FROM SODA TO HOCK— THE GAME OF FARO IN THE 19TH CENTURY
In my latest book, my heroine, Maisy’s Gamble, deals faro for a living. This required a good deal of research on 19th Century games of chance. I love learning new things.
TV and old western movies have led most people to believe poker is THE game of the Old West. Instead, it was faro. In the movie Tombstone (1993), Wyatt Earp (Kurt Russell) plays faro, but the game is depicted incorrectly. In Wyatt Earp (1994), Wyatt (Kevin Costner) and his brothers deal faro using an accurate layout, though the game is still not played 100% correctly.
“Bucking the tiger” and “Twisting the tiger’s tail” are euphemisms for playing faro. A gambling parlor was “tiger alley” or “tiger town.”
Brag is another popular saloon game of the time that later evolved into 5-card draw poker or “Draw.” Draw (“bluff poker” or “bluff”) was a rarity on the frontier until the late 1870s.
In faro, one person is designated “banker.” A faro table is covered with green baize with a board on top bearing one suit of cards (traditionally spades) pasted to it in numerical order—a standard betting “layout.” Each player lays his stake on one of the 13 cards on the layout. A shuffled deck of cards is placed in a “dealing box,” a mechanical device also known as a “shoe,” used to prevent manipulations of the draw by the banker and assure a fair game.
The first card in the shoe is the “soda” card and is “burned off,” leaving 51 cards in play. The dealer then draws two cards. The first (banker’s card) is placed on the right side of the dealing box. The card after the banker’s card—the carte anglaise (English card) or simply the “player’s card”— is placed on the left of the shoe.
The banker’s card (last card or “Hock”) is the “losing card”; all bets placed on the layout’s card of that denomination are lost to the bank. The player’s card is the “winning card.” All bets placed on the card of that denomination is returned to the players with at 1 to 1 (even money) odds.
A “casekeep,” resembling an abacus, assists players and prevents the dealer from cheating by counting cards. Each card denomination has one spindle with four counters. As a card is played, either winning or losing, one of four counters is moved to indicate a card of that denomination was played. Players can then plan their bets by keeping track of the remaining cards in the dealing box. The operator of the casekeep, such as the heroine in my book Maisy’s Gamble, is called the “casekeeper,” or colloquially in the American West, the “coffin driver.”
Title: Maisy’s Gamble by Charlene Raddon
Publisher:Silver Sage Publishing
Genre: Historical, Romance
Length: 493 pages
Summary:
The Preacher is a hired gun on the run for a murder he didn’t commit.
Maisy is a woman fighting for survival, her own and that of her precious son. She’ll do whatever it takes to escape the man hell-bent on silencing her forever.
Thrown together by circumstance and a need they can’t deny, Maisy and The Preacher must take a chance on destiny and each other. They share a common enemy, but they will discover nothing is more dangerous than gambling with the heart.
Previously published as Divine Gamble.
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Purchase Links: Amazon US * Amazon UK
Excerpt
October 1881- Pandora, Colorado
Danger rode a howling wind into Pandora, Colorado, that autumn night. A gleeful desperado, the gale scoured the town’s nooks, alleys, and yards. It iced window panes and froze puddles.
Maisy Macoubrie stood on the boarding house stoop, watching trash blowing down the street, her faro bag held in front of her like a shield. She enjoyed a good storm, but tonight, her mood seemed as ragged and tense as the weather. Blessed Saints, but her back ached. Thank heaven the gambling season would be over soon, and she could go home.
Thoughts of home brought images of her son, Danny. How she missed him. He’d be fourteen next month. She’d bet he’d grown another inch since she saw him in June. If only she dared to have him with her.
The eight o’clock stage slogged past the boarding house and slid to a muddy halt in front of The Pandora House. Half a dozen men on horseback followed. Passengers bolted from the still-rocking coach into the well-lighted building. The others did the same. Once they’d all warmed up and filled their bellies, they’d want a pleasant way to pass the evening, such as gambling.
Maisy sighed. Time to go to work at the Bloated Goat Saloon.
Something darted under her skirts. She swallowed a screech and yanked up her hems.
“Soda!” Crouching, she petted the grumpy- looking calico cat. “Oh, you’re wet.”
Maisy stood. “Come on. I’ll let you in and give you something to eat.”
The second she opened the door the cat darted inside and dashed up the stairs. Leaving her faro bag beside the door, Maisy followed and let the cat into her room. “Stay off the bed until you’ve cleaned yourself.”
The calico padded over to her special rug under the window and set to work licking her fur. Maisy fetched Soda’s food from the storage space in the washstand.
“Here you are.” She put several pieces of chopped, dried beef on the floor. “I have to go to work.” Maisy bent and put her hand beside the cat’s right front leg. “Come on, shake with me as I taught you.”
She almost chuckled at the look of disgust on Soda’s face, but the cat raised her paw. “Good girl. I’ll see you later.”
She’d no sooner stepped back out on the front porch than Lenny Goodman dashed up the steps. “ˈEvening, Miss Maisy.”
“Good evening, Lenny. Did Nose send you?” In the light of his lantern, the boy’s face looked older than fourteen years. His eyes displayed a sort of wisdom and disillusionment in their depths that aged him. His chin showed the promise of a beard he would soon have to start shaving. It wouldn’t be long before Danny would be doing the same.
“Yep.” Lenny took her bag from her and held out his arm to assist her down the stairs. “Said it was too dark for you to have to find your way to the saloon without a lantern.”
The boy held up the light while Maisy maneuvered the makeshift pathway of boards placed over the mud, a precarious trail only wide enough for one. Before she reached the boardwalk in front of the stores, the rain had soaked her cloak and skirt hems.
“I stepped in a deep mud puddle back there,” Lenny said, joining her in front of the Sims Café and Bakery. “Need to scrape it off.” He went to work, using the edge of the porch to relieve him of the gunk. “You want to take the lantern and go on?”
Maisy glanced toward the Bloated Goat Saloon. Light from the windows showed on the boardwalk. “No, I’ll be all right, Lenny. Thank you.”
She took her bag from him and went on. Storm doors kept the weather out of The Goat, but they also blocked the light that the shorter, swinging doors would have allowed to escape. Maisy peered over her shoulder to check on the boy. In the dim light, it took a few minutes to locate him. She turned back around and walked straight into something soft yet solid and unmovable.
A man.
Author Bio
Charlene Raddon is a bestselling author of western historical romance novels. Originally published by Kensington Books, she is now an Indie author. She grew up on old western movies and loved them, but never intended to be a writer. That part of her life just happened. Besides writing and reading, she raises orchids, designs book covers, and spoils her grandchildren.
Author Links: Website * Facebook * Twitter * Goodreads * Amazon Author Page * Silver Sage Book Covers
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Thank you so much for hosting me.
Thanks for sharing the excerpt