TRICKS WITH CARDS AND DICE by Sean M. Brooks

In this article I focused on how Dominic Flandry used poker and dice games in some of the stories Poul Anderson wrote about that character.  I have noticed, while reading many of the works of Anderson, that the two games he seemed to most favor were poker and chess.  I will not be writing a detailed examination of how often the game of poker is to be found in the works of Anderson.  Rather, I wish to review how Flandry used poker and/or dice games for both his amusement and as one of the tools he used for carrying out his work as an intelligence agent for the Terran Empire.

A logical place to see how Flandry used poker/dice games is to start as early in his life as possible, in ENSIGN FLANDRY (Chilton Books: 1966), when he was nineteen Terran years old.  The paragraphs I quoted below came from Chapter 7 of that book.

He [Flandry] tried to laugh.  "Contrariwise.  I'm thinking about food,

fun, and females."

"Yes, females."  She [Dragoika] stood quiet a while, before she too

laughed.  "I can try to provide the fun, anyhow.  What say you to a

game of Yavolak?"

"I haven't yet straightened out those cursed rules," Flandry said. "But

if we can get a few players together, I have some cards with me and

there's a Terran game called poker."

Although we don't get a detailed explanation of how "Yavolak" was played on the alien planet Starkad, mention of that game indicates to me that Anderson believed that at least some non-human intelligent races had their own games of chance and indulged in gambling.  And the fact Flandry was willing to teach the Tigeries how to play the human game of poker would be an example of cultural interaction and change due to contact with other sophont races.  I realize some people would be disdainful about that kind of cultural interaction!

Another example I quoted is from page 14 of the 1979 Gregg Press edition of AGENT OF THE TERRAN EMPIRE, containing Anderson's revision of "Tiger By The Tail," after Dominic Flandry was captured by Prince Cerdic of Scotha: "They [the Scothani] were addicted to gambling.  Flandry learned their games, taught them a few of his, and before journey's end had won several suits of good clothes for alteration, plus a well stuffed purse.  He almost, not quite, hated to take his winnings.  These overgrown schoolboys had no idea what tricks were possible with cards and dice."  And alert readers should keep that in mind--how Flandry would use games of chance as part of his policy of using guile and subtlety to bring down the Scothan house of cards--as we see in the rest of this story!

For an additional example, on page 25 of this same edition of AGENT OF THE TERRAN EMPIRE, we can read this:

In a chamber more elegant and comfortable than the highest standards

allowed--warmth, richly hued and textured hangings, incense and recorded

music sweet upon the air--dice rattled across a table and came to a halt.

Prince Torric swore good-naturedly as he shoved a pile of coins toward

Flandry.  "You have the luck of the damned with you," he laughed.
 

For a slave, I'm not doing too badly, reflected the man.  In fact, I'm by way

of becoming well-to-do, unless my master finds out and confiscates my

hoard.

"Say rather that fortune favors the weak," he purred.  "The strong

don't need it, highness."

Here we see how Flandry used games of chance to ingratiate himself with Prince Torric, a younger half brother of Dominic's captor, Cerdic.  Flandry's object here was to sow discontent in Torric at the modest fief that was all Cerdic planned to let Torric have after the former became king.  The Terran also planned to plant the notion in the Scothan that he did not have to be content with being merely a younger son, that Torric had as much of a claim on the kingship as Cerdic.  Flandry was intriguing to spread treachery and short sighted ambition at the Scothan court.  And games of chance and dice was one means of doing so!

Next, after Flandry had gone to investigate the planet Unan Besar, the hostile government of that world forced him to seek refuge in the slums of the capital city of Kompong Timur and contact elements of the criminal underworld to obtain the assistance he needed.  Part of Flandry's plan took the form of using a variant of the Spanish Prisoner scam to deceive the gang boss Sumo the Fat.  While he was Sumo's "guest," I'll discuss how Flandry passed the time, quoting from Chapter VII of THE PLAGUE OF MASTERS.

That night Dominic stayed in the house of Sumo.  He was, in fact, a guest

for several days.  His chamber was pleasant, though it lacked windows,

and he had enough company, for it opened directly on a barrackroom

where the bachelor daggermen lived.  No one got past that room with-

out a key to the automatic lock, which Dominic didn't ask for.  He messed

with he daggermen, traded jokes, told them stories, and gambled.  Cards

on Unan Besar had changed faces, but were still essentially the same old

pack of fifty-two.  Dominic taught the boys a game called poker.  They

seized on it avidly,  even though he won large amounts from them.  Not

that he cheated--that would have  been fatal, under so many experienced

eyes.  He simply understood the game better.  The daggermen accepted

the fact, and were willing to pay for instruction.  It would take many years

to get back from neophytes elsewhere all that Flandry eventually won,

but the Pulaoic mentality was patient.

