Gift sense

20

Twenty minutes later, Valentine found himself stuck in traffic on the Strip. Thousands of newly arrived tourists had hit the streets and transformed the city's main thoroughfare into a pedestrian walkway. Horns blared, engines overheated, and cabbies stood on the hoods of their cars and shouted in murderous rage.

Where's a cop when you need one? he wondered. He'd promised to call Roxanne and like an idiot had left her home number on his night table. It hadn't helped that he didn't know her last name and couldn't look her up. He glanced at his watch-nearly five. Flipping the turn indicator on, he maneuvered the Cadillac Nick had loaned him into the front entrance of the Desert Inn. Tossing the valet a twenty, he threw his sports jacket over his shoulder and hit the pavement, the Acropolis shimmering miragelike in the distance.

Florida was never this hot. You could go out at night, walk around, and not be afraid of bursting into flames. He crossed the street in slow motion and caught his breath in the welcome shade of a bus stop. It wasn't any cooler.

By the next block, the heat had risen through his loafers and his feet were burning up. Hundreds of people streamed around him, oblivious to his condition. He looked hopelessly up and down the street. In any other city, there would be someone hawking ice-cold drinks and umbrellas. Not Las Vegas-the only free enterprise here was located inside the casinos.

He heard voices. Women singing, the melodious words floating above his head. No one else seemed to notice. What the hell was going on? Crossing at the light, the voices grew stronger, and he shaded his eyes and stared straight ahead. A block away, he saw Nick's harem of ex-wives standing in the fountains, serenading him.

He was hallucinating, the heat doing tricks with his head. It didn't matter. He'd heard women singing the day before Lois died. God talked to people in strange ways, and there was no doubt in his mind that God was talking to him right now. He started to run.

He was sopping wet by the time he reached Nick's joint, his heart racing out of control. The check-in line was twenty deep, T-shirts flapping over Day-Glo Bermudas, and he went straight to the elevators and bullied his way onto the first available car.

The message light on his bedside phone was flashing. Tearing his shirt off, he placed the receiver to his ear and punched in the code for voice mail.

There was only one message. Mabel.

"Oh, Tony, you were right," his neighbor said, her voice trembling. "The ad ran this morning and I got a call from the postmaster. The police had called him, asked who owned the box. The next thing I know, one of Palm Harbor's finest is standing on my porch. Oh, Tony, it was so embarrassing. He arrested me."

Valentine sat on the bed. Gerry's brilliant idea had gotten Mabel thrown in the pokey. His son was a bad-news buffet.

"They gave me one phone call. Thank God for my MCI calling card. The judge told me I'd better hire an attorney. Who do I call? I've never broken the law. You think F. Lee Bailey would be interested?"

Mabel's voice was drowned out by a drunk woman mutilating an old Carole King song. She'd called him from a payphone in a holding cell.

"That's Sally. She's a bag lady. Anyway, I got arraigned an hour ago. Judge set bail at one thousand dollars. I laughed in his face, told him it would be a cold day in hell before I'd fork over a thousand bucks to him. You should have seen his face!"

Valentine fell backward on the bed.

"Well, I guess I got him pretty mad. He banged his gavel like Judge Wapner and gave me a lecture about propriety in his court. I tried to keep my mouth shut, but you know me… I let him have it right between the eyes. Told him to calm down before he had a stroke. Then I asked him why he was wasting the taxpayers' money arresting me, when every day I drive over to Clearwater Beach and see a hooker on Alternate 19 with her thumb out. Guess what he did then?"

"Here it comes," Valentine said, shutting his eyes.

"Well, he starts to talk, only his face is beet red and there's sweat on his brow, and no words come out. So I say, 'Cat got your tongue, Judge?' and that gets him even madder, and he takes a big gulp of water and looks at me, and I think, You're screwed, Mabel, and then I see him start to froth at the mouth and his eyes roll up into his head and he just keels over right there."

"Sweet Jesus," Valentine groaned.

"Had a stroke. They carried him out on a stretcher. I can't tell you how horrible I felt. Still, he had no right to treat me like a common criminal."

