Daisy Love kept her chanting to herself, as per usual, even as the new equations fell like complex rain. She didn’t want to question what had happened, not yet, just to go with it, while she could. OK, work on this; let’s say the professor isn’t just mad, let’s say he really believes in this nonsense. All we need do is reverse the ratio: 78 per cent of players had to play to win for one of them to claim first prize. But the professor’s question stated that only 75 per cent of the punters had been playing to win.
Which means that nobody at all should have won. Surely the professor was wrong.
The professor could never be wrong.
Daisy opened a new window to type up her answer. This was surely the easiest assignment in the world. ‘The chances of winning first prize in the AnnoDominoes, when only 75 per cent of the punters are playing to win, are zero.’
She printed out a copy and then wired the text file to
[email protected]., and spent the rest of the morning attending a boring lecture about Random Topology, during which her mind drifted. She already knew most of the knotted stuff anyway, instinctively, and deep inside she couldn’t stop thinking about the paper she had just delivered. She was nervous, elated, thrilled, and rather too anxious that no other student should find the correct answer.
Daisy knew that Max Hackle would take the assignments home with him that evening, that it would take him at least until Wednesday to mark them. But Daisy couldn’t wait that long. She had to know if she’d got the answer right.
Lunch, finally. Daisy had brought sandwiches with her, astrocheese, because no way was she touching a Whoomphy after Benny’s had come alive, right in front of her. She ate alone, as usual, working in an exercise book. A few tables across, a crowd of students were gathered around as Joe Crocus and Benny and Dopejack held court. Further away, another crowd gathered around Nigel Zuze’s table. They all need something to believe in. Daisy ignored them. She ignored everybody. Only Max was interesting enough. Oh God, maybe she was falling in love with the old man.
Sure enough, when she checked her pigeon-hole after lunch, there was a note waiting for her.
‘Ms Love. My office, straight away. Skip lectures. Max H.’
It was almost like a love letter.
Play to win
‘Now then, about this paper of yours.’
‘You’ve marked it already, sir?’
‘Well, it’s not difficult to mark, is it? What…two lines long. It’s certainly the shortest answer I’ve ever received. Apart from ‘Please sir, the dog ate my homework’, but that was ages ago. Tell me about your workings, please?’
‘Well, I…’
‘Go on.’
This was the first time Daisy had been inside this office; this large brown office of brown carpets and brown furniture. Max’s hair, still thick and brown, his jacket of brown tweed. All the books, along every brown wall, were lined in brown leather, and the titles were dizzying. ‘I’m waiting, Ms Love.’
‘I…’
‘Yes?’
‘Well I was curious, Professor.’
‘Good. I like that.’
‘About your mention of playing to win?’
‘Oh yes?’
‘Because I’d always thought the dominoes were a random game?’
‘You have decided otherwise?’
‘It was at your urging, sir.’
‘More.’
‘Well, I was curious. So I looked inside the database. I found your paper about choosing the bifurcations in Hackle Mazes. It mentioned a play-to-lose equation. I reversed it out and obtained a play-to-win.’
‘I see.’
‘It was very interesting.’
‘Hm hmm.’
‘Especially the equations about something called nymphomation.’
‘Ah yes.’
‘It was the only paper I could access. Why did you hide all your other works? Wait! I get it. This week’s assignment could only be answered with access to your papers on nymphomation and love labyrinths. To make it even harder, you hid all but one of the references. Crafty!’
‘Very good. Except it’s the other way round; my work on nymphomation is always out of bounds. It is dangerous knowledge.’
‘OK, so you let one file loose, just so your students could possibly find it.’
‘Not just any old student, Ms Love.’
‘You chose me! The computer—’
‘I mean that only you received the play-to-win question. The rest of them were given a rather simple task involving Chaotic Economics.’
‘But we could’ve compared notes?’
‘Ah, but you never do. Isn’t that right? Too jealous.’
‘But… but why? Why me?’
Professor Hackle got up slowly from his desk, walked over to the window of his office. When he finally spoke, without even looking at Daisy, his voice was quiet, almost to himself. ‘Look at them all, down there, making their way to lectures, carrying their assignments. Students! Glorious students! The city would be quite dead without the September intake.’ Finally he turned around to look directly into Daisy’s eyes. ‘Youth, Daisy! Young people! How keen they are, how eager to learn!’