The Collected Short Stories Read online

  I quickly took my place opposite her. She smiled, picked up a white and a black bishop and hid them behind her back. Her dress became even tighter and emphasized the shape of her breasts. She then placed both clenched fists in front of me. I touched her right hand and she turned it over and opened it to reveal a white bishop.

  “Is there to be a wager of any kind?” I asked lightheartedly. She checked inside her evening bag.

  “I only have a few pounds on me,” she said.

  “I’d be willing to play for lower stakes.”

  “What do you have in mind?” she asked.

  “What can you offer?”

  “What would you like?”

  “Ten pounds if you win.”

  “And if I lose?”

  “You take something off.”

  I regretted the words the moment I had said them and waited for her to slap my face and leave, but she said simply, “There’s not much harm in that if we only play one gave.”

  I nodded my agreement and stared down at the board.

  She wasn’t a bad player—what the pros call a patzer—though her Roux opening was somewhat orthodox. I managed to make the game last twenty minutes while sacrificing several pieces without making it look too obvious. When I said “Checkmate,” she kicked off both her shoes and laughed.

  “Care for another drink?” I asked, not feeling too hopeful. “After all, it’s not yet eleven.”

  “All right. Just a small one, and then I must be off.”

  I went to the kitchen, returned a moment later clutching the bottle, and refilled her glass.

  “I only wanted half a glass,” she said, frowning.

  “I was lucky to win,” I said, ignoring her remark, “after your bishop captured my knight. Extremely close-run thing.”

  “Perhaps,” she replied.

  “Care for another game?” I ventured.

  She hesitated.

  “Double or quits?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Twenty pounds or another garment?”

  “Neither of us is going to lose much tonight, are we?”

  She pulled up her chair as I turned the board around and we both began to put the ivory pieces back in place.

  The second game took a little longer as I made a silly mistake early on, castling on my queen’s side, and it took several moves to recover. However, I still managed to finish the game off in under thirty minutes and even found time to refill Amanda’s glass when she wasn’t looking.

  She smiled at me as she hitched her dress up high enough to allow me to see the tops of her stockings. She undid the garters and slowly peeled the stockings off before dropping them on my side of the table.

  “I nearly beat you that time,” she said.

  “Almost,” I replied. “Want another chance to get even? Let’s say fifty pounds this time,” I suggested, trying to make the offer sound magnanimous.

  “The stakes are getting higher for both of us,” she replied as she reset the board. I began to wonder what might be going through her mind. Whatever it was, she foolishly sacrificed both her rooks early on, and the game was over in a matter of minutes.

  Once again she lifted her dress but this time well above her waist. My eyes were glued to her thighs as she undid the black garter belt and held it high above my head before letting it drop and join her stockings on my side of the table.

  “Once I had lost the second rook,” she said, “I was never in with a chance.”

  “I agree. It would therefore only be fair to allow you one more chance,” I said, quickly resetting the board. “After all,” I added, “you could win one hundred pounds this time.” She smiled.

  “I really ought to be going home,” she said as she moved her queen’s pawn two squares forward. She smiled that enigmatic smile again as I countered with my bishop’s pawn.

  It was the best game she had played all evening, and her use of the Warsaw gambit kept me at the board for over thirty minutes. In fact I damn nearly lost early on because I found it hard to concentrate properly on her defense strategy. A couple of times Amanda chuckled when she thought she had got the better of me, but it became obvious she had not seen Karpov play the Sicilian defense and win from a seemingly impossible position.

  “Checkmate,” I finally declared.

  “Damn,” she said, and standing up turned her back on me. “You’ll have to give me a hand.” Trembling, I leaned over and slowly pulled the zip down until it reached the small of her back. Once again I wanted to touch the smooth, creamy skin. She swung around to face me, shrugged gracefully, and the dress fell to the ground as if a statue were being unveiled. She leaned forward and brushed the side of my cheek with her hand, which had much the same effect as an electric shock. I emptied the last of the bottle of wine into her glass and left for the kitchen with the excuse of needing to refill my own. When I returned she hadn’t moved. A gauzy black bra and pair of panties were now the only garments that I still hoped to see removed.

  “I don’t suppose you’d play one more game?” I asked, trying not to sound desperate.

  “It’s time you took me home,” she said with a giggle.

  I passed her another glass of wine. “Just one more,” I begged. “But this time it must be for both garments.”

  She laughed. “Certainly not,” she said. “I couldn’t afford to lose.”

  “It would have to be the last game,” I agreed. “But two hundred pounds this time and we play for both garments.” I waited, hoping the size of the wager would tempt her. “The odds must surely be on your side. After all, you’ve nearly won three times.”

  She sipped her drink as if considering the proposition. “All right,” she said. “One last fling.”

  Neither of us voiced our feeling as to what was certain to happen if she lost.

  I could not stop myself trembling as I set the board up once again. I cleared my mind, hoping she hadn’t noticed that I had drunk only one glass of wine all night. I was determined to finish this one off quickly.

  I moved my queen’s pawn one square forward. She retaliated, pushing her king’s pawn up two squares. I knew exactly what my next move needed to be, and because of it the game only lasted eleven minutes.

  I have never been so comprehensively beaten in my life. Amanda was in a totally different class from me. She anticipated my every move and had gambits I had never encountered or even read of before.

  It was her turn to say “Checkmate,” which she delivered with the same enigmatic smile as before, adding, “You did say the odds were on my side this time.”

  I lowered my head in disbelief. When I looked up again, she had already slipped that beautiful black dress back on and was stuffing her stockings and suspenders into her evening bag. A moment later she put on her shoes.

  I took out my checkbook, filled in the name “Amanda Curzon” and added the figure “£200,” the date, and my signature. While I was doing this she replaced the little ivory pieces on the exact squares on which they had been when she had first entered the room.

  She bent over and kissed me gently on the cheek. “Thank you,” she said as she placed the check in her handbag. “We must play again sometime.” I was still staring at the reset board in disbelief when I heard the front door close behind her.

  “Wait a minute,” I said, rushing to the door. “How will you get home?”

  I was just in time to see her running down the steps and toward the open door of a BMW. She climbed in, allowing me one more look at those long tapering legs. She smiled as the car door was closed behind her.

  The accountant strolled around to the driver’s side, got in, revved up the engine, and drove the champion home.

  THE CENTURY

  “Life is a game,” said A. T. Pierson, thus immortalizing himself without actually having to do any real work: Though E. M. Forster showed more insight when he wrote “Fate is the Umpire, and Hope is the Ball, which is why I will never score a century at Lord’s.”

  When I was