' And then he was silent and nobody liked to
question him, and they began to play. There were six men at the
boards playing, and the others were looking on behind. They played
two or three games for nothing, and then the old man took a fourpenny
bit, worn very thin and smooth, out from his pocket, and he called to
the rest to put something on the game. Then they all put down
something on the boards, and little as it was it looked much, from
the way it was shoved from one to another, first one man winning it
and then his neighbour. And some-times the luck would go against a
man and he would have nothing left, and then one or another would
lend him something, and he would pay it again out of his winnings,
for neither good nor bad luck stopped long with anyone.
And once Hanrahan said as a man would say in a dream, 'It is time for
me to be going the road'; but just then a good card came to him, and
he played it out, and all the money began to come to him. And once he
thought of Mary Lavelle, and he sighed; and that time his luck went
from him, and he forgot her again.
But at last the luck went to the old man and it stayed with him, and
all they had flowed into him, and he began to laugh little laughs to
himself, and to sing over and over to himself, 'Spades and Diamonds,
Courage and Power,' and so on, as if it was a verse of a song.
And after a while anyone looking at the men, and seeing the way their
bodies were rocking to and fro, and the way they kept their eyes on
the old man's hands, would think they had drink taken, or that the
whole store they had in the world was put on the cards; but that was
not so, for the quart bottle had not been disturbed since the game
began, and was nearly full yet, and all that was on the game was a
few sixpenny bits and shillings, and maybe a handful of coppers.
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