The Ninth Wave by Eugene Burdick

wants."

"No, no," Mike said as if Hollis were being very dense. "You don't

understand. Once you play for really big stakes, kid stuff like this is

out. You're bored. I wouldn't want to ask him."

Mike walked to the door and opened it. As he closed it behind him he

had a diminishing, angular, smoke-obscured view of the room . . . the

overflowing ash trays, the blank faces of the boys, the white shirt

fronts, the hands holding the fans of cards. Then he heard a collective

exhalation of breath and Hollis said, "I'll be damned." Then the door

closed.

Hollis stuck his head in their room the next night.

"Moore, would you like to play some poker tonight?" he asked. "Nice

bunch tonight. They can probably play for any stakes you want."

Hank looked up, startled.

"No. I don't want to play poker, he said.

When Hollis had left Hank turned to Mike.

"Who was that?" he asked.

"Hollis. He is the guy I told you about. He has a poker game every night

in his room."

Hank had already lost interest and was turning over the pages of Gray's.

The next day at lunch in Encina Commons, Osborne and Hollis sat at the

same table with Mike and Hank. There were eight men at each table. The

food was brought in big white porcelain bowls and each man helped himself.

Hank ate quickly, neatly and fiercely. He seldom talked at the table

and he seldom listened to what was said. He was on his second helping

of creamed chicken over biscuits before he knew something was wrong. He

noticed everyone except Osborne and Hollis was silent. Hank looked at

the boy across from him and at once the boy glanced away. Hank turned

and looked down the table at Hollis.

"It's simple, Osborne," Hollis was saying. "I'll repeat it. Only a crude

anti-Semite would believe that the Jews have all the money because they

are greedy. The fact is that the Jews have all the money because they

never take a chance on losing it. They just hold on. If you hold on

long enough to all the little bits you can collect pretty soon you've

got a big wad. It's just that simple. The Jews just freeze the money

when they get ahold of it."

Hank felt his fork break through the crisp crust of a biscuit. Without

looking down he scooped the food into his mouth. He looked at Hollis'

tweed coat, the striped tie and the coarse, expensive-looking Oxford cloth

shirt. A pinpoint of hunger started up somewhere in Hank's stomach. He

reached out and quickly spooned more chicken onto his plate.

"Go on, Hollis," Hank said. "Tell us more."

"That's all there is to it, Moore," Hollis said. "You heard it. It was

plain enough."

Hank nodded. His mouth was full and a bit of biscuit hung from his

chin. He added some lima beans to his plate, spread butter on a

biscuit. His teeth bit into the lima beans; reduced the soft pulpy

substance to liquid and felt it go down his throat. He felt a necessity

to cram more food down his throat.

He looked at the red embarrassed faces of the other people around the

table and the hunger grew until he knew that he could never ease it. He

took two more gigantic bites of biscuit, scooped up some chicken on his

last biscuit and pushed it into his mouth. He chewed slowly. When his

mouth was empty he looked down the table at Hollis.

"Hollis, I know you're trying to be tough," Hank said gently. "But you

don't understand. I don't care one way or another about being a Jew. I

just don't react to it. I'm a Jew, but I'm not a patriotic Jew. But

I don't like you. Not because of what you said about the Jews. Just

because you're a pretty crude guy. I guess you were trying to be tough

so that you could shame me into playing poker with you. O.K., I'll give

you your choice. I'll play poker with you or I'll take you out behind

Encina and pound the shit out of you. Which will it be?"

Hank turned back to the table and began to eat the bread pudding

dessert. Hollis' face turned a slow red that gleamed through the tan.

He looked at Osborne, but there was no help