The line went silent and he heard Mabel blow her nose. "Well, now the judge's in the hospital and no one in the jail wants to talk to me. I don't know what to do. I'm sorry to be bothering you, but who else am I going to call?"

Why not Gerry? he thought. He got you into this.

"I'm sure you're mad at your son, but it's not his fault. I'm an old woman prone to stupid deeds. It's my nature, so don't blame him, okay? Well, I guess I've babbled long enough. Can't wait to see the phone bill when I get out of here. If you do get home in the next few days, I'd appreciate it if you'd come down to the Clearwater jail and bail me out."

She honked her nose again and he realized she was crying. Tears of sympathy poured down his face, and he rubbed them away with his sleeve. Grow old enough, and Father Time will find a way to rob you of all your dignity.

A dial tone filled his ear. Valentine dropped the receiver on the pillow and covered his face with his hands.

Rising from the bed, he tore off his smelly clothes and took a cold shower, but not before chaining the door and propping a chair up against it. When he came out, he grabbed a Diet Coke from the bar and sat down at the dining-room table, the phone before him, and he began to hunt for his beloved Gerald.

Burned in his memory were five different phone numbers for his son. They included the apartment in Brooklyn, his saloon, his ex-wife, an ex-girlfriend with whom Gerry had cohabited for two years, and his cell phone. It was Pee Wee, Gerry's bartender, who answered the phone at the saloon, his tongue thickened by whiskey.

"Hey, Mr. Valentine, how's it hanging?"

"Longer than yours," Valentine growled. "Where's my son?"

"Out making the rounds," Pee Wee said. "Wanna leave a message?"

Valentine swallowed hard. Bar owners didn't make rounds.

"You're telling me Gerry is out collecting money?" Valentine said.

"I didn't say that-"

"Is Gerry still running a bookmaking operation?"

"I don't have to answer that question," Pee Wee said.

"It's my bar," Valentine reminded him.

Pee Wee hiccupped into the phone. He was in his early forties and probably wouldn't make it to fifty, the booze taking him down a one-way street with no detours.

"You're on parole, aren't you?" Valentine said. "If I call the cops and they find Gerry's taking bets, they'll put you back in jail, Pee Wee."

"You'd turn in your own son?"

"Goddamn straight I would."

"You're something else," Pee Wee said.

"Answer the question."

"Yeah, he's still taking bets."

Valentine slammed down the phone. Seething, he began dialing Gerry's other numbers, working his way through the list until an unfamiliar young miss with a sultry Puerto Rican accent answered Gerry's cell phone, a radio blaring samba music in the background. He sensed that his son was nearby, perhaps lying in bed beside her, and barked louder than he should have.

"Gerry's not here," she replied timidly. Lowering the radio, she said, "Are you really Gerry's father?"

"That's me. Where is he?"

"I don't know. Why are you such a prick?"

"Is that what Gerry told you? That I'm a prick?"

"He said you were the biggest prick on the planet."

"He wasn't off by much. Where'd he go?"

"I don't know. Why are you such a prick?"

"Maybe I'm just a prick with Gerry."

"Gerry's wonderful," she said, the word melting on her tongue. "Nobody else hates him like you."

That was a lie. Valentine gave her Gerry's ex-wife's and ex-girlfriend's phone numbers and suggested they start a support group. The Puerto Rican woman cursed him and the line went dead.

Valentine sat on the bed and felt his blood pressure rise. As criminal endeavors went, being a bookie required a lot of social skills, and he could see his son being good at many other things, like selling real estate or cars or even stock. It wouldn't be hard to make the switch; it just took desire.

Ten minutes later he called Gerry's saloon again.

"Gerry just came back," Pee Wee informed him. "You want to talk to him?"

"You're psychic," Valentine said.

"Hold on."

When Pee Wee returned, his voice was subdued. "Gerry's in his office on the other line. He asked me to ask you if you had a conversation with a young lady on his cell phone."

"I most certainly did," Valentine said.

"Oh, man," Pee Wee said. "Why'd you give Yolanda those phone numbers?"

"Because he deserved it."

