Gone with the Winners

21 October 1999

By Madeliene Bizub

Scorrit was not a beautiful woman. Her hair was just a tinge too red, her nose just a little more than perky, and the freckles on her face battled for available space. However, when men were caught up in her charm, they rarely noticed her lack of conventional beauty.

Such was the case, when the twins--Sienfield and Royston--were entertaining Scorrit one warm spring afternoon, while they all lolled on the front porch of Scorrit's plantation house, known locally as "Terror". The twins were regaling Scorrit with tales of their most recent exploits in the city of Winville, an industrial town to the west of Terror, which manufactured money. People were drawn to the town with promises of "jackpots" and easy money to be had, but they only found dangerous pirates fighting it out on the streets, active volcanoes, and white tigers guarding the perimeters. Still, people flocked there by the thousands, hoping to get some of the free money for themselves, even though they almost always came back penniless.

Scorrit was bored with their stories, though, and suddenly shouted "Gamblin', Gamblin', Gamblin'. . that's all you ever talk about--I swaney! If I hear one more word about gamblin' I'm going straight in the house!"

The twins were sensitive to Scorrit's outbursts, and didn't want to offend since they were hoping for an invitation to dinner. They had left all their money in Winville for recycling, and hadn't had anything to eat for several days. They soothed her temper with sweet words of admiration and a promise to tell her "a secret" if she let them stay. With masterful female manipulation, Scorrit batted her eyes, smiled her most simpering and asked, "What secret?"

The twins were enthralled, and blurted out that Scorrit's neighbor Ashton was going to sneak off with his cousin Misty, and have a quicky wedding in one of the tacky chapels located in Winville. After the nuptials, they would live happily after, reading poetry together in the family estate known as "Triple Twelve on the Field".

Scorrit saw red the moment the twins told her of the coming union, because she had always wanted Triple Twelve for herself, and had previously tried to get Ashton in a compromising position to force the marriage. He had shown little interest in Scorrit's charms, however, and she suspected he was a eunuch, but she still wanted to be the mistress of Triple Twelve, and have Ashton read poetry to her. Scorrit could not stand to be thwarted in her efforts to snag a man in her web. She sent the twins home, and studied the problem with all the power in her pea-sized brain, coming up with a masterful plan to blast the hated Misty off the throne, which rightfully belonged to Scorrit.

Later that night, Scorrit sneaked off the plantation, determined to make her way to the hated Winville and break up the planned nuptials of Ashton and Misty before it was too late. It wasn't too hard to find Winville. Scorrit just followed the ruts in the road left by thousands of baby carriages people were pushing on their journey toward the money mecca. Everyone in the group was so fascinated by the hyperbole surrounding their destination, they barely noticed that a lone female had joined their ranks anyway, so Scorrit was able to reach Winville unimpeded. She completely disregarded their rantings about machines which spit out money supposedly located all over Winville. With barely disguised contempt, she listened to the ravings of these people, who were obviously not in touch with reality. Scorrit knew there was only one way to get money--marry it. The other travelers provided her with a good cover, however, so she just traveled along in silence--seething to get her plan into "action".

Upon arrival in Winville, however, Scorrit found it difficult to keep her mind on the original intent of her visit. She saw sights she had barely considered plausible when told to her by soldiers returned from the frontlines in Winville. At one end of town, there was a pyramid that was probably ten times the size of its Egyptian inspiration, and made out of glass, to boot. There was a huge waterfall, with flames bursting out the top, smack in the middle of a town surrounded by parched desert. The air was full of the music of bells ringing, the clanging of coins dropping into metal boxes, and the squeals of women sitting in front of a strange apparatus that looked like a television, playing the same show over and over.

There were so many people on the street that Scorrit feared she would never find the little chapels she had heard so much about. A kindly tourist told her to just follow anyone who looked like Elvis and she would likely find a wedding chapel, but there were so many Elvises walking around that she didn't know which one to follow. She became hopelessly lost in a section of town that looked older than the rest. This area was less populated by tourists, and there were no waterfalls or statues that talked, and apparently it was off limits to pirates, too.

Scorrit could hear some lively cheering coming from a group of men standing around a long table inside one of the more dilapidated buildings. She was curious why this group was so excited and shouting around a table with no chairs, and obviously no floor show either. What in the world could be so much fun over there?

Scorrit strolled over to take a peek and was nearly blinded by the sight of a bright green table cloth with funny writing on it. When she bent over to touch it someone actually yelled at her to keep her hands out of the "pit". It hurt her feelings that some stranger would actually holler at her, and she turned away from the group with tears in her eyes, when a kindly gentleman handed her his handkerchief and invited her to dinner. Scorrit was starving, and immediately took him up on his offer, even though she knew it was unladylike to accept a man's attentions when she didn't even know who his momma was. She was in no mood to follow the standards of behavior of her former locale, though, in this strange town.

She went to dinner and tried to be her most charming self. Rudeness must have been contagious in this place, though, because the stranger (who introduced himself as Rhotten Bettor), kept telling her to wipe the southern belle simper off her face. He said he would help her survive in this new country called casinoland. Scorrit turned scarlet as Rhott explained how she could make money on a "sustained roll" at that funny looking scooped out table that had attracted her attention in the first place.

"No wonder those men were yelling" she thought to herself.

After dinner, Rhott ushered her back to the table, placed two little dice in her hand, and told her to throw them all the way down to the other end of the table. Scorrit followed his instructions. She pictured the faces of Ashton and Misty at a spot down at the end of the table and threw the dice down there like she had been doing it all her life. The spectators immediately started calling out numbers and throwing cookies around the table, then quieted rapidly as a nice young man in the center of the table moved the dice back to Scorrit with a bamboo stick.

Scorrit repeated this silly activity for over an hour until someone finally said her turn was over. Rhott had accumulated a huge bunch of the round cookies--all brightly colored--but the green ones must not have been any good, because he threw those back on the table "for the boys".

He whisked Scorrit away to a window with bars on it and exchanged the cookies for real money! Now Scorrit was interested!

She joined Rhott in his life of degradation, and never returned to her home of Terror. The former mansion became overgrown with weeds, looking crumpled and forlorn. Rumor has it that the couple opened an extension of casinoland in a small southern town on the coast.

When neighbors and relatives inquire about what happened to the former mistress of Terror, everyone just shakes their head sadly and says she's "Gone with the Winners".