Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 104, Nos. 4 & 5. Whole Nos. 633 & 634, October 1994

The Theft of Twenty-Nine Minutes by Edward D. Hoch

©1994 by Edward D. Hoch

With the explosion of gambling on Indian reservations and in states that previously disallowed it, crime associated with the gaming business is bound to be depicted more frequently in fiction through the rest of this decade. If anyone has his finger on the pulse of crime trends, it’s Edward D. Hoch, whose latest caper for Nick Velvet has the lovable thief behind the scenes of riverboat gambling — another popular new venue for the casino crowd...

This was the final gasp of Mardi Gras and the streets of New Orleans were jammed with costumed revelers. Nick Velvet moved among them unnoticed, even though he wore a fringed cowboy shirt and large white hat, with two guns belted to his waist. He felt a certain invincibility in the carnival crowd, where only the worst of crimes brought forth any police response.

Before long he spotted his target, slipping off one of the elaborate parade floats and ducking into a hotel lobby. Nick followed along, pushing past a bottleneck of veiled harem girls. He glimpsed the man in the skeleton costume just entering the men’s room off the bar. Nick stepped inside, waited an instant while a fat man in a tuxedo departed on his way back to the hotel ballroom. Otherwise he was alone with the skeleton. The man had pushed the mask up on his forehead as he moved to the sink and began washing his hands.

Nick drew one of his pistols and said, “Raise your hands. This is a robbery.”

The man looked at him and laughed. “What?”

“The gun is real. Give me your mask.”

“Are you crazy, mister?”

Nick poked the man’s stomach with the barrel of his six-shooter. “Give me the mask or I’ll ventilate you, partner.”

The man quickly slipped the skull mask from his head and handed it over. “Don’t shoot! Here it is.”

“Thanks. Now finish washing your hands and take your time about it. If you come running after me it might not be so good.” Then Nick was gone, out the door and across the crowded lobby to the street.

An hour later, in a hotel across town, he handed over the mask to the woman who’d hired him. “Here it is, one skull mask.”

She smiled as she opened the plastic bag and checked it out. “Any trouble?”

“No.”

“Good. Here’s the balance of your money. It was a pleasure to work with you, Mr. Velvet.”

“The pleasure was mutual.”

He left the hotel room and counted quickly through the money as he waited in the empty hallway for the elevator. It had been one of the smoothest assignments he’d ever carried out. If they were all that easy—

A stocky man with graying hair had come out of one of the other rooms and was walking toward him down the hall. Nick felt a moment of panic as he sensed something familiar about the man, something from way in the past. “Hello, Nick,” the man said as he reached him. “Nice to see you again.”

“I think you must be mistaken. My name’s Dave.”

The man grinned. “Don’t recognize me, do you? Too many years since our last meeting. I’m Charlie Weston — Lieutenant Weston to you.”

The memories came flooding back. First New York, where Weston had been with the 17th Precinct, then a slower-paced New England police force in Eastbridge, Massachusetts, near Plymouth. Nick had stolen some letters from a sign there, and tangled with Weston again after that, but he hadn’t thought about the man in years. “You’re looking older, Charlie. I didn’t recognize you.”

“We’re all looking older, but I spotted you right off.”

“You with the New Orleans Police Department?”

“Yeah. Still a lieutenant, but the weather’s better down here. I’m too old for all that New England snow.”

The elevator chimed and its doors slid open but Weston placed a restraining hand on Nick’s arm. “Come down to my room for a few minutes and we’ll talk about old times.”

“Do I have a choice?”

“No,” Weston said with a chuckle. “You always were a smart boy. I won’t keep you long.”

They went back down to the room as Nick began to wonder what a New Orleans detective lieutenant was doing with a downtown hotel room in the first place. The room was identical to the one Nick’s client occupied a few doors away. Nick settled into a chair and waited for Charlie Weston to start talking. When he did speak, his words couldn’t have surprised Nick more. “I want you to steal something for me.”

“Come on, Charlie.” Nick tried to laugh, growing more apprehensive by the second. “I haven’t done that sort of thing in years!”

