Murder in Vegas

CATNAPPING by Gay Toltl Kinman

When I hit Las Vegas, which wasn’t often, I usually headed for the MGM and a certain blackjack table, my heart palpitating over its normal range-not good for a guy at fifty, and a beefy 6’2” one.

This time I strode into the Mirage, my heart in the same condition. A pair of beauties they were, I was told. Blue-eyed, white, with paws as big as dinner plates, the Siberian Tigers held court in their den with all of their admiring subjects on the other side of a thick glass partition.

The male paddled around in his pool, and just like every other male of any species, watched her, the female, sprawled ladylike on a ledge, one leg draped over the edge, asleep.

Perhaps.

Was he waiting for her to wake up so he’d have company? Or an audience? Was she sleeping, or just pretending? Would he wake her up when he couldn’t stand to be alone anymore?

Was he any different from me?

Everyone loved those tigers judging by the crowds in front of the glass, and in the shop buying stuffed replicas.

But someone loved them a lot more.

And that’s the real reason I was here.

Someone was planning to steal them. I was here to stop him.

“Why” was a question, but not the question. The question was how. If I knew that, my job as a P.I. would be a lot simpler. I liked simple these days, but that wasn’t what I was getting.

The other reason I was here was Marge. She’s a dental hygienist in Los Angeles, and she was attending a convention at the hotel.

I could tell them right off from the other conventioneers. The jokes. Like what ride in amusement parks do hygienists like most? The molar coaster. How can you not like them?

Oh, yeah, there was a third reason I was here.

My daughter.

Marge said I had to call her this time, arrange to meet her, blah, blah, blah.

Marge knows how to get me to do what she wants. So the call was on the agenda, but first I had to stop a catnapping.

Before I let the management know I was ready to start work, I started. I closed out those beautiful furry bodies and looked around the den. Fake rocks, cavelike on three sides, with a ledge on the left, walkways and a real cave on the right. Above, blue sky. Nothing in between.

Couldn’t imagine trying to steal those two. Pussycats they looked like, but I wasn’t going in there to find out. Not on your life, or rather mine.

I took out my notepad and jotted down a few things. Can’t believe how much I forget things these days. It can only get worse was a thought that didn’t thrill me, so I didn’t think about it anymore.

Instead, I took a moment to think about the good things in life-Marge, the tigers, and dinner tonight at Tillerman’s, where the locals go. A nice Chivas on the rocks in the lounge first, then seated at my favorite table with fresh lobster-and it always was, ironic for a place out here in the desert, but that’s Vegas-with a bottle of Raymond Cab.

Enough of that, back to work. I went to the Security Office and met up with Doug Hassenfeld, the Chief. We’d worked LAPD together. I’d done a few cases for him before.

We chatted a bit about life in general, what was it like back in Los Angeles now, how’s the wife. He knew mine was dead, the big C, about the time he took the job here. I hadn’t introduced him to Marge yet, but I would.

He had another officer, Karen Grafton, and one of the tigers’ trainers, Melissa Caldwell, show me everything. I mean everything. Somehow those two pussycats weren’t looking so cute anymore, particularly when I learned the amount of poop they produce and what it looks and smells like. Not too surprising that there was a lot of it when I saw what they ate. They ate well. But, again, that’s Las Vegas.

They herded the two out while I climbed around the den in borrowed boots. The smell was something I hadn’t expected.Did I think they’d smell of baby powder? Open at the top, the tigers got the desert heat but misting was a constant so it was damp and coolish.

“The tigers were bred in a wildlife park,” Melissa told me, “not a jungle, and they never had to hunt for food. They’re used to humans now, but that doesn’t mean they won’t revert to their wild nature in a blue-eyed blink.”

I didn’t plan to find out. Ever.

They showed me the security system-cameras, sensors, alarms, you name it, top of the line as far as I could tell-Las Vegas again. No way could anyone steal those two.

I shook hands with Melissa and Karen as we were now on a first-name basis. Melissa gave me her card. As soon as I was out of their sight, I jotted down that she talked about them like they were her children. She was maybe in her mid-twenties, Karen about five years older.

I heard my name being called and turned around. Melissa. “I forgot to ask you, Mr. Kendall,” she said, “when will the south camera be back in operation?”

I don’t think my mouth dropped physically, but it sure did mentally.

“I’m not sure what you mean.”

“Your company said they were going to replace the south camera, but it’s still not working.”

