The Cardturner

by Louis Sachar

  Would you believe it? All these bridge geniuses, and none of them could add four numbers in his or her head. They came up with four different totals, and all four were wrong.

  "Forty-two thousand, five hundred and fifty," I informed them.

  Once all of the teams had turned in their masterpoint totals, the directors separated them into brackets. The sixteen teams with the most masterpoints were placed in the top bracket. The next sixteen were in the second bracket, and so forth.

  We were in the top bracket, no surprise there. What did surprise me was that we weren't the team with the most masterpoints. We were actually sixth. There was one team with over 110,000, and another with 87,000.

  We got our table assignment. Gloria and Trapp sat North-South at A-5. Two women about my mother's age were already seated in the East and West seats. The teammates of these women, two men, were sitting North-South at B-5, playing against Arnold and Lucy, who were seated East-West.

  Gloria explained my role, and the women accepted it without any degree of skepticism or amazement. Their only comment about Trapp's blindness was when East, a woman with auburn hair and a nice smile, suggested he might want to try Braille cards.

  "I tried them," my uncle said, which was news to me. "Couldn't get used to it. I don't know what it is. I never could remember my hand. I had to keep running my fingers back over the cards to be sure. But Alton just has to tell me once, and it sticks."

  "Do you play bridge, Alton?" the other woman asked me.

  "Hah!" laughed Trapp.

  "I've played a few times," I said.

  My uncle didn't react to that, but I know my answer surprised him.

  Once we started playing, everyone was all business. It was clear, even to me, that both women were very strong players. The one who had mentioned Braille cards got a "Nicely played" from Trapp on the very first board.

  We would play the entire session against just this one team. The loser would be knocked out, and the winner would get to play in the second round that evening.

  After we finished the first six boards, Gloria called for a caddy, who took those boards over to Lucy and Arnold's table. While we waited for the caddy to return, Gloria asked one of the women if she had played in China.

  "We both did," the woman admitted.

  "I thought so," said Gloria. "Congratulations."

  It turned out our opponents had been a part of the U.S. women's team that had won the world championship in China just a few months earlier. Gloria had recognized the auburn-haired one from her picture in a bridge magazine.

  "There are bridge magazines?" I asked.

  "I'm afraid so," said one of the women.

  "So when you're not playing bridge, and not talking about bridge, you're reading about bridge?"

  The women laughed.

  "Who are your teammates?" asked Trapp.

  "You don't need to worry about them," said East. "They're nobody."

  "Just our husbands," said West, and they both laughed.

  The caddy returned with the six boards that had been played at the other table, numbers seven through twelve. We played them without shuffling.

  When we finished those six boards, the two women left the table, and Arnold and Lucy took their place. We compared results.

  The scoring for a team game is done differently than for a pairs game. They used something called International Match Points, but everyone just called them IMPs, as in, "We lost ten IMPs on board one. We won one IMP on board two."

  This is the chart they used.

  On the first board at our table, the opponents got 420 points for making four spades. That was the one where Trapp had said "Nicely played." At the other table, Arnold and Lucy had held the same cards as the women, and they had also bid four spades. But Arnold didn't play it as well and went down one, giving their opponents fifty points.

  That gave the other team a total of 470 points on that board (420 + 50), which according to the chart was worth 10 IMPs.

  "Sorry, I guess I could have made it," said Arnold.

  "No sorrys allowed," said Gloria. "She played it really well."

  On board two, our opponents made two hearts at our table, for 110 points. Lucy and Arnold made three hearts, for 140. We did thirty points better, so we got one IMP.

  Our best board was board nine. Gloria bid six hearts and made it, for 980 points. At the other table the opponents took the same number of tricks, but they only bid four hearts, for 480 points. We gained 500 points, which was worth 11 IMPs.

  Lucy tallied up the results. They beat us 29 to 26.

  I was stunned. I'd gotten so used to Trapp and Gloria winning all the time, it never even occurred to me that they could be knocked out in the first round.

