Starman's Quest

by Robert Silverberg

  _Chapter Nine_

  Hawkes took a coin from his pocket and dropped it in a slot at the sideof the board. It lit up. A crazy, shifting pattern of colored lightspassed over it, restless, never pausing.

  "What happens now?"

  "You set up a mathematical pattern with these keys," Hawkes said,pointing to a row of enamelled studs along the side of the machine."Then the lights start flashing, and as soon as they flash--at random,of course--into the pattern you've previously set up, you're the winner.The skill of the game comes in predicting the kind of pattern that willbe the winning one. You've got to keep listening to the numbers that thecroupier calls off, and fit them into your sequence."

  Suddenly a bell rang loudly, and the board went dead. Alan looked aroundand saw that all the other boards in the hall were dark as well.

  The man on the rostrum in the center of the hall cleared his throat andsang out, "Table 403 hits us for a hundred! 403! One hundred!"

  A pasty-faced bald man at a table near theirs rose with a broad grin onhis face and went forward to collect. Hawkes rapped sharply on the sideof the table to get Alan's attention.

  "Look here, now. You have to get a head start. As soon as the boardslight up again, I have to begin setting up my pattern. I'm competingagainst everyone else here, you see. And the quickest man wins, usually.Of course, blind luck sometimes brings you a winner--but not veryoften."

  Alan nodded and watched carefully as Hawkes' fingers flew nimbly overthe controlling studs the instant the tables lit for the next round. Theothers nearby were busy doing the same thing, but few of them set aboutit with the air of cocky jauntiness that Hawkes wore.

  Finally he stared at the board in satisfaction and sat back. Thecroupier pounded three times with a little gavel and said, "103sub-prime 5."

  Hastily Hawkes made a correction in his equation. The lights on theboard flickered and faded, moving faster than Alan could see.

  "377 third-quadrant 7."

  Again a correction. Hawkes sat transfixed, staring intently at theboard. The other players were similarly entranced, Alan saw. He realizedit was possible for someone to become virtually hypnotized by the game,to spend days on end sitting before the board.

  He forced himself to follow Hawkes' computations as number after numberwas called off. He began to see the logical pattern of the game.

  It was a little like astrogation, in which he had had the requiredpreliminary instruction. When you worked out a ship's course, you had tokeep altering it to allow for course deflection, effects of planetarymagnetic fields, meteor swarms, and such obstacles--and you had to beone jump ahead of the obstacles all the time.

  It was the same here. The pilot board at the croupier's rostrum had aprearranged mathematical pattern on it. The idea of the game was to setup your own board in the identical pattern. As each succeedingcoordinate on the graph was called out, you recomputed in terms of thenew probabilities, rubbing out old equations and substituting new ones.

  There was always the mathematical chance that a pattern set up at randomwould be identical to the master control pattern--but that was a prettyslim chance. It took brains to win at this game. The man whose board wasfirst to match the pilot pattern won.

  Hawkes worked quietly, efficiently, and lost the first four rounds. Alancommiserated. But the gambler snapped, "Don't waste your pity. I'm stillexperimenting. As soon as I've figured out the way the numbers arerunning tonight, I'll start raking it in."

  It sounded boastful to the starman, but Hawkes won on the fifth round,matching the hidden pattern in only six minutes. The previous fourrounds had taken from nine to twelve minutes before a winner appeared.The croupier, a small, sallow-faced chap, shoved a stack of coins and afew bills at Hawkes when he went to the rostrum to claim his winnings. Alow murmur rippled through the hall; Hawkes had evidently beenrecognized.

  His take was a hundred credits. In less than an hour, he was alreadyseventy-five credits to the good. Hawkes' sharp eyes glinted brightly;he was in his element now, and enjoying it.

  The sixth round went to a bespectacled round-faced man three tables tothe left, but Hawkes won a hundred credits each on the seventh andeighth rounds, then lost three in a row, then plunged for a heavy stakein his ninth round and came out ahead by five hundred credits.

  So Hawkes had won four times in nine rounds, Alan thought. And therewere at least a hundred people in the hall. Even assuming the gamblerdid not always have the sort of luck he was having now, that meant mostpeople did not win very often, and some did not win at all.

  As the evening went along, Hawkes made it look simple. At one point hewon four rounds in a row; then he dropped off for a while, but came backfor another big pot half an hour later. Alan estimated Hawkes' night'swork had been worth more than a thousand credits so far.

  The gambler pushed his winnings to fourteen hundred credits, while Alanwatched; the fine points of the game became more comprehensible to himwith each passing moment, and he longed to sit down at the tablehimself. That was impossible, he knew; this was a Class A parlor, and arank beginner such as himself could not play.

