Thomas A. Bass - The Eudaemonic Pie

Thomas A. Bass

The Eudaemonic Pie

All Rights Reserved 1985, 2014 by Thomas A. Bass

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without the permission in writing from the author.

First Edition published 1985 by Houghton Mifflin Company. This digital edition published by Bass Inc. c/o Authors Guild Digital Services.

For more information, address:

Authors Guild Digital Services

31 East 32nd Street

7th Floor

New York, NY 10016

Cover by Joan Hall

ISBN: 9781625360854

The diagram on page 157, from The Casino Gamblers Guide, Enlarged Edition, by Allan N. Wilson (copyright 1965, 1970 by Allan N. Wilson), is reprinted by permission of Harper & Row, Publishers, Inc. The lines on page 176 from the song Hot Blooded, by Lou Grammatico and Mick Jones, are 1978 WB Music Corp., Somerset Songs Publishing, Inc. & Evansongs Ltd. All rights reserved. Used by permission. The lines on page 183 from Its All Right with Me, by Cole Porter, are copyright 1953 by Cole Porter. Copyright renewed, assigned to Robert H. Montgomery, Jr., trustee of the Cole Porter Musical and Literary Property Trust. Chappell and Co., Inc., owner of publication and allied rights. International copyright secured. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

Page numbers noted above refer to the print edition.

To the Eudaemons

This story belongs to its heroes and heroines. Its strengths come from the patience with which they instructed me in computers, gambling, and the eudaemonic connection; its weaknesses are my own. The manuscript was read entirely or in part by Doyne Farmer, Norman Packard, Letty Belin, Lorna Lyons, Edward Thorp, Tom Ingerson, Ralph Abraham, Ingrid Hoermann, Marianne Walpert, Len Zane, and Jim Crutchfield. I truly appreciate the care they took in getting the facts, and everything else, right.

My thanks go to the following friends who aided this project during the four years required to complete it: Bill Pietz, for supporting the book at a time when it might not have existed without him; Dana Brand, for lending his critical eye to an early version of the tale; and Wendy and Jeremy Strick, for their good company in Paris during the writing of a later version.

Among past and present intercessors at Houghton Mifflin, I would like to acknowledge the aid of Jeffrey Seroy, who knew what this book was about, right from the start; Gerard Van der Leun, who offered wise counsel throughout; Sarah Flynn, who saw it through to the end; and Nan Talese, whose advice and encouragement proved invaluable. Finally, I want to thank Nat Sobel, my agent, and Bonnie Krueger, my wife and best reader.

PROLOGUE

As I walk along the Bois de Boulogne

With an independent air

You can hear the girls declare:

He must be a millionaire!

You can hear them sigh and wish to die,

You can see them wink the hopeful eye

At the man who broke the bank at Monte Carlo!

The Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo

We drive into the parking garage behind Benny Binions Horseshoe Club and circle up the ramp to the third floor.

We shouldnt be seen talking to each other, Doyne says. Not even in the street. In case there are any slip-ups, well meet later in the Golden Nugget. Why dont you run through the signals again?

A bet on red means I take a five-minute walk. Even means sit down and play. A chip on the first twelve numbers and I raise stakes.

This is one of the ways well communicate without talking for the next two hours. The other is by computer.

We park the car and lift two pairs of shoes off the rear seat. These are good leather Oxfords with crepe soles. Only on peering inside does one notice that the bottoms are hollowed out. A channel three inches wide and a half inch deep runs from toe to instep. A second cavity is cut into the heel. This is professional work. Uppers and soles have been separated and restitched without a trace.

We reach back for two more shoe boxes. One of them holds our power supplies, known to us as battery boats because they look like miniature dories with screw-on lids. The second box holds our computers, which resemble orthopedic insoles with toe clickers built onto the front end. The missing pieces in a jigsaw puzzle, computers and boats fit exactly into the cavities cut out of the shoes. The boats slip prow backward into the heel. The computers snuggle up front under the balls of our feet.

Out of their shoes the components might be mistaken for foot warmers or extraterrestrial tape cassettes. But their beauty lies in what they do: their function is the amazing part.

Molded out of clear casting resin, the battery boats hold eighty turns of hair-thin antenna wire embedded along their outer edge. Built into a circuit inside are a 15-volt battery and four 1.5-volt AAA batteries. From the rear of each boat trails a ribbon cable attached to a model airplane connector. This is a miniature plug with eight pins, each of which corresponds to a different function in the computerfor which the boats act simultaneously as radio receivers, power supplies, and message centers.

Covered with screw-on lids made of polycarbonate jail glass, the boats have two metal solenoids the size of pencil erasers sticking out of holes cut into the plastic. Activated by a small current, these mechanical thumpers are positioned to vibrate against the heel and arch of the foot. By varying the location and frequency of these buzzes, a computer driving the solenoids can generate dozens of discrete signals.

Doyne and I unscrew the jail glass and load fresh batteries into the boats. Well use the carbon batteries, he says. Our range may be shorter, but they give out less noise.

Packed with batteries, antenna wire, a capacitor, a resistor, two solenoids, and three diodes, the boats are stuffed to the last millimeter.

Lets power up. Then well do a range test and head for the street.

We insert the model airplane connectors into the rear of the computers. Semitranslucent rectangles wrapped in tapefor comfort in walking on top of themthe computers are the brains of the operation. Under the tape they display top and bottom the silver tracings of printed circuits. For the elect who can read these manuscripts illuminated in copper and solder, they represent glistening avenues and piazzas in the great City of Computation. Lying barely revealed beneath the circuits are a host of capacitors, resistors, and diodes, a crystal clock pointing the arrow of time, and dark fortresses of silicon in which reside the powers of language and logic under the control of one pre-eminent chip endowed with memory.

An experienced eye would be surprised by the arrangement of these silicon boxes. The chips governing the computers two basic functionslogic and memory, volition and destinyhave been loaded separately onto circuit boards, which, in turn, have been folded over on top of each other. Imagine upending Tokyo and fitting its skyscrapers, upside down, into the avenues of New York. You get an elegant solution to a topological problemand a tight fit. Then imagine running a plastic spacer around the waterfront of Manhattan and filling the island with microcrystalline waxa petroleum derivative as hard as plastic, except at 300 Fahrenheit, when it flows with the viscosity of molasses. Cool the ingredients back to room temperature and you have a TokyoNew York computer sandwich hard enough to take a blow from a hammer.