King Con

Chapter Seventeen.

DAKOTA FOLLOWED AS BEANO PUSHED DUFFY INTO the windswept ocean-view hotel lobby. Then he turned right and rolled Duffy through a massive threshold, across an open courtyard, and into the dark, air-conditioned, windowless casino. The sound of trade winds and vibrating palm fronds was quickly replaced by ringing slots and the drone of a dozen Stick-men calling the games at their tables. Beano wheeled the chair across the rich, two-toned purple and red carpet and up to the Cashier's cage.

"Like to deposit some cash an' shoot some craps," Duffy said, his voice shaking now, his palsied hand waving uncertainly in the air as he raised it to get the cage clerk's attention. She looked down and saw him in the wheelchair, then smiled at Beano, who now seemed both bored and angry. Dakota had already split off, heading to the bar.

"Come on, Uncle Harry, you're just gonna lose it like yesterday at the Freeport Princess Casino."

"Don't you start in on me again, Douglas. All you been doin' is carpin' an' complainin'. What'm I supposed t'do, put on one a'them jock strap bathing suits a'yours an' jump in the pool?" He looked up at the clerk, whose name tag said she was CINDY. "Gonna buy fifty thousand in chips, then maybe we could arrange some credit if that runs out." He pushed an envelope full of cash through the cage and watched with red-rimmed eyes while Cindy's nimble fingers counted the bills.

"That's fifty thousand dollars U.S.," she said. "Do you want that all in chips?"

"Yes siree," Duffy trumpeted. "You can deliver it to the nearest table over there and then stand back and watch a master at work."

"Jesus Christ," Beano groaned. "Some master. You been losing worse than the New York Jets."

Cindy shot Beano a look hoping to shut him up, then said, "I could get that credit-ap started if you want. It'll only take a minute."

"Let 'er rip," Duffy honked loudly, which triggered a coughing spasm that doubled him over in the chair.

Cindy got a credit application out of a drawer under the counter. "Could I have your full name?" she politely asked the now-sputtering old man.

"Harry Stanton Price," he said, getting the coughing spasm under control and regaining his composure.

"Place of business?"

"Price Is Right Automotive Center, Fresno, California. I own the sucker," he smiled, but his voice was shaking slightly, his head nodding forward as if it were a constant struggle to keep it up on his wobbly pencil neck.

"Banking affiliation?" she said.

"The Central California Cattlemen's Bank, Fresno," he wheezed at her.

She carefully wrote that down. "Do you have any objections if we contact your bank, Mr. Price?"

"Hell, no! You gotta find out how much I got in there, don'cha? Just tell 'em I'm down here, my luck's finally changed, and I'm about ta kick some serious ass," he said, grinning and letting his head loll slightly over to one side.

'"This should only take a short while, sir… if you want to check back in half an hour. In the meantime, I'll send your rack of chips to table three." She smiled at him and pointed to the nearest crap table.

He waved his hand at her, letting it make small, palsied circles in the air.

"Jesus," Beano moaned, "can't we at least get something to eat, Uncle Harry? You need to take your medicine."

"Y' just don't know how t'have fun," Duffy said weakly, stifling another war with his own lungs. Then he straightened slightly and in a high, reedy voice barked at Beano, "Let's go. Take me, take me… gotta go," he wheezed.

Beano turned and wheeled the chair across the carpet to crap table three.

Cindy watched them go, then picked up the phone in her cash cage and called the Box-man in the pit. "Zig, I'm sending two deadwood players to table three. They bought fifty thousand in chips. They sound like they already dropped a bundle at the Princess in Freeport. I'll send a tray over and get them photographed by Security. You might wanna comp 'em."

The casino Box-man was the individual who was in charge of the crap tables. Luke Zigman was sitting on a metal-backed folding chair with the phone up to his ear. He looked over and saw Beano pushing Duffy up to table three. "The old duck in the rolling seat and the good-looking, red-haired guy?" he asked Cindy.

"That's them. Couple of laydowns if you ask me; keep 'em happy."