Yet another example of cultural change and interaction by means of gambling and games of chance!  Here we see Flandry, unlike on Scotha, using gambling for amicable ends, making friends with Sumo's buttonmen (to use a term from the American Mafia).

Years later, in Chapter XII of WE CLAIM THESE STARS, after Flandry had deliberately let himself be captured by the Ardazirho aliens who had invaded the Empire and seized the planet Vixen, we see this as he was taken through various compartments in the enemy headquarters den: "Or it might be a roomful of naked red-furred shapes: sprawled in snarling, quarrelsome fellowship; gambling with tetrahedral dice for stakes up to a year's slavery..."  The interest here being how we see another example of non-humans who were as fond as gambling as humans can be.

In addition, in Chapter IV of A KNIGHT OF GHOSTS AND SHADOWS, we see Chives, Flandry's invaluable butler/valet/chef/pilot, et al, a non human native from the planet Shalmu, explaining to Kossara Vymezal  how he and Flandry came to meet.  Chives had been one of the victims of Aaron Snelund's illicit trafficking in slaves from Shalmu and eventually ended up working in a mercury mine on an unnamed planet where Flandry  came across Chives by chance.  Disapproving of how Chives and the other miners were treated, Flandry took steps to correct the situation.

"I was not prepossessing, Donna.  My owner had put me up for sale

because he doubted I could survive more labor in his mercury mine.

Sir Dominic did not buy me.  He instigated a game of poker which

lasted several days and left him possession of mine and workers

alike."

Chives clicked his tongue.  "My former master alleged cheating.

Most discourteous of him, especially compared to Sir Dominic's

urbanity in inviting him out.  The funeral was well attended by the

miners.  Sir Dominic arranged for their repatriation, but kept me

since this was far from Shalmu and, besides, I required a long course

of chelating drugs to cleanse my system.  Meanwhile he employed

me in his service.  I soon decided I had no wish to return to a planet

of...natives...and strove to make myself valuable to him."

Here we see how Dominic Flandry not only first met Chives but also taking steps to correct some of the longer term consequences of Snelund's abusive governorship of Sector Alpha Crucis.   AND, albeit through somewhat questionable means, eliminated a smaller abuser of authority.  A bit later, in the same chapter, Chives conceded: "The fact is, he did cheat in that poker game."  Chives' former master should have accepted the loss of his mine instead of fighting a duel with someone as lethally deadly as Flandry!

Let's backtrack a bit, to expand on what Chives said about how he became a slave.  Legally, slavery was used in the Empire as one means of punishing criminals.  For example, at the very beginning of "Warriors From Nowhere," this is part of what Dominic Flandry said: "If you shoot your neighbor in order to steal his property, you are a murderer and a thief, subject to enslavement."  The abuse in Chives case from Snelund's agents using  "questionable" (false) charges to justify trafficking in slaves from Shalmu.  In addition,  we read this in Chapter V of THE REBEL WORLDS: "Snelund isn't stupid, worse luck. Maybe no big, spectacular warriors or statesmen can topple him.  But a swarm of drab little accountants and welfare investigators isn't that easily fended off."  I interpreted this to mean efforts were made, using these accountants and welfare investigators, to control, reduce, and penalize abuse of the system of using slavery as a punishment for crime.

It was interesting to note the various uses Flandry made of the game of poker.  Sometimes, as on Starkad and Unan Besar it was for amicable reasons (although it was useful and prudent to be on good terms with Sumo the Fat's daggemen).  Other times, as on Scotha, Flandry used dicing and gambling as a political tool, to help subvert and undermine the Frithian domination of Scotha, and nullify a serious danger to the Empire.  And even though we don't see Flandry using poker in WE CLAIM THESE STARS, I thought it was still interesting to see non-humans like the Ardazirho gambling.

Readers will also see Flandry using metaphors taken from the games of chess and poker, either for making a philosophical point or for describing problems and dangers faced by him.  Examples of the former can be found in Chapter 23 of THE GAME OF EMPIRE (quoted in my ANDERSONIAN CHESS essay).   For the latter I quoted from Chapter XV of A CIRCUS OF HELLS, when Flandry believed himself to be in a very dangerous situation: "Flandry's head had gone winter clear. He had but to call them, and ideas and pieces of information sprang forward.  Not every card had been dealt.  Damn near every one, agreed, and his two in this hand were a deuce and a four; but they were the same suit, which meant a straight flush remained conceivable in those spades which formerly were swords."  Not being a poker player, I don't claim to entirely understand these metaphors!

It's also safe to conclude from all this that Flandry, had he so wished, could have done very well making a living as a professional poker player!  It's amusing to think of him, had Flandry lived in the 21st century, gambling in the casinos of Las Vegas or Monaco, and with no need to cheat, given his skill with this game.