The Prize

by Irving Wallace

  He nodded off. ‘You’ve lost this race. May I buy you a ticket on the next? What number will it be?’

  After that they saw each other regularly, always in the proximity of others, but regularly. They had drinks in the bar. They attended a movie. They toured the ship. They played bingo. They shared the late night smorgåsbord. She found him flattering and amusing. He had defects, of course. He had read little outside of Blackstone. He was rarely serious. He lacked depth and sensitivity. But he was attractive, and he was fun. Now, this final day, she wanted to be alone with him.

  Across the table, her uncle suddenly gulped the last of his drink, and pushed himself to his feet. ‘I must fill out papers,’ he said vaguely.

  Intuitively, she sensed the reason for his leaving, and turned to see Mark Claborn approaching.

  ‘You don’t have to go, Uncle Max.’

  ‘I was only warming the seat for the young man, anyway. See you at dinner.’ He waved to Mark, and waddled off.

  Mark Claborn came around the table and took Stratman’s chair. ‘Hello, Emily. I wondered where you were. What’ve you been doing?’

  ‘Staring at the ocean, hating to think I must leave the ship. I like it the way it is out there, the way I like rainy days and night time.’

  ‘You’re not exactly a bundle of cheer.’

  ‘But I am. I also like winter. Have you ever read Cowper?’

  ‘I’m afraid not.’

  ‘He liked winter.’ She hesitated, then recited, ‘ “I crown thee king of intimate delights, Fireside enjoyments, home-born happiness” and so forth.’

  ‘I’m not with your man. To me winter means nose-drops.’ He looked off. ‘I took the liberty of ordering drinks for us. What are you drinking?’

  ‘Schnapps.’

  ‘That’s what I ordered.’

  ‘Telepathy.’

  ‘No. Empathy-despite winter.’ Then, he added, ‘Because we’re getting in so late, they’re having a full-course dinner. There are some extra tables. Think you can join me at one?’

  ‘Why, I don’t know. Wouldn’t it be rude?’

  ‘The Captain never comes down the last night. You’ve been eight dinners at that table. Surely you can spend one with me?’

  ‘All right. I’d be delighted.’

  The deck steward brought the Schnapps.

  Mark Claborn took his glass. ‘Let’s do it the way the Swedes do it. Remember?’ She remembered. The bartender had taught them. They solemnly held their glasses rigid before their chests. Mark toasted their next meeting. They looked into each other’s eyes, and then swallowed their drinks all at once. They brought their empty glasses down to their chests again, eyes still meeting, and then set the glasses on the table.

  ‘Great custom,’ he said. ‘One toast is worth one thousand words.’

  ‘Only because it leaves you speechless,’ said Emily. ‘Must be a plot of the Schnapps cartel.’ She felt the heat of the drink in her temples, and now expanding through her chest and breasts.

  In the next hour, they each had two more drinks, and then Emily called a halt.

  ‘I’m not drunk,’ she said, ‘but I didn’t know you brought along a friend. We’d better call it quits. I don’t want you to carry me in to dinner.’

  ‘I’d like nothing more.’

  ‘I prefer to stand on my own feet.’

  ‘I’m sure you do. The question is-can you?’ he said teasingly.

  ‘Always,’ she replied, squinting to see him better. ‘Watch.’ She rose, and stood at attention.

  ‘I bow to your sobriety,’ said Mark, ‘but not to your independence.’ He grinned. ‘Damn the Nineteenth Amendment.’

  He left several notes on the table, then took her arm. He walked her to her cabin on B Deck. Neither spoke, until they reached the door of the cabin.

  ‘I’ll pick you up here at seven,’ he said.

  She leaned against the door, lightheaded. ‘I suppose I should treat you to something before dinner. Southern hospitality.’

  ‘You should indeed.’

  ‘I have a bottle of bourbon in the room. Somebody sent it to the boat. Will it mix with Schnapps?’

  ‘This is the Swedish-American Line.’

  ‘Come at six. Will that give you time to change?’

  ‘Too much time.’