  But then Hawkes began to lose. Three, four, five rounds in a row slippedby without a win. At one point Hawkes committed an elementary mistake inarithmetic that made Alan cry out; Hawkes turned and silenced him with afierce bleak scowl, and Alan went red.

  Six rounds. Seven. Eight. Hawkes had lost nearly a hundred of hisfourteen hundred credits. Luck and skill seemed to have deserted himsimultaneously. After the eleventh consecutive losing round, Hawkes rosefrom the table, shaking his head bitterly.

  "I've had enough. Let's get out of here."

  He pocketed his winnings--still a healthy twelve hundred credits,despite his late-evening slump--and Alan followed him out of the parlorinto the night. It was late now, past midnight. The streets, fresh andclean, were damp. It had rained while they were in the parlor, and Alanrealized wryly he had been so absorbed by the game that he had not evennoticed.

  Crowds of home-going Yorkers moved rapidly through the streets. As theymade their way to the nearest Undertube terminal, Alan broke thesilence. "You did all right tonight, didn't you?"

  "Can't complain."

  "It's too bad you had that slump right at the end. If you'd quit half anhour earlier you'd be two hundred credits richer."

  Hawkes smiled. "If you'd been born a couple of hundred years later,you'd be a lot smarter."

  "What is that supposed to mean?" Alan felt annoyed by Hawkes' remark.

  "Simply that I lost deliberately toward the end." They turned into theUndertube station and headed for the ticket windows. "It's part of asmart gambler's knowhow to drop a few credits deliberately now andthen."

  "Why?"

  "So the jerks who provide my living keep on coming back," Hawkes saidbluntly. "I'm good at that game. Maybe I'm the best there is. I can feelthe numbers with my hands. If I wanted to, I could win four out of fivetimes, even at a Class A place."

  Alan frowned. "Then why don't you? You could get rich!"

  "I _am_ rich," Hawkes said in a tone that made Alan feel tremendouslyfoolish. "If I got much richer too fast I'd wind up with a soft burn inthe belly from a disgruntled customer. Look here, boy: how long would_you_ go back to that casino if one player took 80% of the pots, and ahundred people competed with you for the 20% he left over? You'd winmaybe once a month, if you played full time every day. In a short timeyou'd be broke, unless you quit playing first. So I ease up. I let theothers win about half the time. I don't want _all_ the money the mintturns out--just some of it. It's part of the economics of the game tolet the other guys take a few pots."

  Alan nodded. He understood. "And you don't want to make them too jealousof you. So you made sure you lost consistently for the final half houror so, and that took the edge off your earlier winning in their minds."

  "That's the ticket!"

  The Undertube pulled out of the station and shot bullet-like through itsdark tunnel. Silently, Alan thought about his night's experience.
He sawhe still had much, very much to learn about life on Earth.

  Hawkes had a gift--the gift of winning. But he didn't abuse that gift.He concealed it a little, so the people who lacked his talent did notget too jealous of him. Jealousy ran high on Earth; people here ledshort ugly lives, and there was none of the serenity and friendliness oflife aboard a starship.

  He felt very tired, but it was just physical fatigue; he felt wide awakementally. Earth life, for all its squalor and brutality, wastremendously exciting compared with shipboard existence. It was with amomentary pang of something close to disappointment that he rememberedhe would have to report back to the _Valhalla_ in several days; therewere so many fascinating aspects of Earth life he still wanted toexplore.

  The Undertube stopped at a station labelled _Hasbrouck_. "This is wherewe get off," Hawkes told him.

  They took a slidewalk to street level. The street was like a canyon,with towering walls looming up all around. And some of the giganticbuildings seemed quite shabby-looking by the street-light. Obviouslythey were in a less respectable part of the city.

  "This is Hasbrouck," Hawkes said. "It's a residential section. Andthere's where I live."

  He pointed to the tarnished chrome entrance of one of the biggest andshabbiest of the buildings on the street. "Be it ever so humble, there'sno place like North Hasbrouck Arms. It's the sleaziest, cheapest, mostrun-down tenement in one hemisphere, but I love it. It's a real palace."

  Alan followed him through a gate that had once been imposing; now itswung open rather rustily as they broke the photobeam in front of it.The lobby was dark and dimly lit, and smelled faintly musty.

  Alan was unprepared for the shabbiness of the house where the gamblerlived. A moment after he spoke, he realized the question was highlyimpertinent, but by then it was too late: "I don't understand, Max. Ifyou make so much money gambling, why do you live in a place like this?Aren't there any better--I mean----"

  An unreadable expression flitted briefly across the gambler's lean face."I know what you mean. Let's just say that the laws of this planetdiscriminate slightly against Free Status people like yours truly. Theyrequire us to live in approved residences."