"Hold on."

"Pop, you're killing me," Gerry said moments later, barely able to control his anger. "I've got this crazy bitch on the other line who wants to castrate me on account of something you said. What the hell's wrong now? I thought we had a truce."

When did one conversation constitute a truce? His son was going to have to grovel a lot more before things would ever be right between them. Feeling something inside him snap, Valentine lost control of himself.

"Son of mine, you are one useless piece of garbage. What a mistake I made thinking you had changed. You know that crazy ad you helped Mabel write? Well guess what, meatball: She got arrested for mail fraud. She's sitting in a holding cell down in Clearwater not knowing where to turn."

"Mabel got arrested?" Gerry said. "Geeze, that's too bad."

Too bad? He lost it. "Let me tell you what's too bad. Too bad is when I call the police and have them close you down. Too bad is when I stop bailing you out every time you land in jail."

"Pop, stop it," Gerry said, the edge leaving his voice. "I was just trying to have fun with the old bird. She's a little off in the head, you know? I mean, she's wasting her money running those ads, thinking people care. She gave me a business card. Mabel, Queen of Spoofs. I mean, come on."

"People do care," Valentine bellowed at him. "I care! Just because she's retired doesn't mean she can't make a statement. You think Mabel no longer matters? Well, let me tell you something: She matters plenty. She's decent and strong and God-fearing and likes to make people laugh. I can't remember the last time you embraced any of those things, Gerry."

"Stop it, Pop."

"You hurt my friend, you little shit."

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to."

"You've run out of sorrys."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"It means I want you to fix the problem."

"What are you talking about?"

Valentine glanced at his watch. It was nine p.m. East Coast time and probably too late for his son to catch a plane. He hated the thought of Mabel spending the night in jail, but he saw no other solution. He said, "I want you to fly down to Clearwater tomorrow and bail Mabel out of jail. Then the two of you need to get out of town. Go on a cruise or something. I'll pick up the tab."

"What?" his son said, growing belligerent. "Why don't you help her? She's your friend."

"Because you messed up her life," Valentine barked. "It's called cause and effect. You make a mess, you clean it up. That's the way the world works. Irresponsible little pricks like you are what throws everything out of whack."

"That's right," Gerry said, "blame me for the world's problems."

"You'd better do as I tell you."

"Or what?"

The words left his mouth before he had a chance to catch them. "Or I'll never talk to you for as long as I live."

Gerry coughed. "You mean that?"

Valentine cleared his throat. He'd stepped over the imaginary line that he and Gerry had drawn in the sand a long time ago. They'd been sparring since his son was a teenager-over twenty years-and they'd always remained somewhat civil, until now.

"Yeah," Valentine replied. "I do."

"Jesus Christ," Gerry said.

There was a long silence. Finally his son spoke.

"All right, Pop. You win."

Another silence. Again, it was his son who broke it.

"I'm on the next plane."

"You better be," his father replied.

Valentine was hanging up when there was a knock at his door. Through the peephole he spied Bill Higgins cradling a cardboard box in his arms. He ushered his friend into the suite.

"Wow," Higgins said. "This is some setup. Is Nick comping you?"

"Of course he's comping me," Valentine said.

"You know what they say," Higgins said. "There are a lot of free things in this town, only nobody can afford them." Taking the lid off the box, he dumped its contents onto the dining-room table. "I stopped by Longo's office and got the evidence. He asked me to bring everything back tomorrow, the case still being open."

Higgins pulled up a chair and together they sorted through the evidence. Valentine remained standing, still reeling from his conversation with Gerry. It would be just like his son not to come through. And that would be it, the end of the line. Somehow, he'd always imagined a reconciliation between them, the years of butting heads finally put to rest, the bond between them stronger than it had ever been. Deep down, that was what he had always wanted.

Higgins gave him a funny look. "You okay?"

"I've felt better," Valentine replied. "What have we got?"

"Usual crap. The wiretaps are worth listening to."

From the box Higgins removed a cassette tape and popped it into the tape player he'd brought with him. "We caught Fontaine leaving a message on Nola's answering machine. Call came from a joint called Brother's Lounge. What you're about to hear is Nola trying to call him back and having an acrimonious conversation with the bartender."

