"Beijing Craps" - читать интересную книгу автора (Masterton Graham)

Solly licked his lips. 'The road from whence there is no return? What's that?'

The boy turned and looked at him slyly. 'You're traveling down it already, my friend. You should know.'

'Let me feel those dice,' Solly demanded.

Jack closed his fingers over them. 'Solly ... maybe you shouldn't.'

'Oh, yeah? And any particular reason why not? Seeing as how I'm already supposed to be taking the hike with no return?'

There was such a crackling charge of power from the dice that Jack felt as if every nerve in the palm of his hand was wriggling and twitching, centipedes under the skin. He had the irrational but terrible feeling that the dice wanted Solly very badly. The dice knew that Solly was there; and they were hungry for him.

Solly held out his hand, and Jack reluctantly dropped the dice one after the other into his palm. Solly said nothing, but something passed across his eyes like a shadow across a doorway. There was no telling what Solly could feel. Jack suspected that the dice felt different for everybody who held them. It depended on your needs. It depended on your weaknesses.

'So you place your bet,' said Jack, without taking his eyes away from Solly. 'What do you bet? Your soul, something like that?'

'Oh, no, nothing as melodramatic as that. Anyway, what's a soul worth? Nothing. A soul is like a marker. Once the guy's dead, how's he going to pay?'

'So what's the stake?' Jack persisted.

'Months, that's what you bet,' the boy told him. From the other side of the table, Mr Fortunato hadn't lost sight of the dice for one moment, and when the boy said 'months', he shivered, as if the boy had said 'millions'.

'Months?' asked Solly.

The boy nodded, and then held out his hand for the dice. 'The shooter bets as many months as he wants, and the other players collectively put up an equal number of months that he's going to lose. Lunar months, that is, Chinese months. The rest of the players can bet amongst themselves, too, whether the shooter comes or don't come, except in Beijing Craps we say dies-a-little or lives-a-little; and there are hard-way bets, too, just like regular craps, whether the shooter throws two Yo Huangs or two Chung Kueis or whether he digs himself a grave and throws two Yamas.'

'But if you win, what?' asked Solly, hoarsely.

'If you win, you win months, that's what. Two, three months; maybe a year; maybe two years, depending what you've bet.'

Solly looked around, found himself a chair, dragged it over, and sat down. His breathing was harsh and irregular. 'You mean you actually get younger?'

The boy giggled. 'Look at me, Solly! Nevvar Graf, five years old!'

Solly rubbed his mouth with his hand, as if he were trying to smear away the taste of greasy hamburger. 'Jack,' he said. 'Jack, we got to give this a shot.'

Jack shook his head. 'Forget it,' he said; although his throat was dry. 'I play for money. Months, what's a month? Who wants to play for months?'

The boy shrugged. 'What do they say? Time is money. Money is time. It's all the same. You ought to try it, Jack, you'll like it. I mean, let's put it this way. Keeping yourself in toupees and hotel-rooms is one thing; but being ten years younger, that's something else. How about fifteen years younger, Jack? How about twenty years younger? How about walking away from this table tonight the same age you were when you first started gambling, with your whole life ahead of you, all over again? No more crap tables, no more cards, no more cigar-smoke, no more shills? How about a wife and a family, Jack, the way your life was always meant to be?'

'How the hell do you know how my life was always meant to be?' Jack retorted.

The boy's eyes gleamed. 'I've been working in this business all my life, Jack. You're just one of a million. The International Brotherhood of Optimistic Suckers.'

Jack looked at the table; at Solly; at the mean green lamp; at the strange assortment of faces around the layout. He knew with suffocating certainty that he would have to play before he left. Elaine had died in his arms; Roddy had dwindled to a Kodak photograph tucked in his wallet. The chance of starting over burned in the darkness of his present existence like the molten line of the setting sun, burning on the western horizon. To go back! To catch up the sun!

He heard himself saying, 'Solly and me, we'll watch for a while.'

'Hey, you can watch,' Solly told him, abruptly standing up, and sniffing, and clearing his throat. 'Me, I'm going to play.'