The Bet

Earlier in the week, the large Tunica Casino had been crowded with hundreds of gamblers looking for luck. Now, thanks to the rising Mississippi River, there were only two: The Devil and an Angel.

The brown water lapped at their feet, staining the Angel’s robes and turning to steam as it touched the Devil’s feet. The Devil laughed, stopped and picked up a pair of dice. He was cocky — very sure of himself. He looked at the destruction around him and let out an evil laugh. He threw the dice down the Craps table. “I win again!” The Devil never rolled snake eyes.

The Angel looked at his stained robes and then the Devil in complete disgust. He normally wouldn’t be caught alive in a Casino, but this was such an important moment in Man’s history he made an exception. Lord forgive him.

“I bet Humanity’s collective soul,” the Devil said as he put a quarter in a slot machine that came magically to life, “that no good will come out of this flood. That man will turn on man. That it will only bring grief and anguish.” The Devil pulled the handle and hit the jackpot.

The Angel glowed slightly and smirked at the Devil’s words. He held the dice tightly and opened his hand. Two butterflies flew from his palm and across the casino. “You’re on, Beelzebub.”

The Devil and Angel got in a boat and waited as the flood waters began to recede. There was nothing left to do but watch and wait.

Days passed and the first incident took place. Looters came into the local inundated trailer park. The Devil laughed but suddenly quit when other neighbors came out and ran the looters off. The Angel put a mark in his book. The Devil chuckled at the elderly lady without flood insurance who came back to her destroyed home and collapsed with grief. But to his disgust, a van from the local church stopped and the members helped the lady clean her home. The Angel put another mark in his book. The Devil’s hopes rose again as families in shelters cried out in despair. But his smile was wiped off his face as people from around the state sent aid. Buses of volunteers poured in to help with the cleanup. Donation levels rose quicker than the river itself. And like after Katrina, when things got bad, the people got good.

As a water moccasin slithered by, the Angel smiled and said, “Snake eyes.” The Devil knew that he had lost, sighed and vanished.

Humanity had survived yet another flood.