Spite and malice

Spite and malice, also known as cat and mouse, is a relatively modern American card game for two or more players.

[1] It is a reworking of the late 19th-century Continental game crapette,[1] also known as Russian bank, and is a form of competitive solitaire, with a number of variations that can be played with two or three regular decks of cards.

[2] It had a "well-deserved following" during the 1970s when bridge expert Easley Blackwood saw it being played on a cruise ship and subsequently published its rules.

[5] The first rules are recorded by Richard L. Frey in 1965, who calls it "a recent husband-and-wife game that in some places rivals Russian Bank in popularity".

[6] However, John McLeod points out that the version that appears in card books is "rather different" from those usually played.

All undealt cards are left face down in a stack placed central to all players called the draw pile.

There are three kinds of piles in Spite and Malice: Play starts with the dealer and goes around the table in a clockwise fashion.

If, in the rare instance that the draw pile is exhausted and there is no possible way to furnish a new one, a drawn hand is declared, and the person closest to a cleared goal pile scores the difference between their opponents' leftover cards and their own.

Also, sometimes a rule is employed requiring aces and deuces to be played any time a player is able to do so.

Another variation calls for all piles to be built up to the king, with jokers used as wild cards.

[4] William Henry Storey designed a card game Starturn which was published by Chad Valley in 1935, and which had almost the same rules as Spite and Malice.

Five red cards are dealt to each player, made up to five on each pass, and the rest placed as the draw Pack.

The aim is to make up to four Build piles starting at 1 through to 15, using cards from the player's Stack where possible.