“No? Then you can hand over the money in your pocket. Let’s stop kidding around, Nick. I arranged for you to come here, but that other business was just a blind. I need you for something important.” Nick studied the lined face opposite him, trying to read something into those half-remembered features. “All right,” he said at last, realizing he was in a trap even if he didn’t quite understand the nature of it. “What did you want stolen?”

“Time. Twenty-nine minutes of time.”

“Time! How does anyone steal time?”

“That’s for you to figure out. I want twenty-nine minutes stolen from the five hundred or so customers and employees aboard a gambling ship docked on Lake Pontchartrain.”

“It can’t be done,” Nick said immediately. “At least not by me. I only steal objects of no value. Certainly you must know that time is money, as Benjamin Franklin and others have told us.”

Weston uttered a curse. “We’re not playing games, Velvet. If you refuse to help me, I’ll arrest you on the spot for stealing that man’s mask. The victim and the woman who hired you are both prepared to testify.”

“So it was all set up in advance. Tell me, what’s the sentence for stealing a two-dollar Halloween mask in New Orleans?”

“Enough to make you regret it. Our judges don’t like you Northern criminals importing your crimes into Louisiana.”

“I can remember when you were a Northerner yourself, Lieutenant.”

“What’s your decision?”

“All right,” Nick said with a sigh. “How much are you paying me?”

“You have half of twenty-five thousand in your pocket right now, and you already received the other half.”

Nick Velvet smiled and shook his head. “No, we start fresh. Another twenty-five or it’s no deal.”

“All right, but after you do it.”

“I’ll need money for supplies in advance. The only way you can steal twenty-nine minutes from a boatload of people is to drug them, and that—”

“No drugs.”

“What?”

“No drugs. When I say twenty-nine minutes I mean exactly twenty-nine minutes, not twenty-seven or thirty-one. Any sort of drug you could give to five hundred people would be too variable in its effects.”

“I don’t know how it could be done without drugs.”

“That’s what I’m paying you for.”

“When is this to take place?”

“It must be this coming Friday night, the eighteenth.”

“That doesn’t give me much time. Seventy-two hours.”

“I’ve seen you work. You can do it.”

“May I ask why you need this done?”

“No.”

“Is it police business or something private?”

“That’s not your concern.”

“All right. Tell me about this gambling ship.”

“It’s one of two anchored on the lake, just north of the city. The other is quite legal but there’s a question about the Cajan Queen that’s being argued in the courts right now. They claim they’re not technically a gambling ship because the gambling only follows a full evening’s entertainment including dinner and a stage show. And the ship is designed to look like an old Mississippi riverboat. But that needn’t concern you. Take a look at the place tomorrow night and figure out how you’re going to do it.”

“By Friday.”

Charlie Weston nodded. “It must be Friday, or I’ll have you in a jail cell before you know what’s happening to you.”

The first thing Nick did when he reached his hotel room was to phone Gloria at home and tell her what had happened. “Nicky, you’re in trouble,” she decided when he’d finished talking. “How can we get you out of this?”

“He’ll probably have someone tailing me, so I have to go through the motions. That’s what I’m calling about. Could you fly down here in the morning and help me out?”

“What do you need?”

“I want to visit the Cajan Queen tomorrow night, have dinner, take in the show, and do a little gambling. Then I’ll know better what has to be done.”

“I’ll catch the first plane,” she promised.

Seeing her come off the jetway shortly before noon the next day, Nick was reminded once more why he’d stayed with Gloria all those years, even without a marriage license. Her hair was starting to gray now, and she refused to color it, but there was still the sense of ironic good humor about her. She viewed all of life as an amusement, one designed especially for her, and Nick was the greatest amusement of them all. She was probably the only sort of woman with whom he could ever have been content.

“Have a good flight?” he asked, giving her a quick impersonal kiss.

“It was smooth, I think. I dozed most of the way.”

“You’re not used to getting up early.”

“I guess not. What’s this place we’re going to tonight?”

“A gambling ship docked on Lake Pontchartrain, just north of the city. Only they don’t advertise the gambling. They simply call it the complete experience, like a theme park or something.”

