Doctor and the Kid, The (A Weird West Tale) (Weird West Tales) Read Online Free

entered the saloon.
    The robotic bartender, a gift from Buntline, nodded to him, then went back to pouring drinks. Edison's latest phonograph, running on the same electrical circuit that powered the overhead electric lights, was playing a Viennese waltz, which seemed very out-of-place here. There was a brass roulette wheel at a large table, a dozen smaller tables for poker and blackjack, and a faro table in the corner. Holliday had considered building a stage and importing some dancing girls, but decided against it on the reasonable assumption that his clientele couldn't watch the girls and gamble at the same time, and if it were a choice between the two, he knew which was the more lucrative.
    “Howdy, Doc,” drawled a tall, burly man wearing a frock coat and sporting a ten-gallon Stetson.
    “Hello, Jack,” replied Holliday. “I see you've saved my seat for me.”
    “Ain't no one whose money I'd rather win,” said Texas Jack Vermillion.
    Holliday took his seat, joining Vermillion and the three other men who were at the table. “Has Oscar Wilde been here yet?”
    “Never heard of him,” said Vermillion.
    One of the other men laughed. “You must have passed twenty posters of him on the way here from the Grand Hotel.”
    “Who looks at posters?” said Vermillion with a shrug.
    “He's a British gentleman,” said another. “Here on some kind of tour. I heard him speak last night. Very witty, though I'm sure half of it went over my head.”
    “What's he look like?”
    “He'd never miss a hundred pounds,” answered Holliday, “and he's got just about as much hair as Kate does.”
    “Nope,” said Vermillion. “Ain't seen no one like that, knock wood.”
    Holliday signaled the bartender to bring a bottle to the table.
    “How many glasses?” it asked in a mechanical monotone.
    “Just one. If these gentlemen wish to partake, I'm sure they'll be happy to buy their particular poisons.”
    “I regret to inform you that we do not sell poison in the Monarch,” replied the bartender to a chorus of laughter.
    Holliday grimaced. “Ned and Tom are always telling me that I've got to be literal with it. I guess you gents will have to go to Mort Shale's store to buy poison. But if you want some fine drinking stuff, we can cater to your needs, and it'll make losing all that much less painful.”
    “And winning that much more pleasurable,” added Vermillion, shuffling the cards. “Ante up, gents. Five-card stud is the game.”
    “How much to play?” asked Holliday.
    “Ten dollars.”
    “I approve.” Holliday placed ten dollars in the center of the table.
    He lost the first two hands, won the third, and lost another.
    “Not your night, Doc,” said Vermillion as he won his second pot. “I can't tell you how happy that makes me.”
    Holliday filled his glass, drained it, and filled it again. “This is doubtless going to come as a shock to you, Jack, but occasionally I've even lost three hands in a row.”
    Suddenly he became aware of a large presence standing behind him. He turned and saw that it was Wilde.
    “Welcome to the Monarch,” he said. “Pull up a chair and I'll show you how this game is played.”
    “Poker, isn't it?” said Wilde, seating himself just to Holliday's left.
    Holliday nodded. “You know the rules?”
    “I read up on it,” answered Wilde.
    “What do you play in England?” asked Vermillion.
    “Three-Card Brag,” said Wilde.
    “Never heard of it,” said Vermillion. Suddenly he smiled. “Is it anything like Six-Gun Brag? Doc's a master at that.”
    “There's a difference between recounting and bragging,” said Holliday, taking another drink. “I don't brag.”
    “I'd love to hear you recount some of your adventures,” said Wilde, pulling out a pen and a notebook.
    “Not if you're going to write it down,” said Holliday. “It'll come out like recounting, but it'll read like bragging.”
    “As you wish.” Wilde put the notebook back in his pocket. “Tell me about the O.K.