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The Gambler—

Part One

White's Gentleman's club,

London, 1906

"Bring it in, gentlemen, please. All bets on the table."

"Michael, for God's sake.."

Michael Gregson ignored Adam's pleading whisper, his eyes fixed on the man opposite. There was a half-balloon of brandy by his elbow, untouched for the last hour. Next to it, the crystal ashtray was littlered with smouldering cigar stubs. The lights were dim, the room, despite the open windows, was stuffy and sickly with the mingling of a dozen different colognes.

There were seventy-five gleaming poker chips littered across the green baize table. Each chip was worth one hundred pounds. For some people, the stakes on that table respresented ten years' salary.

And that was before this round's bets had been placed.

Michael wanted to tap his fingers. Scratch his ear. Run his fingers through his disordered chestnut hair, ease the tightness of his white silk cravat. His blood was thrumming in his veins like a tribal war beat, like the clack-clack-clack of a tram hurtling down the London streets.

He confined himself to a smile and pushed his remaining chips out to the centre of the table.

"Mr Gregson, you're all in. Bets, gentlemen?"

"I'm out." A florid gentleman, his rich stomach straining against the white shirt-front, pushed away from the table. "Lady Jarrow will be sharpening her claws on my hide if I lose anymore. May I settle up with you tomorrow, Ackland?"

"Of course, Sir Cyprian." The petite man rubbed his thumb along the curl of his moustache. "Take all the time you need."

Michael bit back on the urge to snort and shake his head. Ackland was the eldest son of an old and doting banker. He spent more on starch for his shirt fronts each year than the chips on this table. He could afford to be generous.

"Michael!"

Ackland and the other player glanced up. A flicker of a sneer shadowed his face. "Your... ah, nursemaid is calling, Gregson?"

Now, Michael permitted himself to break the mask. Twisting in his chair, he swung an arm over the carved back and raised his eyebrows. Adam, he thought, observing the flushed cheeks and moist forehead of his old scribbler-in-arms, would make a terrible poker player.

Thank God, his flair for incisive and elegant prose was unparalleled.

"Michael." In his stress, Adam's Glaswegian brogue cut through the received pronunciation he worked so hard to affect. "Christ man, yer bum's out the window on this. Have you nae idea what a lose could do to ye?"

Of course he did. Michael eyed the pretty tiles piled in a haphazard lumps on the green baize. One tile would feed, house and clothe him for six months with enough left over for a decent bottle of wine every month or so. Two would pay for Lizzy's treatment at Tooting Bec Asylum for a year. The money on the table was worth more than his childhood home four times over.

But it would take the full pile of those hundred-pound markers to persuade old Jessop Kingsley to sell Michael his floundering paper business. The vicious old goat had a banker's cash-safe where other men had hearts. Michael had worked for Kingsley for four years but the man would rather burn the whole business to the ground, office, press and contracts, than offer his old employee a discount in selling price.

If he was Adam, he would stand from the table. Take his winnings, ignore the sneers. He would probably treat himself to a hot meat pie while he made his way home on foot. Then tomorrow morning, he would take his mediocre gains and invest them in the nearest bank.

Sensible Adam.

Nobody, from his long-suffering parents to his own dearest Lizzy, had ever called Michael Alexander Gregson 'sensible'.

Adam, my dear old chap." Shaking the restraining hand off his arm, Michael let his mask break into an indulgent smile. "Don't you see? That's exactly why I play."

Turning back to the table, Michael caught the glint of challenge in Ackland''s weaselly eyes. He plucked the last cigar stub from its smoulder in the tray and drew in a lungful of the fragrant smoke. It tasted as sweet as victory.

"Ackland, what do you say to double or quits?" He paused and felt the eyes of the room settle on their little table. The indulgent smile widened to a sharp, devilish grin.

"I'm feeling like a gambler tonight."

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I was rewatching the episode where there's the house party with the card-cheat and one thing that struck me was Michael Gregson's talent for cards. One was the skill he had with them and two, the calculated way he took the risk of losing a lot of money, just so he could figure out what was going on.

Then, thinking over the rest of his storyline, he seemed a complete gambler at heart: shooting to marry the daughter of an earl (I know Richard Carlisle did too but he, at least, was a 'sir'), employing an unskilled aristocrat as a journalist, going to Germany (which was not, in 1922, the safest of countries- so he found out!) to get a divorce...

Anyway, this quick series of drabbles popped out of that thoughts. I hope you enjoy!

Thanks for reading!