Higgins hit Play and they listened to an agitated Nola Briggs calling Brother's Lounge and asking the bartender for Fontaine.

"Sounds like Fontaine was harassing her," Valentine said.

"It does, doesn't it?" Higgins said.

"Anyone talk to the bartender?"

"Yeah. He says Fontaine was a regular until last week."

"You give him a polygraph?"

Higgins scratched the late-afternoon stubble on his chin. "No. But that's not a bad idea, come to think of it."

"Mind if I talk to him first?"

"Go ahead. Only you've got to share with me whatever he tells you."

"Share's my middle name," Valentine said.

"Good," Higgins said. "Then maybe you'd like to tell me what happened at Sherry Solomon's place earlier."

Valentine felt something catch in his throat. Sherry had called Longo and lodged a complaint, and Longo had called Higgins. The question was, who were the police going to believe, a snitch or an ex-cop?

"Nothing much," he lied. "Why?"

"She said you leaned on her. Is that true?"

"I was just poking around."

"Do it again, and Longo will bust you."

"Sorry."

They sorted through the rest of the tagged evidence. Most of it was junk, scraps of paper, scribbled phone messages, the usual bills. In the bottom of the box, Valentine found Nola's diary. He started reading. Every day had an entry, even if it was only a sentence long.

"Anyone study this?" he asked.

"One of Longo's detectives went through it," Higgins replied. "He found seven entries Nola wrote during her trip to Mexico. It's the same story she told us at the station."

"You're saying she's telling the truth."

"The evidence sure looks that way. You still think she's guilty?"

"I sure do," Valentine said.

"You're in the minority, you know."

"I usually am."

The last envelope was tagged with a question mark. In it Valentine found two twisted metal coat hangers.

"Cops found those in a closet," Higgins explained.

"Mind if I straighten them out?"

"Be my guest."

Valentine straightened the hangers out. Both were three feet long and bent in the same spots, with a curved fish hook on one end. They reminded him of the contraptions people used to open locked cars, only he was certain that was not what they were intended for.

Standing, he held one hanger at chest height so the curved end was pointing at the ceiling. He moved the hanger up and down, using the hook to move an imaginary object above his head. The first piece of the puzzle fell into place, and he felt a sense of relief. He'd been right about Nola from the start. She despised Nick, so much that she hadn't replaced the shag carpeting in her house. It had served as a reminder, all these years.

"So what do you think?" Higgins said.

Valentine folded up the hangers and handed them back to him.

"Beats me," he replied.

Twenty minutes later, Higgins left, taking the box of evidence with him. Valentine was chaining the door when the phone rang.

"Why did you poison Sherry's dog?" Nick shouted at him.

"I didn't poison Sherry's dog," he replied stiffly.

"Don't bullshit a bullshitter," his employer retorted. "It ain't healthy."

"I kicked the little floor mop in the mouth."

"Why'd you do that?"

"Sherry sicced him on me."

"Oh," Nick said, backing down. "She does that sometimes when she's in a pissy mood."

"How sweet. Did she move in?"

"Yeah, and I moved out," Nick said. "You and I are neighbors."

Valentine was standing by the picture window in his living room just as the Mirage's volcano spit a mammoth fireball into the pinkish sky. Without thinking, he said, "You're staying at the Mirage?"

"Fuck the Mirage, you stupid Jersey asshole," Nick bellowed. "I'm staying down the hall, room 1201. We're neighbors, as in next door." One of the luxuries of being the boss was not having to watch your tongue.

"Sorry. What happened?"

"None of your fucking business," Nick said testily. "I called because I wanted to hear how your day went."

"Well," Valentine said, "I started out-"

"Not over the phone!"

"Sorry. I'll be right over."

Nick's suite was unlocked and Valentine entered without knocking. The living room was a throwback to the glorious seventies, the walls covered with splashy LeRoy Niemans, the furnishings sparkling chrome and glass. He crossed the tiled floor and noticed a boxy RCA television set propped against the wall. It did not fit in with the cheesy decor, and he noticed a brass plaque screwed into the top. On May 4, 1972, Elvis Presley had stayed in the suite, distinguishing himself by putting a bullet through the TV. The plaque did not say why.

