Evenings
The Friday tournament in review
The Friday tournament is the most orderly evening of the week, and it begins long before the first card. Alana Curtis opened the list on Thursday, and by noon the next day all twenty-four places were taken. Two further names were written beneath, in case anyone fell ill. By half past seven, every player had been checked at the door, and the seats had been drawn from the shoe by Gillian Novak, who kept her face carefully neutral as the numbers were revealed.
The early levels
Levels last twenty-five minutes, announced by a small hand bell. The first hour belonged to a grazier who had not played for years and who surprised himself, and his table, by building a large stack of chips. Daniel Fitzgerald dealt the main table with his customary quiet, naming each card as it fell.
The tea interval
At the end of the fourth level the front room emptied for twenty minutes. Tea was poured, scones were passed round, and Catherine Nicholson sent out an extra tray of sponge when the first was gone in five minutes. A recurring subject of conversation was a single hand at the second table, remembered differently by everybody present.
The final table
Six players remained, and they moved beneath the brass lamp. A schoolteacher who had come as a guest of a friend found herself heads up against the grazier, and the room went quiet in the way it does when something is about to happen. The grazier lost on the final card, and he applauded first.
The board
The schoolteacher's name was written on the board in the front hall, with the words Champion of the evening. No prize was given, nothing was presented and the brass cup stayed on its shelf above the kitchen door. The room clapped, and one last pot of tea went round the whole house.