The Raiders

1

NEVADA SMITH WOKE. Who could sleep with an airplane buzzin' the house? Airplane ... buzzin'... ? Oh, God! It had to be Jonas, he decided. Who else would buzz the house before dawn?

He rolled out of bed. His wife Martha hadn't wakened. A pair of faded blue Levi's lay on the floor, where he had kicked them off last night, and he pulled them up over his long, muscular legs that had never been anything but thick and strong, all his life. He slipped into soft moccasins. With a backward glance at Martha, to be sure she was still asleep, he trotted from the bedroom and through the house to the gray steel box that contained the switch for the runway lights. He pulled the switch.

He hurried out on the porch. The yellowish-brown lights were on, two parallel lines of them, defining the thousand-foot landing strip. The only other lights were a pair of floodlights on the windsock. It was a primitive strip, for sure, but it had proved enough for Jonas, even in bad weather. Nevada had been his passenger many times, day and night, and he had marveled at Jonas's uncanny knack for finding this ranch and this house and the landing strip, seeing landmarks that were invisible to anyone else. The old man had never been proud of his son's instinct for flying — had, in fact, disapproved of it as dangerous foolishness — but that was because he died before he could experience it and learn to appreciate it.

The strip was not paved. Nevada had gone out and walked it only yesterday, carrying a shovel and looking for any holes animals might have made. It was smooth. An ill-tempered rattler had threatened, but Nevada had let it go, had not killed it. If it was lying out there now, it had a big surprise coming from the onrushing wheels of the heavy airplane that was about to land.

He stood on the porch and watched the red and green lights on the plane's wings as Jonas circled for his approach. Nevada had first seen him fly in 1925 when he had flown to the landing strip at the Cord Explosives plant in an ancient wood-and-wire Waco he had won in a crap game. Nevada had called him Junior then, and Junior had demonstrated a natural aptitude for flying, more aptitude for it than for riding, which Nevada had taught him. Maybe not more aptitude than he had for shooting, which Nevada had also taught him.

Nevada had come to the Cord ranch in 1909, looking for work as a cowhand, and the old Jonas had hired him as a nursemaid. Teach the boy to ride. The old man never used many words. Teach him to ride had meant a lot of other things. Make a man of him was what he'd meant. Nevada'd had sixteen years to do it before the old man died — on that very day when Junior flew to the plant in the Waco. Nevada had been unsure just how well he'd done with the boy until he heard Jonas abruptly and coldly announce to the directors of Cord Explosives that no one was to call him Junior, ever again.

The airplane was a mile east of the runway when it turned and began to lower toward the dusty strip.

When he was maybe a quarter of a mile out and maybe a hundred feet above the ground, Jonas switched on the airplane's landing lights for about two seconds, just long enough to make sure there was not a big animal on the strip. Nevada understood that Jonas's eyes were adjusted to the dark, so he did not want the glare of landing lights as the plane settled on.

The tires squawked as they touched the hard ground, and the airplane rolled down the strip almost to the end. A thousand feet was little enough runway for the Cessna Skyknight, which weighed two tons and had hit the ground at more than eighty miles an hour.

As he turned the airplane toward the house and taxied, Jonas switched on the landing lights and illuminated the porch and Nevada — and Martha, who had now come out. Martha waved. Nevada waved. But he had a big, troubled question —

Why?

2

The sun wasn't up, but Nevada sat down with Jonas on the porch with a bottle of cognac and poured them two generous drinks. Martha was in the kitchen, happily making a big breakfast.

"So you see how it is," Jonas said. He had just told Nevada about the telephone call from Phil in Washington and what he had done about it. "I figured I'd hole up here with you for a little while — that is if it's okay with you."

Nevada had gone to the bedroom and pulled on an old buckskin shirt. He had wrapped a red-and-white bandanna around his neck in anticipation of the heat of the day and of the sweat it would catch. The man didn't seem to age. His shoulders remained broad, his posture straight, his chest deep, his belly flat, his arms muscular, his hands deft and quick. His hair was white. The old story was that Indians' hair did not turn white, which was foolishness; but Nevada's had turned white. Of course, he had blue eyes, too. He was only half Kiowa. He was almost seventy years old.

It would have been easy for Jonas to say that Nevada was Nevada because he had stayed away from cities, that he was a product of the open country, of the blood of his Kiowa mother, of an outdoor self-reliant way of life. The truth of course was that Nevada had seen his share of city living. He was Nevada Smith of the movies, Nevada Smith of the Wild West shows. He'd lived in New Orleans and Los Angeles.