"On it." He hung up and watched as a casino employee in a uniform brought over a large tray of colorful chips on a rolling cart and parked it near Duffy's wheelchair.

"Okay, okay, time t'roll, time t'roll," Duffy said, smacking his lips and grabbing some hundred-dollar chips off the tray beside him and throwing them over the rail onto the table, where they bounced on the green felt. "What's the table limit?" he bellowed.

"Two thousand dollars, sir," Zigman said.

"Gimme the big six-eight for two thousand and insurance. Cover the six and ten for five hundred each, the hard way."

Zigman smiled slightly. The big six-eight, hard way, and insurance bets were all sucker plays. He stepped up and watched as the dice were passed to an elderly woman in pink pastel shorts and beach thongs.

"New shooter coming out," the Stick-man said, beginning his unending line of patter known as table barking.

The woman threw the dice and they came up three and five.

"Eighter from Decatur," Duffy shouted. "A winner."

The Stick-man, who was dressed in white shirt, red vest, and tie, corralled the dice with the curved stick and pushed them back to the lady. Then he paid Duffy's big six-eight, which was a winner. Duffy was determined to lose, so he left his winnings on the table, pushing it all on the line. The lady grabbed the dice and immediately rolled a seven.

"Seven, a loser," the Stick-man droned. "The line loses. Pay the don't come." And he scraped Duffy's lost bet off the table. When the dice were passed to Duffy, he looked at them with a practiced eye.

"Be good t'Harry Price, good t'Harry Price," he mumbled at the red translucent cubes. "These are the dice t'pay the price," he chanted maniacally. While Beano looked at the other players apologetically, nobody noticed as Duffy palmed the dice, expertly dropping them between his legs into the Porta-Toilet, at the same time switching them with a set of his brother's Miami-made counterfeits. Then he put the switched dice down on the table. From his wheelchair seat, his head just barely appeared above the rim of the table. He reached over the rail and arranged the dice in a five-two combination of seven. He was giving the Stick-man a good look at his ringer dice to see if they would pass muster at that distance. Nothing happened so, with his "splash move" completed, he picked up the dice and shook them next to his ear.

"Okay, okay. Talk to me. Be nice to Harry Price," he said to the dice in his fist. Then he turned and snapped at Beano, "Get me down on the come line, Douglas. Wanna raise the limit… five thousand."

"I'll approve the bet," Zigman said to the Stick-man, raising the table limit.

There was a gasp from the table and, once his bet was down, Duffy rolled the bones. They came up six and four.

"Point is ten," the Stick-man said.

"Get me down for two thousand, the hard way," Duffy said. And Beano handed the Stick-man two thousand in chips to buy the longshot sucker bet that the ten would eventually get made as double fives, before he sevened out.

Zigman smiled from his place behind the Stick-man. If the old crippled guy kept betting like that, they'd take his whole poke in half an hour.

For the next thirty minutes Duffy threw his money away like a street sucker betting Three-Card Monty. The Box-man grinned as Duffy's chips were repeatedly scraped off the table. Luke Zigman had quickly figured out that the old man was using a Martingale System, which was a complicated betting scheme often employed by losers. It basically consisted of doubling and quadrupling bets after every other loss. Twice Duffy had to ask that the table limit be waived so he could quadruple his bet. Both times this happened he lost, and the Stick-man would rake over ten thousand of the old man's dollars off the table. Duffy ended up being the only player shooting at table three because he was so cold he had become a plague on everybody's luck.

"Jeezus, Uncle Harry… whatta you doing? Don't bet all the hard-ways; it's a jerk-off bet," Beano whined with no effect, as Duffy hissed at him to shut up and did it over and over again. What nobody noticed was that, with each loss, while the Stick-man and Box-man were trying to contain their grins, another pair of casino dice rained down into the Porta-Toilet catch basin under Duffy's bony ass. After he lost a big roll he would yell, "New dice! New dice!" in his wheezy rasp and the casino would only too gladly oblige this loser, pulling his counterfeit dice off the table and supplying him with a new set of casino perfects, which would hit the plastic catch basin under him a few moments later.

"Jeezus, Harry, can't we get outta here?" Beano whined. "You need to take your medicine." But the old man waved him away.

