The Defector

by Mark Chisnell

  ‘Hey Suchit,’ I said as I strolled up to the bar. ‘Any messages?’

  ‘No messages, but,’ he nodded towards a corner of the restaurant, ‘man waiting for you.’

  I looked round and saw a heavily-set local struggling out from behind a table, on which sat an untouched cola. He was maybe thirty or forty and dressed smartly if rather unconventionally in a sort of semi-military khaki outfit. He came straight up to me. ‘Martin Cormac?’

  I nodded.

  ‘Please follow me.’ he turned on his heel and headed out through the door.

  ‘Hey?’ I followed him slowly, ‘What's the deal?’

  ‘You come to lunch with Mr Janac.’

  I swallowed, heart starting to thump. I looked at the impassive brown eyes and blank face, ‘Why?’ I asked.

  ‘You want money.’ he said, simply.

  ‘No.’ I shook my head, ‘I want the money here. I don't want to go to lunch.’

  ‘You want money you come to lunch. You come to lunch, you want money or not.’ he said, face still expressionless. He turned and walked five paces to a car, where he opened the passenger door. I stared at him, trying to figure the options. Once again, there were none. It was an island, and Janac ran it. I got in.

  We bumped out of the dusty drive and onto an equally dusty road. Turning south we drove parallel to the beach for a couple of miles before diving into the hinterland through an obscure turning. The car bounced and jolted as the rough got rougher and we slowed to a crawl as the driver fought his way round potholes and encroaching undergrowth. The gradient steepened and it was clear we were gaining height. After thirty minutes of this, concern had turned to palpable fear. Whatever was going to happen to me, no one else would ever know about it.

  We finally burst through a gap in the branches and emerged onto a cultivated driveway. In front of us stood a beautiful one storey, colonial style house, built in timber and surrounded by a balustraded veranda. The freshly painted white glistened in the sun. The drive led up through a small area of landscaped garden and we came to a halt at what looked like the back door. The engine died and the tick, tick of it cooling joined the buzz of the forest and the hum of the ceiling fans spaced at intervals along the porch. A hammock gently swayed in the afternoon breeze. Janac was standing at the top of the steps, hands on hips, master of all he surveyed. ‘Glad you could make it.’ he called.

  I got out of the car, walked up the steps and shook his hand, ‘Beautiful place.’ I said. Every sinew, every tendon, every muscle and every nerve was tense enough to snap.

  ‘You haven't seen the view yet.’ he replied, turning to lead the way inside. ‘Drink?’ he asked over his shoulder.

  ‘A beer would be fine.’ I answered. It wasn't smart, but I needed a drink. We stepped through the door into a hallway, which led into a living room. The room was large, in front of me the two outside walls slid back in a succession of panels to reveal a stunning view down the mountain, towards the ocean.

  The driver had disappeared and Janac was talking quietly to a pretty Thai girl. I turned to survey the rest of the room. One wall was occupied almost exclusively with books, the ceiling high shelves broken only by a doorway. The other, the one I had walked through, was sparsely decorated with a couple of paintings I didn't recognise. The white walls, varnished hardwood floors and gentle whoosh of the ceiling fans created a peaceful and tropical atmosphere.

  I stepped over towards the bookshelves and ran my hand along the spines. It was all neatly catalogued and some of the titles looked highly academic. The only ones I recognised under warfare were Paul Kennedy's 'Rise and Fall of the Great Powers' and Michael Herr's 'Dispatches' - two more disparate volumes on the struggles of empire it would be hard to imagine. Then there was finance: 'Barbarians at the Gate', 'Liar's Poker' plus all those American 'how to make a million' books, along with a few academic volumes on economics. Further along I found philosophy. Hofstader, Putnam, Dennet and Skinner were new to me along with a lot more; Nietzche and Machiavelli I did know. Politics was there, Marx and Lenin, and a copy of Mein Kampf. I raised a hand to pull it off the shelf, and then thought better of it.

  I felt someone behind me and turned, tensing. Janac proffered a beer. I took it and said, ‘Impressive, very impressive.’

