No Such Creature

SIX

“Time for you to hit the road, Charlene.”

Zig was propped up on the pillows, watching her cute little fifteen-year-old butt waving in the air. She was down at the end of the bed totally absorbed in Zig’s collection of graphic novels-not reading them, just grooving on the drawings and exclaiming every five seconds.

“That is so cool,” she would say, and flip another page.

“I got stuff to do this afternoon,” Zig said.

“This is so beautiful,” Charlene said, pronouncing it beauty-full.

Zig could have stared at her butt all day, except for the fact that they’d already done it twice. Amazing what the kids of today would do for free drugs. Although clearly he had misjudged his proportions. There was a real art to getting it just right.

He used to prefer his females totally unconscious, courtesy of Rohypnol or some variant. In fact, he had done serious time for a couple of those. But these days he preferred them, well, compliant and relaxed but not comatose. He’d been in the mood for a bit of fun, so he and Charlene, a kid he’d picked up near Covenant House, had been playing Ex, Dex and Sex, as he liked to put it. The Ex had worn off, but the Dex was obviously still working because she was speed-focused on his damn comics.

She said beauty-full once more and that did it. Zig got out of bed and put on his pants. He picked up the girl’s clothes from the floor and threw them at her in a ball. She looked up, giggling.

“You got thirty seconds to get dressed and get out of here.”

She looked back down at the book. Zig snatched it out of her hands.

“Hey!”

“I said beat it. Now get the fuck out.”

“There’s no need to get nasty about it.”

“You don’t know what nasty means. Keep talking and you’ll find out.”

Stu Quaig sipped his beer and tried to ignore the television behind the Five Card’s bar. He wasn’t interested in poker, mostly because he’d never won a poker game in his life, and he didn’t understand the current fascination with the game. He tried not to be too obvious about staring at himself in the bar mirror, but he could see his reflection between the Glenlivet and Johnnie Walker and he definitely needed a haircut. He seemed to enjoy a peak period of two weeks where his hair looked its best, and then all of a sudden he looked shaggy and pathetic and it was time to head back to the salon.

Clem Boxley was staring at the poker game as if at any minute money might fall out of the TV screen onto the bar. Stu was still on his first beer of the night, while Clem was rapidly disposing of his second margarita. Clem could line them up and drink them down, but it didn’t do anything positive for his interpersonal skills. He was congenial, even chummy, after one or two, but once he got onto three, four or more, chummy could turn gloomy could turn hostile and then there was no telling what kind of mayhem he would raise.

Clem held up his empty glass for the cute little bartender to see. Number three coming up.

Stu glanced at the mirror where half the lounge was reflected and saw Zig coming in.

“Boss is here,” he said.

Clem turned to greet Zig with extravagant heartiness, but Zig just ordered a beer and got right down to business.

“Old guy named Max Maxwell I met in stir. Shoulda retired a long time ago, but he’s in town and I think he’s still in the game. In fact, I think he’s feeling pretty flush.”

“Why?” Stu said. “He’s throwing money around?”

“He’s too smart for that. But I can read this guy and he’s in the chips. In fact, I think he may be behind this.” He held up a couple of pages downloaded from the San Francisco Chronicle, headlined THE DIVA AND THE THIEF. “An old guy and a kid pulled this off and got away with some serious bling, not to mention cash. I think it coulda been my old friend Max and his nephew.”

“I know Max,” Stu said. “Did a job for him years ago.”

“Shit,” Zig said. “Is he going to recognize you?”

“Doubt it. Not unless he gets close.”

“Well, don’t let him. I bumped into him and his so-called nephew earlier at Slots-a-Lot and followed him. Turns out he’s staying at a fucking trailer park. Unfortunately, I don’t know which trailer is theirs-I didn’t have a card to get through the gate. But I want you guys to keep an eye on him. And I mean a close eye.”

“What kinda guy brings a kid to Las Vegas?” Clem said. “How can you have a good time in Sin City if you got, like, offspring with you?”

“Maybe he really is his nephew, who knows,” Zig said. “He was okay for a teenager. Very polite.”

“Gives me hope for the world,” Stu said, and took a sip of his Corona. He’d asked for it with no lime, but the bartender had stuck a lime in it anyway. In Stu’s experience girls never made good bartenders.

Clem raised his hand to get her attention. “Bar mistress!”

Zig grabbed Clem’s wrist. “You don’t need another drink. What you need to do, the both of you, is keep an eye on the trailer park, starting at, like, dawn. Follow Max and this kid and see who his associates are. If this is a working vacation he’s on, and you can bet your ass it is, he’s gonna be staffed up. I want to know who’s with him and what they’re up to.”

“How we gonna know what they look like?” Clem said.

“Stu’s met Max, dipstick. The kid will be with him.”

Max was reading aloud in the back of the limo. They had made the papers-even the Las Vegas papers-thanks to the celebrity of Evelyn del Rio.

“‘He was completely charming,’ Ms. del Rio said. ‘Or at least, as charming as a man can be while he’s robbing you. Yes, I was terrified at first, but it became clear very quickly that they weren’t going to hurt anybody, they just wanted their loot and out.’

