Inspired by a true story of one Scot’s rise to prominence, Murray Hall is a historical fiction novel that takes the reader to a dazzling turn-of-the-century New York, where the eponymous Hall has a secret that is only revealed after death. In this extract, a journalist determined to discover the truth speaks to one of Murray’s gambling buddies.

Murray Hall
By Milo Allan
Published by Black and White

Joe Young’s eyes gleamed green in the electric light of the card room. I had remembered them grey, like Hall’s, from our first meeting, but I now saw the depths of them like a briny sea. 

‘Ah take it you know how to play the Widow. Thirty-one? It’s a simple game but it was one of Murray’s favourites. Better to play with three or four, but we can play it fine enough with two.’ 

A pack of cards danced between his hands, fluttering like sparrows taking to the air, then caught between his deft fingers. 

‘I’ve played it a number of times,’ I replied. 

My father’s voice murmured through the back of my mind as the cards spread like a lady’s fan at the opera, then closed again. We must, as we battle for reform, not allow ourselves to be deformed . . . Gambling, cards, disorderly houses, the pool room, all these can divert us from holiness. 

‘The aim being to be the player who has collected cards closest to a total of thirty-one,’ he said as if he sensed my uncertainty. ‘A dollar note on the table, and each life you lose, you fold the corner. No more than a dollar lost in the whole game.’ He chuckled. ‘Ah sense you’re not a gambler, Mr Clellan. Ah know, of course, your aversion to such base pleasures. But if you’ll permit me a game, ah’ll tell you about my friend Murray Hall.’

The two candles of the bouillotte lamp bathed the mahogany surface in light, sharpening Joe’s features as he leaned inwards to offer the deck towards me. ‘Cut,’ he instructed, and I did as he said. 

‘The Widow,’ he repeated as his muscular, nimble hands dealt three cards to each of us, then slid a further three down onto the centre of the table. ‘Strange how many card games are named after the female cards, don’t you think, Mr Clellan?’ 

The man leaned back into his chair and inhaled deeply. He appeared to be studying me, just as he had those few years ago in Fatone’s. He hadn’t changed much, save the hint of grey in his moustache. I wondered for a brief moment if I had. He drew a box of cigars from his pocket and offered me one. I raised a hand and shook my head, then watched as, with a smirk, he lit his own. 

‘They say Murray Hall fooled many shrewd men. Well, you can count me as one,’ he said, taking a long draw. ‘Your start.’ 

I turned my cards towards me. On the table, flipped upwards, the flop contained a further three: a five of diamonds, a seven of clubs and six of spades. 

‘Murray loved this game,’ he went on. ‘First time ah ever saw him was in the back room of the saloon on the corner of fourteenth and sixth in the run-up to the 1883 senatorial election. Ah hadn’t gone in there looking for a poker game, just a drink and to eavesdrop on the gossip of the County Democracy crowd. Ah drifted into that room because the whisper in the bar was that they were back there, playing, and there was a big pot already building. This, ah figured, might be a game of some interest. Quite how much, I could not have imagined. Needless to say, ah played him at cards that night and lost. 

‘Always remember the first glimpse ah had of the little fellow with the hat, silhouetted at first by the lamp behind him. Watchin’ him play, ah soon realised that this was the fella people had been talking about. Murray Hall. Ah remember how he played, cigar between his teeth – though I don’t believe he lit it. At one point he held out a trey, a three, for a “kicker”, and, blame me, if he didn’t pull another three and a nine spot.’

‘I heard the woman was a remarkable shark – a killer instinct,’ I said, fighting to resist a smile as I stared at my cards. There, already, was an ace of spades and a Jack of spades, an early score of twenty-one. On the table, a further six. I waited for a moment, as if assessing my hand with uncertainty. If I could have knocked right then in the first round, I would have. 

‘That night he beat out three aces and swept up over a hundred dollars,’ said Joe, cigar smoke obscuring his face for a moment. ‘And this was a woman, a fella who stood two raises, on only two nines? Ah don’t believe it . . .’ 

I reached forward and pulled the six of spades towards me, replacing it with my nine of hearts. The man opposite smiled and plucked his hand off the table. He glanced at the cards for barely a second before he took my nine of hearts. 

‘It seems, over time, you got to know her better than most,’ I tried as I rearranged my hand. His manner was so casual that I wondered if he could possibly have forgotten our first meeting, if the incident was so frequent, or myself so unmemorable. 

‘Did ah know him well?’ he said, resisting the feminine pronoun. ‘You reporters and your questions! What does that mean? Ah knew his style as a poker player, what cigars he smoked, who he would lay a bet on in a fight, and what he was like to come up against in an election match, but if you’re asking me for details about where he came from and how he ended up in the city, you need to look elsewhere. Ah reckon most of us Tammany boys would say the same.’ 

I studied the face, the scar like a pencil line leading down to those jade-coloured eyes. Could he truly have forgotten me? No, I thought, it was more likely the man was playing me, waiting to see who would cave first. But I was far from caving. 

I knocked gently on the table. My heart pounded and I spread the three, the ace, the jack, the six. ‘Twenty-seven,’ I said, now allowing myself a flicker of a smile. 

‘Nice,’ he said, as he laid out his own spread of nine and ten of hearts. ‘A lucky first hand.’ Joe’s fingers reached forwards to pick up his dollar bill, flattening it on the table before turning one corner inwards. ‘One life gone,’ he said as he creased it with all the precision of Japanese folded paper. 

‘Ah’d say Murray was one who lost a few lives along the way. So be it. Lives are made to be lost.’ Those eyes held my gaze for a moment and he pushed the deck of cards towards me, his hands hovering a moment longer than I expected before he pulled away. ‘Your shuffle, sir,’ he said. The eye contact did not waver. 

Murray Hall by Milo Allan is published by Black and White, priced by £16.99.