“You already took it,” Mr Hubert said. “You did that when you cam back here.” Then he stopped too. Then he batted his eyes, but only about six times. Then he stopped and looked at Uncle Buck for more than a minute. “What chance?” he said.
“That five hundred dollars,” Uncle Buck said.
“What five hundred dollars?” Mr Hubert said. He and Uncle Buck looked at one another. Now it was Mr Hubert that batted his eyes again and then stopped again. “I thought you said you found him in Tennie’s cabin.”
“I did,” Uncle Buck said. “What you bet me was I would catch him there. If there had been ten of me standing in front of that door, we wouldn’t have caught him.” Mr Hubert blinked at Uncle Buck, slow and steady.
“So you aim to hold me to that fool bet,” he said.
“You took your chance too,” Uncle Buck said. Mr Hubert blinked at Uncle Buck. Then he stopped. Then he went and took the candle from the table and went out. They sat on the edge of the bed and watched the light go down the hall and heard Mr Hubert’s feet on the stairs. After a while they began to see the light again and they heard Mr Hubert’s feet coming back up the stairs. Then Mr Hubert entered and went to the table and set the candle down and laid a deck of cards by it.
“One hand,” he said. “Draw. You shuffle, I cut, this boy deals. Five hundred dollars against Sibbey. And we’ll settle this nigger business once and for all too. If you win, you buy Tennie; if I win, I buy that boy of yours. The price will be the same for each one; three hundred dollars.”
“Win?” Uncle Buck said. “The one that wins buys the niggers?”
“Wins Sibbey, damn it!” Mr Hubert said. “Wins Sibbey! What the hell else are we setting up till midnight arguing about? The lowest hand wins Sibbey and buys the niggers.”
“All right,” Uncle Buck said. “I’ll buy the damn girl then and we’ll call the rest of this foolishness off.”
“Hah,” Mr Hubert said again. “This is the most serious foolishness you ever took part in in your life. No. You said you wanted your chance, and now you’ve got it. Here it is, right here on this table, waiting on you.”
So Uncle Buck shuffled the cards and Mr Hubert cut them. Then he took up the deck and dealt in turn until Uncle Buck and Mr Hubert had five. And Uncle Buck looked at his hand a long time and then said two cards and he gave them to him, and Mr Hubert looked at his hand quick and said one card and he gave it to him and Mr Hubert flipped his discard on to the two which Uncle Buck had discarded and slid the new card into his hand and opened it out and looked at it quick again and closed it and looked at Uncle Buck and said, “Well? Did you help them threes?”
“No,” Uncle Buck said.
“Well I did,” Mr Hubert said. He shot his hand across the table so that the cards fell face-up in front of Uncle Buck and they were three kings and two fives, and said, “By God, Buck McCaslin, you have met your match at last.”
“And that was all?” Uncle Buddy said. It was late then, near sunset; they would be at Mr Hubert’s in another fifteen minutes.
“Yes, sir,” he said, telling that too: how Uncle Buck waked him at daylight and he climbed out a window and got the pony and left, and how Uncle Buck said that if they pushed him too close in the meantime, he would climb down the gutter too and hide in the woods until Uncle Buddy arrived.
“Hah,” Uncle Buddy said. “Was Tomey’s Turl there?”
“Yes, sir,” he said. “He was waiting in the stable when I got the pony. He said, ‘Aint they settled it yet?’”
“And what did you say?” Uncle Buddy said.
“I said, ‘Uncle Buck looks like he’s settled. But Uncle Buddy aint got here yet.’”
“Hah,” Uncle Buddy said.
And that was about all. They reached the house. Maybe Uncle Buck was watching them, but if he was, he never showed himself, never came out of the woods. Miss Sophonsiba was nowhere in sight either, so at least Uncle Buck hadn’t quite given up; at least he hadn’t asked her yet.
And he and Uncle Buddy and Mr Hubert ate supper and they came in from the kitchen and cleared the table, leaving only the lamp on it and the deck of cards. Then it was just like last night, except that Uncle Buddy had no necktie and Mr Hubert wore clothes now instead of a nightshirt and it was a shaded lamp on the table instead of a candle, and Mr Hubert sitting at his end of the table with the deck in his hands, riffling the edges with his thumb and looking at Uncle Buddy.