  "Don't look so upset," said Lucy, fluffing my hair. "The match is only half over. We still have another twelve boards."

  Arnold and Lucy went back to the other table, and the two women returned to ours. "Three?" one of the women asked.

  Gloria agreed that was the score; then, without further discussion, we started shuffling the boards.

  There are some hands where even a great player doesn't have much of an opportunity to shine. He just passes and follows suit and is more or less at the mercy of his opponents. If they bid and play well, all he can do is go on to the next board, and hope that when his teammates play the hand, they make the same good bids and play the hand just as well.

  I think that was pretty much how the first half of the match went. In the second half of the match, Trapp had more opportunities.

  We won by 26 IMPs.

  44

  The Milkman's Clothes

  Lucy said she knew a great Lebanese restaurant not too far away, but Trapp said he preferred to eat in his room. He was exhausted. "Besides, I'm sure Teodora has prepared some sort of macrobiotic delicacy for me."

  "Lebanese food is very healthy," urged Lucy.

  "I need to lie down," said Trapp.

  "You're coming, aren't you, Alton?" asked Arnold.

  "It will be a lot more fun than a boring hotel room," said Lucy.

  I had never eaten Lebanese food, but how good could it be if it was so healthy? Besides, I'd always wanted to order room service.

  "Not for Alton," said my uncle. "They have video games in the rooms. Hah!"

  "Lebanese sounds great," I said.

  Hah yourself!

  First I had to escort him to his room. "So you've played bridge a few times?" he suddenly asked me in the elevator.

  "Twice," I said. "Once at my house, and then Thursday at the bridge studio with Toni."

  I waited for some comment, but he said nothing more about it. He didn't even ask how we did. I think maybe he was mulling it all over, letting it sink in.

  Teodora opened the door to his suite. "Did you get knocked up?" she asked, taking Trapp from me.

  "Knocked out," said Trapp. "No, we're still in it. Knocked up means you're pregnant."

  Teodora squeezed my arm and said, "Well done, Alton," as if I deserved the credit for the victory.

  Knockouts go quicker than pairs games, since you play board after board against the same opponents and don't have to wait for everyone else to finish and then move to a new table. Lucy's husband and Arnold's wife still had three rounds to go in the pairs game when we left for the Lebanese restaurant in Arnold's rental car.

  "Is he really going to Chicago?" Lucy asked.

  "He booked the rooms," said Gloria.

  "You think he's up to it?" asked Arnold.

  "To tell you the truth," said Gloria, "I think the nationals are what's keeping him alive."

  "He'll win," I said. "You just knocked out two world champions!"

  "Their husbands weren't exactly world-champion caliber," said Arnold.

  The Lebanese restaurant was in an old cement factory that now housed quite a number of upscale shops and restaurants. There were lots of exposed pipes and odd-looking pieces of machinery, but it was all for decoration.

  Lucy ordered a bun
ch of appetizers and salads for the table. It tasted pretty good to me, and everyone seemed to be enjoying the meal, until I ruined it by asking, "So what ever happened to Annabel?"

  All I got for an answer were three cold stares.

  I knew Gloria didn't want me talking about Annabel in front of Trapp, but he wasn't around now, so I didn't see the harm. I pressed on. "Why has it been so long since Trapp played in a national tournament?" I asked. "Did something happen the last time? Is that why Annabel went insane?"

  "Who told you she was insane?" Lucy asked sharply.

  Her tone of voice caused me to shrink back. "I don't know," I said. "Just something I heard somewhere."

  "What did you hear?" asked Arnold.

  "She gave the milkman a thousand dollars for his clothes. And then made him wear her clothes."

  Their stares grew colder.

  "Maybe I heard wrong," I said. "I don't remember exactly."

  "If you don't know what it is you're talking about, then you really shouldn't talk about it, should you?" asked Lucy. Her anger surprised me.

  "She did not make the milkman wear her clothes," said Arnold. "Annabel gave him some of Henry's clothes."