  "But this is practically a slum."

  "Forget the _practically_. This is the raw end of town, and no denyingit. But I have to live here." They entered a creaky old elevatordecorated with too much chrome, most of it chipped, and Hawkes pressed_106_. "When I first moved in here, I made up my mind I'd bribe my wayinto a fancier neighborhood as soon as I had the cash. But by the time Ihad enough to spare I didn't feel like moving, you see. I'm sort oflazy."

  The elevator stopped with a jarring jolt at the hundred-sixth floor.They passed down a narrow, poorly-lit corridor. Hawkes paused suddenlyin front of a door, pressed his thumb against the doorplate, and waitedas it swung open in response to the imprint of his fingerprints againstthe sensitive electronic grid.

  "Here we are," he said.

  It was a three-room apartment that looked almost as old and asdisreputable as the rooms in the Enclave. But the furniture was new andattractive; these were not the rooms of a poor man. An elaborate audiosystem took up one entire wall; elsewhere, Alan saw books of all kinds,tapes, a tiny mounted globe of light-sculpture within whose crystalinterior abstract colors flowed kaleidoscopically, a handsome robot bar.

  Hawkes gestured Alan to a seat; Alan chose a green lounge-chair withquivering springs and stretched out. He did not want to go to sleep; hewanted to stay up half the night and talk.

  The gambler busied himself at the bar a moment and returned with twodrinks. Alan looked at the glass a moment: the drink was bright yellowin color, sparkling. He sipped it. The flavor was gentle but striking, amixture of two or three tastes and textures that chased each other roundAlan's tongue.

  "I like it. What is it?"

  "Wine from Antares XIII. I bought it for a hundred credits a bottlelast year. Still have three bottles left, too. I go easy on it; the nextship from Antares XIII won't be in for fourteen more years."

  The drink made Alan mellow and relaxed. They talked a while, and hehardly noticed the fact that the time was getting along toward 0300 now,long past his shiptime bunk-hour. He didn't care. He listened to everyword Hawkes had to say, drinking it in with the same delight he feltwhen drinking the Antarean wine. Hawkes was a complex, many-facetedcharacter; he seemed to have been everywhere on Earth, done everythingthe planet had to offer. And yet there was no boastfulness in his toneas he spoke of his exploits; he was simply stating facts.

  Apparently his income from gambling was staggering; he averaged nearly athousand credits a night, night in and night out. But a note ofplaintiveness crept into his voice: success was boring him, he had nofurther goals to shoot for. He stood at the top of his profession, andthere were no new worlds for him to conquer. He had seen and doneeverything, and lamented it.

  "I'd like to go to space someday," he remarked. "But of course that'sout. I wouldn't want to rip myself away from the year 3876 forever. Youdon't know what I'd give to see the suns come up over Albireo V, or towatch the thousand moons of Capella XVI. But I can't do it." He shookhis head gravely. "Well, I better not dream. I like Earth and I like thesort of life I lead. And I'm glad I ran into you, too--we'll make a goodteam, you and me, Donnell."

  Alan had been lulled by the sound of Hawkes' voice--but he snapped toattention now, surprised. "Team? What are you talking about?"

  "I'll take you on as my protege. Make a decent gambler out of you. Setyou up. We can go travelling together, see the world again. You've beento space; you can tell me what it's like out there. And----"

  "Hold on," Alan said sharply. "You've got things mixed up a little bit.I'm going to Procyon on the _Valhalla_ at the end of this week. Iappreciate everything you've done for me, but if you think I'm going tojump ship permanently and spend the rest of my life----"

  "You'll stay on Earth, all right," Hawkes said confidently. "You're inlove with the place. You know yourself you don't want to spend the nextseven decades of your life shuttling around in your old man's starship.You'll check out and stay here. I know you will."

  "I'll bet you I don't!"

  "That bet is herewith covered," Hawkes drawled. "I never pass up a surething. Is ten to one okay--your hundred against my thousand that you'llstay?"

  Alan scowled angrily. "I don't want to bet with you, Max. I'm going backon the _Valhalla_. I----"

  "Go ahead. Take my money, if you're so sure."

  "All right, I will! A thousand credits won't hurt me!" Suddenly he hadno further desire to listen to Hawkes talk; he rose abruptly and gulpeddown the remainder of his drink.

  "I'm tired. Let's get some sleep."

  "Fair enough," Hawkes said. He got up, touched a button in the wall, anda panel slid back, exposing a bed. "You sack out here. I'll wake you inthe morning and we'll go looking for your brother Steve."