by Karlin
imaginable sort roamed free. A place where you could gamble, whore, steal and even murder without repercussions. Where drugs were sold at every street corner. In short – a hell of a paradise.
There were some limits. Anybody entering had to be screened for diseases. Murder was tolerated only if the killer was a paying guest at one of the hotels. Revenge killing was also tolerated, so a killer was really taking his life in his hands, and enjoying every second of it.
The most notorious among all of the questionable places of entertainment in the Islands was the restaurant we were headed towards right now, the Russian Restaurant. The curious thing about this restaurant was that everybody knew of its existence, and presumably some knew what was unusual about it, but nobody, and I mean nobody, ever talked about what actually went on there.
I had been in the Islands for over a month, and had witnessed every depravity known to man, all openly practiced, as befits a land where the only king is anarchy. Every form of entertainment available was widely advertised. Every business did its best to attract the adrenalin-hungry, dollar-laden tourists. Every business, except one. The Russian Restaurant.
As a journalist, I was fascinated by this most notorious yet mysterious dining establishment. There had been endless reports out of the Islands, yet no journalist had managed to crack the secret of the Russian Restaurant. As far as I could tell, any journalist who managed to get a hint of what was going on there backed off immediately, and looked for more benign things to report, like the High Bull Fight, where both the bull and the volunteer matador where shot up with Heroin before the fight. Or the vicious highway-drive, where you could get out your anger at other drivers by trying to kill them on the road – before they managed to kill you.
We turned off of Main Street into an unmarked narrow lane, and continued walking for a few minutes.
"So, what can you tell me about the restaurant?"
"Not very much, right now. Guests are allowed, even encouraged to visit, but one of our rules is that the secret of the restaurant can only be revealed over a meal. So you will have to join me for dinner, and then you can quiz me as much as you like.
"I can say a few words about myself. The restaurant is a bit like a club, and we all have nicknames there."
This didn't surprise me. Hardly anybody used their real name on the Islands.
"I go by 'Big Ben' myself. If you become a regular customer, you will have to choose a name as well."
"Are most of the clients regular goers?"
"Definitely. It is a place that offers the finest, most exciting entertainment imaginable, and the clients are nearly all regular customers. We do invite guests as much as possible, though, as a way of filling in our diminishing numbers. It seems harder and harder to attract new guests, though. I never could understand why our little club is so feared."
We arrived at the club, a large brick building with white columns set back from the road. It reminded me of Jefferson's Monticello, a stately, civilized edifice. A uniformed servant ushered us in, and we found ourselves in a large dining room with small tables set elegantly for dinner. Each table was set for two. White linen napkins contrasted with the black tablecloths, and a bewildering array of silverware and glassware was laid out for each place.
Calls of 'hey Ben!', 'Still a risk-taker, Big Ben?' and the like greeted my host as we walked in. He answered in kind, and the other diners nodded kindly in my direction. We went to the bar, got some drinks, and mingled a bit. I noticed that all of the regular guests were men, and most of them quite heavy – the kind of fellows that really enjoy a meal. So I at least could be sure of enjoying a good meal, no matter how bizarre the entertainment turned out to be. A few more heavyset men entered the room, and we were all seated.
"You see, a meal here doesn't start until exactly one hundred diners have arrived."
"And if somebody comes late?"
"Their loss. And possibly ours."
"Why exactly one hundred? Is there something special about that number?"
"Well, there is, in a statistical kind of way. But you will have to wait till after we drink our toast before I can explain."
At this point about a dozen cummerbunded waiters came in, and distributed our first course, a thin slice of pickled meat laid carefully on a black plate. A single black olive and sprig of parsley decorated the plate.
I followed Big Ben's example, cut a small piece, and chewed it carefully.
"What kind of meat is this?"
"It is a bit hard to tell. The chef is very creative, so you can't always recognize what a course is. My guess is that this is pickled tongue."
I nodded my understanding and continued nibbling at the bit of meat. I glanced around. Everybody was slowly and carefully eating their portion, in an almost religious ecstasy. I found this odd since the meat, when it came down to it, was tough, and didn't taste like much.
