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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Silver Moon" data-source="post: 1879532" data-attributes="member: 8530">Chapter Fifty, “Just Getting Ready”, January 7th, 1882:Jake, Katherine, Ruby and Little Joe arrive at the Lone Star, which currently has three-dozen patrons. Tony has a five players seated at his table, including Ned Walters, and has already started a game. Six players are currently seated at Job Kane’s table, five men and a woman. Two of these are Neil Cassidy and Al Brower, each seated in their usual places. Jake reminds himself that Brower owns the gunshop in Promise City and makes a mental note to talk to him later about the hand-cannon that they acquired. Of the other four people seated Jake recognizes a pair dressed as ranchers who were present at the Lone Star the night before where they had been spectators of the game at his table. Both are wearing gun belts with revolvers.  Another man is attired in a blue pinstriped suit, a red-checkered-print shirt and a solid red bow tie. He has long reddish brown sideburns that are staring to gray but is otherwise clean-shaven. On his belt is a holster with an old-style cap and ball pistol. The woman looks to be in her late thirties and is wearing a navy blue skirt, white ruffled shirt and a leather vest dyed a royal blue. A fair-sized gray hat with a white bow and blue feathers on the bow sits atop of her head. Jake’s nose detects an odd scent coming from her, not perfume, more of a smell like you’d find in turpentine or kerosene. Her hands appear to belong to somebody who works for a living, with short fingernails and a few calluses. She has no visible weapons. Katherine and Ruby focus their attention at a man seated on the piano bench and placing some sheet music on the piano. He is tall and rail thin, clean cut, with short blonde hair parted in the middle and wearing a pair of wire rimmed eyeglasses. He has on a suit that hasn't been in style since the 1850's, with an ascot rather than a tie. The sleeves of his white silk shirt are fastened with cufflinks. His fingers are long and delicate looking. Maggie motions them over to one of the four-person dining tables and says "Have a seat your steaks will be right up. And don't complain about not having time. We're still waiting for one more of your players Jake and we have other entertainment for the next half hour." With that she nods to the man at the piano who begins playing Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto Number One.  Kate listened to the music with pleasure. She had never expected to hear Tchaikovsky here, but she was beginning to expect surprises. It was a shame that she worked when Flossie McKenna sang. Kate doubted she would be singing tomorrow night when Kate had the time to go listen to her. The man was an excellent pianist, and although Kate enjoyed listening to him, it made her a little sad. She watched his fingers move smoothly over the keys. "I don't think I'll be trying any classical music tonight," she said to the others. "I'd rather not try to follow that. But perhaps Maggie will let me come in tomorrow and play just for myself." Ruby replies, “Oh, I’m sure she will Kate. That would be a nice break for you to do something different…” Ruby gives Jake the go-along-with-it look he is getting accustomed to. “Some peace and alone time sounds wonderful, no? I must admit that sounds good to me too. And tomorrow would be a good day for it…” Ruby pinches Jake on the leg and he mumbles some agreement under his breath.   Jake choose a seat where he can see the table his will be playing at while talking to the others. "So Little Joe, tell us about your ranch." Jake nods and smiles, but he really isn't listening to Little Joe Cartwright. He is busy watching the faces actions and mannerisms of the people at his poker table. He sees that Ruby has noticed his attention is elsewhere. Jake shrugs his shoulders and says quietly to her, "Just getting ready."Kate says, "Looks like you'll have an interesting game tonight, Jake." "Hmmm?" It takes Jake a moment to turn to Katherine and register what she said. "Yes, looks like a full table." He casts a sideways glance at Ruby and says, "Perhaps I'll be lucky tonight."  “Of course you will. You’re wearing your new lucky hat. You’ll be just as lucky as you want to be,” Ruby says with a wink.The six people waiting at the table all are reacting differently. Cassidy and Brower are conversing primarily with themselves with an occasional comment to the man in the bow tie. Brower seems content to wait, Cassidy is acting rather impatient, while the man in the bow tie appears deep in thought and annoyed whenever Cassidey or Brower talk to him.  The two ranchers appear to be friends and are talking exclusively to each other. Jake is able to determine from the body language that one of the two seems to have some sort of influence over the other.  The woman has turned her chair to get a better view of the pianist and is sitting back and enjoying every note of the music, with a broad smile on her face.Ruby is intrigued by the blond haired piano player. The music he is playing is beautiful and she is almost entraced. She gets up, walks over to the piano, and sits next to him on the bench. When he stops playing she says, "That was just wonderful." She stretches out her hand to him, "My name's Ruby."   