“The south camera? I’ll check on that for you.” I pulled out her card. “I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.”

“Okay!” She strode off, her ponytail swinging.

South camera?

I looked around the walls and finally found a camera swiveling to watch the crowds. On the bottom of it was the label, “Kendall Security Agency.”

I sat down in the nearest chair.

Coincidence?

I didn’t think so.

I thought back to the way Doug had introduced me to them and that I was setting up a security system for a proposed wild animal park. News to me, but I thought that was supposed to be part of my cover.

Neither of them had even blinked.

They thought I was Kendall of Kendall Security Systems.

But I wasn’t.

I put that thought aside and thought about what Doug had really hired me for. The attempt was supposed to be made sometime during the July Fourth parade with fireworks, when the hotel’s security staff was watching out for pickpockets, room thieves and all the other arts of war that go on in a hotel. Especially a Las Vegas hotel. Doug had hired extra security, but there’s only so much that can be done. Doug couldn’t change the place into an armed camp. And even that might not work. Not many people knew about the proposed crime. I had learned about it from a guy I caught trying to burglarize one of my clients. Before I handed him over to LAPD, he tried to trade the information for a lighter charge. Told him I’d think about it, got on the horn to Doug and gave him the info. Silence on the other end of the line for a bit. Then he asked me to come over, look around and do what I could do. I went back to my guy in lockup and told him I needed more information. Too sketchy, he could have made it up. I let him think I was on his side, believed him, and that I was doing a little horsetrading with the D.A.’s office on his behalf. But that was all he had. Nada else. He’d given me his whole wad. I wanted to get him out so he could get more information for me. Especially the ‘how.’ Armed robbery, bail and transient are not used together positively in one legal sentence. So that option was out. I had to go with what I had, hoping he could pick up something else in jail which wasn’t an option I expected to be able to take to the bank.

I knew the target and the timing and that was it.

I went back to the den but all I saw was one of the workers hosing down the cement rocks. I knew what he was sluicing off. Then he hopped down into the drained pool and scrub brushed the sides and bottom.

Yuk.

A plan formed in my mind.

I turned away and looked at the small furry tigers in the shop’s window. But I could see the guy’s reflection. Thin, maybe 5’4”, no bulging muscles there. Bet he wasn’t thinking warm fuzzy thoughts about the tigers, as I’d bet that Melissa did all the time, no matter what the work involved. Just like any mother.

He glanced up occasionally. Pigeon shit from pigeons flying en masse around the opening. He was probably saying, “Thanks a lot, guys.” But he had enough sense not to keep facing up too long.

I made another note. “List / employees / access.”

Then I started thinking about the ‘why.’ Money was up there. Always tops the list of motives. But other reasons came to mind. A collector who wants rare things? A publicity stunt? I went through the other motives like the seven deadly sins, greed, revenge, envy. A sloth was not being stolen here. I gave up. Having met so many nutsoes in my days, most of the time their motives made no sense to me.

Time to rendezvous with my dental hygienist and see if I could get some lunch stuck in my teeth. Maybe she’d cut class and do some flossing. Up in our room.

Telephoning, not anything else, was what Marge had in mind. Under her eyes, I called my daughter. Marge stood there while I did it. No pretending I was talking to someone else. Pregnant at sixteen, my daughter had dropped out of school, moved in with the lowlife who’d had a string of petty theft convictions. Maybe that’s how he thought he was going to support his new family. At least she didn’t marry him. Nor did she have the child. She aborted both the baby and the lowlife. And her family.

I had changed her diapers, stayed up with her when she was sick, helped her take her first steps. Couldn’t believe the daughter I raised would do all those things. And at sixteen. When I was her age-Enough of that.

Got bits and pieces of news about her but never from her. She got on a work-study program that the Alhambra Soroptimist Club, a women’s club next to Los Angeles that helps young girls, sponsored and she straightened out. Got a full-time job and kept getting promoted until she worked some mucky muck here in Las Vegas. Bought a house. Bought a nice car. Lived well. Worked hard. So I heard.

Guess those are all the things you could say about me. Yeah, I worked a lot. Loved the job, took all the overtime I could get.That bought us a nice house, nice things. Okay, so I didn’t take many vacations with them, but made sure they went someplace nice.

