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On the Coat Tales of a Gamber... Sailor continues his story
The Ultimate
Bankruptcy… Episode 22
I had a cousin back
in Greenville that was quite a bit older than I was, maybe twenty years older.
He was a compulsive gambler. He never had any money and he owed everybody from
family to friends, and unfortunately for him, his gambling buddies. In fact,
that is how he died come to think of it. Duke gambled on everything. If he was
around and he heard, “You wan’ a make a bet?” he would be in on it. Dog racing
is how I got to know him. Duke was tall, slender and he sported a thin mustache.
He always dressed nice and looked every bit the part of a gambler, fedora and
all. He had a kind of regal stature, and he was smart like anything. That is how
he got his nickname while a student of the Crimson Tide, University of Alabama.
One of his fraternity brothers dubbed him the “Duke” of his frat house and it
stuck. His real name was Duncan Parman.
For three summers,
after I had my licenses to drive, Duke would take me to Mobile for the dog
races. It was great for me because he’d let me do all the driving. A couple of
times, we even spent time on the Gulf. I was too young to buy race tickets so
Duke would see to it, when he made his wagers, he’d buy my ticket too. I did not
know anything about dog racing. But I was a quick study under Duke’s tutorage,
and before long I could read the racing forum and handicap the dogs. I can
remember vividly, those summer nights at the dog track, yelling for my dog to
finish in the money. Duke on the other hand knew all the dogs, the kennels, the
owners and the handlers. How he could make it his life’s study, I never did
figure out. He was amazing at picking the races. However, when the race was
over, he was never on the winner. I never figured that out either. Every trip
pretty much ended the same, even if he hit some races; he managed to lose it all
by the last race. It was as though he could not allow himself to win. There were
many times when he’d tap out before the last race. He’d tell me to wait some
place for him, disappear for a while and when he came back, he’d have more
racing tickets. I later figured it out that Duke would seek out someone he knew
and beg them to lend him money so he could keep betting.
As for me, Duke
always made sure that he put me on a dog that would be in the money. In the
money would mean third place or better. The higher my dog placed the more money
I would win. By the end of the night, I’d have enough beer money for the
weekend. Mind you, I could only bet $2 a race. Some tickets paid $2.40 to show,
and up to maybe $8.20 to win. Duke always had me bet with the odds on the
favorite dog. Though I am sure I lost some races, I do not recall it that way.
Eleven races and I’d have six to ten extra bucks in my pocket. In 1958, that was
great fun and easy money for a teenager.
For all Duke’s
talent, knowing how the dogs would run around a track, he seldom followed his
own advice. His compulsivity, I guess, would not allow it. He always had to work
in a long shot or two into his betting strategy. It was as thought he could not
be excited or satisfied with just picking the winner of the race, he had to hit
the long shot jackpot. During the running of the race, Duke would transform into
another person. It is hard for me to explain it, but from my teenage perspective
it was scary to witness how Duke would become emotionally overwhelmed. Like a
crazy man, Duke would scream at the top of his lungs until he became too hoarse
to talk. I can still see him, eyes bulging out of his head, pounding his hand on
a railing and screaming at his long shot to “get up there”, “go 8”, “run you
son-of-a-bitch!” I mean he became so unreal, that I could not watch the race.
His behavior attracted all my attention. I became witness to the sickness of a
compulsive gambler, screaming insanely, without any consciousness of what he was
doing, or of anything else around him, except his dog running last. I suppose,
it was not too different from so many other bettors at the track. I remember it
vividly because of how it affected me at the time. It scared me. After the last
race, we’d walk around the grandstands with Duke muttering to himself “Why, why?
I was so unlucky”, as he picked through the litter of losing tickets to see if
anyone mistakenly had thrown away a winner.
One night I got to
meet one of his gambling buddies, “Little John”. As far as I knew at the time,
Duke had few, if any friends. Duke introduced me to Little John. I was surprised
in fact. I did not expect to even be noticed let alone introduced. Little John
greeted me, and shook my hand like “welcome to the gambler’s club”. In those
days, no one paid any attention to kids that they did not know. Meeting Little
John made me feel really good. I recall the two of them going on about the
Trifecta that was coming up in the tenth race. It was like some big secret deal
that they huddled over. They were going on and on about which dogs they should
bet on, the correct order and how much the winning ticket would pay. For some
reason, this Trifecta was going to a bigger win than usual. I remember how they
talked in their track-side lingo. They met during the sixth race. Little John
did not stick around once they were in agreement on the Trifecta, he went his
way. I did not see Little John again until after the last race. He was ecstatic.
Yeah, a very happy man I could say. Little John hit the Trifecta and was coming
to celebrate with Duke. Only that Duke was in a stunned stupor of disbelief.
Once again, Duke could not bring himself to go with the potential order of
winners that he and Little John had discussed. He lost the third leg of the
Trifecta in the tenth race. His dog came in fifth instead of third. If Duke had
kept to the plan, his Trifecta tickets would have paid him over twelve thousand
dollars. Little John made the bets and that was reason why he was so ecstatic.
On the trip back to
Greenville, I had to listen to Duke repeating to himself over and over, “Why,
why am I so unlucky? Why couldn’t that dog get up there and be third? If that
3-dog had just got up there, I would have won eighteen thousand dollars.” Of
course I had winning tickets on the last three races to win, place or show for
two bucks each. I would be drinking beer come that weekend and Duke was flat
broke.
In later years, I
came to understand why Duke did not have friends. Because of his losing ways, he
was forever trying to borrow money from anyone that he knew at the track.
Thinking back, I may be the only person he never asked for money. Of the three
years of driving with Duke to the dog track, he never once asked to borrow money
from me. Not that I ever had more than maybe twenty bucks on me, but just the
same, I was working summer jobs and living at home. I was pretty flush for a
teenager.
Four years after I
had moved away from Alabama, I received family news that Duke had passed away in
the hospital. The story told was he had some sort of circulation problem that
unexpectedly resulted in a blood clot to his lungs. It was several years later
that I heard the whole story. Duke was way behind in debt and his creditors beat
him up, breaking both legs of his legs. In a morbid way, I could not help to
think how death was a gambler’s ultimate bankruptcy. Dying was his only way out.