Jonas's father had died with Nevada's secret in his heart, never disclosed. Jonas, who had discovered it accidentally, had kept it since. Nevada's real name was not Nevada Smith but Max Sand — the initials on his old revolver: MS. He'd killed the men who killed his parents, tracked them down and killed them without mercy. He'd spent time in prison and had escaped. He'd done other things the law did not allow. Technically, he was perhaps still a fugitive. But for more than forty years he had been Nevada Smith and — among other things — the hero of Western pictures the whole world respected. To Jonas he had never been anything but a hero and the best friend a man ever had.

"I don' hardly have to tell you," Nevada said, "that you're welcome to stay here as long as you want to. Nothin' would pleasure me more, and nothin' would make Martha happier. Nothin' but having Monica and Jo-Ann here with you. But we gotta figure that there'll be a problem."

"I think I know what you have in mind," said Jonas.

"Well, let's suppose I was a law feller, a United States marshal," said Nevada, "and I come to your house and find you've skedaddled. Now, where'd I go lookin' fer you, if I was a law feller?"

Jonas took a swallow of Nevada's fiery brandy. He stared out at the eastern mountains, where the sky was turning and the sun was about to show itself. In the red light now blooming on a few gentle clouds that had developed overhead he could see a big old rattler coiled alongside the runway, probably moved into a defensive posture because of the mysterious disturbance that had shaken the land half an hour ago. A silly tiny animal skipped past, but the rattlesnake was apparently still so alert for danger to itself that it took no notice of what otherwise would have been a tasty meal.

"I see what you mean."

"I'd say, 'Jonas Cord, where'd he go?' And I'd say, 'What you bet out to Nevada Smith's place?' I could hide you here. I got places where we could hide you. Course, we'd gotta get rid of the airplane. But, problem we got is that that plane was see'd landin' here. Hands that work the place. Folks around. An airplane landin' on my strip before dawn ... The word's all over. Now, if you'd druv—"

"They'd still look for me here," said Jonas.

"I'm afeard so," said Nevada.

"It's not so easy, is it? I mean, running away from the law."

Nevada turned toward Jonas with a small ironic smile on his lined face. "No, it ain't. But it can be done. Some folks do it for a lifetime."

"I'm not planning on doing it for a lifetime," said Jonas.

"Fellers don't, generally," said Nevada. "Question is, just what have you done so far? Like, did you tell Monica where you were goin'?"

"No. I told her I'd be in touch."

"That airplane out there belongs to you. They'll look for it. First place they'll look for it is here. We got ... what? Two, three hours? You gotta eat, then take off. I got drums of aviation gas on hand. We'll pump your tanks up, like usual."

"Going where, Mexico?" Jonas asked.

"No. You fly 'cross the border, they track you. No. You gotta go somewheres else."

"I guess an airplane's an impediment," said Jonas. "Wherever it sits, it's got its numbers painted on it. You can hide a car, but —"

"Right."

"Shit," said Jonas. "I got away for a few hours, but —"

"You got a problem, Junior," said Nevada. "You're business smart. You turned out to be surprisin' business smart. Your daddy never guessed how business smart you were ... or how fuckin' stupid you can sometimes be about life-type things. I don't know if you should've tried to duck that subpoena. That ain't a judgment for me to make. I know one thing. You gotta lam, and you gotta lam smarter than you've done so far."

"Can you help me, Nevada?"

Jonas reached for the cognac bottle, and Nevada caught his hand short of it and pushed it back. "You gotta fly, so you don't need no more of that. I gotta make a telephone call or two. What I think you oughta do is eat what Martha's cookin', then stretch out on a bed and get some shut-eye. Hour or two, you'll have to take off. By that time I may know where you can go."

3

Jonas lay in a cool dark room and tried to sleep. He dozed only, and odd, half-real dreams ran through his head. In his dream his father was still alive, and they were very angry with each other. About Rina. The old resentment.

In the waking part of his dream, when he was aware of himself and where he was, he regretted never forgiving his father. More than that, he regretted that his father had not lived to see him take over the company and expand it into what some people called the Cord empire. Of course ... if his father had lived, his son would never have had the chance to do it.

Jonas didn't believe his father was in heaven or the other place, or somewhere out there watching him. But he wished he were. God, how he wished that! Everything he did he measured against one standard: Would his father have approved? He tried not to. He tried not to think of how his father would judge. But he caught himself constantly asking, "Did I do it right, old man?"

