by Roald Dahl
‘About how long ago do you think he did it?’
‘Some time this afternoon. He usually does it in the afternoon.’
‘About what time?’
‘Oh, I don’t know. Around four o’clock I should guess.’
‘Now tell me another thing. How does the captain decide which number it shall be? Does he take a lot of trouble over that?’
The purser looked at the anxious frowning face of Mr Botibol and he smiled, knowing quite well what the man was driving at. ‘Well, you see, the captain has a little conference with the navigating officer, and they study the weather and a lot of other things, and then they make their estimate.’
Mr Botibol nodded, pondering this answer for a moment. Then he said, ‘Do you think the captain knew there was bad weather commg today?’
‘I couldn’t tell you,’ the purser replied. He was looking into the small black eyes of the other man, seeing the two single little sparks of excitement dancing in their centres. ‘I really couldn’t tell you, Mr Botibol. I wouldn’t know.’
‘If this gets any worse it might be worth buying some of the low numbers. What do you think?’ The whispering was more urgent, more anxious now.
‘Perhaps it will,’ the purser said. ‘I doubt whether the old man allowed for a really rough night. It was pretty calm this afternoon when he made his estimate.’
The others at the table had become silent and were trying to hear, watching the purser with that intent, half-cocked, listening look that you can see also at the race track when they are trying to overhear a trainer talking about his chance: the slightly open lips, the upstretched eyebrows, the head forward and cocked a little to one side – that desperately straining, half-hypnotized, listening look that comes to all of them when they are hearing something straight from the horse’s mouth.
‘Now suppose you were allowed to buy a number, which one would you choose today?’ Mr Botibol whispered.
‘I don’t know what the range is yet,’ the purser patiently answered. ‘They don’t announce the range till the auction starts after dinner. And I’m really not very good at it anyway. I’m only the purser, you know.’
At that point Mr Botibol stood up. ‘Excuse me, all,’ he said, and he walked carefully away over the swaying floor between the other tables, and twice he had to catch hold of the back of a chair to steady himself against the ship’s roll.
‘The sun deck, please,’ he said to the elevator man.
The wind caught him full in the face as he stepped out on to the open deck. He staggered and grabbed hold of the rail and held on tight with both hands, and he stood there looking out over the darkening sea where the great waves were welling up high and white horses were riding against the wind with plumes of spray behind them as they went.
‘Pretty bad out there, wasn’t it, sir?’ the elevator man said on the way down.
Mr Botibol was combing his hair back into place with a small red comb. ‘Do you think we’ve slackened speed at all on account of the weather?’ he asked.
‘Oh my word yes, sir. We slackened off considerable since this started. You got to slacken off speed in weather like this or you’ll be throwing the passengers all over the ship.’
Down in the smoking-room people were already gathering for the auction. They were grouping themselves politely around the various tables, the men a little stiff in their dinner jackets, a little pink and overshaved and stiff beside their cool white-armed women. Mr Botibol took a chair close to the auctioneer’s table. He crossed his legs, folded his arms, and settled himself in his seat with the rather desperate air of a man who has made a tremendous decision and refuses to be frightened.
The pool, he was telling himself, would probable be around seven thousand dollars. That was almost exactly what it had been the last two days with the numbers selling for between three and four hundred apiece. Being a British ship they did it in pounds, but he liked to do his thinking in his own currency. Seven thousand dollars was plenty of money. My goodness, yes! And what he would do he would get them to pay him in hundred-dollar bills and he would take it ashore in the inside pocket of his jacket. No problem there. And right away, yes right away, he would buy a Lincoln convertible. He would pick it up on the way from the ship and drive it home just for the pleasure of seeing Ethel’s face when she came out the front door and looked at it. Wouldn’t that be something, to see Ethel’s face when he glided up to the door in a brand-new pale-green Lincoln convertible! Hello, Ethel, honey, he would say, speaking very casual. I just thought I’d get you a little present. I saw it in the window as I went by, so I thought of you and how you were always wanting one. You like it, honey? he would say. You like the colour? And then he would watch her face.
