Chapter 25 Ninety-fifth Night Dealer

Ji Yan's letters always come when I feel the most boring, I know that must be another interesting story. (The following is Ji Yan’s letter.) I am a person who likes to go around, and I have friends all over the world, so when I pass by a familiar city, I naturally think of that familiar name. I have no intention of visiting him.I haven't actually been to his house, and I can't reach him because he never uses his phone.But I know how to find him, because his kind of life is extremely regular, and you will see him in a certain place at any time. Because he is a croupier. This is a profession that makes you and me feel mysterious and distant, but in fact, it is just a profession.For those familiar occupations, we always think we know very well, but in fact we are often very ignorant of them.Just like the entertainment industry, no one knows how many photos are hidden behind the colorful screen.Everyone performs their duties, just like you know a newspaper office, or a doctor knows a hospital.

A croupier is just a slightly different profession. He is in contact with gambling, but he is very far away from it. In fact, a pure croupier does not participate in gambling—I mean those gamblers who lost their minds, small gamblers In fact, it can be a kind of entertainment, just like listening to music, clubbing, and disco dancing, but there are often many croupiers who cannot escape from it. I don’t know if you know this profession, but it’s a very common profession in Macau and Las Vegas, but it’s still not seen in the underground casinos and gambling boats in the mainland.Cultivating a croupier is not a one-time thing. Although in those regular casinos with licenses, the salary of croupiers is very high, but like my friend, there is no one to protect their interests.

I found the casino along the road I was familiar with, and passed the checks and secret checks. It was not as noisy and filthy as described in the film and television works, full of the mixed smell of cigarettes and sweat. On the contrary, the people here were very With quality, it is very different from the gambling in the village I saw when I was a child.There are even guards with live ammunition next to them. Of course, they are well hidden. If it is not for people like me who like to watch around desperately, they will not notice. The people who shuttled around to exchange chips, most of them were thin, with big hooked noses, pointed heads and protruding mouths.They looked excited and moved quickly like barracudas to walk around these rich and proud gamblers.They are not gamblers, but a kind of people called "Jackpot Boys".Most of them have their own regular customers. Whenever those big bosses come to gamble, Junket Boy will help serve tea and water and exchange chips, as if the money in their hands is their own money, but usually only when their boss wins money Only then can they get a share of residue from powerful predators such as lions like vultures, but even this residue is 0.7%, which is enough for them to survive.In addition, there are many occupations born here, and these people gather here like parasites.A friend of mine used to use his own house to entertain those bosses who gambled. It is said that the water imported from Thailand eaten at night and the small turtles in tea cups are a lot of money. Of course, every day This time, his dividends were as many as hundreds of thousands.

This is the casino, in fact, it is more like a nature where the weak prey on the strong, so I think it is closer to the real, but the real is often cruel, everyone has their own different way of life, and it does not matter what justice, conscience, morality, of course, Including my croupier friend. I quickly walked up to him through a group of gamblers. The professional gamblers had different expressions, but one thing was the same. Their hands were shaking. Whether they are winning or losing, they are all trembling, some violently, some slightly, there are slender jade hands, there are also rough hands covered with calluses, and there are hands that can almost be called claws with gray-black skin covered with blood vessels like rhizomes.

In fact, what gamblers enjoy is the thrill of deciding the outcome of the moment. Winning and losing are just incidentals after the game. He is the same as three years ago, still smiling, wearing a white shirt without any dust. He said that his wardrobe is full of dozens of sets of exactly the same clothes - white shirt, black uniform jacket, beautiful bow tie.His hands are slender and powerful, his face is round and full, the sky is round, his eyes are deeply sunken, and they always appear blurred under the light, making it impossible to see clearly.Every time he speaks, two dimples the size of soybeans appear on his cheeks.His face is as white as a frail scholar, and he always lowers his head when he smiles, revealing a row of shell-like teeth, just like a novice. In fact, many guests are deceived by his appearance. Although he is young, he is It's the best technology here.Every time the cards are dealt, he is so accurate. His movements of shuffling the cards are more graceful and skillful than in the movies, as if performing stunts. His hands are so flexible that they seem to have a life of their own. Yes, his hands seem to be made for gambling. Suddenly, the ten fingers and the poker were mixed together, as if slowly merging.

