Gambler’s Eyes

IN THE NEW WORLD, in any town with a Chinatown, there would always be a gambling hall. Usually it was a log cabin perched at the edge of the forest. There the miners and loggers and farmers would gather, crowding around heavy plank tables. The fireplace and gas lamps threw out smoke and a dim yellow glow that swirled and mixed with the thick shouts and laughter of men. Deep into the night they played, fishing for new fortunes as they threw out their savings as bait.

One night, the door to one such place swung open. Silence fell like a heavy blanket over the room. The jingle of coins ceased, the grunts of drunken men shushed, and everyone turned to stare.

A man stood in the doorway. He was tall and thin, with a face darkened by the sun and hardened by the wind. His jacket was ragged and patched, and a knotted cloth bundle was slung across his back.

The stranger stood for a moment to get his bearings. His eyes were long sealed with hardened spittle and settled dust.

Never before had a blind man come into the gambling hall.

“Hey, brother,” called out one fellow. “You’re in the wrong place. Don’t you know this is a game hall?”

The blind man’s cane whipped from side to side as he strode to the fan-tan table, and the bystanders fell aside.

Then the blind man threw a thick roll of bills onto the table.

“This money, is it not good here?” he asked.

The dealer smiled. “Easy earnings tonight!” he muttered to himself. Then he beckoned to everyone. “Come, come, let’s play!” He threw a handful of game coins onto the table and covered them with a brass cup. “Lay your bets!” he shouted.

The blind man hesitated.

“Come, come, come,” the dealer cried, shaking the cup and rattling the coins. “Let’s play, let’s play!”

The blind man stood without moving. Finally he peeled off four large bills and thrust them on the three slot.

“No other bets?” called the dealer.

The crowd coughed and shifted. Two idlers who gambled every night snickered aloud.

“You don’t want to toy with the blind,” said one. ‘They can’t see, and they’ll call you a cheat if they lose!”

“Blind men are bad luck,” called out the other. “Who needs that in a place like this?”

The dealer ignored the unfriendly rumble and went on. “Let’s open!” he cried. He lifted the cup and sorted the coins into groups of four. “Four, eight, twelve, sixteen, twenty ...” and so he counted. When he got to the tail end, lo and behold, three coins were left! The blind man had won!

“Play again?” asked the dealer. He threw another handful of coins under the brass cup and shook them.

The blind man nodded. He slid ten big bills on the two slot, and then the dealer uncovered the coins to count. And when he got to the tail end, lo and behold, two coins were left! The blind man had won again!

The blind man played another three rounds, betting more and more each time. And time after time, he was the winner.

The crowd muttered in amazement at his luck. The dealer tightened his thin lips and waited grimly. He had seen this before. A man might win a few rounds, but sooner or later, all the money bounced back to the dealer’s side of the board.

Now the spectators reached into their pockets. The blind man listened to the dealer’s impatient jingling and finally set a bet on the three slot. Right away, everyone in the room added their cash to his. A mountain of money faced the dealer.

The dealer sighed and started to count the game coins. When he reached the end, lo and behold, only one coin was left! The dealer smiled a smile that stretched from ear to ear. The groans of forty men hit the roof as their money was swept away.

“Play again?” asked the dealer eagerly.

The blind man shook his head. “My luck is finished,” he declared. Then he turned from the table and groped his way to the door.

The two gamblers who had snickered aloud earlier spat out their tobacco in anger. They had lost all their cash with the blind man’s bet. Without a word, they went out after him. One seized an iron bar, the other a length of wood. They crept up as quiet as could be, and then they struck. But the blind man ducked and jumped aside. His cane swung and knocked out one man. As the other man hit out again, the blind man hopped nimbly away.

The second man winced. How could a blind man fight so well? He readied his iron bar again, and the two men faced each other, their steps tracing a circle in the dust.

“You think you’re smart, don’t you?” growled the gambler. “You cheated us all!”

“You tricked yourselves,” retorted the blind man calmly. “Are you sure you want to fight me?”

The gambler looked up with a snarl. As he swung his bar, the blind man’s eyes flashed open. They glinted blue-green, sharp as mountain ice, hard as emeralds

The gambler screamed and ran.

Weeks later, the blind man was seen in a distant town, and then in another. It was always the same. He won his wagers and then he left when greedy gamblers tried to wager with him.

Late one day, the blind man came to a new place, to a new game hall. He made his way to the table and laid down a wager, but the dealer stopped him.

“Don’t bother,” he ordered. “We know your game, blind man. You can’t play here, nor in any town near or far in this territory. You are finished, do you understand?”

The blind man stumbled back and down he sat with a heavy sigh. When he opened his mouth, the men moved warily away.

“All of you,” he said, “you wonder where I come from, why I win so well. Is that not so? I will tell you now, since I can gamble no more. You see, my father came from China to seek his fortune here, but my mother was white, and she gave me these.”

He opened his eyes and everyone saw the blue-green flashes – blue as sky, green as pine.

“When I was a child,” he continued, “I could go nowhere with eyes like these. Storekeepers turned away. Children danced circles around me. Whites and Chinese alike, they mocked my mixed blood. So I shut my eyes and I opened my ears. As long as no one saw my eyes, they let me by. Now I hear what you cannot hear: the hearts of greedy gamblers, the pulse of petty thieves. I hear the game coins rattle under the brass cup, and the unique sound that each combination makes. I hear everything.”

With that, the blind man rose and threw down his cane. He walked out the door and into the dark, and was never seen again.