That evening, having phoned for reservations and been told they must arrive promptly at seven, Nick and Gloria set out for the ship. It was actually on the north side of the lake, across a twenty-nine-mile-long toll causeway, and Nick entertained Gloria on the way with bits of knowledge he’d picked up during his stay. “It isn’t really a lake at all. If you look on a map you can see it’s a shallow extension of the Gulf of Mexico.”

“Is it legal to have gambling ships here?”

“The state approved one of them, and they’re building a huge casino in New Orleans. The Cajan Queen is another matter. A man named Roster owns and operates it. He claims he’s competing with organized crime, running the only honest games in the Southeast. The state’s trying to close him down but it’s not that easy.”

“You got all that from Lieutenant Weston?”

“Most of it.”

“What’s his angle with these twenty-nine minutes?”

“I don’t know,” Nick admitted.

He turned the rented car off the north end of the causeway and they headed for the brightly lit old-time riverboat anchored next to a large parking lot that was already almost full. Nick had to admit the whole thing was quite an operation. They were met at the top of the gangplank by an attractive young woman in a gold-braided naval uniform who delivered her welcoming lines with feeling. “Welcome aboard the Cajan Queen! Is this your first time with us?”

“Yes, it is,” Gloria told her.

“It’s so nice to greet new friends. If you’ll proceed through those doors to the dining room, dinner is ready to be served. After that you’re invited to our hour-long stage show in the ship’s theater. Then you’ll have three hours to wander among the gaming tables if you desire. We close promptly at midnight.”

“Thank you,” Nick told her.

“Have a wonderful evening!”

The food, with a choice of three entrees, was in the manner of pre-cooked airline meals. Judged by those standards it was pretty good and certainly reasonably priced. The food and the show were obviously designed to lure customers to the gambling later on. It wasn’t exactly Las Vegas or Atlantic City, but Nick guessed from the full dining room that they were doing well. The show consisted of a couple of forgettable comic acrobats. No one complained that it lasted only a bit over thirty minutes. By that time they were anxious to get to the gaming tables and slot machines.

“They’re making a ton of money here,” Gloria commented later in the evening, joining Nick with a paper cup brimming with quarters.

Before he could reply he spotted Lieutenant Weston moving down the aisle toward them. He introduced Gloria and commented on the size of the crowd. “It’s like this every night,” Weston assured him. “Got any ideas?”

“Just one. I’d like to meet your friend Roster, the owner.”

“He’s not exactly my friend,” Weston said, letting his eyes scan the room. “He’s always here by midnight to cash up, but sometimes he arrives late— No, there he is, by the roulette table. Come along.”

Abe Roster proved to be a slender, dark-haired man with sharp features and a smooth manner of talking. He stared at Nick Velvet as if trying to memorize every detail of his face, paying scant attention to Gloria. “You’re a friend of Weston’s?” he asked, trying to confirm the relationship.

“An acquaintance. Actually I’m a professional magician.” Gloria raised an eyebrow but said nothing. “Nicholas the Great. I’d like a chance to try out my act for you. It would be a big improvement over the acrobats.”

“A magician.” He glanced now at Gloria. “What do you do — saw the little lady in half?”

“It’s much more original than that. Let me try it on Friday night. I’ll perform free, as an audition. If you like the act we’ll talk about a contract.”

Abe Roster rested his hand on Nick’s shoulder. “Look, friend, I know the show’s not the greatest. Neither is the food. It’s the gambling people come for, but I’ve got legal problems. The rest of it is thrown in to keep the politicians happy.”

“Still, it wouldn’t cost you anything to give me a try.”

The slender man squinted at Nick. “Nicholas the Great, huh? Lots of cute girls in tights?”

“A few.”

He turned away, then turned back again at once. “All right, I’ll go for one night, a free audition. Impress me and we’ll see about more appearances. Tell my stage manager what you’ll need as far as props, lighting, and rehearsal time go.”

“Thank you, Mr. Roster. You won’t regret it.”

“I hope not. If you’re a friend of Weston’s I guess you’re all right. One thing to remember — we bill the show as running an hour, but keep it short. I want them on the gaming deck with their money.”

“Don’t worry,” Nick told him.

He walked away and Gloria tugged at Nick’s sleeve. “What’s all this about a magic act?”