  He nodded, ‘I'm interested in the human mind, how it works, how it thinks, how it behaves in different circumstances. I think there is a great deal to be learned about such matters from books - all products of minds. Please have a seat.’ He extended an arm and I led the way to a couple of chairs and a table by one of the doors. I sat back and gazed out at the view. It was cool, despite the heat outside, but it was the delightful cool that comes from the intelligence of good design rather than the power of air conditioning. Unwillingly I started to relax a little. I took a handful of the nuts that were on the table and looked over as Janac sat down.

  He smiled, and took a sip of his beer. ‘I'm sorry that last night got a little heated. I hope you don't think any the worse of me for it.’

  I said nothing, surprised by the conciliatory tone.

  ‘I took care of the girl for you, she's had medical attention, I'll get her a job in town somewhere when she's fixed up.’

  I recovered enough to manage, ‘What kind of job?’

  ‘Hotel, cleaning job, something like that. You can't expect too much.’

  ‘That's very good of you.’ I said, unsure of this sudden display of magnanimity.

  ‘Not at all. Your outburst, made me think a little about what was happening. I have asked the club to stop that act.’ he leant forward and took a single peanut, chewed it slowly, thoughtfully. Again I couldn't think of anything to say. I took a long swallow of the beer to fill the silence.

  ‘So have you thought about my offer any further.’ he asked, eventually.

  ‘I think I've explained my reasons for not wanting to get involved.’ I said slowly.

  ‘It's possible that we might be able to set it up rather more generously for you, perhaps, a little risk, a little game to play. But bigger stakes.’

  I forced a smile. ‘Unfortunately, I'm quite happy to get out while I'm ahead.’

  ‘Ahead? Yes, of course.’ Janac eased a thick leather wallet from a back pocket and slipped out ten, thousand dollar bills onto the table. I looked at the money carefully, but didn't reach for it, yet.

  ‘Lots more where that came from.’

  ‘I'm sure.’ I replied evenly.

  ‘You see, you interest me, Martin. There is a conflict struggling away inside you, even as we speak. Transposing your guilt from the crash to the selfishness in your City lifestyle showed compassion. And there was your sympathy for the girl last night. Demonstrated at a moment that could have wrecked what might be a profitable relationship with me. And yet there is your greed - you want to go back to the City. You consider my offer, not on the basis of the immorality of smuggling drugs, but on a risk/benefit ratio. And of course...’ he nodded at the ten thousand dollars on the table. Then leant forward and pushed it towards me. ‘You know where the money has come from.’

  I hesitated, I guess this was the moment I had been worried about. Would accepting the money dig me in deeper? The grey eyes were watching me carefully. I couldn't get any deeper. And I certainly wasn't going to let him moralise me out of taking it. I'd won it fair and square. I leaned forward and picked it up. Stacked it and put it in my pocket.

  I looked up. He was smiling. ‘I have a better game for you too, Martin.’

  I shook my head.

  ‘But this is different. A non-zero-sum game.’

  ‘I'm sorry, I...’

  ‘You're not familiar with Games Theory?’

  I knew a little, of course, but decided to stall, ‘No.’ I said.

  ‘Zero-sum is winner takes all, what you win I lose. Like spoof. They are relatively simple, the objective is clear. More interesting are non-zero-sum games where winning and losing are blurred.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Lunch
is ready Mr. Janac.’ The sing-song voice of the Thai maid interrupted.

  He turned to her, the faintest trace of annoyance crossing his face, ‘Oh. Well, we'd better eat. It's not the kind of meal that will wait.’ He faced me again and the tight smile was back. ‘Please, follow me.’

  I trailed through to the dining room, another vision of wood panelling and tropical elegance. We sat down at a long polished table as the girl poured a glass of white wine. I sipped delicately, it was chilled perfectly. Janac was silent whilst the girl bustled around serving the first course. Finally she was gone. I waited for Janac and then began investigating the rather curious vegetable that had been served with my prawns. The beer was beginning to work, the tension was ebbing away.