  After Emily had gone into her cabin, she remained uncertainly in the centre of the room, feeling the rhythmical heave of the ship beneath her and listening to the creak of the wood. She was not drunk at all, she decided, but then she was not sober. She tried to evaluate her feeling. The feeling was one of well-being and irresponsibility. The feeling was weightlessness, mind and body both. She kicked off her sandals, and threw herself on the bed. Sprawled on the blanket, she tried to tie her mind to a thought. There was not one to grip. She let go and slept.

  When she awakened, it was with surprise that she had been asleep at all. She sought the wall clock. Seven minutes to six. In seven minutes, she would not be alone. The logical act was to change quickly into her dinner dress and apply fresh makeup. She felt illogical, defiant of risk, daring. She wanted a shower, and she would have it.

  Swinging her weight off the bed, she stood, pulled off her shirt and unzipped her pleated skirt. She unhooked her nylon stockings and rolled them off, and then took off her suspender belt and threw it on the chair. She weaved into the bathroom, considered locking the primitive metal latch, decided that was foolish, then went to the bathtub and turned the knobs until the shower was going full force. Next, she undid her brassière, and pulled off her pants and dropped both on the wooden stool. Starting for the bathtub, she saw herself in the full-length mirror of the partially open door. This was not narcissism, as you always read in those novels, she told herself, but a form of reassurance known only to herself. Her nudity was without blemish. Any man, Mark or any, seeing her thus, would have agreed that this was purity.

  She stepped into the bathtub, drawing the ringed curtains around her protectively, and then moved all but her head under the powerful spray. She revelled in the punishment of the water, and began to sober.

  She did not hear the cabin door open, and she could not hear her name.

  Mark Claborn had knocked and, receiving no reply, had tried the door and found it open. Emily was nowhere to be seen, except in the evidence of her clothes, which lay in disarray. He called out for her, and there was no reply. And then he heard the shower. He walked to the bathroom door, and peered inside the steamed room. He saw her outline behind the wet curtain, and and that was invitation enough.

  With a grin, he returned to the bedroom. The clock told him that it was five past six. She had asked him for six. She had promised to treat him to something. The hint had been broad enough. Here was something. The invitation stood. He pulled off his jacket, yanked off his tie, and began to unbutton his shirt. He was a young man of considerable experience in novelty. This would be memorable.

  Once he had stripped, Mark’s excitement accelerated. She was waiting. He pictured her. He then hurried into the bathroom, closed the door, slid the latch, and strode to the bathtub. He could hardly contain himself. He groped for the shower curtain, found the end, and ripped it aside.

  Emily stood nude, her back to him, streams of water chasing the soap down her limbs. At the noise, she wheeled around, almost losing her foothold. What she saw, through the steam, petrified her: Mark, his lascivious grin, his huge, hairy chest, the horrible, blatant torso.

  ‘Sa-ay, now honey,’ he was saying, ‘I knew you were beautiful, but-’

  She reached to cover her breasts first, and then darted one hand below. She had lost the power of speech. Her eyes widened with disbelief, as he climbed into the bathtub.

  Her voice surfaced in a shrill cry. ‘Are you crazy? Get out!’

  ‘And miss the fun?’

  He stepped beneath the shower, reaching for her. With a tremor, she tore away from him, and leaped out of the tub. Landing on the bathroom floor, her wet feet gave way, and she fell on th
e bathmat. Rolling off it, her slippery body on the tile, she clutched for the mat to cover herself.

  As she tried to pull the inadequate mat around her waist, she felt Mark’s hand on her shoulder, pinning her to the floor.

  ‘Let go of me!’ she cried. ‘What’s got into you?’

  ‘Cut it out-stop the act.’

  His hands were on her breasts. Horrified, she released the mat and tried to grab his wrists and remove his hands. With ease, he pulled one hand free of her wet fingers, and tore the mat aside and threw it against the wall.

  ‘There now-now-’

  Panting, she pressed her thighs together, as he loomed above her.

  ‘Honey,’ he was saying, ‘be a good girl, honey. We can’t get anywhere with your legs like that. Come on, now, relax, enjoy yourself-’

  ‘No, damn you, I don’t want that!’

  One hand was on her thighs, as the other fended off her fists. ‘Sure you want it, sure you do-you wanted it all this trip-you kept telling me without words.’

