by Jack Finney
The twenty-dollar bill in his hand, Ben stepped up to his old place, then stood wondering dully how to know when to bet. Through half a dozen players' turns he waited, unable to commit himself. Then — A new shooter, and a good one! — the dice passed to the lean-faced man who had been shooting the first time Ben came to the table, and this seemed to mean something. Ben put his bill on the Line, and stood waiting, shriveled within himself.
The dice shot over the green felt, struck, and rolled. Five is the point, caught a five. Utterly committed now. Ben felt his thoughts leap the barrier, and wondered in sick fear what would happen if he lost.
The lean-faced man rolled four, four again, a six, an eleven, and then Ben knew he would win, that the time for a seven was past, and the fear gave way to a gathering excitement. The man rolled an eight. The stick raked the dice back, the lean hand snatched them up, and Ben leaned forward to watch the dice scamper.
Caught five, front-line winner! Ben's hands began trembling so much he had to grip the table ledge to quiet them.
The gray-haired man was matching the winning bets, and four yellow chips dropped onto Ben's twenty-dollar bill. He tasted the moment, the gloriousness of it, slowly pulling air back into his lungs, looking his fill at the slim, green bill, held to the cloth now by a neat little stack of yellow chips.
The figure long since wearily familiar, he automatically and mechanically said it again; now he was six dollars out. Then the sudden impact of a thought stiffened his body and held the breath in his lungs. To win once more — it was so astoundingly easy in the instant it happened — to win twenty more dollars in the next few seconds, would put him actually ahead, far ahead, fourteen dollars ahead. For a moment, the delirious thought was a reward for all the agony he had experienced. With every nerve and cell in his body he wanted it; to walk from this room, wake Rose up and tell her this time that he had, not lost, but won.
But to go under again, down into the fear, was more than he could do. Watching the gliding dice move toward the waiting hand, he could not have made the slightest movement to put down a bet. But he did not have to; he had not touched his money or chips. He had only to freeze and do nothing, barely breathing, holding his mind in check, telling himself frantically that always, at the last instant, he could reach out and take off his stake. Then the lean hand had the dice, they were flashing over the table, and he was committed again.
The dice struck and bounced, rolling fast. Abruptly, they were motionless on the table, and he could not add up the sum of the spots. He saw them, yet avoided looking directly. The two uppermost faces were clustered with dots. It was twelve or eleven, he knew; a difference of one white pip between disaster and wild success.
Yeeoh, eleven! It burst on his ears, and he wanted to cry out in sudden hilarious thanks for this deliverance. Then he was suffused with a blinding affection for these people — the stick man, the sun-tanned woman, the lean-faced man who had rolled the dice.
Then his eyes dropped to his bet to feast on the pay-off. The moving hand swung to his stake, and Ben was astounded. For the yellow chips were not matched, but doubled. The hand moved on, leaving, not one more, but two more little stacks, and in a rush of comprehension, he saw his error and his hands began to shake. He had not bet twenty dollars, but forty. He'd left his money plus four five-dollar chips, and now he was thirty-four dollars ahead.
He reached for his money. The yellow chips and the twenty-dollar bill squeezed in his fists, he could not ever quite get enough air into his lungs, and his back began to ache with the effort, but he did not think of it. He simply stood, and though the dice rolled, and the sounds of the room went on, he saw and heard nothing, wrapped in a motionless ecstasy of relief greater than any he had known in all his life before.
Then, presently, he became aware of his surroundings once more, and he did one thing immediately; he took the green bill and wedged it deep in his watch pocket with five yellow chips, and now his relief was complete. Nothing he had ever done, no liquor he had ever tasted, had given him anything that even approached the glorious well-being he now felt; he was close to tears. There in his pocket were forty-five of his forty-six dollars, and he knew no power on earth could make him remove them.
He looked at the chips in his hand. There were seven — thirty-five dollars — and he could lose them all and still be out only a dollar. He wasn't going to, he knew; he was going to return to Rose ahead, but now he most certainly deserved the deep pleasure and relief of gambling at this table in the certain knowledge that, whatever happened, he could not lose.
