The Yellow Rose by Gilbert Morris Page B

and one of the losers, a tough-looking man named Hack Dempsey, stared down at the winning hand Clay had tossed down in the middle of the table. He stared at his own hand, threw them down with a curse, and watched as Clay, moving leisurely, reached out and dragged the pot in.
    “You’re too lucky, Taliferro.”
    “Why, Hack,” Clay said, pronouncing his words very distinctly, as drunks will usually do, “you hurt my feelings. Poker ain’t luck. It’s all skill.”
    Dempsey cursed again and poured himself a drink from the bottle on the table. He was a large man, a little overweight, but obviously tough.
    The scars on his face were proof that he had been in some fights in the past. “I’m sayin’ that it ain’t luck, and it ain’t skill either.”
    Clay reached over and put his arm around the woman and pulled her close. He put his head next to her ear and said, “Lena, I think Hack is hinting around that my card playin’ ain’t exactly on the up and up. Is that what he’s sayin’?”
    “Why, honey, he wouldn’t say a thing like that.”
    Hack cursed again. “You win one more pot, and I’ll do more than say it.”
    “You don’t understand,” Clay said. He almost said unnerstand but pronounced the word very carefully to show them that he was not affected by all the of liquor he had downed. “I win at cards because I have a pure heart, don’t you see?” He laughed at Hack’s expression and said, “I don’t think you have a pure heart, Hack. I think you are a mean man.”
    “You’re gonna find out!”
    At that instant Clay looked up at a man who had just entered the saloon. He blinked his eyes and had some effort focusing, then he carefully stood up, saying, “Don’t nobody leave. I’ll be back in a minute to show you how a pure-hearted man can win at cards.”
    “You’d better come back. I’m gettin’ even,” Dempsey snarled.
    Clay walked carefully, holding himself erect, over to where Brodie stood. “What are you doing here, Brodie? This is no place for a young man to be. It’s only for us people who have pure hearts.” He laughed at his own joke and said, “Come on to the bar. I think they got some sarsaparilla.”
    Brodie grinned and followed Clay to the bar. He leaned up against it, and Clay said, “Clyde, give me a drink of whiskey, and give my boy here a sarsaparilla.”
    “I don’t want no sarsaparilla, Clay, and you ain’t my pa.”
    “Why, son, I’m the same as your pa. Ever since your poor dad died, I just felt like you was my own son, and I’m gonna look out for you. I surely am. I want you to have a pure heart like me.”
    Brodie laughed aloud and said, “I’ll have a whiskey.”
    Clay studied Brodie owlishly and finally nodded, saying, “All right.
    You can have one drink, but that’s all.” He took his own drink, tossed his head back, downed the whiskey, and then pulled at Brodie. “Come on. I’ll teach you how to play cards.” He walked back to the table, slumped down into his chair, and said, “Pull up a chair there. This here is my friend Brodie. I’m gonna teach him how to play cards, but he can’t have but one drink. Don’t be givin’ him none, you hear me?”
    “I hear you,” Dempsey grunted. “Now, play cards.”
    The game began, and Brodie drank the whiskey. It was not his first drink, despite what Clay was thinking. He watched as Clay played, and when Clyde came around with a bottle of whiskey, he let him fill his glass.
    “Remember now. You can only have one drink,” Clay said, his speech a bit slurred.
    Brodie took the drink and grinned at the woman sitting with Clay. “I bet when you were my age, you had more than one drink.”
    “When I was your age,” Clay said, swinging his arm around in a grandiose gesture, “I went to church every Sunday. And I helped old ladies across the street.”
    Brodie drank his drink, and Clay said, “Well, that’s one, and that’s all you get, Brodie.”
    “Sure, Clay,” Brodie said as he sat back and