Some Buried Caesar

By the time he returned, in a quarter of an hour, my mate and I were old friends. His name was Basil Graham, and his firsthand knowledge of geography and county jails was exten- sive. I spread my lunch out on the cot with a sheet of the newspaper for a tablecloth, and it wasn't until the last crumb had disappeared that he made a proposal which might have withered the friendship in the bud if I hadn't been firm. His preparations were simple but interesting. From under the blanket of his cot he produced three teaspoons of the five and dime variety, and a small white bean. Then he came over and picked up one of my newspapers and asked, "May I?" I nodded. He put the newspaper on the floor and sat on it, and in front of him, on the concrete, ranged the three tea- spoons in a row, bottoms up. He had nifty fingers. Under one of the spoons he put the bean and then looked up at me like the friend he was.

"You understand," he said, "I'm just showing you how it's done. It will pass the time. Sometimes the hand is quicker, sometimes the eye is quicker. It's not a game of chance, but a game of skill. Your eye against my hand. Your eye may be quicker than my hand, and we can only tell by trying. It never hurts to try. Which spoon is the bean under?"

I told him, and it was. He tried again, his fingers darting, and again it was. The next time it wasn't. The next three times it was, and he began to act flustered and surprised and dis- pleased with himself.

I shook my liead. "Don't do it, Basil," I said regretfully. "I'm not a wise guy exactly, but I'm a tightwad. If you go on working up indignation at yourself because my eye is so much quicker than your hand, you might get so upset you would actually offer to make a bet on it, and I would have to refuse. As a matter of fact, you are extremely good, both at manipu- lating the bean and at getting upset, but the currency you saw in the wallet is not my own, and even if it was I'm a tightwad."

"It don't hurt to try, does it? I just want to see-"

"No, I don't lather."

He cheerfully put the spoons and the bean away, and the friendship was saved.