Waiting till a new shooter, the Air Force corporal, came out for a point, he bet a chip — and won. On a hunch, he picked up both chips, skipping the next roll, and the soldier lost. Then he bet with the man in shirt sleeves, won, let the bet ride, and lost.
He didn't care. To be playing without fear was pleasure in itself, and he was enjoying himself, winning with one shooter, losing with another, and it did not matter which. His turn was next, and he had chips to play with — eight or ten now; he didn't count. Then, win or lose, he would leave with whatever winnings he had, and wake Rose up, smiling at what he had to tell her.
Dreamily, he waited while the man beside him repeatedly rolled the dice, making neither his point nor seven. Again the dice flashed out, neither winning nor losing. Ten, hard; pay the field — and Ben stared absently at the table, waiting. With no warning, conviction rose up in him that when his turn came he would make four or five passes. It was more than conviction; it was absolute knowledge. He didn't believe, think, or feel — he knew.
The experience dazed him; it was unique and he was awed, and he wanted to tell the man at his left about it. It never occurred to Ben that anyone before him had ever experienced this same feeling, that this sudden preknowledge, far more than a hunch, was as old as the human race.
He simply knew, with no flicker of doubt, that he was going to make four or five successive passes, and that, when the time came, he had only to consult this mysterious source of knowledge to know which. And now he wanted the dice in his hand. Impatiently he waited; and presently the man beside him threw seven and lost, and Ben put down his chips, eight of them.
The dice were scattered before him. He selected two, waited a moment till they picked up warmth from his hand, then threw, flicking his wrist, watching in quiet confidence for whatever would happen.
Six. Six, easy, loser in the field. The dice moved over the table to his hand again. Four more times he rolled, in the sure knowledge that no seven would appear, and on the fourth roll repeated his six, and his chips on the Line were doubled. One pass down, he said to himself, knowing it was important to count without error; that he had four or five passes in his system, not six.
He threw a ten, and made it on the very next roll. Hardly thinking about it, anxious for the dice, he impatiently watched the gray-haired man turn his two stacks of chips into four. Two passes down.
Again the dice returned, and he threw them out, just hard enough — he could feel the throw was right as the dice left his hand, and knew it would not be craps. It was four. Hard point, his mind told itself, and for an instant the flame dropped, and doubt entered his mind. But instantly it rose again, pure and steady, and he knew he had only to keep rolling the dice to repeat his four.
It took twelve rolls, the players commenting on it, the dice returning again and again to his hand. Then they bounced and stopped, two deuces up. Four, hard! Front-line winner! Three passes down. The dealer matched his bet — carefully now, for there were a lot of chips to stack up. Ben would not allow himself to watch, or even calculate how many chips there were; to do so now would kill his run.
The pay-off was finished, and Ben realized that the next roll would be easy; a seven or eleven. Then he knew it would be eleven. Accepting this knowledge, he reached to the heap of chips before him and lifted off what he felt to be approximately ten. These he set on the eleven square, marked 15 to 1, then cast the dice quickly, watching them fly out, strik
e, and drop tumbling to the table. He watched, waiting for the six and five in tense confidence, then saw them, as the dice went motionless. Yeeoh, eleven! The excitement in the stick man's voice was genuine, and there was a murmur from the players, and Ben knew they were all watching him, and he turned to the dealer who was carefully counting the chips on the eleven-square.
Twelve? The gray-haired man was asking Ben to confirm his count, and Ben nodded hastily. The man began lifting tall yellow stacks of twenty chips each from the rack before him, setting them two at a time before Ben. Four times he did this, then added one more stack of twenty. Then he began matching the chips on the Line.
The arithmetic of it was beyond Ben at the moment. He saw only that the dealer's heavy hands were pushing stack after stack of yellow chips toward him. When finally the man gathered all Ben's chips into a mass on the Line, they were piled twenty chips high and solidly covered an area a foot long and half a foot wide. And each chip in that incredible mound was good for a five-dollar bill at the cashier's window.