The auctioneer was standing up behind his table now, ‘Ladies and gentlemen!’ he shouted. ‘The captain has estimated the day’s run, ending midday tomorrow, at five hundred and fifteen miles. As usual we will take the ten numbers on either side of it to make up the range. That makes it five hundred and five to five hundred and twenty-five. And of course for those who think the true figure will be still father away, there’ll be “low field” and “high field” sold separately as well. Now, we’ll draw the first numbers out of the hat… here we are… five hundred and twelve?’
The room became quiet. The people sat still in their chairs, all eyes watching the auctioneer. There was a certain tension in the air, and as the bids got higher, the tension grew. This wasn’t a game or a joke; you could be sure of that by the way one man would look across at another who had raised his bid – smiling perhaps, but only the lips smiling, the eyes bright and absolutely cold.
Number five hundred and twelve was knocked down for one hundred and ten pounds. The next three or four numbers fetched roughly the same amount.
The ship was rolling heavily, and each time she went over, the wooden panelling on the walls creaked as if it were going to split. The passengers held on to the arms of their chairs, concentrating upon the auction. ‘Low field!’ the auctioneer called out. ‘The next number is low field.’
Mr Botibol sat up very straight and tense. He would wait, he had decided, until the others had finished bidding, then he would jump in and make the last bid. He had figured that there must be at least five hundred dollars in his account at the bank at home, probably nearer six. That was about two hundred pounds – over two hundred. This ticket wouldn’t fetch more than that.
‘As you all know,’ the auctioneer was saying, ‘low field covers every number below the smallest number in the range, in this case every number below five hundred and five. So, if you think this ship is going to cover less than five hundred and five miles tn the twenty-four hours ending at noon tomorrow, you better get in and buy this number. So what am I bid?’
It went clear up to one hundred and thirty pounds. Others besides Mr Botibol seemed to have noticed that the weather was rough. One hundred and forty… fifty… There it stopped. The auctioneer raised his hammer.
‘Going at one hundred and fifty…’
‘Sixty!’ Mr Botibol called, and every face in the room turned and looked at him.
‘Seventy!’
‘Eighty!’ Mr Botibol called.
‘Ninety!’
‘Two hundred!’ Mr Botibol called. He wasn’t stopping now – not for anyone.
There was a pause.
‘Any advance on two hundred pounds?’
Sit still, he told himself. Sit absolutely still and don’t look up. It’s unlucky to look up. Hold your breath. No one’s going to bid you up so long as you hold your breath.
‘Going for two hundred pounds…’ The auctioneer had a pink bald head and there were little beads of sweat sparkling on top of it.’Going…’ Mr Botibol held his breath. ‘Going… Gone!’ The man banged the hammer on the table. Mr Botibol wrote out a cheque and handed it to the auctioneer’s assistant, then he settled back in his chair to wait for the finish. He did not want to go to bed before he knew how much there was in the pool.
They added it up after the last number had been sold and it came to twenty-one hundred-odd pounds. That was around six thousand dollars. Ninety per cent to go to the winner, ten per cent to seamen’s charities. Ninety per cent of six thousand was five thousand four hundred. Well – that was enough. He could buy the Lincoln convertible and there would be something left over, too. With this gratifying thought he went off, happy and excited, to his cabin.
When Mr Botibol awoke the next morning he lay quite still for several minutes with his eyes shut, listening for the sound of the gale, waiting for the roll of the ship. There was no sound of any gale and the ship was not rolling. He jumped up and peered out of the porthole. The sea – Oh Jesus God – was smooth as glass, the great ship was moving through it fast, obviously making up for time lost during the night. Mr Botibol turned away and sat slowly down on the edge of his bunk. A fine electricity of fear was beginning to prickle under the skin of his stomach. He hadn’t a hope now. One of the higher numbers was certain to win it after this.
