"Mr. Medway? I'm afraid he's with a client just now, but one of our other account executives...
"Medway. Tell him he's got a live one.
When Mr. Medway appeared, it took him a moment to recognize Stan. "Oh, the one who was looking for the girl. Didn't she work out? You want to pick another?
"No, Mr. Medway, I want to make a deal. I want to take twenty bottles, one after another. I walk out of here with twenty thousand dollars or you get to keep the bod.
Medway sank back behind his desk, thumbs in his armpits, looking at Stan. "You're a real gambler, he said admiringly. "But you can't do that. It'd kill you. Twenty is an overdose.
"I'll take that chance, Medway. I want the money. I want to take it and he hesitated "...all right, I want to take it and go to school and train for your job. I want real money, Medway.
"Wow, said Medway softly. "I have to say I admire your spirit. Well, you can't do it the way you say, but TransParts is willing to roll the dice with any of its clients, any stakes, just so it's a fair shot. How about this. You get your choice of two bottles. One puts you to sleep for the night, the other. . . that's a fifty-fifty chance, and what you get if you win is twenty-five thousand dollars. Or if you're really hot, you can take the long shot. The same fifty bottles as always. Only this time only one of them is just a sleeping pill. All the other forty-nine are too-bad- Charlie. That's a forty-nine-to-one shot, according to the arithmetic, but TransParts is willing to absorb the difference, so if you win that one, you walk away with fifty thou. You can even get a hundred to one if you want it, or a thousand. You name it. We'll set it up, just so the arithmetic works out.
A thousand to one! My God, a million dollars! But to have only one chance in a thousand of surviving. If I take the twenty-five, he said.
"Good bet, nodded Medway. "When?
"Right now.
Medway punched a combination into his desk top and stood up. "Come on, they'll have it ready for you by the time we get there. And so they did, the standard room with its single bed and vase of flowers, and on the sideboard the little tray of bottles; but this time there were only two on it.
You could spend the whole night arguing which is which, Stan thought grayly, and reached out for the nearer. He flipped off the top and drank it down. "Might as well get a good night's sleep, he said, turning toward the bed. "So long, Medway.
He didn't look around as the account executive went out, and so he didn't see that someone had come in, until she said, "I really liked you, Stan. I mean it.
He turned around, feet tingling in his pants legs. "Evanie!
"Go ahead, Stan, get into bed. You'll be feeling it in a minute.
"I know. And he was, the same warm whirling that he had felt every other time. That was good. But not really good, he thought, the killer dose would feel the same going down, he just wouldn't ever wake up. He tried a pleasantry. "I thought maybe you were coming to... to. .
The words got harder and harder to get out, but she knew what he meant. "Not this time, sweetie," she said, drawing the cover over him. "I just came in because I wanted to tell you two things."
"Wh-" He couldn't even finish the "-at."
"That I really liked you. And that it wasn't anything personal, Stan. You see, I get a commission too."
Frederik Pohl, Pohlstars
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