As a ship crosses the ocean, one passenger hits on a seemingly foolproof way to win the gambling pool on its daily progress. Attendants at a gallery are presented with an incredible piece of art tattooed on the back of an old man. Three men are pitted against a venomous krait in an agonisingly tense battle of wits. Machines are invented that can write entire novels with the barest human input — or pick up the shrieks of roses when they are cut. And a small boy's game of spotting snakes in a carpet pattern transforms into something grotesquely, horrifyingly real...