‘Oh, my God,’ he said aloud. ‘What shall I do?’
What, for example, would Ethel say? It was simply not possible to tell her that he had spent almost all of their two years’ savings on a ticket in the ship’s pool. Nor was it possible to keep the matter secret. To do that he would have to tell her to stop drawing cheques. And what about the monthly instalments on the television set and’the Encyclopaedia Britannica? Already he could see the anger and contempt in the woman’s eyes, the blue becoming grey and the eyes themselves narrowing as they always did when there was anger in them.
‘Oh, my God. What shall I do?’
There was no point in pretending that he had the slightest chance now – not unless the goddam ship started to go backwards. They’d have to put her in reverse and go full speed astern and keep right on going if he was to have any chance of winning it now. Well, maybe he should ask the captain to do just that. Offer him ten per cent of the profits. Offer him more if he wanted it. Mr Botibol started to giggle. Then very suddenly he stopped, his eyes and mouth both opening wide in a kind of shocked surprise. For it was at this moment that the idea came. It hit him hard and quick, and he jumped up from his bed, terribly excited, ran over to the porthole and looked out again. Well, he thought, why not? Why ever not? The sea was calm and he wouldn’t have any trouble keeping afloat until they picked him up. He had a vague feeling that someone had done this thing before, but that didn’t prevent him from doing it again. The ship would have to stop and lower a boat, and the boat would have to go back maybe half a mile to get him, and then it would have to return to the ship, the whole thing. An hour was about thirty miles. It would knock thirty miles off the day’s run. That would do it. ‘Low field’ would be sure to win it then. Just so long as he made certain someone saw him falling over; but that would be simple to arrange. And he’d better wear light clothes, something easy to swim in. Sports clothes, that was it. He would dress as though he were going up to play some deck tennis – just a shirt and a pair of shorts and tennis-shoes. And leave his watch behind. What was the time? Nine-fifteen. The sooner the better, then. Do it now and get it over with. Have to do it soon, because the time limit was midday.
Mr Botibol was both frightened and excited when he stepped out on to the sun deck in his sports clothes. His small body was wide at the hips, tapering upward to extremely narrow sloping shoulders, so that it resembled, in shape at any rate, a bollard. His white skinny legs were covered with black hairs, and he came cautiously out on deck, treading softly in his tennis-shoes. Nervously he looked around him. There was only one other person in sight, an elderly woman with very thick ankles and immense buttocks who was leaning over the rail staring at the sea. She was wearing a coat of Persian lamb and the collar was turned up so Mr Botibol couldn’t see her face.
He stood still, examining her from a distance. Yes, he told himself, she would probably do. She would probably give the alarm just as quickly as anyone else. But wait one minute, take your time, William Botibol, take your time. Remember what you told yourself a few minutes ago in the cabin when you were changing? You remember that?
The thought of leaping off a ship into the ocean a thousand miles from the nearest land had made Mr Botibol – a cautious man at the best of times – unusually advertent. He was by no means satisfied yet that this woman he saw before him was absolutely certain to give the alarm when he made his jump. In his opinion there were two possible reasons why she might fail him. Firstly, she might be deaf and blind. It was not very probable, but on the other hand it might be so, and why take a chance? All he had to do was check it by talking to her for a moment beforehand. Secondly – and this will demonstrate how suspicious the mind of a man can become when it is working through self-preservation and fear – secondly, it had occurred to him that the woman might herself be the owner of one of the high numbers in the pool and as such would have a sound financial reason for not wishing to stop the ship. Mr Botibol recalled that people had killed their fellows for far less than six thousand dollars. It was happening every day in the newspapers. So why take a chance on that either? Check on it first. Be sure of your facts. Find out about it by a little polite conversation. Then, provided that the woman appeared also to be a pleasant, kindly human being, the thing was a cinch and he could leap dverboard with a light heart.
Mr Botibol advanced casually towards the woman and took up a position beside her, leaning on the rail. ‘Hullo,’ he said pleasantly.