Valentine found Nick sitting at the dining room table while a doctor attended to a puncture wound on his hand. The doctor removed a needle from his bag and swabbed Nick's forearm with alcohol.

"This is going to sting," the doctor warned.

"Great," Nick said, clenching his teeth as the booster was jammed in. To Valentine, he said, "What kind of guy kicks a little dog?"

"One who doesn't want to get bit."

"Only W. C. Fields didn't like dogs," Nick said, flexing his arm as the doctor tried to apply a bandage.

"It was self-defense."

"Me, I love animals. Sherry says she has a dog, I say, 'Bring it over.' Dog comes into the house, sniffs my leg, I bend down to pet it, suddenly the little monster attacks me."

"You let her move in?" Valentine asked, unable to hide his astonishment at Nick's lack of judgment.

"No! I invited her over for some sex and a little dinner," Nick said, feigning innocence. "The next thing I know, she's got a U-Haul parked at the front door. I tried to talk some sense into her, but she wouldn't listen." He shook his head. "Crazy broads. I'm a magnet for them."

"So you moved out."

"Temporarily. If she's not gone by tomorrow, Hoss and Tiny will toss her." The doctor was packing his bag. Nick dug out his wad and tossed him several hundred dollars. "Hey, Doc, I really appreciate you coming over. You're a lifesaver."

Pocketing the money, the doctor handed him a vial of white pills. "These are antibiotics. Take three a day for the next two weeks. And no alcohol."

"Sure thing. Thanks, Doc."

The doctor showed himself out and Nick threw the vial into the garbage. "So, on to more important things. You find any trace of Nola?"

Valentine told him how his day had gone, leaving out Higgins's visit. Bill had stepped over the line by sharing police evidence with him, and telling Nick now would only compromise his friend for the rest of his days. In conclusion, he said, "Look, Nick, you may not want to hear this, but the way I see it, Fontaine's going to show up in your casino again, and Nola's going to be with him. Maybe not physically with him, but with him nonetheless. The more I look at what happened, the more I'm convinced she's the one pulling the strings. Shakespeare said all the world's a stage, and this is Nola's stage we're playing on."

Nick's face was emotionless. His fingers fumbled with a half-smoked stogie that lay in a heart-shaped marble ashtray on the table. As it reached his lips, the tip magically turned orange.

"I still want to see her."

Valentine said, "I just wanted to warn you."

"I want to make peace, you know? Clean the slate."

"She might gouge your eyes out."

"You're a real positive guy, you know that?"

Valentine nearly told him to go to hell. His argument with Gerry was eating a hole in him. It was growing dark outside, and across the street, the Mirage had turned its lights on, the mammoth structure glowing like a thousand-watt bulb.

"You think Fontaine will try to rob us when Holyfield's fighting tomorrow night?" Nick asked.

Valentine gave it some thought. The casino would be dead during the fight, and he said, "Probably not."

"Good. Being that Sherry won't be joining me, I was wondering if you wanted to come."

Valentine did not know what to say. Why was Nick offering him the hottest ticket in town? Then it dawned on him: Nick had lived in Las Vegas for over thirty years but didn't have any friends. He suddenly felt sorry for the guy, even if he was a flaming jerk.

"Sure," he mumbled.

"I'll give it to the bellman if that's the way you feel about it."

"No," Valentine said. "I'd like to go."

"You could have fooled me."

"Seriously."

"You a fight fan?"

Valentine acknowledged that he was. Nick slapped his hand on the empty seat beside him, begging for company. Valentine moved to join him. Then it hit him like a thunderbolt: He hadn't called Roxanne. He glanced at his watch. It was nearly seven. He imagined her at home right now, the steam pouring out of her ears.

Nick practically pulled Valentine into the chair.

"Sit down, sit down," the little Greek said. "I got a story about Muhammad Ali you're not going to believe."