He ignores her extended hand, introduces himself as Stanley Barker, says "You must be Katherine." He then and then finds another piece of music titled "Beethoven Piano Concerto Number Five" and starts playing. "No, it's Ruby..." but Stanley had already started playing again. "Hum, a challenge..." she thinks, "if I get bored." She smiles to herself. Ruby was almost never bored. Katherine tried to split her attention between Joe Cartwright and the music coming from the piano, but more and more the music was winning. She felt a bit guilty, but Joe didn't seem to mind the lull in the conversation, and Jake was obviously already putting himself into the poker game to come. The smile on Ruby's face told Katherine that the girl was also fascinated. She laughed to herself when Ruby got up and sat on the bench with the young man. For a moment Kate feared the Ruby's presence would distract him, but he seemed only to say hello and then go back to his music. She smiled at the slightly startled look on Ruby's face. Apparently this was one man who was not distracted by a pretty girl.  The familiar strains of Beethoven began, and Kate shut her eyes to listen.  Ruby gets up and goes back to the table to finish her dinner. Kate had her eyes closed and Jake was concentrating on his poker table. So for once Ruby sat there quietly.So you want to be a better Poker player?" Jake's eyes flick from Ruby to the table he has been watching. "Even the best players sometimes give themselves away when the game is not on. One way to win is to take them out of their element. See there?" He nods slightly. "The impatient one, make him wait. The contented one, pick up the pace. That one there with the bow tie, if I'm not mistaken he'll be easy to rattle. Probably likes everything just so. Even little things like dealing his cards a bit messy will set him on edge. Those two ranchers, well I'll watch for one watching the other for queues, or even backing off when he thinks his partner has a good hand. The woman, well I haven't figured her yet. But she probably is a risk taker, just being a woman at the table if you are concerned about your reputation is a risk. She seems confident and at least somewhat educated. I'll have to think on her some more." He turns to look at Ruby, "Of course I could be wrong, which is why you size them up and try your guesses out early. Cocky poker players usually end up with empty pockets. There is a lot of the game that has little to do with the cards." "Jake, are you giving away your secrets to me? That could be dangerous... And what's this about a women's reputation and sitting at a poker game?" "Ruby, I don't make the rules on reputations, just tellin' you what I hear and see." And then quietly with a wink, "Girl, secrets or not, I don't reckon how you could be any more dangerous."Ruby puts her hand on Jake’s hand, leaning towards him. “Dangerous? Whatever are you talking about?” Then she laughs and sits back. “I like you Silver Jake Cooke. You make me laugh. Now listen, what are you waiting for? Go win back your money from last night. I think you have that table all figured out already. And with your new lucky hat you can’t lose.” Ruby pauses. “But if you think at some point you need more you let me know and I’ll come and give you some.” Ruby takes another look back at the table Jake will be playing at to process his conclusions. The woman was a very curious enigma. At this moment she seemed to be totally enthralled by the man at the piano sitting attentively and watching not his face but his fingering of the keys. The impatient one took out his watch, looked at the time, and then stood up. He walked over to the bar and spoke to Tom Whipple. Tom then got the man a drink and when the man took out money to pay for it Tom would not accept it. That seemed to somewhat pacify the man, who stayed by the bar chatting with Tom rather than returning to the table.   Jake's assessment of the man with the bow tie appear to be correct as the man carefully rearranged his drink, napkin, and money clip on the table before him so that the edges were all square together. With the closer look the relationship between the two ranchers also became clearer. Although both men were dressed in standard outdoor garb that was practically identical she began to notice some minor differences. One man had boots that showed a lot of wear but were well made and would probably last for several more months of hard work. His shirt also showed wear but was free of stains. And his belt was made of thick leather with a silver-plated belt buckle. His companion had boots that one heal was beginning to come loose, a stain and missing button on his shirt and a thin leather belt with a steel buckle. The more presentable man then said something to his companion and the other one went up to the bar to get drinks for both of them.Kate ate her dinner with little attention to the taste. Jake and Ruby talked about poker, so she didn't feel the need to pretend to listen. She continued to enjoy the music until her plate was somehow empty. Finally she got up to fetch her apron and look for Maggie. Meanwhile, two miles northeast of Promise City….The prospector Elliott suspected that the ride to Promise City would be a long one, but it was taking even longer than he had ever anticipated. Around a half-mile back one of the wagon’s back wheels had become wedged in a culvert along the side of the road and the already fatigued horses could not pull it out. The two men had to unload several hundred pounds of stones from that end of the wagon and then help push, after which they then had to reload the wagon. The delay had cost them a couple of hours and taxed their already overworked muscles, so both now men rode inside the wagon rather than having one walk alongside it. The ride since that time had been slow but without incident, although the wheel that had gotten stuck was now wobbling and squeaking. And the town was still a long ways off.</blockquote>

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