  "There was nothing untoward about it," said Gloria. "They changed in separate rooms. Annabel put on the milkman's uniform in order to sneak out of her house and play with Trapp in the nationals."

  "Her husband kept her locked up like a criminal," said Arnold. "The servants were under strict orders not to let her leave the house."

  "I still remember the way she looked," said Lucy, her voice softening. "In those days, people used to dress up for bridge tournaments. Women in dresses. Men in suits and ties. And there was Annabel in those white overalls, with her hair cropped short. She was absolutely radiant! Even without her hair and in those clothes, she was the most beautiful woman in the room."

  "That was because she was with Trapp," said Arnold. "Whenever she was with him, her face glowed and her eyes sparkled like diamonds."

  "She was in love with him?" I asked.

  "And he was even more in love with her," said Lucy.

  "But in the car, he said she was just his bridge partner."

  "That doesn't mean he wasn't in love with her," said Lucy. "It just means he was a fool."

  45

  Thugs in Business Suits

  The year was 1963. Trapp and Annabel were playing for the national championship. It was a two-day, four-session event. After the first day, half the field was eliminated, leaving only the best of the best.

  "All the legends of the game were there," said Arnold. "Goren, Jacoby . . ."

  "And Annabel and Trapp had as good a chance of winning as any of them," said Lucy. "They were in fifth place going into the final session."

  About an hour into the session, a group of men entered the playing area. "Thugs in business suits," Arnold called them. The men spread out and walked up and down the aisles between the rows of tables. Lucy said there were more than twenty of them, but Arnold said there were only twelve.

  Arnold and Lucy had also been playing in the event, but not with each other. Gloria hadn't been there, but she had heard all about it.

  One of the thugs spotted Annabel, and then they all converged on the table.

  "Two men were holding Annabel," said Lucy, "and the rest formed a wall around her. She was dragged away, kicking and screaming."

  Lucy's voice cracked as she spoke. Forty-five years later, the memory still brought tears to her eyes.

  "Couldn't anyone stop them?" I asked.

  "Your uncle tried," said Arnold. "I drove him to the hospital. He had a busted nose and three broken ribs."

  "What about the police?" I asked. "Did they have nine-one-one back then?"

  "This was Chicago," said Arnold. "Those men were the police."

  That was the last time Lucy or Arnold ever saw Annabel. It wasn't until almost six months later that they learned she had been locked up in an insane asylum.

  "The Rolling Brook Sanitarium," said Arnold. "Trapp went there almost every single day, but they wouldn't let him see her. He demanded to speak to her doctor, but they wouldn't let him do that, either, because he wasn't family."

  "But then when Nina became involved," said Lucy, "they wouldn't let her talk to Annabel either."

  "Who's Nina?" I asked.

  "Annabel's sister," said Gloria.

  "Trapp and Nina must have filed half a dozen lawsuits on Annabel's behalf," said Arnold, "but the King family controlled the judges, too. The judge said he couldn't do anything without a signed affidavit from Annabel. But how were they supposed to get a signed affidavit if they weren't allowed to see her?"

  Not even the other patients were allowed to see her. She was kept isolated for more than two years.

  "She wasn't insane when she entered Rolling Brook," said Gloria, "but after two years . . ."

  The only way Trapp could find out any information about Annabel was to wait in the parking lot, and then bribe the orderlies and janitors when they got off work. Most had never seen her, but they had heard rumors about her. And they heard her screams.

  She wasn't being beaten. Her screams were screams for attention.

  At some point, Annabel managed to obtain a bottle of bleach from a janitor's cart.

  When Arnold first mentioned the bottle of bleach, I actually felt hopeful. I thought that maybe she threw bleach in a doctor's face, then escaped out a window into Trapp's waiting arms.

  I watch too much TV.

  She committed suicide by drinking the bleach. It took her several tries, because she kept vomiting it back up.

  We walked out of the restaurant. I ran my fingers over the cold, hard bricks of the cement factory.