“How else am I going to steal twenty-nine minutes, except by magic?”

Friday was already almost upon them, and Gloria got the assignment of hiring four girls and renting costumes for the act. Nick spent all day Thursday on the riverboat, going over his act with the stage manager. He was a sandy-haired young man named Dominick Powell, and as he listened to Nick he simply scratched his head. “I don’t know. I never heard of anything like this.”

“That’s why I do it, because it’s original. When I was a kid I saw a magician borrow a watch from a member of the audience, wrap it in a handkerchief, and smash it with a hammer. Then his assistant brought out a loaf of bread on a tray. He unwrapped the bread and there was a live rabbit inside the loaf. On a ribbon around the rabbit’s neck was the watch the magician had borrowed. I never forgot that trick.”

“But you’re talking about a much bigger trick.”

“I hope so. This is the nineteen nineties. Everything’s bigger!”

“Gambling sure is. I never thought they’d have it all over the country with casinos on Indian reservations and riverboats, with lottery tickets sold out of machines at the supermarket and new states jumping on the bandwagon about every month. There’s too much organized crime getting involved, though. An honest man like Abe Roster doesn’t stand much of a chance.”

“What do you mean?”

Powell shrugged. “He’s been offered money for this place, but he keeps turning it down. Billy Burdeck told him his time is running out.”

“Who’s Billy Burdeck?”

“You must be new to the Gulf Coast. Burdeck controls most of the important gambling between here and Florida. He wants Abe out, one way or another.”

“Well, all that business doesn’t concern me,” Nick told him. “Let’s get on to the lighting for my act.”

Later Nick strolled around the ship, noting especially the lack of clocks on board. Casino operators never liked to remind gamblers of the time. What few clocks there were, in offices and employee locker rooms, would be controlled by a central clock, probably on the ship’s bridge.

As he was coming down the gangplank in the late afternoon he saw Lieutenant Weston sitting in an unmarked police car waiting for him. “Get in, Nick. We have some things to talk over.”

He slid into the front seat next to the detective. “Everything’s on target for tomorrow night.”

“Tell me how you’re going to do it, how you’re going to steal the twenty-nine minutes.”

“Let it be a surprise,” Nick told him with a smile.

“You were talking before about drugging them, knocking everyone out. That’ll never do.”

“I understand that. It’ll be something else.”

“See, here’s the point,” the detective began, frowning as he tried to get his thoughts across in the fewest possible words. “The time has to be taken away from them, from everyone on the boat. The idea of drugging people removes them from the time, which continues as usual. I don’t want that.”

“That’s pretty deep philosophy, but I guess I understand what you’re saying. If I’m successful I’ll be stealing the twenty-nine minutes from them and from the Cajan Queen itself.”

“Exactly! That’s what I want.”

“I need money for expenses.”

Weston handed over an envelope. “That should cover it.”

“The police down here must pay better than up north,” Nick observed, glancing inside the envelope.

“Don’t ask questions.” Nick started to leave the car. “And be careful. I don’t want anything happening to you before tomorrow night.”

Back at their hotel Gloria reported on her activities. “I’ve hired four models for tomorrow night. One of them even worked on the Cajan Queen before, so she’s perfect. They’ve been fitted for their costumes and they know what to do. A dress rehearsal tomorrow afternoon should top it off. How about you?”

“The lighting is set. I’ll pick up a few props in the morning. Charlie Weston’s getting edgy. I wish I knew what was going on.”

“Edgy in what way?”

“He warned me to be careful.”

“I suppose Abe Roster wouldn’t be too happy if he discovered we were trying to pull this off.”

“I don’t know if it’s Abe he’s worried about. My problem is that I don’t know if Charlie Weston is an honest cop or a crook. A long time ago when I knew him he was honest. Now I’m not so sure. When you talk about stealing twenty-nine minutes from the patrons of a casino the first thing that comes to mind is a robbery. That’s just about how long it would take for a gang to hold up the place and make off with all the cash.”

“But he told you he didn’t want them knocked out. If he was planning a robbery that’s exactly what he would want.”

“Let’s see what happens at tomorrow’s rehearsal.”

Gloria chuckled. “Nicky, the master magician!”

