by Bill Moody
“I thought you were only there a few weeks.”
Louise smiles but won’t meet my eyes. “Caught me. I went back, very much against my mother’s wishes, the last month. I was eighteen, hooked on the glamour, the celebrities, the excitement. I had to go back. Can you understand that?”
“I think so, but in a different way.” Maybe what I didn’t want to admit, even to myself, was that same feeling was pushing me to play a solo piano gig at a shopping mall.
“Well,” Louise says, “at least you’re still doing it. I sell homes to casino executives and retired Californians.”
“And I bet you’re good at it.”
“I’ve been lucky. This town runs on juice, they call it—influence, connections.”
“Did the Moulin Rouge have anything to do with that?”
“No,” she says, but her answer is too quick. “Why do you ask?”
“Just curious. What about Wardell Gray?”
Louise shrugs. “I just remember a swinging band and Wardell being a nice, good-looking man who played great saxophone. He was too fast and too old for me, and the word was he was doing drugs.”
“What was the feeling the night he died?”
“Of course everybody was shocked, sad, but there was a show-must-go-on kind of thing, and it was kept pretty quiet.”
I could imagine. Two nights into the opening of a new hotel, and one of the musicians is found dead in the desert. Not the kind of publicity any business would want. I drink the last of the iced coffee and chew on an ice cube, letting some silence pass, between us, but I sense Louise has told me all she’s going to, and now she’ll get to her real reason for meeting with me.
I glance at my watch. Misters or not, I’m thinking about Ace’s pool, but I’m too late.
“Look,” Louise says, “maybe I can help. I kept a journal during the Moulin Rouge days. I didn’t tell your friend that. I’ll go through it, see if there’s something else that might be helpful.” She sits up straighter in her chair and assumes what I guess is her closing posture. “I read about the Lonnie Cole thing. I know you were pretty involved in that investigation, and I thought—”
“That was a one-time thing,” I say, cutting her off. “If you read all the accounts, you know I was named in the blackmail note as a go-between. I didn’t have much choice about getting involved.”
“Oh, I know. I wasn’t thinking about anything like that.”
“What then?”
“My daughter. I am worried, and I don’t know how to look for her other than hoping she might show up some night at the Four Queens. You’re a musician, you must know a lot of musicians in town, the hangouts. You could ask around. I would certainly pay you for your trouble.”
I stub out my cigarette before answering her. She’s a nice woman, so I measure my words carefully. “Louise, this is the first time I’ve been able to even remotely play the piano in more than a year. That’s the only thing I want to think about at the moment. Wardell Gray—the Moulin Rouge thing—is just to help out a friend. I’m not a detective or an investigator or whatever they call them in Nevada, and believe me, I wouldn’t know where to start looking for your daughter, whether you pay me or not.” I pause for a moment and try to take the edge’ off my voice. “I’m sorry.”
“You’re right,” Louise says. “I had no right to ask. It’s just, I’m afraid something might have happened to her.”
“Call the police. File a missing persons report. You don’t even know if she’s still in Las Vegas.”
“No, I don’t want... can’t do that. I don’t want to go into it, but I just can’t.”
“Well, I don’t know what else to tell you.” I try to be firm, but I find I just can’t walk away either. “Look, tell you what I will do. You’re right. I know some musicians, some of the clubs here. I’ll ask around a bit, see if anyone knows her, but I don’t want your money and I’m not promising anything.”
“Thank you, I would appreciate any news.” She digs into her purse and pulls out a photograph. “Just in case.” She hands me the photograph and I flash on photos of Lonnie Cole and Charlie Crisp. This is how that all started.
Rachel Cody, blond, her hair cut short, is smiling at the camera like she hasn’t a care in the world. “When was this taken?”
Louise sees my look of surprise. “I know, even light-skinned black girls aren’t usually blond. She wanted a new image. That was taken about a year ago at my house. By the way, if you’re free for dinner sometime I’d love to have you out.” She digs in her purse again and comes out with a business card.