  She held his defensive arm, and began to plead. ‘No, Mark, no-I can’t-’

  ‘Listen to you, the way you’re breathing-’

  ‘I’m scared!’

  ‘Stop that stuff. You’ll love it, I guarantee you, you’ll want more. We’ve got hours-’

  Suddenly, he freed one arm, slipped it around her back, so that it came around to cup a breast. She snatched at the invading hand, trying to sit up, trying to push herself upright, and as she did so her legs and thighs came apart. In an instant, he rolled between them, above her.

  She was exhausted, her heart against her ribs, and the decision was now, relent or fight. She was conscious of the suspended second. To lie back and let the muscular naked body above enter and consume her or to beat off and repel the ugly menace of its offering?

  With all her strength, she smashed both fists against his chest. For a moment, he tottered above her, then reeled backwards on his haunches in genuine surprise and bewilderment.

  She sat up. ‘Get out, or I’ll scream!’ she shouted.

  He sat blinking at her a moment, awkward and foolish. ‘You mean it.’ It was a flat statement. He climbed to his feet. ‘You don’t have to scream. And stop shaking like a frightened rabbit. Rape isn’t my line. But you sure had me fooled. I’ve never been wrong before-’

  ‘You’re wrong now!’ She had recovered the bathmat, and, still sitting, shielded her lower parts. ‘Please go!’

  With some remnant of dignity, he turned, unlatched the door, and went into the bedroom.

  Trembling, Emily stood up, edged to the door, and held the knob. She could hear him dressing. She started to close the door, when he spoke.

  ‘I still say I wasn’t wrong. I just wonder what happened between the time you said yes to yourself and no to me. Something happened.’

  ‘Nothing happened,’ she said through the door. ‘I was a little drunk, and you-you misinterpreted it.’

  ‘Maybe. Honey, tell me one thing. Between us.’

  She waited.

  ‘Are you a virgin?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, that explains a little.’ He paused. ‘I’m leaving now. I’m sorry for both of us. No hard feelings. See you at smorgåsbord.’

  She heard the door slam, held back, then peered out, and saw that the cabin was empty.

  Emotionally spent, she turned off the shower and then dried herself. After tidying the bathroom, she went into the cabin and mechanically dressed in the garments that she had recently discarded. Closing the zip of her skirt, she felt dizzy. She lowered herself to the bed, and finally fell back on the pillow, hands covering her eyes from the overhead light.

  Twenty minutes later, passing to his room, Max Stratman thought that he heard her sobbing. He placed his ear to her door, confirmed his suspicion, and hastily opened it and went inside.

  ‘Emily, um Himmels willen, what is the matter?’

  ‘Nothing, Uncle Max, nothing-I swear.’

  ‘Why are you crying like this?’

  She tried to contain her sobs, and finally reduced them to a soft whimper. ‘I’m not crying-see?’

  He pulled the chair up beside her bed, and perched forward on it, like a kindly country doctor. ‘Something has happened. We have no secrets.’

  She rolled on her right side, studying the hedge of hair on his oversized bald head, the worried eyes behind the steel-rimmed bifocals, the concern in his wise old red face. Here was one of the great minds of the world, a genius cherished and honoured, and she, a neurotic nobody, was troubling him with her petty problems.

  ‘It’s nothing,’ she repeated without conviction.

  ‘Please tell me. I will not go until you tell me.’

  She tried to visualize her father, and could not, and suddenly there was only Uncle Max, and she wanted to tell him. Haltingly, avoiding his eyes, she related the events of the past hour or more, from the time Mark had escorted her to the door to the time he had left her nude on the bathroom floor to dress and leave.

  ‘That is all?’ asked Stratman, when she had finished. ‘You are not leaving out anything?’

  ‘He didn’t touch me, I swear-’

  ‘No-no assault?’

  ‘Uncle Max, I’d know.’

  Stratman rose, agitated. ‘It is terrible, anyway. No one is safe. I will go to the Captain at once-’

  ‘Oh, no!’ She sat up and swung her legs off the bed. ‘I don’t want him in trouble-’

  ‘You care for him that much? Is that it?’