It was no easy standard. What would his father say, if he knew, about ducking this subpoena? What would the old man think?

He went to sleep finally and was asleep when Nevada entered the room and told him to wake up.

Jonas sat up and put his feet on the floor. He hadn't slept enough and felt as if he had a hangover. Nevada handed him a mug of strong black coffee.

"I found a place where you can go," Nevada said.

"Where?"

"Las Vegas."

"Las Vegas? There's hardly a more public place in the world. Besides, the town swarms with federal agents, all kinds."

"Don't call an idea dumb before you even heard it," said Nevada. "I'm goin' with ya to set things up. The first thing we've gotta do is fly that conspicuous airplane out of here. There's a private field in Arizona where they'll shove it into a hangar for us. Then we'll drive to Vegas. After dark. Tonight. This is gonna cost you some money. You carryin' any?"

"Not much."

"I'll take care of things till you get some funds transferred."

"Where'm I gonna be living, Nevada?"

"Did you ever hear of a casino-hotel called The Seven Voyages?"

"Of course."

Nevada nodded curtly. "Well, that's where you're gonna be livin'. You got the whole top floor, and nobody but nobody is gonna know you're there."

"How'd you arrange that?"

"Over the years, a man makes friends," said Nevada.

4

They hand-cranked a primitive pump to transfer aviation gas from drums into the wing tanks on the Cessna. As Jonas shoved in the throttles and the airplane roared down the short runway and lifted off, a pair of black cars turned in at the gate and drove toward the house.

"We played that one a little too close," Nevada remarked. "If I was flyin' this airplane, I'd turn like we was headin' east. I'd wanta be well out of sight of those fellers before I turned the right way."

Jonas did exactly that. He did not turn south until he was east of the Utah state line, after which he flew over the Grand Canyon, then turned west. He navigated the way he'd done in the old days, before technical types mounted all kinds of radio-navigation equipment in airplanes. He didn't even refer to his charts but constantly compared what he saw on the ground to what he saw on state highway maps. The little private airport was where Nevada's friend had told him it was: eighteen miles northeast of Dolan Springs and a mile east of a narrow rural highway. He overflew once to have a look at the runway and windsock, then throttled back in a left-hand pattern and touched down just over the threshold, leaving himself plenty of room to bleed off speed and come to a stop before the end of the runway.

A large but rusting and ramshackle corrugated-steel building sat alongside the runway. Jonas and Nevada had hardly stepped down from the Cessna when a tractor backed up to it and towed it inside the building. The tractor guided it into place in a row of expensive twin-engine private planes. Powerful electric motors pulled the big doors shut.

Jonas and Nevada walked into the line shack, where Jonas asked the man on duty to top off the tanks on the Cessna.

"Okay, Mr. Cord. Nice-lookin' airplane. We'll take good care of it. We've got a car waiting for you. Understand you don't want to leave for a while. The house at the end of the ramp is a private club for owners and pilots."

Jonas nodded. "Fine. We'll pay it a visit."

5

Jonas and Nevada did not want to drive into Las Vegas until after sunset, when they would be far less likely to be recognized by chance. They knew the town. Both of them had been there before, often.

Jonas in fact had a business connection with the city. It resulted from the peculiar history of the State of Nevada and of Las Vegas.

The Nevada legislature had legalized casino gambling in 1931, as a measure to pump up the state's Depression-stricken economy. A few hotels and casino-hotels opened, but the business was modest. The problem was Las Vegas was too remote. Los Angeles, the nearest city of any consequence, was three hundred miles away, a daylong drive in daunting desert heat in cars that were not air-conditioned, or a bumpy, adventurous two-and-a-half-hour flight over deserts and mountains. San Francisco was six hundred miles away, the East Coast as remote as China.

The casino-hotels operated like dude ranches, on a howdy-pardner basis with rustic accommodations and fare and no entertainment but the gambling. Sophisticated nightclubs operated in Los Angeles, and a few enterprising men developed the idea that Las Vegas should offer a combination of casino gambling, first-class accommodations, and top-notch entertainment.

The problem was, banks were reluctant to lend money to build casino-hotels. One Benjamin Siegel, better known to the world as Bugsy Siegel, solved that problem. With money of his own from his bookmaking operations in California, plus money from such investors as Meyer Lansky and Moe Greenbaum, Bugsy built the Flamingo. It opened on December 26, 1946, with Jimmy Durante and the Xavier Cugat band on the stage.