Know her mother was in touch with her through the years, nothing regular but enough to know she was on the straight and narrow. Somehow I was the villain in all this. Can’t say I didn’t speak my piece in the beginning. Didn’t back down too much. Hell, I was a cop, thought like a cop and still do. That’s who I am and I can’t change.

Couldn’t understand what she had done and why, and why she just didn’t come home again. We had the money to pay for college. She came to see her mother in the hospital near the end when I wasn’t there.

Gotta say I was there a lot. Found out about her visit from the nurse, not from Lois. Then after Lois died… well, I’d probably do and say the same thing all over again. So there I was, sweating like a pig, when she came on the line.

Marge had given me some suggestions to get the conversation going. Yeah, I’m real good at those kinds of conversations, just like working the room-not me!

Marge stood there, hands on her hips, making sure we were actually talking.

Talking. I was talking to a stranger, and then suddenly I wasn’t. She was my pre-sixteen year old, chatting away, like she’d be home from school soon. I had to get the old handkerchief out. I think I heard Marge laughing when she left.

There’d be three of us for dinner tonight at Tillerman’s. She said. She’d call them to make a reservation. She knew the manager at the Mirage, would have them put us in a suite, stuff on the cuff. Had to whoa her down as soon as I got my jaw back up where it should be enough to talk. I told her we were already getting the room free since I was working for the Mirage on a case. I didn’t go into details.

After I hung up, I realized she must know other people, might have an insight into why the white tigers might be stolen. Suddenly having dinner with a veritable stranger didn’t look too bleak. Old man, I thought, you’re always a cop, working, now you’re going to pump your own long-lost daughter for information.

The young woman who walked into Tillerman’s lounge was my mother. Not that I knew her at twenty-five but I’d seen the wedding pictures. She was so beautiful. No, gorgeous. For a minute my heart stopped, Chivas halfway to my mouth, eyes popping.

The scene played in slow motion on my mental computer, now on overload. Jeannine. No longer a flat-chested, pimply teen-ager. Oh, no. Saw two guys at the table near the doorway stop and stare.

Glad Marge was there with me, otherwise I wouldn’t have known what to do.

Hey, give me a murder scene and I can handle that. Hate these family things, emotional things.

Jeannine floated over, the guys behind her watching, wondering when they could make a move on her.

I stuck out my hand, not knowing what the proper etiquette was, but I needn’t have worried. Women know the right things to do. And she was a woman. Holy cow, I produced this creature?

She gave me a kiss on the cheek and sat down on the padded bench beside me, her arm through mine for a minute.

We chatted. No, Marge and Jeannine chatted like they’d known each other for years. I just grunted occasionally. In top form for me, socially.

Jeannine went over to talk with the maitre d’. Gave him a bunch of orders I was sure. Bowing and scraping was not quite the word, because he wasn’t that kind of a guy. He was the kind of a maitre d’ who would give her anything. That’s Las Vegas. Anything, anytime.

But he knew her. She came here a lot? The cop in me still observing. Dinner was-the best I’ve ever had. Raymond Cabernet, yes. But a year not on the winelist, and judging by the other prices, off the Richter scale for my budget. It was liquid velvet. Drinking the wine, I could believe myself a connoisseur. Now I understood the words-complex, flavors, nose.

When the last of the lobster shells disappeared into the sunset, I was a P.I. again.

“The reason I’m in town,” I said, and told her what she should know to answer my questions.

“Is that the reason you called me?” Her eyes held a hint of amusement exactly like her mother’s. My mother, her mother. She brought the women of my life, who were no longer on this planet, alive. I took a gulp of water. Then I realized from her words, somehow I had missed a cue. I looked at Marge, but she looked as mystified as I felt. Jeannine must have sensed our confusion if she couldn’t read the stupid look on my face.

“I thought you were asking me because of the security system at the Mirage.”

“Kendall Security Systems,” I said slowly, guessing that there was no coincidence.

“I am Kendall Security Systems,” she said.

Afterwards Marge assured her that we had no idea. Marge kept looking at me, but I can’t fool her, so she knew I was telling the truth about not knowing about the connection. Then I wondered if Doug had thought I was part of Kendall, or if he just hired me for the past jobs because we had worked together. Maybe both.

We got back to my questions. “Why would anyone want to steal them?” I asked her.