  ‘I don’t care for him at all,’ she said vehemently. ‘He means nothing to me. But I’m just not sure he’s all to blame.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘Only-I had too much to drink-I invited him-he misunderstood. It is something that happens every day.’ She softened her tone. ‘Let’s not make a fuss, Uncle Max. I don’t want to go through that. It would embarrass me. It would be easier to forget it. We’re almost there. We’ll leave the boat soon and not think of it.’

  ‘You are sure it is that simple?’

  ‘Oh, yes. I was upset, naturally. But I’m all right, you can see. I don’t want an incident, that’s all.’

  He looked at her. ‘Maybe I can get the ship’s doctor. To give you a shot, calm your nerves-’

  ‘Not, not even that. Just let me rest, and an hour before we get in, come and get me. I’ll be ready.’ She tried to change the subject. ‘Do you think there will be a reception when you get to Göteborg?’

  ‘I doubt it. Everything is in Stockholm.’

  She feigned enthusiasm. ‘I can’t wait. It’s really been a marvellous trip.’

  She dropped back on the pillow. He waited until she was comfortable. ‘I’ll be next door if you need me.’

  ‘What about dinner?’

  ‘I’m not hungry. I’ll have the steward bring a sandwich. I’ll come back soon. You rest.’

  He went to his cabin, disturbed. In a way that he could not define, he felt that he had failed Walther. What had happened to Emily must never happen again. He had over estimated her. In Stockholm, he would not leave her alone. Pacing past his bed, he heard his heart. In all the years before, he had never heard it, had ignored it as he had his inhaling and exhaling. But now, too often, it demanded to be heard. There was a heaviness in the right side of his chest, not pain but pressure. He opened the overnight case located the bottle of pills that Dr. Ilman had given him, and took two with half a glass of water.

  He rang for the room steward, ordered a cheese-and-ham sandwich. Presently, when it came, he gave the steward two envelopes, each with a fifteen-dollar tip in it, and requested that the second envelope be given to the stewardess. Stratman knew that the tips were generous for his budget, but he also knew that the serving people depended on these tips for their livelihood, especially on the run from New York to Göteborg. Too, since the Nobel Prize included a highly advertised sum of money, more would be expected of him, as one of the winners. He allowed the steward to remove his su
itcases. After the man had gone, Stratman settled down and nibbled at his sandwich.

  Presently, because his mind was on Emily, he returned to her cabin. She was still on the bed, as he had left her, eyes closed, dozing. He sat in the chair beside her, extracted a pocket-sized German edition of a biography of Immanuel Kant from his coat, and resumed reading. When he reached Heine’s description of Kant, he reread it: ‘The life of Immanual Kant is hard to describe; he has indeed neither life nor history in the proper sense of the words. He lived an abstract, mechanical, old-bachelor existence, in a quiet remote street in Königsberg…’

  Stratman considered this. There, he thought, but for the grace of Emily, go I. By her sharing of his life, she had infused her guardian’s ‘old-bachelor existence’ with an element of normality, yet, ironically, had been unable to retain an element of normality for herself. The terrible incident of the evening underlined for him, in a way he had found impossible to explain to Dr. Ilman, Emily’s dependence on him. Without his support, after he was gone, she would have been forced into the turmoil of the working world. Any notion that this necessity would have given her strength had been dissipated by the night’s events. As he had long ago guessed, she would not have survived. One cannot expect a person without arms to feed himself. How fortuitous had been the Nobel award. Once he had the cheque in hand, Emily would have her buffer against the future.

  He read more about his beloved Kant, drifted off into numerous speculations, even nodded off several times, hardly aware of the passage of time or of the fact that the ship had ceased pitching and was now rolling less.

  The rapping on the door brought him up sharply, and awakened Emily, too.

  The steward put his head in. ‘I’ll need the rest of the luggage, sir. We’re just outside Göteborg. It’ll be less than an hour now.’

  No sooner had the steward gone with the suitcases, than a young boy in white uniform, wearing the telegraph-office arm band, appeared. There were four long-distance calls from Stockholm. Stratman asked if he might take them here in Emily’s room. The boy went to the telephone and contacted the officer’s room. In a few moments, he handed the receiver to Stratman, gratefully accepted his tip, and rushed off.