  A heart like a brick, my father had said. Whose heart wouldn't turn cold and hard?

  I thought of my mother as a little girl, hearing all those stupid, dirty stories about Annabel King.

  I thought of all the stupid things I had said to my uncle.

  Did you ever work as a milkman?

  When you first met Annabel, how old was her daughter?

  I always make the biggest fool of myself just when I think I'm being the most clever.

  46

  Nixon

  In their grief, Trapp and Nina turned to each other.

  "They each loved Annabel," said Lucy, "and for a while, they confused that with thinking they loved one another."

  We were in the car, driving back to the hotel.

  "I was the best man at their wedding," said Arnold, "but I knew the marriage wouldn't last. Everyone put on happy faces, but it was the saddest wedding I'd ever witnessed."

  They were divorced within the year. Trapp quit playing bridge and started the Yarborough Investment Group.

  "It was just another game to him," said Arnold. "Except, instead of masterpoints, now he was accumulating money. You want to know what he once told me? He said he preferred masterpoints to money because masterpoints were worthless."

  Twenty years later, Gloria happened to run into him at a shoe repair shop.

  "I needed a strap fixed on my purse. Trapp was worth millions, but he still got his shoes resoled."

  She asked him if he would like to play bridge sometime. She mentioned that there was a sectional the following weekend, and she was looking for a partner.

  "His face turned white," Gloria told us. "He started trembling."

  He told her no, he couldn't, then hurried out of the shop.

  "But then at three o'clock in the morning my telephone rang," Gloria said. "It was Trapp. All he said was ‘I might be a little rusty.' We played a week later and had a seventy percent game."

  Richard Nixon was Eisenhower's vice president. In 1960 he ran for president and lost to John F. Kennedy, and according to Arnold, most people thought that would be the last they'd ever hear of Richard M. Nixon. By 1967, Henry King, who had been in the Senate for more than a decade, was expected to be the next Republican presidential candidate.

  But Nixon wasn
't finished.

  "I'd always hated Nixon," said Arnold. "But one thing I've got to give him credit for: he was good at destroying his enemies. And to him, Henry King was the enemy."

  Nixon tried to dig up dirt on Henry King and came across all the court documents Trapp and Nina had filed. That was more than just dirt. He hit a gold mine. He initiated a well-publicized investigation into the care and treatment of the mentally ill, and into the suicide of Annabel King, his "dear friend's wife."

  Rolling Brook Sanitarium was shut down, and two of the doctors went to prison.

  "What about Henry King?" I asked.

  "He and Nixon made some kind of secret deal," said Arnold.

  Arnold didn't know what the deal was, but Henry King abruptly resigned his Senate seat and lived the rest of his life in relative seclusion. Nixon was elected president in 1968.

  When Sophie King turned eighteen she changed her last name to Finnick (Annabel's maiden name) and never spoke to her father again. She never allowed him to see Toni, his only granddaughter.

  47

  Teodora's Tea

  I almost felt like crying when I knocked on the door to my uncle's suite. I couldn't stop thinking about Annabel, and had to remind myself that her death had occurred more than forty years ago. He had gotten over it, or, if not over it, at least he'd learned to live with it. He certainly didn't need me to open up old wounds. I'd already asked too many stupid questions.

  Teodora answered and told me that Trapp was still in the process of waking up, whatever that meant. She told me to go ahead and shovel and she'd take him down in a few minutes.

  She must have said shuffle, not shovel.

  Lucy and Arnold were sitting East-West at B-2, and Gloria was North at A-2. Before joining her, I decided to research the competition. The lists of teams and matches were posted on the wall beside the directors' table.

  I was hoping to play the team with more than 110,000 masterpoints. I was looking forward to knocking out the big shots. Instead, I saw that our next opponents were the lowest-ranked team in our bracket. However, I also saw that they had defeated the team with 87,000 in the afternoon session, so maybe they shouldn't be taken lightly.