There has been a good many times, true enough, when things looked doubtful. Players has come that had new wrinkles in the way o’ holdin’ out, or stackin’ the cards, or some new system o’ play that puzzled the boys for awhile. An’ there’s been some come that sure knowed the game an’ played it almighty skilful. But none of ’em, as I said, ever reely got away with the proposition. There was one feller, though, that showed up here about six years ago, that come monstrous near breakin’ the record. That is to say, if he’d have understood the first principles o’ poker he’d ha’ busted the town wide open, an’ the mortifyin’ thing about it was ’twas poker he was playin’. That is, ’twas called poker, an’ he sure did win, but the way he played it was one o’ the seven wonders o’ the world. We talked about it quite some, after he left, an’ the unanimous verdict was that if he ha’ knowed what he was doin’ an’ how to do it, he’d ha’ just everlastin’ly skint the entire crowd out o’ what money there was, instead o’ comin’ out consid’able ahead, an’ him not knowin’ just how he done it or what he’d done. It sure were bewilderin’, an’ well cal’lated to make a man lose his faith in Providence, ’thout he was one that stuck to his religion spite of anything. The puzzlin’ thing about it were that the feller seemed to be playin’ poker all the time, an’ the rest o’ the party was playin’ it for all they knew, but he were either playin’ on a system that was entirely unbeknownst to everybody in this part o’ the world, or else he were that outrageous ignorant o’ first principles as would disgrace a half-grown boy. An’ yet he won! Some of ’em was inclined to think at first that it were a new system, an’ there was a good deal o’ speculation on how it would work, played constant, but nobody had the nerve to try it, seein’ it were plumb contrary to all science as poker is understood, an’ they couldn’t get up that child-like confidence in heaven’s mercy that would lead ’em to look for over-whelmin’ luck in the matter o’ cards at the critical moments o’ the game. The way of it was this. He just landed from the boat one day an’ walked up the levee a bit, lookin’ round, an’ sayin’ nothin’ to nobody. There didn’t seem to be no reason for anybody to pay attention to him, an’ consequent nobody did, for he wa’n’t a man that looked like a sport, nor yet a business man. Just ’peared to have got out f’m somewheres an’ didn’t know his way back. After he looked round a spell, he sort o’ drifted in to the hotel an’ wrote his name, absent-minded like, on the register, an’ said ‘Yes’ when the proprietor ast him if he wanted a room. Then he just sat round for a day or two, sayin’ nothin’ to nobody all the time. Didn’t appear to have ambition enough to eat his meals, for he’d wait till everybody else was most through ’fore he’d go into the dinin’-room. An’ even when he took a drink, which wa’n’t often, he did it all alone without seemin’ to take no interest in it.