  ‘So Martin,’ he restarted, ‘I was telling you about non-zero-sum games.’

  ‘Yes.’ I murmured non-comittally. I took another sip of wine and a mouthful of vegetable. It was sweet and crunchy. Not vegetable at all, some kind of fruit.

  ‘The Prisoner's Dilemma is the best. It explores exactly that distinction you appear so confused by, between self-interested greed, and concern for one's fellow man. You haven't heard of the Prisoner's Dilemma?’ he sipped at the wine, the grey eyes watching me still.

  I shook my head.

  He put the wine glass down, steepling his fingers. ‘The classic formulation, and the one that gives the problem its name, is with two prisoners in solitary, who are unable to confer. They are both accused of the same crime and, as in the finest traditions of American justice they are both offered a deal. They are each given the chance to turn State's evidence to assist in the conviction of the other. If they both choose to remain silent, they can each only be convicted for one year. If they both choose to turn in the other, they will be convicted for three years each. However, should one of them remain silent and the other turn State's evidence, the grass will go free and the other will do five years.’

  He smiled and picked up his fork, ‘The central problem of course, is whether you feel you can risk remaining silent, in an attempt to cooperate with the other prisoner, so that you both get off with one year. Aware that he could then grass on you and walk away free while you go down for five years. The pressure is on you, and him too, not to take that chance and so you grass on each other. When you do, you get three years each, rather than the one year you both could have got, if you had kept your mouths shut. The game is a metaphor of man's behaviour in society - do you look after yourself, or are you prepared to take the risk and act selflessly so everyone can be better off.’ he forked up a mouthful of rice and sat with it poised, ‘I have a machine that I had specially built. We'll have a game of the Prisoner's Dilemma after lunch. Then you will understand. It'll be a good opportunity for you to test yourself.’ he swallowed the forkful.

  I prodded thoughtfully at a prawn. He seemed much less intense, less intimidating now. Fork poised over a battered prawn, glass of chilled white at his elbow - the picture of a man at ease pondering an intellectual problem. But the lean face had a taunting half smile, and the eyes flickered inquisitively. I was still unsure of him, more so of his interest in this Prisoner's Dilemma. Just a game? Perhaps, but I'd already learned that nothing was 'just' a game with Janac.

  Chapter 5

  Steaming coffee splashed into the china cup in front of me. I poured in some milk and watched as black and white blended into a murky brown. I had almost relaxed. I just had to get through the next game, without getting sucked into some high stakes play-off, and get the hell out of there.

  Janac pushed his chair back from the table a couple of inches and crossed his legs. The thin, almost delicate fingers lit a cigarette from an engraved silver case with precise, careful movements. The lighter was a Zippo. He dragged deeply on the butt and exhaled a cloud of smoke. ‘You see, Martin,’ he started, ‘your struggle between behaving out of self-interest or for group interest - in this I see the whole history of the world. The struggle between personal sacrifice for the community and looking after number one. It was clear in the eighties which took over and you are a product of those times. Can you shake off those values for the new, more caring decade?’ he chuckled.

  I smiled, neutrally.

  ‘This game, this Prisoner's Dilemma, is your problem. Come, I want to show you.’

  He eased his sparse frame out of the chair and, stubbing out the remains of the cigarette, headed towards the door. I poured down the last of my coffee and followed. The meal and its surroundings had quelled most of my fears, but I wouldn't be happy until I was out of there.

  The door led into a third room, much smaller than the others. Windowless, it was lit only by the luminous glow of two computer monitors on a table in the middle of the room. They faced away from each other, both connected to the same processing box, but each with a separate mouse. There was also a couple of wristbands with each monitor, connected on long flexes to a second box. The only other items in the room were two hard-backed chairs.

  ‘Take a seat.’ said Janac, sitting down opposite the chair indicated. I glanced at the screen, feeling the flicker of the refresh on my cheeks. Numbers danced across the monitor in ever-changing patterns. My blood stirred. But Janac was talking again, ‘You'll see on the screen two boxes.’ The numbers dissolved into a shower of coloured pixels and the screen reformed itself in two halves. The boxes appeared in the top half as he described. He went on, ‘You can use the mouse, you are familiar with mouses?’