I finished my portion long before anybody else, and had to wait a while before everyone finished and the waiters cleared the plates. I was dying to hear what dark secret this place had, but knew that I would have to wait until after the toast to find out.
Finally, the plates were cleared, and the waiters brought out drinks in black glass wine glasses.
"The toast?"
"Yes, the toast. You must drink the toast if you plan on continuing your meal here."
"Well, it's the only way I'll ever find out what is happening here, so drink the toast it is."
Soon we all had our black glasses. One of the guests, and immense fellow whose little head perched directly on his bloated torso without a visible neck, stood and made the toast.
"To our friend, Lucky Jimmy, a man of good taste!"
"To Lucky Jimmy, a man of good taste!" the cry rang out.
I followed my host's lead, banged the glass on the table, and downed the drink in one gulp. It was wine, red wine, but I couldn't quite place the type. Perhaps a Chilean vintage.
"Well, we've had our toast. Can you explain now? What is this place? What happens here?"
"Well, I will explain slowly, so you will understand. The fellow who made the toast, "Slims", is our longest surviving member. Survival is the name of the game here, much as it is in other businesses in the Islands. Every evening, a hundred of us gather here to dine. One hundred enter, but only ninety-nine leave."
"One doesn't leave? One dies?"
"Yes, you have been in the Islands long enough to understand that."
"Well, perhaps one dies, but one hundred must leave. Ninety-nine on their feet, and one in a box."
"No. Only ninety-nine leave. Ninety nine dine, and one is dined."
"Is dined?"
"Is dined upon, if you will."
One is dined upon? They couldn't possibly – yet the Islands were the one place where they actually could. 'Anything goes' had gone beyond the mundane violent crime, off into the realm of gourmet cannibalism. I ran my tongue over my dry lips, and managed to ask a few more questions.
"Somebody volunteers to be eaten?"
"No, not at all. We all volunteer to be eaten. We each take the one in a hundred chance of being cut up into steaks and roasts."
"One in a hundred chance? So there is a lottery."
"Of sorts."
My host peered at me, waiting for me to figure it out, and ask the next question. It took me a moment.
"There are one hundred guests here?"
"Yes."
"Including myself?"
"Yes."
"So I am expected to take part in this lottery?"
"No. You have already participated. We just don't know the results yet."
"Meaning what?"
"Our toast is the lottery. The glasses were full of wine, but one glass had something extra. A drug. A drug that takes effect after twenty minutes. In twenty minutes, less actually, one of us will collapse, unconscious, and the chef's men will take him to the kitchen for dinner."
"I could be out cold, in say, fifteen minutes?"
"Yes. So could I."
"And in the kitchen they would…"
"I am not sure of the details. I believe they cut the winner's throat. It is painless in any case, since the winner is unconscious."
'The winner!' What an odd term for the victim.
I figured that a one in a hundred chance wasn't that bad, compared to the odds in some of the other activities in this 'resort'. But I was only here once, while these guests were regulars.
"How long have you been eating here?"
"Two years now, once a week, every week."
"You've eaten here a hundred times? Your chance of 'winning' is astronomical!"
"Not at all. It is the same one in a hundred chance every time. There is no difference between the first and the hundredth time. 'Slims' there has dined here over two hundred times, and every time he takes the same risk. In fact, there is a wide spread belief here that once you've survived a hundred toasts you become immune to the laws of probability."
"Nobody is immune to the laws of probability."
"I suppose not. But it seems to work that way."
"You realize that though your chances of surviving any particular evening are ninety nine percent, the chance of your surviving a hundred meals is much lower."
I pulled out my cell phone, and struggled with the math on its inadequate calculator.
"Your chance of surviving a hundred meals is only 37 percent. If you stick around for two hundred meals, you're looking at a fourteen percent chance of survival."
"Ah. That would be true if I looked at the whole picture before I first started eating here. As it is, I only think of the day, so I have a ninety nine percent chance of survival. And look at "Slims" over there. His continued survival