The Flamingo made no profit with the flamboyant Bugsy managing. Besides, he had a furious temper and more than once attacked and injured men who called him Bugsy — in full view of casino clientele. A person or persons unknown — who would permanently remain unknown — solved the Bugsy problem on June 20, 1947, by shooting him in the head with a 30-caliber rifle as he lounged on a chintz-covered sofa in the Beverly Hills home of his girlfriend Virginia Hill. With him out of the way, banks were more willing to lend money to finish the Flamingo and to construct other casino-hotels. The Las Vegas boom was on its way. New hotels went up all along what they began to call The Strip.

A major problem remained. Access. Las Vegas was still difficult to get to.

Jonas Cord had contributed significantly to the solution of that problem. In 1947 he had instituted daily Inter-Continental Airline flights to Las Vegas from Los Angeles and San Francisco. Shortly he made that two daily flights. His airplanes flew at high altitudes, in the smoother, cooler air. They flew faster. On Inter-Continental, Las Vegas was only ninety minutes from Los Angeles. Players could fly to Vegas on an afternoon flight, gamble all night, and return on the morning flight. Hostesses served drinks during the flights.

Airline hostesses had originally all been nurses, expected to hover over passengers and to help them through likely bouts of airsickness. Even after they were no longer nurses, hostesses remained treacly solicitous. The Vegas flights were supposed to be fun, and Jonas asked his hostesses to wear shorts. They were the first airline hostesses in the world to wear shorts. They wore T-shirts too, lettered intercontinental—las vegas. Most flights were full, or nearly so. Other airlines saw the profitability of the market, and in 1948 other flights began to come in from as far away as Denver, Dallas, and Chicago.

Jonas Cord had made a major contribution to the success of Las Vegas, and his name was known there. He had never paid for a room, had never paid for a drink or a meal, on any visit.

He would never have thought of coming to Las Vegas to stay while the enthusiasm for subpoenaing him died down. That had been Nevada's idea. He knew Nevada would have made good arrangements.

6

The little frame house at the end of the ramp was indeed a private club for owners and pilots. They could eat, drink, play one of the dozen or so slot machines in the hall, or visit rooms upstairs with one of the girls who sat in the bar.

"Don't know about you," said Nevada, "but I could stand a nice thick steak."

They took a table by a window overlooking the runway and ramp. The table and chairs were solid maple furniture. The tablecloth and the curtains on the window were of red-and-white-checkered cotton. A candle had been allowed to burn down and cover with wax the neck of a Chianti bottle in a basket. The napkins were paper.

Jonas asked for a bottle of bourbon and two thick steaks, rare, with potatoes.

"Who's renting me the top floor of The Seven Voyages?" Jonas asked.

"The man who owns it," said Nevada. "His name is Morris Chandler."

"I've heard the name," said Jonas.

"Maurie and I go back a long, long way."

"Longer than the time you've known the Cords?" Jonas asked.

"Longer than that."

Jonas did not pursue the subject further. A part of Nevada's life was a closed book. Jonas knew the broad outlines of it, as his father had known, but Nevada Smith was not the kind of man you cross-examined.

One of the girls from the bar came to the table. She was a short bleached blonde wearing too much red lipstick. She wore a white peasant blouse to show off her oversized breasts.

"You guys bored?" she asked.

"As a matter of fact we're not," said Jonas. "And we've got business to discuss."

"Oh. Well, if business gets boring, I'll be in the bar."

When she was out of earshot, Nevada said, "Maybe you oughta take her up on it. Settle your nerves."

"The bourbon will take care of my nerves. I suppose I should call Monica and tell her where I am."

"Wait till you're in your suite," said Nevada. "Chandler has got the phones hooked up so they relay through an office in San Diego, which makes it impossible for somebody to trace your call and find out where you are. Besides, whatta you wanta bet they got your home phones tapped by now?"

"How am I going to talk to my offices?"

"Trust Chandler. He'll put scramblers on your phones, too. I talked to him about it. I told him you'd have to be able to reach the people that work for you. Hey! You're not the first guy that's holed up on the top floor of The Seven Voyages."

" 'Trust Chandler'?"

"I do."

As they talked, Jonas watched the tractor pull a Twin Beech out of the hangar. Shortly two black cars drove onto the ramp. Five men got out and climbed into the Beech. It taxied to the end of the runway, turned, and came roaring back. It needed all the runway available to take off and rose into the air just before the pavement ended.

"We're staking a lot on this Morris Chandler," said Jonas.

"Don't worry about it," said Nevada. "Maurie and I go back a long way."