She turned and smiled at him, a surprisingly lovely, almost a beautiful smile, although the face itself was very plain. ‘Hullo,’ she answered him.
Check, Mr Botibol told himself, on the first question. She is neither blind nor deaf. ‘Tell me,’ he said, coming straight to the point, ‘what did you think of the auction last night?’
‘Auction?’ she asked, frowning. ‘Auction? What auction?’
‘You know, that silly old thing they have in the lounge after dinner, selling numbers on the ship’s daily run. I just wondered what you thought about it.’
She shook her head, and again she smiled, a sweet and pleasant smile that had in it perhaps the trace of an apology. ‘I’m very lazy,’ she said. ‘I always go to bed early. I have my dinner in bed. It’s so restful to have dinner in bed.’
Mr Botibol smiled back at her and began to edge away. ‘Got to go and get my exercise now,’ he said. ‘Never miss my exercise in the morning. It was nice seeing you. Very nice seeing you…’ He retreated about ten paces, and the woman let him go without looking around.
Everything was now in order. The sea was calm, he was lightly dressed for swimming, there were almost certainly no man-eating sharks in this part of the Atlantic, and there was this pleasant kindly old woman to give the alarm. It was a question now only of whether the ship would be delayed long enough to swing the balance in his favour. Almost certainly it would. In any event, he could do a little to help in that direction himself. He could make a few difficulties about getting hauled up into the lifeboat. Swim around a bit, back away from them surreptitiously as they tried to come up close to fish him out. Every minute, every second gained would help him win. He began to move forward again to the rail, but now a new fear assailed him. Would he get caught in the propeller? He had heard about that happening to persons falling off the sides of big ships. But then, he wasn’t going to fall, he was going to jump, and that was a very different thing, provided he jumped out far enough he would be sure to clear the propeller.
Mr Botibol advanced slowly to a position at the rail about twenty yards away from the woman. She wasn’t looking at him now. So much the better. He didn’t want her watching him as he jumped off. So long as no one was watching he would be able to say afterwards that he had slipped and fallen by accident. He peered over the side of the ship. It was a long, long drop. Come to think of it now, he might easily hurt himself badly if he hit the water flat. Wasn’t there someone who once split his stomach open that way, doing a belly flop from a high dive? He must ju
mp straight and land feet first. Go in like a knife. Yes, sir. The water seemed cold and deep and grey and it made him shiver to look at it. But it was now or never. Be a man, William Botibol, be a man. All right then… now… here goes…
He climbed up on to the wide wooden top-rail, stood there poised, balancing for three terrifying seconds, then he leaped – he leaped up and out as far as he could go and at the same time he shouted ‘Help!’
‘Help! Help!’ he shouted as he fell. Then he hit the water and went under.
When the first shout for help sounded, the woman who was leaning on the rail started up and gave a little jump of surprise. She looked around quickly and saw sailing past her through the air this small man dressed in white shorts and tennis shoes, spreadeagled and shouting as he went. For a moment she looked as though she weren’t quite sure what she ought to do: throw a lifebelt, run away and give the alarm, or simply turn and yell. She drew back a pace from the rail and swung half around facing up to the bridge, and for this brief moment she remained motionless, tense, undecided. Then almost at once she seemed to relax, and she leaned forward far over the rail, staring at the water where it was turbulent in the ship’s wake. Soon a tiny round black head appeared in the foam, an arm was raised above it, once, twice, vigorously waving, and a small faraway voice was heard calling something that was difficult to understand. The woman leaned still farther over the rail, trying to keep the little bobbing black speck in sight, but soon, so very soon, it was such a long way away that she couldn’t even be sure it was there at all.
After a while another woman came out on deck. This one was bony and angular, and she wore horn-rimmed spectacles. She spotted the first woman and walked over to her, treading the deck in the deliberate, military fashion of all spinsters.
‘So there you are,’ she said.
The woman with the fat ankles turned and looked at her, but said nothing.