Without batting a blonde curly eyelash, she went to the heart of the matter. “The tigers are the Mirage’s drawing card. It’s what sets them apart from all the other hotels here. Everyone’s looking for a shtick. Without it, they are just another hotel. Without the tigers, the Mirage might be in serious financial trouble. They have a way high profit margin and operate on that. If they drop even one percent, they could have a problem. Without the tigers…” she let the sentence hang. “I’m guessing, they’ll hold the tigers for ransom.”

I looked at her face, intelligent, and watched the words form in her mouth. I had two brains. One brain processed the information she gave me. Now the ‘why’ made sense.

The other brain listened to my mother, pre-me, talking. I shut that part of my brain down.

“So what will they do with the tigers if they get the ransom?”

“They don’t need them, can’t use them or exhibit them, so they’ll probably kill them.”

A frozen hand clutched my heart. I gasped. Not on mywatch. No way, José. Don’t even think about touching the tigers while I’m responsible for them, I wanted to shout to the world.

“There’s an element here in Las Vegas who would do anything to make more money. And there’s an element here, Dad, who would help them do it.”

Dad.

For a moment I was back being a social oaf. That brain door had sprung open.

I slammed it shut.

Back to work.

“Do you have any names?” I pulled out my notebook.

Doug would probably know them. I wondered if that thought had occurred to him. Since the tip came from out of town, maybe he wasn’t looking at locals.

“I had the tour with Melissa and Karen, so I know the basics. Anything else you can tell me about the security system?”

“I’ve got stuff in there I never even told the Mirage about.”

“You’re checking employees?” I thought about Doug. Did he know? Was he one of them? I hoped not. But there was a lot of money to be made in Las Vegas, greed eased a lot of consciences.

She laughed. “Would you believe animal abuse complaints?”

Yeah, I would.

“We want to be sure that when we go to the D.A., the complaint’s not going to go anywhere. In fact, those two get treated better than our homeless.”

The tigers were in their den, both lazing around, only a few people and no kids banging on the glass. Everyone at the parade-and the fireworks.

I was crouched in the chute that connected their indoor den and the show one. The iron gate separating me from the tigers was down and pinned in place. No way it was going to be moved. No matter what happened. At the other end of the chute, their path to their indoor lair, was locked on the inside. In essence, I was locked in, but I was the one who could do the unlocking. The smell of the tigers was strong in their chute. Had they marked their territory?

There was another entrance to the den about twenty feet away, a door for maintenance, feeding, and all the people who cared for the tigers.

It came down to the fact that I had to trust someone on the inside to get into the chute. I swore her to secrecy. Tell no one, not even your bedmate. I played on her love for the tigers, her babies. She was momma. If she told, they would die, that’s the way I put it to her, no finesse used. She had to be with me one hundred percent otherwise I could be the tigers’ next meal and looking at them blue eye to blue eye made me feel like the main course.

My gut instinct was usually right. Besides that, she was the one with the most to lose in this caper.

Melissa, the human mom. She was the only other person who knew what I was going to do. Not the head of Kendall Security Systems. Not Doug. Not even my bedmate.

I had boots on, a work jumpsuit that Melissa had outfitted me with, and covered with some sort of aroma that tigers weren’t interested in and that negated my human smell.

Don’t wear any cologne or hairspray, Melissa had warned me, or anything with a fragrance.

Crouched down, my calves whimpering, I wondered how long I could hold out. Stakeouts had never been my long suit. And I couldn’t have a cigarette. Fireworks at 9. I was sure that’s when they were going to make their move.

Move. There was a movement off to my right.

Herbie. Hose in hand.

He cleaned up at night? With the tigers in the den?

He placed the hose carefully over a concrete crag, then climbed to the top of the concrete mountain. It took me a moment to remember the built-in ladder on the other side.

What was he doing?

Bright light flooded the den.

What the hell!

The tigers got up and padded across the side of the pool toward me. Some signal for them? Daylight? Some sound? Now it was time for them to go into the night den?

They couldn’t get through the grate that separated us. The smell of their bodies and their hot breath made me sweat. Theywere so close. The male and I were looking each other in the eye. Blue to blue.

They weren’t cute anymore, not nose to nose, they were jungle animals, man eating tigers. He checked me out, his tongue licking the sides of his mouth.

Their smell drifting toward me on the draft.

I didn’t move a muscle except my eyes. I couldn’t even close my eyelids.

Sweat was coming out of every pore probably canceling out whatever that stuff was that Melissa had put on me. Bored, the tigers drifted away.

I tried to bring my heart rate down. Herbie was doing something. The light-a helicopter!

