Max Kelada

The war had just finished and the passenger traffic in the ocean-going liners was heavy. 
Accommodation was very hard to get and you had to put up with whatever the agents chose to offer you. 

I was happy that I got a cabin with a fellow British person.

He wasn’t too friendly to me so I offered him a drink.

He looked at me with a confused expression because prohibition was in force and to all appearance the ship was bone-dry.

We became friends.

We ate together, shared a cabin and went everywhere together, but sometimes he was annoyed by my presence.

I decided to run everything on the ship.

From the auctions to prize money and balls.

Everyone called me Mr. Know all.

Mr. Ramsey was a rude man whom always tried challenge me.

He argued with me over everything and never won.

His wife was nice and pleasant.

She had good manners and she was very pretty.

One evening at dinner the conversation by chance drifted to the subject of pearls, my expertise.

We talked about the culture pearls that are made in Japan.

Mr. Ramsay challenged me to identify whether or not his wife’s necklace made out real or fake pearls.

We bet 100$ on their authenticity.

I knew the pearls were real but when i went to check them Mrs. Ramsay’s face had a horrible expression.

I quickly figured that the pearls were real but Mr. Ramsay didn’t know that so i decided to pretend to be wrong.

Next morning me and my partner to the cabin found an envelope addressed to me.

In the envelope there was 100$ bill.

My partner asked me:“Were the pearls real?”

At that moment I knew we will be good friends.