The croupier not only needs to be quick, but the technique he uses lies in psychological research, the enthusiasm of the customers, the amount of bets, and the mastery of emotions, as if they are all at his fingertips.He was like a puppeteer, standing in front of the green gambling table, manipulating the gamblers until they lost all their chips and left angrily. He seldom loses, and some people even say that he never loses. It stands to reason that such a reputation spread is not good, because no fool would challenge an undefeated person.When you come to the casino, the first thing is to win money.But the strange thing is, he is like the attractions of this casino, more and more people come to him to gamble, most of them come here just because of the fame, and of course, they all lose as clean as water.This is the wonderful thing about gambling, which neither you nor I can understand.

I looked at him quietly, and he glanced at me, with no other expression on his face, just nodded, which is considered a greeting.I also nodded, and then leaned on a table next to me to watch other people's gambling - in fact, I can't understand, I am very unfamiliar with any gambling equipment, and my family education was very strict since I was a child. My father and grandfather never allowed the Ji family to get involved fault. This place is open 24 hours, there is a constant stream of gamblers, and the croupier will be too tired to bear it, but the boss is very tight to his cash cow, and often only let him take a break when the passenger flow is slightly less, I am He calculated the time to go, so he didn't wait long before he got off work.

He didn't speak, just gestured to the door to go out, and I followed him out of the casino. "I haven't seen you for a long time, but you want to see me." He smiled at me, narrowed his eyes, and yawned long like a cat just waking up. "All night?" I asked him. "Yes, to be precise, it has been almost twenty hours since four o'clock yesterday afternoon." His tone was relaxed, obviously this was commonplace. "Aren't you going to leave? You've earned a lot of money. If this continues, will your health be able to bear it?" I finally couldn't help asking him.He turned his neck with difficulty, still smiling.

"No, I'm not a croupier for money. As for my health, if it's really bad, I will choose to leave." Speaking of this, he was a little sad.I saw that he was still holding a deck of cards in his left hand, shuffling and sorting the cards. "Does the fist never leave the body and the song never leave the mouth?" I joked. He didn't speak, his face was a little dark, he nodded reluctantly, and quickly put the hand holding the poker into his trouser pocket. "Go get a drink before I fall asleep." He patted me on the shoulder.I thought about it and agreed.

We found an ordinary-looking clean street food stall and sat down.This is a seaside city, where you can find fresh seafood that you can't afford in the interior, and it's very cheap. Unfortunately, I don't like the fishy smell of the sea, so I reluctantly ate some. "Do you know why I made friends with you? You should know that I don't have any friends except you." He ate a piece of hairtail and drank a big cold beer.I shake my head. "Because you beat me." He said lightly, but his eyes suddenly looked straight at him like a sword. I have rarely seen that kind of gaze, very aggressive and aggressive.