“It may be the start of a whole new career!” he told her with a grin.

In the morning he rented a tuxedo, a cape, and a top hat for the show, then made the rounds of certain other suppliers for some needed equipment. After lunch, with Gloria and the four costumed assistants on the stage, he went through an outline of the show. The auditorium itself ran between two decks of the Cajan Queen, with guests entering from the dining room on the upper level, walking down to take their seats for the show, and then exiting at the front directly into the gaming rooms. There was seating for four hundred and seventy-five, but Nick had been told the reservations for that evening totaled just four hundred seventy-two. In addition, the casino workers, chefs, waiters, security guards, and other employees added up to forty-five people. Most of the waiters and waitresses doubled in the casino after the dinner hour, using the show time to clean up and change their uniforms.

The four girls, Bonnie, Clair, Theresa, and Kimberly, were all attractive. Gloria’s choice of costumes was perfect, with sequins and legs notably on view. Nick showed them the claim checks they’d be using and explained what to do.

“You go up each of the aisles collecting every watch and clock in the audience. You rip the claim checks on the perforations, give this half to the audience member and stick the other half on the watch. They’re self-adhesive and peel right off after you return the watches at the end of the trick. You put the watches in these bags.”

Gloria had her doubts. “You’re not going to get every one. Some people simply won’t part with a valuable watch for a magic trick.”

“It doesn’t matter, so long as we get most of them. And I think we will. If my patter is convincing enough, ninety percent of those people will surrender their timepieces.”

“Then what?”

“Once we get the bags backstage you take out the watches and set them all ahead twenty-nine minutes.”

“Four hundred watches?”

“There’ll be four hundred seventy-two in tonight’s audience, or maybe a few less with no-shows. Figure about four hundred watches. The girls will help you when they’re not on stage. We get the watches at the beginning and then do our other tricks while you’re changing them. When the watches are all changed you signal me for the finale. Regular analog watches will go fast, five seconds each at most. Some people still wear digitals and they’ll take a bit longer, maybe ten seconds. Figure you’ll do about ten a minute, per person. There’ll be at least three of you working on it all the time — thirty watches a minute. With luck they’ll be finished in fifteen minutes, but we can risk twenty if necessary. Five minutes at the beginning to collect the watches, five minutes at the end to return them. We’re off the stage in thirty minutes. With the missing twenty-nine minutes they’ll think they got an hour’s show and they’ll be ready to gamble.”

Gloria wasn’t so sure. “I’d know the difference between a half-hour and an hour.”

“These people will have eaten a meal, had a few drinks. We’ll keep the stage show moving fast, so time seems to be passing. If they’re in doubt they’ll find a clock somewhere and confirm that an hour has passed. That won’t be easy, though. In keeping with the old casino tradition there are no wall clocks in the gaming rooms. And you’ll notice there are none here in the auditorium.”

“How will you change the others?”

“They’re controlled by a master clock on the ship’s bridge. I’ll do it just before the show starts.”

“Many of the employees will have watches.”

“I’ll take care of that,” Nick told her. “Now let’s get on with the rehearsal. Remember, girls, we have to move fast on everything. Lots of tricks. We’re doing an hour’s show in thirty minutes.”

Most of the tricks were simple things with cards and flowers and a pair of doves. One involved linking rings, an old favorite with magicians. Nick had known a few and had learned the others from a magic book. His performance wouldn’t win any prizes, but he didn’t need prizes. He only needed to keep things moving for thirty minutes.

They ran through the entire show twice, cuing the lighting and even giving Gloria and the girls some practice at quickly resetting the time on various types of watches. Shortly after five o’clock, Nick was finally satisfied that they were ready. The six of them left the ship and went off to eat at a nearby restaurant. The four assistants had slipped coats over their costumes so they wouldn’t have to change again. Nick soon discovered that Clair was the most outgoing and knowledgeable of the four girls. Just nineteen, she’d worked as a dancer in a show on the Cajan Queen over the Christmas holidays and even knew Abe Roster.

“Actually you could put on almost anything and the audience would be satisfied,” she told them. “They’re on board to eat, drink, and gamble. Mr. Roster puts on the show because it looks good in the ads, and it gives some of the dining-room staff time to change into their casino outfits.”

