Starting Page

The game starts out with the title and credits page, then sequences to the presentation of the jukebox. You can click on various things at this point (the 'option' key, plus the Mac 'command' key - the 'looped square' button - shows you the active areas on a Hypercard graphic).

When you select the nickel, an involved animation loops the nickel to the jukebox coin slot.

You then get to select A-Y; then you get to the following selection page:

The top three rows are the Fibonacci series; the game goes into much greater detail about that later. The fourth row is a geometric progression. The last row seems to have "someone's" birthday, along with the special numbers on the ends.

The empty selections vary from page to page. There are 625 possible buttons, but there are 518 actual selections because of the blanks. Do the patterns mean anything? The first puzzle I point out to you is one I have not solved. Roger left the arrow keys working, so you can index through these pretty conveniently. They MUST mean something? Don't they? ...

Here is the pattern of blanks, as you go through the alphabetical selections.

...

“Don’t fret about it. Let's play some cards.” He reached in a pocket. “I’ve got a second deck; how about some Russian bank?” 

“No, thanks. I've got to get out of here.” 

He shouted again; still no answer. “Don’t waste your lung power. Captain,” Baldwin advised him. “They’ll come when it suits them and not a second before. I know. Come play with me; it passes the time.” Baldwin appeared to be shuffling the two decks; Gilead could see that he was actually stacking the cards. The deception amused him; he decided to play since the truth of Baldwin’s advice was so evident.

“If you don’t like Russian bank,” Kettle Belly went on, “here is a game I learned as a kid.” He paused and stared into Gilead’s eyes. “It’s instructive as well as entertaining, yet it’s simple, once you catch on to it.” He started dealing out the cards. “It makes a better game with two decks, because the black cards don’t mean anything. Just the twenty-six red cards in each deck count with the heart suit coming first. Each card scores according to its position in that sequence, the ace of hearts is one and the king of hearts counts thirteen; the ace of diamonds is next at fourteen and so on. Savvy?”

“Yes.” 

“And the blacks don't count. They’re blanks ... spaces. Ready to play?” 

“What are the rules?” 

“We’ll deal out one hand for free; you’ll learn faster as you see it. Then, when you’ve caught on, I’ll play you for a half interest in the atomics trust or ten bits in cash.” He resumed dealing, laying the cards out rapidly in columns, five to a row. He paused, finished. “It’s my deal, so it’s your count. See what you get.” 

It was evident that Baldwin’s stacking had brought the red cards into groups, yet there was no evident advantage to it, nor was the count especially high nor low. Gilead stared at it, trying to figure out the man’s game. The cheating, as cheating seemed too bold to be probable.

Suddenly the cards jumped at him, arranged themselves in a meaningful array. He read: 

XTHXY

CANXX 

XXXSE 

HEARX 

XUSXX

"Gulf", Robert Heinlein