"You mean three years ago? That's just my luck, and you should know that I don't know how to gamble at all." I picked up my glass and smiled, but I saw his blurry and distorted picture through the glass. There was no smile on his face. He put down his chopsticks and quickly took out the poker from his pocket. "Take one and compare the size." He said hastily.I couldn't be stubborn with him, so I had to draw a card randomly, and he also drew a card. He didn't look at his cards, he just flipped over mine right away. An ace of spades, he smiled wryly. "Do you know that those people come to gamble even though they know they can't gamble?" He put away his poker, his cheeks began to turn red slowly, as if he was a little drunk, and he didn't drink much. "Because they believe in luck, and because they want to use money to gamble to see if luck can beat me, a croupier who is almost unbeaten. Of course, it is also out of curiosity. In fact, luck is too little, even for me It's diabolical to me. Because you're a perfect example, and I'll never beat you because you're so lucky." I naturally took advantage of his last words, indeed, I am afraid that even you see me in the same way. "And my luck, since I met you three years ago, is gone, so I have to find another thing, something that can replace luck and keep me from losing." His pupils gradually narrowed, staring at I. I looked at him, at his hands, to be precise.Once his hands left the gambling equipment, they became very ordinary, but once they came into contact with something like poker, they seemed to sparkle suddenly, like a piece of rough jade that had been cut. "Three years ago, I longed to be a croupier, not for money, but a yearning. I longed to gamble with different people and enjoy the pleasure of winning or losing in a flash. I worked hard towards my ideal. Go, maybe before I meet you and that person, I will only be a mediocre croupier." He touched his face with his right hand, his trembling lips didn't know whether it was because the weather was getting colder or emotional. He always keeps his left hand in his pocket. "That person?" I asked strangely.When I first met him three years ago, he was indeed just an ordinary croupier, not as amazing as he is today.He bet with me once and became good friends. I don't know who else he met later. "Yes, a terrible person." He looked up at the sky, as if lost in thought, as if he wanted to bury his soul in the vast sky. (The following is the dealer's tone.) At that time, I was just a trainee, and I could only temporarily replace it when there were few people.There was a rainy night, and there were few gamblers, and most of them were lazy and uninspired. Of course, so were we. After I separated from you, I have been thinking about how to go my own way, because your life is my yearning, that is to do what I like to do. While I was distracted, the man walked in.He was almost half a head taller than me, and the short, soft hair on his nearly square head was wet from the rain and stuck tightly to his scalp, which was as ridiculous as a layer of mud that had been smeared randomly, but when he walked up to me In front of me, I couldn't laugh anymore. Some people walk with a kind of momentum, and this guy is undoubtedly that kind of person.I squinted my eyes and slowly looked at him: wearing tall black leather boots, black trousers, and a knee-length gray coat; with a square face, a high forehead, two saber eyebrows protruding towards the temples, and a tall eagle. Hooked nose, thick lips, square chin, still wriggling.There were streaks of water on his big face, which fell drop by drop on the carpet, forming irregular black circular water spots in an instant. He spat out the betel nuts in his mouth, and grinned at me, a row of crimson neat teeth, like a little bit of blood, dazzled my eyes. He didn't speak, just stretched out his hands and made an initial movement. I dealt and opened the cards almost sluggishly. As you can imagine, I lost completely. Of course, I was quickly replaced under the scolding of the boss. But my successor was just as unlucky as I was. In a blink of an eye, a huge pile of chips was piled up in front of the tall man, and I saw the foreman's forehead start to flow. Yes, it was running water instead of sweating, more water than the man's forehead. That night was a boss' nightmare.That man almost won the total income of the casino for a month, and the dozens of cameras from different angles around him couldn't see any of his out-of-the-box movements. Finally, he changed the chips into money, put them in a black leather pocket, and left whistling. I saw the boss wiped his face, and then called Brother Hei to whisper a few words.Brother Hei is very dark, not our kind of black. It is said that he has been running on the beach with bare buttocks since he was six years old. There is no one in this area who is not afraid of him. It is said that he is very good at chopping watermelons. A person who is good at chopping watermelons should also be good at chopping heads. The boss thinks so, and we think so too. Although the man is tall, Brother Hei is not short, not to mention he has a brother, and his brother carries a watermelon knife several feet long. I started to worry about the big guy, so I sneaked out and followed Hei Ge, and Hei Ge followed the big man. Finally, they met each other. I thought there would be swords and swords that only appeared in movies, but after only a few encounters, Brother Hei and his party all fell to the ground. After all, the watermelon knife is still not so easy to cut off people's heads. I think the boss will be smarter and choose other security guards next time, but I don't know, because I decided to leave there. Casinos are almost a legitimate industry here, there are so many big and small ones, so leaving there will not prevent me from fulfilling my dream of becoming a great dealer. In fact, this is only the first step. Because I decided to be my teacher, the big man as my teacher. When I knelt down in front of him, he looked at me with a smile, and then shook his huge head. He refused.Of course I didn't give up, I continued to follow him and be his little brother, without any extravagant expectations in return.I have suffered a lot and been injured, and I helped him get stabbed. He never talked to me, and he never stopped me from doing those things.I still persisted, and finally the way he looked at me gradually changed, as if with a little tenderness. "If I have a son, he will be almost as