Marshall Harris

Marsh Harris was a miniature mobster, all pinstripes and fedoras, black-and-white wingtips and packs of cards, rolling dice. He was light blue eyes and glossy, floppy brown hair, quick slender hands and an even quicker smile. On the edge of the school-yard, he ran three-card monty and craps, twenty-one and poker. In the back of the classroom, he murmured quietly to himself about chances, odds, and fates, cross-roads and choices. When other students tapped with their pencils or doodled in the margins of notebooks, he sketched Hebrew letters on his desk with his fingertips.