“‘The loot and out,’” Max repeated. “I couldn’t have put it better myself.”

A voice addressed them from the front of the limo in a strong Indian accent. “You are utterly bewitched by this woman,” Pookie said. For some reason he had it in his head that all limo drivers hail from the Punjab.

“Just drive, Pookie. Please don’t act.”

Max was dressed in baggy khaki pants, sandals and a pale pink polo shirt. He wore a baseball cap on his head that said Las Vegas, and he had covered the exposed skin of his arms and face with makeup that turned him lobster red, over which he had added little curls of “peeled skin.” An ancient Aer Lingus travel bag was slung across one shoulder. Owen had never seen him look so bad.

Not that Owen was doing much better. His hair was red tonight, his face and arms freckled. He had yellowed his teeth, and even blacked out one bicuspid as if it were the casualty of a bar brawl. For pants he had selected extremely baggy shorts with elaborate pockets that went badly with his battered pair of green high-tops. The Guinness T-shirt was new, and its deep black made Owen’s skin look extra pale.

The MGM Grand of course contained a casino, and casino security staff are the masters of facial recognition software, so in addition to the wardrobe Max had expended a good deal of effort adjusting their brows, noses and jawlines. They wouldn’t stand up to the full sun, but would be convincing under artificial light.

“Right to the door, if you please, driver,” Max said with a Dublin lilt. “Don’t go droppin’ us a country mile downstream.”

“Yes, sir, of course, sir,” said Pookie the Punjabi. “Many plenty good.”

“Pookie,” Max said in his normal voice, “just be your normal, rude, untutored self and all will be well.”

“You are being the boss, sir. But enlighten me, please-who is this odd-looking carrot-top?”

Owen laughed.

Pookie turned onto the Strip and slipped into a school of limos cruising the shoals of coral and ruby lights.

“Don’t let’s lose our fizzy stuff,” said Irish Owen, handing a two-hundred-dollar bottle of champagne to Max. It was a good prop for a show like this; plus, there was always the chance that you might end up actually drinking it.

Pookie pulled up in front of the Grand and opened the door for them. Max and Owen headed for the entrance, Owen weaving a little, Max extremely upright in the manner of the self-conscious drunk. A svelte youth over-decorated with gold braid opened the door for them.

They had the elevator to themselves.

“Tell me again why we’re doing this,” Owen said.

“I’ve always been in it for the money, myself.”

“But why a break-in? Always before it’s been the dinnertime thing. Now here we are, it’s the middle of the night, and we’re breaking into someone’s hotel room? Besides which, she’s not even a Republican. She campaigned for Obama.”

“Don’t be so conservative, laddie. One must evolve or die.”

“This is not good, Max. You know it.”

“Relax, boyo. I’ve done the research. Her fancy-man actor and her bodyguard are going to be at the concert.”

They got off on the twentieth floor. The corridors had the solemn hush of a good hotel, with thick pile carpeting that ran halfway up the walls. Although there were no security cameras, Max maintained his stately gait all the way down the corridor.

Except for the champagne, they were travelling light. As Max put it, you could explain being on the wrong floor, but you couldn’t explain bolt cutters. At the end of the corridor they took a stairwell down four flights.

Their destination was the corner suite on sixteen. This was where Max’s research in all those issues of Rolling Stone, Variety, Hotelier, Town amp; Country, Hollywood Reporter, Premiere, People and Hospitality paid off. He had determined that Angela Lake would be staying in suite 1601 for the full two weeks of her engagement at the Grand. Her last set was due to finish at two a.m.

They listened at the door for a full minute, but there was no sound of voices, television, running water-nothing.

Max, who was a champion pickpocket, had liberated a card key from a manager earlier that afternoon. Now he slipped it into the slot and the lock clicked open. Owen sensed impending disaster.

They entered a living room. The hotel billed itself as a nonsmoking environment, but there was a strong smell of nicotine in the air-the acrid after-smell that clings to clothing, as of someone who had just come in after stepping outside for a smoke.

Owen tugged at Max’s sleeve, but Max just scowled at him and moved farther into the room. The curtains were open, and ambient light from nearby buildings was enough to cast his bulky shadow low on the wall.

Between the living room and bedroom lay a dressing room and bathroom. Goodies were lined up on the dressers like a midnight snack set out for Santa Claus: two watches, a sparkling necklace and a fat wad of cash in a money clip. With one swift motion Max swept it all into the Aer Lingus bag.

Owen checked the closet safe; it was open and empty. He was just turning back when a voice said, “Get out of here. Now.”

“Nora?” Max said, not even looking. “Darlin’, that’s a considerable frog you’ve got in your throat.”

The man stood just inside the bedroom doorway. He was about forty, with close-cropped hair and dark circles under his eyes. Owen recognized him instantly. This was bad. This was not supposed to happen.

“I’m telling you again,” Tony Tedesco said, “get out of here.”

Tedesco was the kind of actor producers cast as the cop’s badass partner, the tough bastard who turns out to have a heart of gold. More recently he had been taking smaller parts in independent films.

