October 2013
Dick 'The Wizard' Lancaster's son Jim, always seemed to know the subtle difference between 'prediction' and 'forecasting', forecasting is concerned with a certainty, prediction is about the possibility of something happening.
Dick sent his son to the same school that he had attended for a while as a temporary member of the sixth form. Jim was in the final few months of his stay at Greyfriars School. He had passed all his exams and had been offered a place at one of the more prestigious universities. While he had been at the school he had been plagued by a boy from the Remove this boy like his father. Bunter had more interest in filling his face with food than carrying out his studies. Jim had made use of this weakness by getting Bunter to run errands for him with just the promise of a piece of cake. Jim had an interest in Statistics and would often run a betting book on various topics in which fellow students could place their bets. Of course the headmaster did not approve of such practices and would often send the very old Mr Quelch to carry out checks on what was going on in the common room. It was here that Jim made use of both Burner's and Quelch's weaknesses. Bunter for food and Quelch to catch Bunter stealing the food. Jim believed that while Quelch was busy chasing Bunter he could continue running his book makers business. Bunter for the price of a bun would always warn Jim of Quelch's approach to the common room and create a diversion.
Jim left Greyfriars and went to university to study mathematics, during this time he continued his fascination with Statistics and its ability to Predict the probably of certain events to happen. He finished his course and was awarded a First in mathematics with an offer to go on and take a Doctorate. With the extra university facilities and the use of the main computer he was able to explore the predictive capabilities of statistics. Eventually he was awarded his Doctorate and left university. He decided that he would join his father in Book Making but first he would try out the other side of gambling i.e. the punter.
Jim had thoughts about reducing the odds and making that change in his favour. He had been brought up in a family where his father, 'The Wizard' had made his living as a Bookmaker. He knew that the result of a particular bet place by an individual is immaterial it is only the bottom line that counts. He usually operates so that he will only lose money if one particular horse, dog, etc wins, for some of the others if they win he will break even and for others he will make money.
Jim had often gone with his father to the tracks and seen how he operated; he felt that he really wanted to be on the other side. He could see that the gambler had the adrenaline flow of excitement and he wanted to enjoy some of that excitement, but not enough that he wanted to lose money, his plan was to gamble but come out the winner.
He knew that certain gambles were too much of a chance, for instance the Lottery had a l4 million to one chance of winning the big sum it was not for him. He did his studying of gambling games and found out that games like Black Jack were less chancy particularly if you know what you are doing.
It seemed that in the end these games come down to statistics by observing the cards that have been played it's possible to predict the probability of cards left in the pack and thereby of having a winning hand, when it looked favourable to increase the size of the bet. It wasn't the prediction of the actual value of the next card to be laid but the probability of a hand beating the dealer's cards.
Jim called on some of his school friends to ask them if they would be interested in joining him in setting up a small betting syndicate. John Cherry was the first of his old chums to reply, he was between jobs and the possibility of doing some travelling was quite appealing to him. Bob Wharton, Frank Bolsover. Ajay Jamset Ram Singh and John Nugent quickly followed, Bunter also tried to join the group but it was felt that his mind would be on food rather than on the game. Jim had been in some Casinos and knew that they often offer free snacks and he was certain that Bunter would always have his nose in the trough, so he was excluded. Jim and his colleagues used to meet at his father's house where they had plenty of room to practice their craft. They practiced for more than six months and felt they would have the edge if they were to go to a casino and try out what they had practiced. Their chosen game was Black Jack.
The friends met up and travelled to the chosen Casino. It was decided that Jim and John would be the only ones to play, the other friends would hang around and keep their eyes on the security and help with the card counting. To help improve the odds both Jim and John had been equipped with radio sets so that their friends could help in calculating the odds. Jim and John would work together if one had a favourable hand the other would acquire cards in order to protect their friend's hand so that the friends came out on top.
The players changed their money into chips and made their way to the Black Jack tables. Sitting round the tables there were some old men with their young nieces, at least that was Jim's interpretation of their relationship but he also thought he could be wrong.
The two settled down at the table and began to play at first they just placed small bets until the dealers changed to a new deck of cards. Now they knew their job of predicting the cards had begun. After several hands they had won and lost money, but they were gradually getting the statistical feel of the cards left in the pack that the dealer would have to play. This would give them the opportunity to increase their bets and make a killing. After a couple of hours playing they were at least 15 thousand up and they decided to call it a night.
Just then there was a commotion at the bar and the two security guards that were making their way to Jim and John were diverted to the bar. To Jim's surprise it was Bunter he was causing a disturbance and diverting the guards. While they were dealing with Bunter the friends were able to cash in their chips and leave the Casino.
As they were leaving Bunter escorted by the guards was physically thrown out of the door, he landed at the feet of the friends.
'Just a moment Sir,' said one of the guards to Jim.
'We know you were cheating, because nobody takes us for 15 thousand but we don't know how yet. Don't you or your friends ever come back. You're not welcome and we have ways of dealing with the unwelcome,' said the guard going right up to Jim and looking him directly in the face.
'We didn't cheat but we did use our brains,' replied Jim.
The guards left leaving the friends standing there looking at poor old Bunter sitting in the road and just about to take another sausage roll out of his pocket.
'I say you chaps! It's just like the old days, when I used to keep cavy for you when Quelch was on the prowl. 1 could see you were going to have problems with the guards as I saw them going towards you, so I caused a diversion. I've been a member of that casino and I have seen what they do to unwelcome punters,' said Bunter as he stuffed a roll into his mouth.
'What do you think chaps, should we recruit Bunter as our security chief and food taster,' said Jim with a smile in his voice.
'Well we have 15 thousand, let's all go off to Las Vegas and take our chances with the Mafia and if necessary Bunter can be our scapegoat,' said John.
'I say chaps,' replied Bunter, as he stuffed yet another sausage roll into his mouth.