“Midnight seems awfully early to close,” Nick said.

“He’s trying to get the hours extended, but it’s tough. The whole operation violates the spirit of the gaming laws. He’s in trouble with the authorities and the other gambling ship — the legal one — that operates on the lake. Not to mention Billy Burdeck’s goons, who just want him out of business.”

Nick nodded. “The gambling boss. Someone else mentioned him too. Tell me, Clair, just what is the procedure on board the Cajan Queen when it closes?”

She shrugged, thinking about it. “First they shut down the tables and machines and clear everyone out. They figure about fifteen minutes to empty the ship of customers. Then the money is taken to the cashier’s office to be counted. The employees are all gone in another ten minutes and Abe Roster and his cashiers count up before locking the money in the safe overnight. An armored car picks it up in the morning.” She grinned at him. “Thinking of robbing the place?”

“No, I just do what I’m paid for.”

By six-thirty cars were beginning to arrive in the parking lot. Though they still had ninety minutes before show time, Gloria suggested they start back to the riverboat. Nick left them to ready things for the show while he made his way up to the ship’s bridge. Since the Cajan Queen never left its dock, there was no need to have crew members on the bridge. It was unoccupied now as Nick entered and checked on the clock. He saw at once that it would be a simple task to push it ahead by twenty-nine minutes, changing the other clocks as well.

By the time he heard the slight sound of the opening door behind him, it was too late to hide. He turned and looked into the cold gray eyes of Abe Roster, holding a 9-mm automatic pistol in his hand. “The silent alarm system works quite well on my ship, Mr. Nicholas. Please raise your hands.”

Nick Velvet smiled. “Put away the gun, Abe. I’m about to perform the greatest trick you’ve ever seen. I’m about to save your life.”

The curtains parted to a recorded drum roll exactly at eight o’clock. Working the lighting panel, Dominick Powell spoke the announcement into his microphone. “Ladies and gentlemen, the Cajan Queen is proud to present — Nicholas the Great!”

Nick stepped forward and doffed his top hat, pulling from it endless bouquets of flowers, throwing his white gloves in the air where they became a pair of doves, tapping his cane on the stage to give birth to a momentary fountain. The audience gasped and applauded. He had them, for the moment. The girls appeared behind him, two on either side.

After a few words of greeting, Nick told the men and women in the seats before him, “Because time is the enemy, time is a liar, and time is out of joint, I will ask my lovely assistants to pass among you and collect all watches, clocks, hourglasses, and timepieces. You will be given a claim check for them and they will be returned, though perhaps not in the condition they are now.”

The audience stirred uncertainly, but Nick was pleased to see that most of those in the front row parted with their timepieces. The assistants in their glittery costumes worked with charm and precision, as if they’d been doing it like that for months. When they delivered the four cloth bags to the stage and placed them in a pile at Nick’s feet, he knew the trick was going to work. One of the assistants brought him a heavy sledgehammer and he proceeded to whack each of the bags several times. The crunch of smashing metal could be heard over the gasps of the audience. For the first time Nick spotted Lieutenant Weston in the second-to-last row, watching him intently. He gave the bags a final kick and resumed the rest of his act.

He ran through a few card tricks, seated on the edge of the stage, then tried the linking rings. When one of them got away from him and clattered onto the stage he had a joke for the occasion. The audience loved it. Finally, when he’d exhausted all his tricks and patter, he glanced into the wings. Gloria gave him a thumbs-up sign. Two of the spangled girls rolled out a large pie. With a recorded fanfare Nick produced a sword and cut across the top of it. They pulled out a bag identical with the ones still on stage and Nick opened it, feigning surprise as he removed a wristwatch with a tag stuck to it.

“Number thirty-two!” he called out. A man came up to claim the watch, which was indeed his. The audience broke into cheers and the rest of the watches were quickly returned to their owners.

Nick bowed and left the stage, then returned with his four assistants for a final curtain call. He received a hug from Gloria as he hurried backstage. “It was perfect, Nicky! You’ve got a new career.”

“I’m afraid I wouldn’t last long among real magicians. Come on, let’s mingle with the customers and try to change any slow watches we discover.”