Perhaps a minute had passed, and Ben was suddenly aware that the young stick man had been quietly murmuring to a hard-looking man in a beautifully tailored gray suit. As the two men talked, Ben saw the lowered eyes of the big man lift momentarily, and with a shock he knew they were talking about him.
For an instant, he thought guiltily that they must somehow be questioning his honesty, must be about to dispute his winning throw. Then he understood. A part of his mind had finished a calculation, and he suddenly knew he had some two hundred and ninety-odd chips, nearly fifteen hundred dollars, on the table before him.
He had passed the limit. There was a limit, he realized, of perhaps a thousand dollars a bet, and he was beyond it, and the stick man was simply asking the boss if Ben's bet was to be allowed.
With a quick little nod, the big man in gray turned abruptly, walking casually away, and the stick man reached for the dice. Coming out! — the table came to life again — Coming out for a point! and Ben knew his bet had been allowed to stand.
Then he remembered — was he to make five passes, or four? He had not, as he should have the instant the fourth pass was made, consulted whatever the source of his knowledge was, and he hurriedly did so now, eyes narrowed, concentrating, waiting for the familiar rush of knowledge. It did not come; the flame was out.
The dice stopped before him. There was nothing to do but pick them up, Ben knew. Foolishly basking in the admiration he had felt to be around him, he had allowed the consultation to begin, continue, and conclude; the time to quit had been moments ago and now it was lost. It was too late to do anything but throw.
He did so, quickly, before he could torture himself with lost alternatives; he had absolutely no feeling of what was going to happen. Caught eight; eight's the point! the stick man called, and Ben was sick with regret and longing for the mound of money that was no one's now; neither his nor theirs to pick up. Then he remembered; he could lose, but he could also win — not only regain, but double this incredible mass of chips. In split fractions of seconds he saw himself, Rose still asleep, kneeling on the floor and paving their rug with twentydollar bills; saw himself showering handfuls of money on her sleeping head. …
The dice were back, waiting, and the fear rushed through him again. If he pretended to faint, falling to the floor — He threw out the dice; a nine, only one point away! The gloriousness of it, to win! They could buy a house! They could live a month till he found exactly the right job, and still have the first payment left over! They could do anything! It was actually true that he, Ben Bennell, stood here at a crap table in Reno, Nevada, within seconds of winning nearly three thousand dollars. He couldn't wait to have it final and confirmed, and he threw out the dice. Twelve, the stick man announced quietly, no longer bothering to describe the other possible bets; only one thing mattered here now, and the dice moved back toward Ben's hand.
He threw, and there it was. There the dice lay, motionless on the felt, and showing what he had known all along they would finally show. Hesitating a moment, the stick man murmured, Seven, a loser, the tone subdued. With what seemed to be genuine regret, the gray-haired man slowly reached forward with both hands for the great heap of chips.
Ben realized that he felt no strong emotion. For it seemed to him in this moment as though it had always been true, that while he had hoped, he had never actually believed he might win. As he watched the yellow mound of chips join the anonymity of the racks again, the very sound of it — winning three thousand dollars — seemed ridiculous. Smiling pleasantly, he nodded to the stick man and his partner and turned from the table; and they responded, as did several players, with rueful better-luck-next-time smiles. Already the gray-haired man was scattering the dice before the next player.
Waiting at the elevators, Ben tried to make himself feel that he could have won — had won — nearly fifteen hundred dollars; that he could have quit and cashed in. But he could not make himself believe it. Nothing could have happened, it seemed to him now, except precisely what had happened, and he could feel no more regret than for money won or lost in a daydream. He shifted his weight to one leg and something pressed into his flesh and he frowned. Then he smiled, dug five yellow chips and the twenty-dollar bill from his watch pocket, walked back to the brass-barred cashier's window and turned in his chips for cash.