Zigman moved up and whispered to the Floor Manager, "We're gonna Schneider this jerk in less than an hour."

Every employee in the casino knew in minutes there was a major slab of deadwood on table three.

In the Credit Office, the Shift Manager, Arnold Buzini, was waiting for his Credit Manager to confirm the sucker's net worth. Buzini was known around the Sabre Bay Club as the Buzzard, and was leaning over her desk, impatiently tapping his fingers.

"Try and verify him as high as you can," Buzini said; his close-cut hair was steel-gray and he had gray-white skin. He lived indoors and loved to see "leakers" like Harry Stanton Price show up. He lived for dumb bettors with systems.

The Credit Manager was named Angela Hopkins and she had just dialed the Cattlemen's Bank of Fresno, using her new set of McGuire Financial Listings that had been unexpectedly delivered yesterday. After a series of clicks, which she assumed was the island telephone system but was really the rollover call-forwarding mechanism in Fresno, the pay phone at the golf shop, not two hundred yards away, rang.

"Cattlemen's Bank of Fresno, one moment, please," Victoria said in a high sing-songy voice; then she hit one of the numbers on the punch-dial to make a tone sound and held the receiver to her stomach until an island workman's car with a loud muffler passed by. "Yes, how can I help you?" she said, coming back on the line.

"This is the Sabre Bay Club on Grand Bahama and we'd like to get a credit verification," Angela said, while the Buzzard leaned closer to try and overhear.

"That would be Miss Prentiss. One moment, I'll transfer you." And she hit a number on the keypad for a sound effect, then put the phone back up to her ear.

"Louise Prentiss, Personal Accounts Manager," she said, now using her normal voice. She was holding the sheet of paper in front of her with all of the information Beano wanted to impart.

"This is the Sabre Bay Club on Grand Bahama. We're doing a credit check on Mr. Harry Stanton Price. He told us he banks with you."

"That's correct. Let me get his account on screen. Do you have an International Verification Number?" Victoria asked.

"Two-four-five-nine-eight double-zero." Angela gave the number from memory.

"Thank you. How can I help?"

"He's requested a loan from us of two hundred thousand dollars. We need verification up to that amount."

"Is this a casino hotel?" Victoria asked.

"Yes, it is," Angela responded.

"Both Mr. Price's personal account and his Price Is Right Automotive Center bank with us. Mr. Stanton has a net worth in excess of ten million dollars. His cash-on-hand balance is well in excess of the required two hundred thousand. We can reserve it here, but would rather not wire it unless it becomes necessary."

"That's fine. Reserve it and we'll issue the credit and settle with you if need be when he checks out."

Buzini was out of the office before Angela hung up. He made his way across the carpeted casino to where a small crowd had gathered to ooh and aah as Duffy threw his money away with stupid bets on table three.

"New dice," Duffy yelled after each miserable roll. When Buzini got to him, he was down to less than five thousand dollars, and half of that was scraped away two rolls of the dice later.

"Sons-of-bitches," Duffy scowled at the dice. "Losing's worse than a Communist dictator." He looked up at the casino Shift Manager through bloodshot eyes; his head lolling badly to the right side, he had let a fine line of spit drool down his chin.

"It's a pleasure to have you at the Sabre Bay Club," Buzini said, smiling at the horrible-looking cripple, praising his good fortune and thinking the old man would be better off in some vegetable ward at a mainland hospital.

"Goddamn dice, can't buy a fucking winning number," Duffy complained.

"Sir, I'm sorry you're experiencing a run of bad luck," Buzini purred, "but Sabre Bay would like to extend you the courtesy of one of our priority suites. Everything that's here, dinner, the shows, all of the resort amenities, will be complimentary."

"How's my credit check coming? Need more cash," Duffy wheezed.

"I've checked that, sir, and your credit has been approved to two hundred thousand dollars." He smiled, hoping the old leaker didn't croak before he had a chance to lose it all.

"Harry, can we get out of this casino for a while? You've lost enough for one sitting," Beano moaned. "Let's go before you lose the whole car business."