  I nodded yes.

  ‘You can use it to click on one or other of the boxes to make your decision. You can choose to cooperate or defect. The computer will work out the result depending on both our decisions according to the pay-off table. You should be able to see it on your screen now.’ There was a couple more clicks and the bottom half came to life. Numbers marched onto the monitor again. I smiled, thoughts crowding in of a thousand games played through trails of shifting numbers; buy or sell, win or lose. Slowly they began to stop, the patterns fixed, the game defined.

  Janac described what I was seeing, ‘Player one is myself, you're player two. You will see from this table that if we both cooperate there is a level one punishment for each of us. For mutual defection we both get a level three punishment and for a defect/cooperate response, the defector gets no punishment, the co-operator a level 5. This is exactly the problem the Prisoners faced, they can cooperate with each other by remaining silent, or defect to the authorities. I can alter the pay-offs to my preference, but these are the same as the classic problem and will suit us well.’

  I stared at the screen in silence for a while, thinking. It was a simple matrix of decision and consequence, cause and effect. I could see the link with the earlier problem, with one major difference. I said, ‘What's the punishment?’

  ‘A points score.’

  That was harmless enough, but there was one thing that wasn't clear. ‘So, is the idea to minimise our personal score, or our collective score against the machine?’

  Janac smiled, ‘I see you have a grasp of the situation already. As I said, in these games winning and losing are not so clearly defined. Do you want to beat me, or minimise our collective punishment? That of course, is the essence of the game. What do you consider to be winning?’ Before I could answer he went on, ‘Let's try a round. You can have a minute or two to think.’

  So I thought about it. The hotshot broker with numbers to balance and a game to play. It was that old feeling again. The buzz of the trading room came back to me from the past; phones, slapping keyboards, hustling conversations, the shouts of triumph and defeat. Always moving inexorably onwards, no time to rest, barely time to think. I shook my head, but this was a static problem. It should be easy. Forget the memories and concentrate on the now. Play the game.

  The first thing that became apparent was that as an individual, whatever he did, I was better off if I defected. Since if he cooperated then I got zero - compared to one if I had cooperated also. If he defected I got three as a defector - whereas if I cooperated
I would get five. Defection was the option that best protected my own self-interest.

  So far so good. But Janac obviously understood that, so we'd both end up defecting and getting three points. And here was the rub, because if we could, somehow, both cooperate, we'd get one point each, which was both an individual and a collectively better result. But could you afford to take the chance on cooperating and have the opposition defect on you? Who wanted to take the big loss while the other guy got off scot-free? The greatest mutual benefit, cooperating and taking the point each, was exactly the option that self-interest said you shouldn't follow.

  The rationality of the market. Trading. Sell early, because if you're still holding that position when everyone else runs for cover you'll lose big time. But of course it is the actions of you and others like you, trying to get out early, that pushes the price into freefall. You may cover your own position, but you help create a chronically unstable market, dominated by short term profiteering. And an economy in which no one can get on with the real businesses that the market was originally created to support. Which, in the final analysis, is not good for any of us. What do you choose, the personal or the public good?

  I shifted uncomfortably, gazing steadily back at the numbers lighting up my face. Torn between memories of the glamour and excitement of the games I had played, and the realisation of their consequences. The game did have a point, Janac was right, this was my problem. Was I a co-operator or a defector? I thought about the City, about the smash, about the life I'd led before and after. About the real evil I had glimpsed in the past couple of days. Slowly, and almost unwillingly, I clicked on cooperate. I could be a good guy.

  ‘Done?’ said Janac.

  I looked up and nodded.

  ‘Okay, I'm making my choice now.’

  ‘You can't see what I've done?’ I said, ever suspicious.

  ‘No, not until I make my choice, when the computer displays the results - like that.’

  The screen flashed again: