right up and leaped off them pilings, and if we all hadn't jumped we would have been picking two-by-fours out of our heads.
Out in the pass, Al and Carmine must have knowed something went wrong when the lines slacked off, because the hammering of the winch engine stopped. The three of us on land stood there a while and there warn't no sound but the wind whistling through a pile of the biggest jackstraws anybody ever seen.
"Fellers," I said, "it is all my fault."
Blackie looked at his gun and said, "I wish I wasn't fresh out of slugs."
"Lay off," Little Nick said.
"All I was thinking of doing," Blackie said, "was shooting myself."
I said, "What I done wrong was to tie them lines high up on your pilings and around your beams. That give the winch a lot of leverage. If I had tied them lines at ground level like I ought, there wouldn't have been no leverage and the lines would have busted. It was just that I warn't thinking. All I done was copy the way them lines was tied around our pilings and beams, without stopping to think if that was the right way or wrong way."
"It's not your fault," Blackie said. "The whole thing goes back to Al and Carmine, not slacking off their lines to the two big pilings out beyond the barge. Me and Little Nick are gonna send them to bed without dessert for a week."
Little Nick said, "What's the idea calling me Little Nick? I don't go for that."
Blackie said, "It was just a slip of the mind, like you and me have been having lately. Well, do we try it again?"
"Not this," Little Nick said. "Not for my money. This is a losing hand, see? I learned a long time back not to keep betting on a losing hand. Take your beating and wait for the next deal." He turned to me and said, "By the way, let's not say anything about how this happened."
"Well, all right," I said. "But I can take my share of the blame."
"We're thinking of Al and Carmine," Blackie said. "Those guys are real sensitive. If the story got around, they couldn't hold up their heads."
So I promised not to say nothing to my folks or anybody, and we parted friends and it was right nice of them to take it that way when I had done so many dumb things.
13
THE next day the storm had gone over and there was a mob of workmen at Little Nick's and Blackie's, clearing things up and putting in new pilings and using jacks and a crane to lift that framework up again. In a couple days they had things back as good as new, and in another week they had the whole building finished so it could be used. It warn't much for looks, but that didn't matter to the folks it started drawing from Gulf City and even the East Coast. Like I seen with the fellers at Fort Dix, when folks is took with the gambling fever they will do anything to get down their quarter or even half dollar on a bet.
The first night Little Nick and Blackie had their place open, Blackie come down to the bridge where I was fishing and asked if I didn't want to drop in and learn how they played craps. But I said I was too busy and maybe some other time. I told Pop and Holly about that, and Holly said, "Don't you ever go in there and gamble, Toby."
Pop said, "I wouldn't put it past them to try to win this place off you. So don't give them a chance."
Pop and Holly meant well but they didn't need to take on like I was a baby. So when a couple nights later Blackie come by where I was fishing, and said why didn'tI drop into' their place and look around, I said I would except for not being dressed very good. Blackie said nobody done much dressing and just to sling on a clean pair of pants and shirt. I snuck in our shack and got clean things without Pop or Holly knowing, and changed in back of our shack and then walked with Blackie to his place. There must have been twenty cars parked there that night. They was so jammed you had to squeeze between them to get to the door, and Blackie said they really did need more parking space but didn't have no more land to spare.
Inside the door there was a bar where you could drink yourself silly, if you warn't satisfied that you was silly enough to start with. Along with the bar they had four machines that Blackie said was called one-armed bandits. You put a quarter in one of them machines and pull a lever, and the machine spins some wheels and tells you why you can't have your quarter back. Two fellers was putting in money and yanking the levers. I bet them fellers would have laughed if you had offered them a job in a factory yanking a lever all day at a dollar-eighty an hour, but there they was doing the same work and paying the machines for the chance to do it. Now and then the machines would tease them fellers by giving them back a few of their quarters, but it warn't no more than a loan and the fellers paid it back quick.
Blackie asked if I wanted to try them machines, but I said I would just as soon spend a couple of hours pulling the cord of one of our outboard motors if I wanted that kind of exercise. Blackie said I was right and that one- armed bandits was just for suckers. Next to the bar was kind of a big room where they done the real gambling. At the doorway a feller sat in a little booth with a lot of white and red and blue chips in front of him. Blackie said if I wanted to play any, I should get chips there, because in the real gambling games they used chips instead of money.
"I'm glad to hear that," I said, "because if you use chips and not money it is not really gambling, and plenty of times I have played games for matchsticks."
Blackie laughed and said, "You still have to buy the chips."
Well, there warn't nothing wrong about that, because if you go in a store, nobody is giving away chips and they will charge you one or two dollars a box for them. But you can get a hundred chips in a box so that don't really come out much for each chip and you wouldn't hardly call it gambling.
"If it is just buying chips," I said, "maybe I might play some, but I didn't bring no money along."
"We'll be glad to give you credit," Blackie said. "You can sign a receipt. How many chips do you want? The whites count' one. The reds are five and the blues count twenty."
"I wouldn't want to do a lot of counting," I said. "So why don't I take some blues? I would say about fifty of them."
"Attaboy," Blackie said. He turned to the feller in the booth and said, "Fifty blue chips for this gentleman, and make out a slip for them."
The feller give me the fifty blues and I signed the slip for
them. That meant I would be out maybe fifty cents to a dollar if I lost all them chips, because in a store they don't charge no more for blue chips than for white or red ones. There was forty to fifty folks playing games in that room, and Blackie took me around and showed me the different games. One was called roulette and another blackjack and then there was craps. I couldn't catch onto the roulette and blackjack games, and anyway you wouldn't get me into nothing called blackjack after I seen that feller Al and his blackjack. What I really liked was craps, which I already knowed something about from watching the fellers in my outfit at Fort Dix. Blackie explained it to me and I caught on good.
What you have in craps are two dice with numbers from one to six on each of them. When it's your turn for the dice, you bet some chips and roll the dice and they come up two or three or twelve and you say Oh Hell and have lost your bet but keep the dice. Then you put out more chips and roll again, and up comes a seven or eleven, and you act like it warn't nothing you can't do every time and you win the bet and keep the dice and start all over again. Then maybe you roll a five and you got to say something like Hello Phoebe, and you try to roll another five and now you don't want no sevens, because if you get a seven before you get a five you have lost your bet and the dice too, and if you are at Fort Dix you tell the other fellers them goddam dice won't behave, but if you are at Little Nick's and Blackie's you are more polite and just say things under your breath. It is handy to be a girl when you lose, because then you turn to the feller you are with and say Oh now I am out of chips and I guess you will have to let me have some more.
At Fort Dix the fellers bet against each other, but at Little Nick's and Blackie's you done all your betting against what they called The House. Another thing that was not the same as on the blanket at Fort Dix was a place where you put your bets that had a lot of lines and words and numbers on it. You could bet to "Bar Sixes" or to "Come" or to "Don't Come" if you knowed what them things meant which I didn't. What it all boiled down to was you could bet on any number at all that might show up on them dice. If you felt the feller who had just got the dice was not going to roll a seven or eleven the first time, but was going to roll a two or three or eleven, you could bet on two or three or eleven and then you wouldn't have to say Oh Hell if they done it, and you would win seven times what you bet. What with paying seven times it looked like a real good way to get a lot of chips, but I dropped a blue chip on two-three-twelve a couple of times and had to say Oh Hell under my breath.
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