Accused of Stealing!

3 DEC 06

So, I’m playing a little 4/8 LHE at the local cardroom, PJ Pockets. We are short handed, so two of the dealers are filling in the open seats. The dealer/player to my left announces that he has $47 to a question from the other dealer/player. He then gets up from the table for a smoke break.

When comes back, I see him playing with his chips. Finally, he turns to me and says, “I have only $40 here. Did you take the other $7?”

At first, I’m stunned into silence. “I’m sorry?” I reply. He restates that he had $47 before he left and now he only has $40. I look at his stack and sure enough, he only has $40. I didn’t remember seeing anyone mess with his stack. My stack still had exactly my $100 buy-in neatly stacked in 5 columns right in front of me. “Go check the tapes,” I insist. There are cameras all over this place. If someone took his chips, I’m sure it would be on the camera. We go back and forth like this a couple of times. I’m getting more insistent now. “Go check the tapes. You, a DEALER, are accusing me of stealing.” What I wanted to say was that if this were Texas, I’d have drawn my pistol already.

He gets up and comes back a little later without saying a word. Finally, I can’t take it anymore. I’m bursting at the seams in my seat. As calmly as possible, I ask, “Did you check the tapes?” “Huh?” he replies. “Oh, the $7. I found it over at the board.”

That’s it. No apology. Nothing else.

I picked up and went home. I would not have been able to play good poker in that frame of mind.