I nod and start for my car. “Evan? There’s just one more thing.”
“Yes.”
“Rachel is a very good singer.” Her smile is like a plea.
I sit in the car for a minute, Rachel Cody’s photo in one hand, her mother’s business card in the other.
A possible murder out of the past, a missing person in the present. Where do I go from here? I start the car and drive off, wondering what Danny Cooper will think of all this.
CHAPTER SIX
There’s a note on my door from Ace when I get back to the apartment. He wants me to join him at a tennis club in Green Valley. I look longingly at the pool. A drive across town in this relentless heat isn’t appealing, but I think Ace needs some company, and there is a sense of urgency in his note.
“Please try to make it by five,” Ace has written, along with directions to the club. I check my watch and find there’s still time for a quick dip if I hurry.
Ten years ago Green Valley was nothing but desert, several hundred acres of it, owned by the Greenspun family, who also owned and published the Las Vegas Sun newspaper. In the far southeast corner of the city, Green Valley is now a sprawl of comfortable homes, shopping centers, restaurants, and apartment complexes. A development pushing Las Vegas ever closer to Los Angeles.
The tennis club is just off Sunset Road and upscale all the way. I park in the busy lot and hope shorts and T-shirt are adequate for whatever Ace has in mind. A pretty blond at the front desk, dressed in a tennis skirt and top, directs me to the courts on the lower level.
“Almost finished,” Ace yells, and waves as I take a seat on the bench at his court. For his size, Ace moves amazingly well and his height is a real asset at the net. But his opponent, a chunky man with a gray beard, moves faster and is too much. He passes Ace with a blistering shot down the line for match point, then throws his racket in the air.
Ace drops his racket and applauds the shot. “Next time, Jim, next time,” Ace says. The other man waves, and Ace flops on the bench beside me and towels off. “I’m beat,” Ace says.
“Now I know your secret. Playing on an air-conditioned court.”
“Once in a while,” Ace says. “I’m just his guest today. This club is too expensive for college professors.”
I know Ace well enough to sense that he’s stalling, avoiding telling me something. “So, what’s up?”
Ace gathers up his things and shoves them in his tennis bag. “Let me grab a shower and I’ll meet you up in the juice bar, okay?”
“Sure.” I go back upstairs. The bar is across from the front desk. Two guys in workout clothes are doing their best to interest the bartender, but she looks to be in better shape than both of them. I order some kind of juice shake that’s the special of the day and watch an aerobics class through a wall of glass opposite the bar.
The women are dressed in outfits ranging from leotards to warm-up suits to shorts and T-shirts. The sound of heavy rock music leaks through the wall. Watching these women grind it out before a disciplinarian instructor makes me think of Cindy.
“She called today,” Ace says, dropping his bag on the floor. “A bottled water, please,” he calls to the girl behind the bar.
“Who?” I watch Ace pour the water into an ice-filled glass.
“Cindy.” Ace nods toward the aerobics class. “You told me how much she was into working out.”
“That I did. What did
she want?”
“Just, you know, how you were doing.” Ace takes a long pull of his water. “The girl is nuts about you, my friend. You know that, don’t you? Love is the pump that inflates the soul.”
“You going poetic on me, Ace?”
“That’s from a Czech writer, Milan Kundera. He’s right you know.”
I’m not one to spill everything to my friends, but I know Ace means well. “Yeah, I know. You didn’t drag me all the way over here for advice to the lovelorn, did you?”
Ace laughs. “No, not from me, but Cindy and I had quite a little talk. She just wonders why you haven’t called her. She’s worried about you. You know, how the gig is going, that kind of thing.”
“It’s not going, Ace.” I reach for a cigarette but remember this is a health club. The smoking police will probably surround the club if I light up. “I can barely get through the two hours. Two hours, Ace. I’ve played club gigs backing two or three horns for six hours and I was still ready to play more. Now I can’t get through a solo gig for a third of the time.” I flex my fingers and stare at my hand as if it’s betrayed me.