“Jeannie Mac,” Max said, holding the pass card up to his face, studying it like a jeweller, “how for the love of Pete did our key work?” He took a step toward Tedesco. “I’ve no doubt yourself could use a drop about now. Please accept the bubbles as a token of-well, like a consolation, sort of.”

Max set the bottle down on the dresser and started toward the door.

“Hold it right there, pal. How about I call the manager and you explain all this to him?”

“Tony Tedesco,” Owen said, snapping his fingers. “The very man. I’ve seen you in tons of fillums. Highwire? Detective Blue? Absolutely grand you were. I’m bettin’ you studied under some real coppers, because you had the look, you had the manner, you had the whole thing down perfect. Bruce Willis is bollocks next to you.”

“All right, Seamus,” Max said. “Let’s be off now and not inconvenience yer man any more than we already have.”

Tedesco snatched up the phone.

“Now, now, sir,” Max said. “Don’t be after phoning the authorities.”

“Why should it bother you?” Tedesco said. “You’re just in the wrong room, right? Honest mistake, right? And that’s your room key? I’m sure management will understand.”

“We’ll be off, then,” Owen said. “Take care, Mr. Tedesco. Sorry to disturb you.”

He tugged Max’s sleeve. Max shook him away and grabbed the champagne bottle. Before Owen could stop him, Max had swung the bottle full into the actor’s head. Tedesco slumped sideways and slithered to the floor.

“Jesus Christ,” Owen said, dropping the accent. “Jesus Christ.”

He knelt beside the actor, feeling his pulse. He was alive, but his jaw was crooked and blood flowed from his mouth onto the carpet.

“Leave him,” Max said in his normal voice. “Pookie will be waiting.”

Owen went to the bathroom and soaked a face cloth in cold water. “It’s not good to be unconscious too long,” he said. “You can end up in a coma.”

“Why don’t we call security while we’re at it?”

Owen pressed the cold face cloth against Tedesco’s forehead and the actor began to stir. Owen grabbed a cushion off the couch and placed it under him.

“Sorry for the misunderstandin’,” he said, back in character. “Didn’t mean to hurt no one.”

Tedesco groaned louder and his eyes fluttered open.

When they were in the elevator, Max said, “If you want to be Florence Nightingale, why don’t you go to a bloody nursing school.”

“You broke his jaw, Max.” Owen could hear the quaver in his own voice. “I’ve never even seen you get physical before, and you break the guy’s jaw. You broke some teeth. He’ll be lucky if he isn’t disfigured. And he’s an actor, Max. How could you do that to an actor?”

“It was him or us, lad. Him or us. I prefer us.”

The elevator door opened and they strolled into the lobby. The entire staff seemed to be on cellphones or engaged with computer screens and didn’t even look at them.

Pookie was in the limo halfway up the block, reading a Harry Potter novel.

“Quick,” Max said. “Get us out of here.”

Pookie spoke up, still the cheery Indian. “You have been enjoying a pleasant evening, I trust, sir?”

“Just drive, will you?” Max said.

“You have been imbibing some alcoholic beverage, I am thinking. You are no longer transporting your bottle of champers and your mood is noticeably darker. Have you been forcing alcohol on the young fellow, too? He is looking ghostly pale, is he not?”

“Pookie, for God’s sake move it.”

In the back seat, Max and Owen removed their wigs and other makeup, Max scratching at bits of glue on his eyebrows. The smell of rubbing alcohol filled the car. Sirens grew louder in the distance, but there were always sirens in Las Vegas. They struggled out of their costumes and into the casual stuff that was waiting for them in an open suitcase.

By the time Pookie dropped them off at the El Cortez parking lot-for security reasons, neither he nor Roscoe knew about the Rocket-they were once again the old British wig salesman and his nephew.

They paid Pookie and said good night.

“Namaste,” he said. “I am wishing you peace and joy always.”

“Pretty good haul,” Max said.

“You didn’t have to hit him,” Owen said.

Max was checking his face in the bathroom mirror, looking for any makeup he had missed. “Tony the Thug was going to either jump us or get us thrown in the slammer, and I wasn’t about to let that happen. I don’t see why you’re so jellified about it. We’re thieves, boy, we dance with danger. Part of the fun.”

“Fun? Suddenly out of the blue you smash a guy’s jaw? An actor?”

“Tedesco is a well-known right-wing lunatic. I do not consider him a colleague. You’d be feeling a whole lot worse if we were sitting in jail now.”

“Max,” Owen said, “let’s please get out of this business before something terrible happens.”

“Get out any time you like, me lad. I’m in for the long haul.”

Max headed for the galley. It was their custom, after pulling a job, to have a snack before going to bed, but Owen got changed in the bathroom and climbed into his bunk.

“What’s this, lad? Going to bed without your midnight snack?”

“I’m not hungry.”

“Nonsense. You hardly ate any supper. You’ll waste away.”

Owen turned out his light, wanting to put an end to the day.

The Rocket filled with smells of toast and the melted cheese in Max’s inevitable midnight omelette. Owen turned his back and stared at the wall.