He heard a woman leaving the auditorium say to her husband, “My watch is a half-hour slower than yours.” Gloria immediately moved in and insisted it was nine o’clock, right on the dot. The woman asked someone else and received the same answer. She shrugged and reset it. “I’ve never known it to lose time like that before.”

Nick moved among the players in the casino, watching the blackjack tables and the roulette wheels, looking for something, somewhere. About an hour later, Charlie Weston joined him. “How’d you do that trick with the watches? I had my eyes on those bags every minute. They never left the stage.”

“It’s a trade secret,” Nick answered with a smile.

“The clock out by the reception area is a half-hour fast.”

“Twenty-nine minutes fast, to be exact.”

“How’d you manage it, Nick?”

“For what you’re paying, you get results. Explanations cost extra.”

“I thought your show was an audition for Abe Roster, but he didn’t come in to watch it.”

“We had a talk earlier.”

That seemed to surprise the detective. “You did? What about?”

“Stick around till midnight and I’ll tell you.”

Weston glanced at his watch. “It’s not even ten yet.”

“You’re slow, Lieutenant. It’s ten twenty-four to be exact. You’d better reset your watch.”

“Yeah. Sure.” But he did it.

“What about the rest of my money?”

“Meet me on the dock at midnight, when the place closes. You’ll have it then. I’ll be in a red Olds at this end of the parking lot.”

Nick spent the next ninety minutes searching through the ship, but it was a useless task. There were too many places to hide something, and too many security guards likely to pounce on him if they found him outside the public areas. He would have to confront Charlie Weston, even if it meant losing the balance of his money.

He made sure Gloria and the girls were off the Cajan Queen by eleven forty-five. “Pay them off,” he told Gloria, “but make sure they don’t go back on board. You either. Go over to the rental car and wait for me there. If for some reason I don’t join you by twelve-fifteen, drive back to the hotel and I’ll meet you there later.”

“Nicky, what is all this? What’s going to happen to the ship?”

“Later,” he told her.

Nick strolled along the front row of cars until he spotted the red Olds. Lieutenant Weston was already inside behind the wheel and he motioned for Nick to get in next to him. It was just before midnight by Nick’s new improved time, and people were starting to leave the ship. He didn’t worry about what they’d think when the clocks in their cars revealed a discrepancy of twenty-nine minutes.

“All right,” Weston said when Nick was in the car. “Here’s the rest of your money.” People were streaming down the gangplank now.

“I need some information from you,” Nick said, starting to reach for the envelope.

“What information?”

“Where is the bomb hidden?”

Charlie Weston snorted, then squinted at Nick through half-closed eyes, the lights from the riverboat playing across his face. “What bomb? What’re you talking about?”

“Do I have to explain it, Charlie? You had money to spend on luring me down here, money to pay me to steal those twenty-nine minutes. That’s more money than any police lieutenant earns, if he’s honest. I’ve heard how Billy Burdeck controls gambling along the Gulf Coast. You don’t get that big unless you pay people off, including cops. You’re on Burdeck’s payroll, aren’t you? But tonight he’s trying something that even you couldn’t stomach. You couldn’t go to your superiors without admitting your own involvement so you got the idea of luring me to New Orleans and hiring me.”

Weston scratched his nose. “Keep talking,” he said grimly.

“You hired me to steal twenty-nine minutes from the customers and employees of the Cajan Queen. I had to ask myself why. What would it accomplish? Well, I was told that the management allows fifteen minutes after closing to empty the ship of passengers, and another ten minutes for the employees to depart after delivering the money to the cashiers. Naturally I was thinking about a robbery, but why would that upset you so much and get you to put up your own money to safeguard these people? Certainly a robbery, even a violent one, wouldn’t be likely to harm more than a handful of people. Yet by emptying the ship twenty-nine minutes early you seemed to be worried about almost everyone on board. That’s when it dawned on me. It wasn’t going to be a midnight robbery but a midnight bomb — something strong enough to destroy the Cajan Queen and most of the people on it. I asked myself if that made sense. Was there any reason why Billy Burdeck would want the bomb to go off at midnight rather than four in the morning or two in the afternoon? Yes, a very good reason. Abe Roster was always on board at midnight to total up the night’s receipts.”