“Hey, it’s early,” Ace says. “You just started. It’ll just take time to get back in the swing of things.”
“I’d like to believe that, but I think I know better.”
Ace is silent for a few moments. He knows better than to push it, and I know he wants me to make it.
“So how are you doing?”
“You mean with Janey gone? Okay, I guess.” He shrugs. “The days are long. You know, we never spent a night apart since I was in graduate school. Sometimes it just doesn’t seem possible that she’s gone.” He blinks back a couple of tears and takes another drink. He stares off into space for a few moments, lost in memory. “Anyway, a lot of teaching, writing to do. I don’t know why, but this article has become really important to me, Evan.”
Cindy’s call was not the urgency in Ace’s note. He just wanted some company. Glad for the change of subject, I tell him about my talk with Pappy Dean and Louise Cody. Ace immediately discounts Pappy’s apprehension and is excited by Louise Cody’s revelations.
“C’mon, Evan. Wardell’s death is ancient history. Who would be interested in it now except a professor who needs to get published? The mafia is history too. These days the town is run by corporations.”
“So they tell me.” That was certainly true as far as music goes. The bean counters in suits closed lounges, cut back on entertainment, and installed more slot machines in its place.
“Well, there might be some leftovers, but who would be left from the ’50s?”
“Maybe I’ll find out.”
Ace ignores that. “It sure would be nice to get a look at Louise Cody’s diary. You know there could even be a book in all this. Maybe you’ll get lucky and find her daughter and—”
“Settle down, Ace. I’ll do your research for you, but I’m not in the missing persons business.”
Ace puts up his hands in surrender. “Okay, okay,” he says. “Just do me one favor. Call Cindy.”
“I did. Left a message.”
“Yeah, well, talk to her next time.”
Ace is right about one thing. Corporations do run Las Vegas now, and that mentality extends into complimentary tickets for shows. Before my shift at the Fashion Show I make a few calls to some musicians to see if I can line up something for Coop and his meter maid, but it’s not until I get through to Wayne Newton’s conductor that I have any luck.
“Yeah, it’s tough these days,” Tommy Redman says. “Tony Orlando couldn’t even get his mother comped, and the hotel charged him for every bottle of champagne he gave away at the show.”
“How is the Midnight Idol?”
“Wayne? He’s putting my kids through college, thank you very much. They’ll owe their education to ‘Danke Schön’.’’
I’ve heard Tommy play many times. He isn’t Bill Evans or Oscar Peterson, but he knows how to play for singers and conduct an orchestra. “Well, do what you can, Tommy.”
“You got it, man. I’ll tell Wayne Lonnie Cole’s conductor wants to see the show. That should do it. I’ll try for Friday night.”
“Thanks, Tommy. Let me know.”
Thanks to Tommy, when Coop calls from the Rio Hotel on Friday, I can tell him we have ringside seats to Wayne Newton’s show. “You owe me big-time, Coop.”
“Why? I thought this was a freebie.”
“It is, but if I have to sit through the show, you’re heavily in my debt.”
“You jazz guys are all alike. How about I introduce you to my friend from Metro after the show?”
“That would do it.”
“Okay, I’ll check with him. No promises though.”
“I know you’ll do your best to further relations with the Santa Monica police.”
“Fuck you, Horne.”
Coop is checking his watch and pacing around in front of the showroom entrance when I get to the Sands. A line snakes from the desk back through the casino. The tables are crowded with players, and the banks of slots and video poker machines are crammed with hopefuls, eyes glazed, palms blackened from the slot handles. When Coop sees me he charges forward, a scowl on his face.
“We’re going to be late, aren’t we? We’ll never get a seat.”
“Relax. Where’s your companion?”
“Huh?” Coop spins around, scanning the crowd. A tallish blond in a black cocktail dress waves at him from a video poker machine. She gathers up some quarters from the tray and comes over.
“Winning already? Hi, I’m Evan Horne.”