Upstairs — shoes, coat and tie off — he lay beside Rose, facing her, one arm around her, waiting for sleep. Then she picked up his wrist to look at his watch. You were gone a long time.
Yeah. He did not open his eyes.
What was the matter? She yawned. Didn't they have a paper downstairs?
Yeah. He hesitated. But I was in the casino. He grinned then, opening his eyes to watch her. Gambling.
Her yawn broke off, her eyes widening, staring at his face, her voice alarmed. What happened?
Ben winked, as though he were amused that she could be concerned; someday, he knew, but not now, he would tell her. Nothing much, he answered, and he pressed his head into the pillow. I lost a dollar.
Collier's, January 5, 1952, 129(1):10-11, 39, 42-44
Obituary
(written with C.J. Durban)
All right! My husband was nearly shouting, standing between his chair and the breakfast table, his napkin in his fist. Then he dropped his voice, but he was still mad. So I talked in my sleep, for once. So I said, Marie. So I dream every night, and never told you about it. That's one of his most irritating habits in an argument — beginning a string of sentences with “So.”
So I discover, I said calmly, and waited.
He stood there a moment, but then he sat down again, dropping his napkin sullenly on the table. I don't actually know anyone named Marie, he said. I give you my word. So what do you want to know? What the dreams are about?
Suit yourself. I took a sip of coffee.
He shrugged. There's nothing to tell. They're uninteresting. Boring. That's the only reason I never mentioned them. I just dream I'm this guy. The same guy, every night. And in the dreams I go through his whole day from beginning to end.
He was quiet for a moment; then his expression began to change, and I could see that, now he was started, he wanted to go on. He shook his head and sort of murmured, They're the damnedest things, though; they're so real. He looked at me to make sure I understood this. You can always tell a dream, no matter how real it seemed at the time. Once you're awake, you always know it was a dream. But these are different. He shook his head again, puzzled. They're as though I were in something that really is happening somewhere.
Charley stared down at the sugar bowl. Why, I know every room in their apartment, like I know ours. I know what's in their medicine cabinet, I know every stick of their furniture, I could draw the pattern of cracks in an enameled ash tray on their living-room radio. I know their bedroom by heart; his slippers, the patterns in all his pajamas — everything. He glanced up at me, explaining: The dreams practically always begin with me in bed, and it's morning. M
y name is Ed — Edward V. Carmody — and I'm in this apartment, a big duplex; six rooms.
I'll admit I was interested. And you're married in these dreams, I said.
He sort of hesitated, then said, Yes.
And where is she, in the morning when you wake up? Dear Marie?
He shrugged, as though that weren't important. Usually up; downstairs in the kitchen talking to the maid about breakfast.
Oh! I couldn't help myself. So you've got a maid. You do well by yourself. In your dreams.
You want to hear this or not?
Go on. I reached for the coffeepot.
I get up and take a shower. There's a big glassed-in shower. And a sunken tub, too, if you want to know.
Marvelous, I said. How utterly charming. You're filthy rich, no doubt. In your dreams.
No, he said quietly. A corner of his mouth smiled just a little, and I could swear he actually felt proud of this: But this guy Carmody, this guy I am in the dreams, has some kind of big job. Has an office in Wall Street, and makes plenty, believe me. He's — Charley bad the grace to blush a little — an investment counselor.
I couldn't help it, I really couldn't; I had to laugh. Oh, good Lord, and you can't even do simple arithmetic!
Maybe no, he said calmly — I hadn't gotten to him at all.
All right, I said. Then what?
That's all. I just go through his whole day. Down to the office —
In a cab?
That's right.
I just grinned.
And then I work all day. Sometimes there's a big meeting. In the board room. And I stand up and talk. Sometimes I work on figures, pages full of them — in the dreams I understand all that stuff. Then at night I go home. Maybe we go to a theater. In evening clothes. The poor dope was proud of his dream life! Once in a while, we go to the opera, or a concert. And sometimes we have big parties, or go to them.