For a moment Weston said nothing. He seemed to be watching two couples who’d left the Cajan Queen together and were chatting on the dock by a moored powerboat. One couple apparently had come by water and now they were parting. “You’re a smart guy, Velvet. You always were. Maybe we should have switched jobs back about twenty years ago. You’d probably have made a better cop than I did.” He paused and asked, “Is Abe still on board?”

“No,” Nick told him. “I needed to have him change the ship’s clocks and have the employees change their watches. I told him it was my best trick — I was going to save his life.”

The detective glanced at the car’s clock. “It’s almost a quarter to twelve, real time.”

“Where’s the bomb hidden, Charlie? Abe Roster’s safe. What good will it do you or Burdeck to kill the innocent people still on board?”

“Tell me how you did the trick with the watches,” Weston countered.

Nick sighed. “My assistants left the real bags behind the last row of seats and picked up duplicate bags full of junk to bring on stage. While everyone was watching me go to work with the sledgehammer Gloria sneaked out behind the audience and picked up the real bags. She and the girls changed the times backstage. Now where’s the bomb?”

“There isn’t any bomb on the ship.”

“Then why were you so anxious to get the people off early?”

“Burdeck is launching a radio-controlled motorboat from across the lake. It’s filled with explosives. It’ll hit the Cajan Queen at midnight or just before.”

Nick heard the words even as his eyes caught sight of a familiar figure running back up the gangplank. It was Clair, one of his four assistants, and Gloria was running about twenty feet behind her.

Nick was out of the car in an instant, shouting to Gloria as she ran up the gangplank after the girl. “Gloria! Come back! It’s ten to twelve!”

Weston was out of the car too. “She’s a fool to go back on board.”

Nick turned and grabbed him by the shirt. “You’ve got to stop Burdeck’s boat!”

“Can’t be done. I think it’s already started. He must have seen that everyone was leaving early.”

“What do you mean?”

“Out there,” the detective pointed. “See the running lights? That’s the direction it would be coming from.”

Nick couldn’t see it for a moment. Then he spotted it, moving moderately fast and definitely headed toward them. He glanced quickly around, his options fading. He took a deep breath and plunged forward toward the couple just getting into their little boat. “Police!” he shouted. “I’m commandeering your boat!” He shoved the man back into the woman’s arms, grabbing the key already in his hand. Then he was into the powerboat, casting off the line as the man shouted after him.

He gunned the engine and shot straight forward, swerving just in time to avoid his own collision with the riverboat. He felt comfortable on the water, remembering his sailing days on Long Island Sound, and headed straight out onto the lake. For a moment he couldn’t see the running lights on the other craft, but then he picked them up, a hundred yards away and closing fast. He turned on his boat’s spotlight and targeted the other craft. There was no one visible aboard it.

Nick took a deep breath and turned the wheel slightly, setting a course to intercept it. The explosion, when it came, lit up the shoreline like a sudden midnight sun.

When Gloria unlocked the door of their hotel room Nick was just stepping out of the shower. “My God, Nicky, I thought you were—!”

“Dead?” he asked with a grin. “Only a bit messy from swimming around in that scummy water. I feel better now. I swam in a bit up the shoreline and didn’t want to bother explaining it all to the police. I found a cab to bring me back. Sorry to give you a fright.”

She hugged him, close to tears. “Lieutenant Weston thought you were dead for sure. When I left he was telling them all about it, about Billy Burdeck wanting to blow up the Cajan Queen and kill Abe Roster.”

“When I saw you run back after Clair I knew I had to save that boat somehow. What happened? What went wrong?”

Gloria shook her head. “You wouldn’t believe it! I told the girls we’d gotten everyone off early because something would happen on board at midnight. As soon as she heard that, Clair went wild. It seems they’d started having an affair when she appeared in that other show on the ship recently. She was in love with Roster and was trying to save him.”

Nick finished drying his hair with the bath towel. “Did Weston tell the police about my stealing twenty-nine minutes from the customers?”

“I doubt it,” Gloria told him. “Who would ever believe that?”