“Natalie Beamer.” She holds out her hand. I try to imagine her in a police uniform. Even a quick glance tells me I wouldn’t mind a parking ticket from her. Coop has outdone himself. He looks proud but is assessing the line to the showroom.
“Hadn’t we better go?”
“Yeah, c’mon,” I say. I lead them to the invited guest line. Miraculously, all the arrangements have been made. We’re quickly ushered into the showroom and shown to a booth near the stage. Coop slips a folded bill to the maître d’, and the three of us slide into the booth. It’s nearly center stage. Coop is beaming.
The room is quickly filling up. There’s a buzz of conversation, and the waiters and waitresses are bustling about, trying to get drink orders in before the show. Coop orders a split of champagne for himself and Natalie. I settle for a couple of beers.
“All right,” Coop says. He pats Natalie on the shoulder. “I told you my man would come through.”
I raise my glass to them. “Here’s to a happy weekend.”
“This is awfully nice of you, Evan,” Natalie says.
“No problem. It wasn’t that difficult.”
“No, I mean to sit through this show.” She gives me a big smile and nudges Coop.
He rolls his eyes. “Yeah, I forgot to tell you. Natalie here claims to like jazz. Just don’t get any ideas, sport.”
I like her already. “Any favorites?” I think I can see this coming, but I’m wrong. Natalie knows her stuff.
“I love Chick Corea,” she says, “and I just bought all the early Stan Getz that was reissued on CD.”
“I’m impressed.”
“Lot of money for a sax player,” Coop says. “Kenny G, now there’s a sax player.”
Natalie and I both scowl. “There isn’t any early Kenny G, Coop,” I say. “He hasn’t been around long enough.” Natalie and I are going to be good friends.
The house lights dim, a timpani roll signals a booming voice from offstage that dramatically announces, “The Sands Hotel proudly presents Mr. Las Vegas, the Midnight Idol, Wayne Newton.”
A wave of applause sweeps the room as the curtain goes up, the band kicks in, and Wayne strides onstage in a white suit, waving and smiling, shaking hands with the ringsiders. He grabs the mike at center stage and launches into a fast version of “Country Roads.”
Coop is mesmerized. Natalie sips her champagne and stares curiously at the stage. I
recognize several of the musicians and Tommy, of course, his back to the stage, watching Newton out of the corner of his eye, putting the band through its paces.
For one reason or another a lot of jazz musicians have passed through hotel house bands. James Moody, Dizzy’s long-time partner, and Red Rodney, who toured with Charlie Parker, are two who labored behind the Las Vegas stars while nobody in the audience would give them a second look or know who they were if you told them.
After nearly two hours of nonstop Newtonizing, which includes the obligatory “Danke Schön” and numbers by Wayne on banjo, guitar, drums, and just about anything else, the audience prepares for the finale. Tie loosened, Wayne starts talking to the audience, introduces Tommy and the band.
I lean in close to Coop. “Now he’s going to say, ‘We normally finish about now but you’re such a great audience, we want to play some more for you. Right, guys?’”
Newton says exactly that, and right on cue, the horn section rises in unison and dons McDonald’s hats. “You deserve a break today!” they shout.
“How about these guys?” Newton asks the audience. The crowd breaks up, and naturally, they love it. “Hit it,” Wayne shouts. The band goes into “Mack the Knife,” Wayne’s tribute to Bobby Darin. That’s followed by “America the Beautiful” as a huge screen rolls down behind the band and an American flag flutters in the breeze. Wayne hits his last notes and salutes the audience, who are on their feet before the last chord for the twice-nightly standing ovation.
Coop jumps up to join in and claps so hard my ears sting. Natalie, I notice, is as reluctant as me to rise. The house lights come up, and Coop drops back into his seat, looking nearly as tired as Wayne must be.
“Well, I’ve got to admit,” Natalie says, “he gives them their money’s worth,”
“That was fucking great,” Coop says. He slaps me on the back. “Thanks, sport.”
“The best thing Wayne Newton does is make large contributions to the UNLV jazz program.”
“No shit,” Coop says.