"Goddamned whining and complaining. All you do is groan an' moan an' ruin everybody else's fun."

"Sir, would both you gentlemen honor us by being our complimentary guests for as long as you'd like to stay?" the Buzzard said, exposing his carrion smile.

"Damn right I'll stay, bet yer ass I'll stay. I gotta get even here. Luck's bound ta' change. Bound ta' change."

"Can we at least get something to eat?" Beano whined.

"Our Pelican Room is excellent; the dinner menu is exquisite. I'll bring your room key over to your table. Allow me to make the reservation," Buzini said, wringing his hands and reminding Beano of the manager who ran Rings 'n' Things in Atlantic City.

Tommy finally agreed with his brother, Joe, that Calliope Love was a head-splitting pain in the ass. They were sitting in the bar at the Sabre Bay Club. Tommy had the gunfighter seat, with his back to the wall so he could scope out the hot-looking talent coming up from the pool. His eye had locked onto a brunette in a yellow silk dress the minute she arrived… He could barely pull his gaze away. The dress was little more than a nightgown and his sexual imagination was filling his loins with lust while Calliope's flat Boston vowels were filling his ears with complaints.

"All them little kids down by the pool, screamin', throwin' their Frisbees," she complained, while Tommy was studying the beauty sitting alone at the bar. Several men offered to buy her drinks or to dance to the music of the small calypso band that was set up next to the dance floor. The brunette spurned them all. "You should make it an adults-only hotel, Tommy, I swear," Calliope continued. "It's a casino. Them little brats can't gamble. Why they gotta be here? You just know them little shits is pissing in the pool."

"This was your idea, comin' down here," Tommy growled. "Why don't ya shut yer yap for a while? All you fuckin' do is gimme a fuckin' list a'things that piss you off; I ain't the fuckin' complaint department, okay?" His gaze was focused past Calliope as the brunette at the bar crossed her legs and the slit dress fell away, almost exposing her. Tommy's expert eye had already determined she wasn't wearing anything under the silk dress… no outline of underwear, nothing. She was naked as an egg under there. The only thing keeping his pecker down was Calliope's constant braying.

"The hamburger was absolutely ruined," she observed. "You should talk to the guys that cook at the grill. Tell 'em we don't need our meat burned to charcoal, for Christ sake."

"Why don't you give it a rest?" Tommy sighed, hoping to shut her up.

"I'm only trying to help improve this joint. They overcook everything," she said, pouting slightly, "but maybe the only meat you give a shit about is that tube steak between your legs."

"Stop talkin' like a whore. Joe says you talk like a street hooker and he's right." Tommy moved slightly to his right, so he could see better over Calliope's shoulder. A red-haired man came into the bar, walked up, and started talking to Tommy's almost-naked fantasy Goddess. She made no move to pull her dress back over her legs or to cover her exposed thighs. She also didn't wave the guy off like she had the others. He was too handsome and too tall and Tommy hated him on sight. Then the redheaded man committed the ultimate sin: He put his hand on the Goddess's shoulder and leaned down and whispered in her ear. Tommy dug into his pocket and put five hundred dollars on the table.

"Why don't you go play this?" he said, and Calliope snapped up the money like a hungry tree lizard, tongue-zapping an insect.

She got up and faced him. "Y'know, Tommy, you don't always have to treat me like I'm some kinda rental. I have feelings."

"Right, but ya don't give a shit about mine. You're in my ear all day long… 'Do this, change that.' This ain't my hotel."

"You said it was…"

"Joe makes all the decisions."

"You let him boss you around. He's your little brother, you should stand up to him. He's not so smart."

"Just go blow the five benjies and stop chewing on me."

She turned and walked away, swaying her ass, trying to cool him down by giving him a show, but Tommy missed it. His eyes never left the girl at the bar. When the tall, redheaded guy turned and left her, she immediately motioned for the bartender to get her check. Tommy waved to the bartender, shook his head, then pointed to himself. The bartender nodded, then leaned down and spoke to the girl, who glanced at Tommy. Then she deliberately opened her purse and paid her bill anyway. She got up from the bar stool, started to leave, then abruptly turned and moved toward him. He could see the sway of her hips, see the outline of her nipples through the translucent fabric of her gown. She moved to him, stopped, then put one hand on her hip and smiled.