Why hadn’t I foreseen that?

Cops never look up, that’s a known fact. Hide anything above eye level and it’s safe.

The tigers gathered around the foot of the ladder. Maybe Herbie wasn’t about to descend all the way.

Grappling hooks. Two of them came down. One landed in the pool. The other conked Herbie on the head. He yelped. I saw blood.

Everything was perfectly clear in the light.

The tigers looked interested.

Herbie pulled out a gun.

No!

I scrabbled for the grate and yanked the pin, out along with my forty-five.

A tiger put his paws on the bottom rung.

Herbie shot.

I shot.

Herbie fell.

The tigers investigated.

I stood there shocked.

A heavy net dropped through the opening. I stared at it trying to compute what was going to happen.

Holy shit!

Herbie must have had a tranquilizer gun. They were going to airlift the tigers out after they’d been tranquilized.

Then I had another thought. How was Herbie, a hundred-poundweakling, going to drag a six-hundred-pound unconscious tiger onto a net that was now dangling in the pool along with the grappling hook?

I didn’t have to wonder long.

The human-size door opened again, and in walked Godzilla. Not quite but almost. He wore a grey sharkskin suit, tailored for him. Who had shoulders like that? Bull head, hair slicked back. This was not a guy I wanted to meet anywhere. He looked at me and then at the tigers.

“What the fuck is going on? I heard two shots, they’d supposed to be out by now.” He thought I was Herbie? Herbie was out of sight, sprawled in a concrete ditch.

“Shoot them,” he said. Did he think I had a tranquilizer gun?

One of the tigers growled. That was enough for me to step back. A big step.

He had his own gun out and I saw him push off the safety and aim for the tiger as it took another step forward.

Godzilla backed up.

In the background I heard the fireworks, overhead, the roar of the helicopter.

Think! Think!

“Wait,” I said, “I’ll tranquilize them, you get out for a minute and then we can haul them off. Everything’s under control.”

“Shoot ’em now or I will.”

“Boss wants them alive.” I made a wild guess.

“Fuck it. The chopper can’t stay there forever.”

The tiger took another step. I thought he was just curious, but then I wasn’t the one it was advancing on. Godzilla must be sweating. Probably didn’t smell too good, or maybe he smelled really good to the tiger.

Bam!

The human-size door hit the wall and there stood Melissa.

Oh, shit!

“I saw what happened. What’s going on? What are you doing to Rufus and Betty?”

Rufus and Betty?

“Who are you?” The human momma tiger. Even Godzilla was about to back away from her, then he remembered the tiger. The lady or the tiger?

“Rufus, back,” she said in a commanding voice like she was talking to a puppy.

“You,” this to Godzilla, “Put that gun away, he’s not going to hurt you.”

I glanced from the tiger to Melissa. Who would I believe?

Godzilla looked at her like she’d just dropped from Venus. He was trying to keep the gun on the tiger in front of him and Melissa behind him.

Then she saw me. “What are you doing?” she said to me. “You lied to me. You’re the one who’s going to steal the tigers.”

Godzilla’s head was swiveling between us. Good, he thought I was with him.

Or did Melissa really believe I was one of the bad guys?

“Get over there,” he told her, gesturing to Rufus.

“Yes, of course, I’m moving slowly, because it’s not a good idea to move quickly. Good, Rufus, come to mommy.”

She was even with Godzilla now. The tiger moved toward her.

Godzilla was bringing his gun up, aiming at the tiger. I was sure he was about to fire off a round at it.

All of a sudden there was a hiss and Godzilla was screaming. Rufus backed up fast. Melissa was spraying Godzilla like he was a cockroach. I could smell the stuff-Mace.

Rufus didn’t like the smell and was moving away.

Betty was taking playful-for a tiger-swats at Herbie who looked like he was moving.

I ran over and kicked Godzilla’s gun away as he groveled on the cement.

“Put this on,” Melissa shoved a mask at me and put one on herself. “I’m going to get Rufus and Betty out of here. Who’s that? Herbie? What’s he doing here? This place has more people than the viewing area.” Her voice sounded strange through the mask.

“Call an ambulance,” I said, my voice sounding weird also. “And Security.”

“I am Security,” she said, pulling out handcuffs and bending over the writhing Godzilla, “For Kendall Security Systems.”

She wrestled with positioning his wrists. “Your daughter says Hi.”