Then he tapped the edges even and set the deck out in the middle of the table, under the lamp, and folded his arms on the edge of the table and leaned forward a little on the table, looking at Uncle Buddy, who was sitting at his end of the table with his hands in his lap, all one grey colour, like an old grey rock or a stump with grey moss on it, that still, with his round white head like Uncle Buck’s but he didn’t blink like Uncle Buck and he was a little thicker than Uncle Buck, as if from sitting down so much watching food cook, as if the things he cooked had made him a little thicker than he would have been and the things he cooked with, the flour and such, had made him all one same quiet colour.
“Little toddy before we start?” Mr Hubert said.
“I dont drink,” Uncle Buddy said.
“That’s right,” Mr Hubert said. “I knew there was something else besides just being woman-weak that makes ‘Filus seem human. But no matter.” He batted his eyes twice at Uncle Buddy. “Buck McCaslin against the land and niggers you have heard me promise as Sophonsiba’s dowry on the day she marries. If I beat you, ‘Filus marries Sibbey without any dowry. If you beat me, you get ‘Filus. But I still get the three hundred dollars ‘Filus owes me for Tennie. Is that correct?”
“That’s correct,” Uncle Buddy said.
“Stud,” Mr Hubert said. “One hand. You to shuffle, me to cut, this boy to deal.”
“No,” Uncle Buddy said. “Not Cass. He’s too young. I dont want him mixed up in any gambling.”
“Hah,” Mr Hubert said. “It’s said that a man playing cards with Amodeus McCaslin aint gambling. But no matter.” But he was still looking at Uncle Buddy; he never even turned his head when he spoke: “Go to the back door and holler. Bring the first creature that answers, animal mule or human, that can deal ten cards.”
So he went to the back door. But he didn’t have to call because Tomey’s Turl was squatting against the wall just outside the door, and they returned to the dining-room where Mr Hubert still sat with his arms folded on his side of the table and Uncle Buddy sat with his hands in his lap on his side and the deck of cards face-down under the lamp between them.
Neither of them even looked up when he and Tomey’s Turl entered. “Shuffle,” Mr Hubert said. Uncle Buddy shuffled and set the cards back under the lamp and put his hands back into his lap and Mr Hubert cut the deck and folded his arms back on to the table-edge. “Deal,” he said. Still neither he nor Uncle Buddy looked up.
They just sat there while Tomey’s Turl’s saddle-coloured hands came into the light and took up the deck and dealt, one card face-down to Mr Hubert and one face-down to Uncle Buddy, and one face-up to Mr Hubert and it was a king, and one face-up to Uncle Buddy and it was a six.
“Buck McCaslin against Sibbey’s dowry,” Mr Hubert said. “Deal.” And the hand dealt Mr Hubert a card and it was a three, and Uncle Buddy a card and it was a two. Mr Hubert looked at Uncle Buddy. Uncle Buddy rapped once with his knuckles on the table.
“Deal,” Mr Hubert said. And the hand dealt Mr Hubert a card and it was another three, and Uncle Buddy a card and it was a four. Mr Hubert looked at Uncle Buddy’s cards. Then he looked at Uncle Buddy and Uncle Buddy rapped on the table again with his knuckles.
“Deal,” Mr Hubert said, and the hand dealt him an ace and Uncle Buddy a five and now Mr Hubert just sat still. He didn’t look at anything or move for a whole minute; he just sat there and watched Uncle Buddy put one hand on to the table for the first time since he shuffled and pinch up one corner of his face-down card and look at it and then put his hand back into his lap. “Check,” Mr Hubert said.
“I’ll bet you them two niggers,” Uncle Buddy said. He didn’t move either. He sat there just like he sat in the wagon or on a horse or in the rocking-chair he cooked from.
“Against what?” Mr Hubert said.
“Against the three hundred dollars Theophilus owes you for Tennie, and the three hundred you and Theophilus agreed on for Tomey’s Turl,” Uncle Buddy said.
“Hah,” Mr
