Wild West (A lesson learned)

Wild West

The sound of the piano in the saloon could be heard almost as if an afterthought to the game of cards that was playing out.

It was quite the hand he held, his eyes looking at the cards he held inches from his face as he looked across the poker table at the rough-looking prospector that sat before him.

The man was years older than himself and with a thick beard and unkempt hair that showed a more wild side to him, quite the opposite to himself, with his groomed hair and clean-shaven face.

if he had to give any credit to the prospector that sat across from him, the man did not seem to be showing any obvious tells that would give away whether he had a good set of cards in his possession or not.

"What you got there? Young man"

The older-looking prospector offered to fill the silence between them, his face or actions still giving no indication of whatever cards he may or may not have held in his hand.

This gives the younger well-groomed man a moment of pause, his eyes shifting to his cards once more and calculating the odds of his hand being beaten by the man before him.

His gives lifting from his cards after a second and looked across at his opponent as he gave a knowing smile to the older man and gently fanned the cards in his hand back and forth but never enough to do more than tease what he might have had to offer.

"I got enough, old man question is, do you think you do?"

The words were offered with playful gamesmanship to them but there was enough of a challenge in those words to make the prospector raise his eyebrows in some form of response.

He reached down to his stack of poker chips and eased them forward to join the pile of chips in the middle of the table and show his intentions of taking the game a little further if his opponent had the fortitude to do so.

"I think l do"

His words were offered in response as he eased his hand back from the pile of poker chips and showed he was indeed confident in the collection of cards that he held in his other hand.

He shifted his hand to the chips he held in front of him and followed the action of his fellow card player and moved his poker chips to join the growing pile in the middle of the table.

"All in"

He responded and the tension between the pair suddenly became more apparent, a few of the saloon patrons easing around in their chairs to watch the game now being played out.

"Alright, young man"

He offered and laid his cards down on the table, the younger man opening his eyes a little wider at the spectacular hand that he now saw before him, his eyes shifting back to his cards to see if he had made a mistake and had a better hand than he originally believed he had.

"What you got, young man?"

The question asked as the older man smiled arrogantly across the table at him seemingly safe in the knowledge his hand was not going to be beaten by his younger adversary.

The sound of a single shot ringing out and a puff of gunsmoke coming up from the pistol that the younger man now held in his free hand, the explosion of sound now drawing more attention to the poker table as the older man slumped forward in his chair.

A good lesson learned a pistol will always beat a full house in the wild west