"I can afford my own drinks. But thanks," she said; her seductive voice whistled like a cold wind blowing across smooth marble.

"They're complimentary," Tommy said. "Compliments of the casino. I'll have the money returned to your room if you give me the number."

"You work for the casino…?"

"I own the casino… From now on your money is no good in this place," he said softly. Then he followed that with his best smile, which would qualify at most hangings as ghoulishly speculative. "Thomas Rina," he said and stood, putting out his hand. She was almost four inches taller and he had to look up at her, but for once he didn't mind being shorter because he was too busy admiring her. She was the best piece of free-floating pussy he had seen in his entire life.

"I noticed a lotta guys asked you to dance… What's wrong, you don't like to dance?"

"Wrong verb," she said coolly, and Tommy's grin widened.

"How'd you like to join me for dinner on the High-roller floor?" he said, thinking he could get her out of here and take her to the private dining room on the key-locked High-roller floor on ten, and avoid running into Calliope. He hadn't given Calliope a key to the High-roller floor because she would probably spew out her complaints and upset the thousand-dollar bettors. He also didn't need her up there dressed in short-shorts and heels, pissing on him in public. This Goddess was different. She was sexy and classy at the same time. "How 'bout you join me for dinner?" Tommy pressed.

"I'm with some people," Dakota smiled.

"Friends?"

"Not exactly… I met 'em in Vegas, flew down here with 'em on their private plane. Now I'm kinda stuck."

"What's your name?"

"Dakota Smith," she said softly, her husky voice sensual and full of promise.

"And that guy you were with over there… he's not your boyfriend?"

"I don't know what he is right now… a mistake, probably."

"Well, things're definitely looking up," Tommy said, again smiling unattractively.

"You own this place? Really?" she said, and he nodded. Then a thought seemed to hit her. "Douglas and his Uncle Harry have a table in the Pelican Room for dinner. They paid my way so I better join them, but I've never been to the High-roller floor. Maybe I could ditch them and meet you for a drink later."

"How 'bout right here, ten-thirty?"

"Make it eleven," she said, smiling at him. "Am I dressed okay for the High-roller floor?" she asked.

"Baby, if you were dressed any better you'd set off the fire alarm."

She smiled and walked out of the bar, turning every head. Tommy didn't usually connect so easily… He had sometimes dated beautiful women, but they were pros and Tommy always had to pay, but luckily, this Goddess was different.

The Pelican Room overlooked the ocean on the mezzanine level. It was elegant, with off-white carpet and dark wood antique tables and chairs. The silver was authentic. Buzini gave Beano and Duffy a key to Suite 10-B. He told them it was one of their best High-roller suites and was on the key-locked tenth level. After he left, Dakota joined them at the table in the magnificent dining room, but was strangely silent.

"You hook up with Tommy?" Beano finally asked.

She nodded. "We're meeting later. He looks worse than I remembered. A housefly in loafers."

Beano nodded and started to say something…

"Don't, Beano. Okay? I'll do my end, you do yours. It's about Carol, not about you and me." She looked at Duffy. "You get the perfects?" she asked, referring to the casino dice.

"Twelve sets. I'm blowin' farts on 'em right now t'keep 'em warm," he grinned.

They ordered dinner but said very little. There was a strange tension between Beano and Dakota that cut through the air like words screamed in silence. Finally, after they finished their coffee, the beautiful mack put down her napkin. "If you're looking for company, you should take Victoria out. Show her your multi-terrain personality. Might stir up some of her bottom sediments."

"Maybe I'll do that," Beano said.

Then Dakota turned and walked out of the restaurant… Neck cartilage snapped all around her.

"You two should lay off," Duffy said.

"I fell in love with her once. She spit me out like fish bones."

"So it's over."

"I know." He tapped his head. "At least in here, I know." Then he got up, pulled Duffy away from the table, and pushed him out of the room.