old as you." One day, he finally spoke the first words to me. I was overjoyed and knew the opportunity had come. The master gave me almost all the tricks he knew. Every time he was with me, he held something in his hand, sometimes it was Pai Gow, sometimes it was Mahjong, sometimes it was a poker sieve. I took that as his A hobby, just like someone likes to squeeze a walnut in his hand, or hold a steel ball. But although I learned a lot, I found that I still lose when I gamble with others. So I asked him why, but he only told me that I lacked something, something that cannot be made up the day after tomorrow. Having said that, my dealer friend suddenly stopped and looked at me. "You know what my master is referring to." He smiled, and suddenly took out another poker from his pocket, and I drew another card, this time I was the first. It was a 3 of hearts, and I was about to say I lost, but he took a 2 of hearts.He seemed satisfied with the result and continued on. (The following is still the dealer's tone.) I started to get mad, because I knew that I seemed to be getting farther and farther away from my dream. I repeatedly begged my master to teach me other methods, but he still refused coldly.I also gradually forgot, and decided to live like this for the rest of my life. But I gradually discovered something unusual about the master. He often went out every two or three months, and took me to gamble around when he came back, but every time the money he won was spent everywhere, and the remaining part was given to others. People living in poverty.At first I thought he was a knight, robbing the rich and giving to the poor, but it turned out that I was too naive. I found that the families he donated to had one thing in common.It was also accidental to discover this. Sometimes he was so drunk that he asked me to deal with those who asked him for money, but I found that most of the hands of those who came to ask for money were severed. I was a little suspicious, and then I went to investigate those families according to the address, and found that all the men in their families had broken their hands, and the time of the broken hands was the same as the time when the master went out. I began to slowly investigate this matter. When the master went out next time, I promised to practice hard, but actually followed behind him. He was quite careful, but I was more cautious. After following him at a considerable distance, he walked into a slum.As the sky was getting dark, he knocked on the door of a low bungalow. His tall figure was incompatible with that house. The door creaked open, no one came out, but a hand was stretched out. A hand holding mahjong tiles, that hand is very dirty, even if the surrounding light is thin, you can still see that the arm is covered with needle holes and layers of dirt that have solidified together like black moles, and the wrist is rolling up and down, but The fingers are rather slender. The master looked at the hand carefully as if looking at the goods, then touched his chin, and nodded with satisfaction.Then he took from his pocket what appeared to be a bottle full of liquid, and poured it on the hand. Suddenly, he took out a knife from the windbreaker. I only saw a flash of cold light, and the hand fell off and fell into the master's hand. He quickly and deftly took out a plastic wrap from another pocket and wrapped the severed hand.But what surprised me was that the person whose hand was severed didn't make any movements, and couldn't hear any shouts. The wound was bleeding, but it wasn't severe, and then the severed hand retracted. The master seemed to be whispering to the crack of the door After a few words, he put a dark green coke bottle on the ground and left quietly. I didn't leave, and continued to observe. Not long after the master left, the door opened, and a man as thin as a skeleton came out in naked clothes, picked up the bottle, and poured the liquid on his severed hand. On the wound, and then pass through the gate. I was so horrified that I could hardly speak, and then ran back quickly. I wanted to get back to our residence before the master. A few days later, I saw the man with the severed hand again, but this time I gave him 300,000 yuan, and he left with satisfaction. When he was leaving, his nose kept sucking. I felt sick, but he smiled laugh. I began to be afraid of the master consciously or unconsciously, and even gradually alienated him, but I tried to be as subtle as possible, but after a long time, I didn't care about it, and felt that the master had his reasons for doing so. Finally, when I followed him back from a big win in the casino, and I was still intoxicated by the excitement just now, he suddenly proposed for the first time that we should go drinking together. I am very happy. I have never had a father since I was a child, and I have always regarded the master as a father, and the words he said, "My son is as old as you until now", convinced me that he also thinks so. So, just like today, we also found a street stall and sat down to have a drink, with the sea breeze blowing, just drinking, very happy. I don’t know how long we’ve been drinking, but I only know that the people next to us are getting less and less, and the boss kept scanning us from the corner of his eye, trying to make the noise of cleaning up the dishes louder, so the master and I staggered up, paid the money, and exchanged words. He went back with his arms. The master is not drunk, and my mind is very clear. His hair is still intertwined and tightly attached to his head, but this time it is caused by sweating. One of his hands is always in his pocket, even when drinking. Based on the effect of alcohol, I dared to ask him, how can he make himself invincible forever, and why can't I. "Actually, I have the same luck as you, so I have to rely on other things to make up for it." His tongue is a bit big, but I can still hear it clearly. "Do you know, when you get the cards and turn them over, what determines the cards that appear? It's your hand, because that's the first organ of your body that touches the cards, so we draw the cards Your hands are the most important, followed by your skills. As for tricks, it’s just a childish trick, just like magic, we have to learn it, but we can’t use it. We learn it to expose them. What kind of small handling method? You have to understand things like entrainment." The master suddenly said a lot, which caught me off guard, so I could only bow my head and say yes. "But a