Judith Merril - The Year's Greatest Science Fiction & Fantasy 4

He played first. On his first shot, out went five. Second, out went four. The last was easy. He had scored a Three.

And now it was my turn. Caressing my nut I said to it, without talking, “Now, old thing, show them what you can do. Try for a One, just to astonish the natives.”

Without much hope, and with no skill at all, I flipped my nut. It seemed to stop halfway, gyrating. Everybody laughed, and my opponent reached for my pajama top— when, suddenly, my nut kind of shouldered its way forward into the circle, and with something devilishly like careful aim, spun its way into the ten and pushed them, one by one, beyond the bounds of the ring.

You never heard such a shout! I had broken a record. Picking my nut up, I caressed it and warmed it in my hand.

The chief said, “This I have never seen. Two, yes. One, no. I know what it is—the markings inside that nut must exactly match the markings of your brain. You are a lucky man.”

Feeling the weight of the necklace I had won, I asked, “Is there any more stuff like this hereabout?”

He said no, they didn’t regard it especially. The ex-champion had won it downstream, where they picked it out of the river bed and gave it to their women for ornaments. A string of your enemy’s teeth meant something. But the yellow stuff was too soft and too heavy. “If you want it, take your tictoc nut and you can win as much of it as you can carry away—you and ten strong men.”

I promised him that when I came back I would bring more guns and bullets, hatchets, knives, and all his heart could desire, if he would lend me a good canoe and the services of half a dozen sturdy men to paddle it, together with food and water. He agreed, and we took off.

In fine, I cleaned out that village and went on downstream with two war canoes, all loaded with gold and other valuables, such as garnets, emeralds, et cetera. I should have left it at that. But success had gone to my head.

On the way I stayed the night in the shack of a petty trader, a Portuguese, from whom I bought a whole suit of white-duck clothes, a couple of shirts, and pants and some other stuff. “Your fame has gone before you,” he said, looking enviously at me and then at the gold nuggets I had paid him with. “They call you the Tictoc Man up and down the river. Now I happen to know that no white man can play tictoc—it takes twenty years to learn. How do you do it?”

I said, “A mere knack.”

“Well, give me another nugget and I’ll give you some good advice. . . . Thank you. My advice is, make straight for the big river, and so to the coast. Don’t stop to play at the next village—there is only one—or you may regret it. The Esporco are the most villainous Indians in these parts. Don’t push even your luck too far. Four ounces of gold, and I’ll let you have a fine weapon, a revolver, all the way from Belgium.”

The revolver I took, but not his advice, and we went on at dawn. In the late afternoon several canoes came out to meet us. My men spat and said, “Esporco, master—very bad.”

“What, will they attack us?” I asked. “No.” They indicated that the Esporco Indian was the worst trickster and cheat in the Mato Grosso. But I fondled the tictoc nut, while observing that in every canoe sat a girl wearing a necklace of raw rubies, and little else. The men—big fellows, as Indians go—had an easy, cozy way with them, all smiles, no weapons, full of good humor.

They hailed me as Senhor Tictoc, while the girls threw flowers.

My leading paddler, the stroke, as it were, growled, “When Esporco bring flowers, keep your hand on your knife”—a savage version of Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes.

Still, I gave orders to land, and was received with wild delight. The chief ordered several young goats killed. I presented him with a sack of salt, which is highly prized thereabout. There was a banquet with a profusion of some slightly effervescent drink in the nature of the Mexican mescal, only lighter and breezier.

In a little while we started to talk business. I expressed interest in rubies. The chief said, “Those red things? But they are nothing.” And, taking a magnificent necklace from one of the girls, he tossed it into the river—I was to learn, later, that he had a net there to catch it. “I have heard that you are interested in stones,” said he, while I gaped like a fish. And he went away and came back with an uncut diamond of the Brazilian variety, as big as your two fists.

I displayed no emotion, but said, “Interesting. How much do you want for it?”

He said, “It has no price. I have been around, and know the value your people set on such stones. I also know—we ail know on this river—what would happen if the news got about that there was gold, rubies, emeralds and diamonds hereabout. Your people would come down on us like jaguars, and drive us off the face of the earth. As it is, we have enough, we are contented, we regard such stuff as this as pretty for unmarried girls. No, my friend, it is not for sale. But I tell you what. It being a plaything, let us play for it. You have a great reputation as a tictoc player. As it happens, so have I. Now what have you to stake against this stone?”

“Three canoeloads of treasure,” I said.

At this, one of his sons chimes in with, “Don’t do it, father! The man is a wizard. All the river knows it. He has a thinking nut!”

Apparently tipsy, the chief shouted, “Silence, brat! There is no such thing. It is a superstition. Tictoc is a game of skill, and I am the best man on this river.” He became angry. “Who questions my skill?”

Nobody did. The circle was made, the ten nuts arranged at their proper distances. I begged my host to shoot first. There was a breathless hush as he went down on his knees and shot a perfect Two—at which there was a murmur of applause.

Then I stroked my nut and asked it for a One. Out it went, spinning like a little whirlwind, and a One it was.

It is etiquette, in the tictoc game, for the winner to pick up the fighting nuts and bring them back to the base. Loser shoots first. This time the chief shot a Three. I was feeling warm-hearted. Who “wouldn’t, if he was certain to win a diamond that would make the Koh-i-noor and the Cullinan diamonds look like stones in a fifty-dollar engagement ring? So I said to my nut, “This time, for the sport of the thing, get me a Five. But last shot we’ll have another One and the best out of three games.”

It did as it was bid, and I lost with a Five. The Chief much elated, got our nuts and handed me mine with grave courtesy. I shot with perfect confidence. Imagine my horror when, instead of moving with grace and deliberation, it reeled drunkenly forward and barely reached the periphery of the circle! I wondered, could that mescal-like stuff I had drunk have gone to its head through mine? Thinking with all my might, I shot again—and knocked one nut out of the ring. A third time, and I finished with an Eight.

The chief went to pick up our nuts. I was numb with grief. He handed me the nut I had played that last game with. I looked at it—and it was not my own!

Then the truth dawned on me. The old rascal had swapped nuts after the second game! Simple as that. But I kept my temper, because in a split second everybody had stopped laughing, and every man had produced a machete, an ax, a bow or spear. I said, “There is some mistake here, sir. This is not my tictoc nut.”

“Then whose is it?”

“Yours. You are, no doubt inadvertently, holding mine in your hand. Give it back, if you please.”

And driven beyond prudence, I made a grab at it. I was fast, but he was faster, and surprisingly strong. I, too, am tolerably strong in the fingers. We stood locked, hand to hand, for about twenty seconds. Then I heard and felt a sharp little crack. So did he, for he stood back, waving away his tribesmen who were closing in. . He held out his hand with dignity; it held the common tictoc nut that he had palmed off on me. In my palm lay my own true nut, but split down the center, exposing the kernel.