Aces and Knaves

blurted.
    "I've known him longer than his wife—at least in this country," Ms. Sung said, an inscrutable look in her eyes.
    She had been honest with me, as far as I could tell. Should I ask the definitive question? Why not? "Do you think James had Ned killed?"
    Her dark eyes studied me. "No, James isn't a killer. What I do think is this. I think Ned may have taken the gun to give him the guts to tell James off. Not that he would have ever used it against James."
    "But then, was the telephone message from James legitimate or not? I don't think James left his house all evening." A fact easily verified.
    "James told me the message did not come from him. I believe him."
    Then who did it come from?"
    Ms. Sung smiled, sadly. "If you can answer that question you can probably find the killer."
    "Shouldn't you go to the police and tell them what you know?"
    "I don't know anything that would help. It is too late to trace the telephone call and I don't believe James did it so I am not going to implicate him."
    "But it was you that James called when he was looking for—or pretended to be looking for—Ned."
    "Yes."
    "So he knew Ned had been here."
    "But that was no surprise. Ned visited me every time he came to San Francisco. And James, bless his sexually mixed-up little heart, knew that."
    I tried not to show a reaction. "What about the cocaine?"
    She shrugged. "Ned was as clean as a newly diapered baby. I don't know anything about the cocaine."
    I couldn't think of any more questions. I said, "Ms. Sung, thank you for your time." I stood up.
    "What are you going to do now?" she asked, also standing. "Are you going to tell the police about me?"
    "No. Although...I would like to reserve the right to do so if I can find out who made the phone call—so that you can verify that the phone call was actually made."
    "If it will clear James I will testify. But I don't think my testimony would make Ned's wife very happy."
    "Probably not. But I guess that's a chance we'd have to take."

    Chapter 32 LOSER
    I arrived at James's place in my rental car just before seven. Arrow pulled into the driveway ahead of me. We walked up the steps together. I had decided not to tell Arrow about Flora Sung because doing that would be tantamount to telling my father and the whole world.
    I was feeling better about Arrow being there. I said to her, "Are you going to solve the puzzle tonight or am I going to have to do it?"
    She said, "The Arrow approach is to bull your way in."
    "Like Alexander the Great cutting the Gordian knot."
    Stan answered our ring and I wondered whether he would let us in at all. He did, without even giving us the puzzle. Either Arrow had set a precedent or you didn't need to solve the puzzle when you were in the middle of a bet.
    Stan met us at the bottom of the stairs. He gave Arrow a hug and shook my hand. I didn't detect any animosity toward me, but that didn't mean it wasn't there.
    He did say to me, "I understand you're going to come to work for us."
    "If he loses," Arrow said. "But he's not going to lose."
    Stan laughed and said, "If we had voted for the most determined student in grad school you would have won. But I'm afraid you can't substitute determination for luck."
    But my luck, or rather my skill, was working and I increased my stake to $3,000 in a relatively short time. Only $1,000 to go. At that point Arrow made me take a break, even though I was hot.
    "I don't know what you mean by hot," Arrow said after we sat down. "I took statistics in grad school and I know that each trial is independent of all others. Each throw of the dice, each deal of the cards, has no relationship to what happened on the previous throw or deal. So there's no such thing as hot."
    I grinned sheepishly and said, "I guess you really did learn something at Stanford."
    "One thing I know that I didn't learn in school is that the longer you play the harder it will be for you to maintain concentration. Therefore, I suggest the following: Bet small until the odds swing in your favor. Then bet a thousand or whatever you need to win."
    "In other words, all or nothing."
    "Not quite. If you lose you'll still be ahead of your original stake."
    The more we discussed this the better it sounded. I went back to the table determined to try to win quickly while Arrow kept an exact count of my chips. The opportunity came three deals later. Toward the end of the deck the odds swung radically in my favor.
    I nudged Arrow. We did a quick calculation and pulled