person's hands are very wonderful. Different people have different hands. In fact, even the same person has different hands at different times. So I have been thinking about how to make my hands last forever. It is more special than others. So I searched everywhere, and others regarded me as a lunatic. The so-called luck and red hands are just joking names, but I took it seriously. But I was not reconciled, and finally when I was about to give up, I I finally know how to let my gambling hand draw good cards as I like." He stared at me suddenly, he stood in front of me condescendingly, like a door god, with a look of watching prey in his eyes. "It is said that there is a saying that when you keep using other people's hands instead of your own, your luck will get better and better. This method is especially suitable for unlucky people like me and you. So I went everywhere to find the right hand , not the hands of the lucky ones, but the hands of the unlucky, almost destitute, whose hands are more greedy, more greedy than others, and which are cheaper. So I went around Buy a hand, cut it off, and put it in my own hand." He bent down, breathing almost into my face, and said with a smile. "Do you know how to change it?" He suddenly grabbed my hand and asked. I was sober and knew what he wanted to do. "Master, master, didn't you say you want those unlucky people?" I said inarticulately, I don't know if it was cold or frightened. "No, those people's hands are not as good as yours, because you want to be a croupier more than them, right? The desire to bet with others and win in your heart is stronger than mine. You Your hand is the most suitable one, and with your hand, I don’t have to change it every few months.” He finally couldn’t help laughing, the serious expression on his face disappeared, and now Under the light of lightning outside the window, he became like a ghost. "Didn't you always think of me as your son? I always thought of you as my father." I couldn't get rid of his big hand, and cried out, because I saw that he had already stretched his other hand into his pocket , Through the imprint, I can see that it is a knife. "Hehe, there are no fathers and sons in casinos, not to mention you are just the fruit I planted, and now it's time to harvest. Don't worry, it won't be too painful, and it will be over soon. I just want your two hands, and you will get a lot of money Money." He pulled out the knife abruptly, and chopped at my caught left hand. I don't know where the power came from, and I suddenly grabbed the blade with my right hand. The pain flowed through my whole body like an electric current, and my fingers throbbed with pain. If he pulled out the knife, I'm afraid my fingers would all be broken. Obviously he didn't expect it either, so we started fighting. Although I was smaller than him, I was even more desperate under the influence of alcohol and the threat of my hand being broken. Taking my hands was more cruel than killing me!The two wrestled in the room for a few minutes, when suddenly he fell. He stepped on the bottle that he dropped out, the one he had placed at the door of Yin Junzi's house whose hand had been cut off earlier. I snatched the knife from the floor and picked up the bottle. There was fear in the master's eyes, he sat up, stretched out his hand, and said with a quick shake, "No, no!" I looked at him, and then at the bottle. Through the glass wall, the liquid in the bottle emitted a strange black light. I uncorked the bottle and poured it into his hands, not knowing what was going to happen, almost subconsciously. A strange thing happened, and the master cried out in pain. I have never seen him in such a state of embarrassment. Then I picked up the knife and cut off his left hand without thinking. He clutched his severed hand and ran out of the room like a madman.All that was left on the ground was his huge, defeating hand. By the light, I felt something strange about that hand, and when I slowly squatted down, I realized that the severed hand turned into a human leather glove with nothing inside. I picked it up slowly, and then put it on my left hand, as if it was prepared for me. When I wanted to take off the human leather glove, I couldn't find the opening. The glove and my hand fit perfectly Blended together. The next day, I went to the biggest casino here. Of course, I didn't lose a game.Then I went to the boss, gave him back all the winnings, and asked to stay as a dealer. After that, I never saw my master again.It is said that someone saw a tall man with a broken hand begging for food in a foreign country, and finally died of poverty.But I don't feel anything, as if he is just a passerby, just like those gamblers in the casino, I will never remember their looks and voices, but I will remember their hands when they draw cards. He finally finished speaking, then picked up the chopsticks with his right hand, picked up a large piece of fish and stuffed it into his mouth. I kept looking at his left hand in his trouser pocket. "Did you know that the hand of the person who changes hands will always hold the gambling equipment involuntarily, as if that hand never knew that there are other things in the world, as if it is independent of the subject and has another life. , just like me, I can't restrain it at all, and I don't want to restrain it." He took out his hand, which was still washing a pack of poker. I sighed, "Is this really the life you want?" He froze for a moment, then nodded firmly. "You have to know that there are many kinds of people, and there will always be weirdos like you and me. Besides, I lost to you again today, haha, it's really interesting, I haven't lost for a long time." He toasted me again , I drank it too. I gradually felt a little dizzy, and then my head became particularly heavy. When I woke up, he had gone, I don't know how long I slept, only saw a note on the table. "You know, in fact, I really want to change your hand, but I thought about it, there must be someone in this world that I can't win to be interesting, don't you think?" My hand holding the note began to tremble, maybe it was just his second thought, I won’t even be able to read a book for the rest of my life, and of course it’s even more impossible to write this letter to you. I didn’t go to this croupier friend again, and I believe I will never see him again, but I don’t know whether he will continue to gamble like this, whether his left hand will still hold the poker so tightly and never let go. open.