Loaded Dice

by James Swain

  “You think I’m wrong?” Wily said.

  “Yes.”

  “Tony, you’re getting old.”

  “You think so?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m going to tell Nick.”

  A look of apprehension crossed Wily’s face. “You really think it’s him?”

  “Yes.”

  Wily went to the console, punched in a command, then crossed the room to the laser printer in the corner. A printed sheet came out. He held it up so Valentine could see it. It was the photograph of Fontaine talking on the phone.

  Walking over to a technician, Wily handed him the photograph and said, “Make a few hundred copies and distribute them to every employee. If anyone sees this guy, tell them to send up a flare.”

  Valentine watched the technician leave. Then he looked at Wily. He hadn’t liked the crack about getting old. That was the thing he hated the most about Las Vegas. People didn’t stay your friend for very long.

  Walking over to the printer, he removed Fontaine’s photograph and left without saying a word.

  17

  Mabel got up Saturday morning, fixed herself a fruit smoothie, and walked down the street to Tony’s house. She drank her breakfast while sitting at Tony’s desk, fielding e-mails and phone calls from panicked casino bosses that had come in the night before. In a business that never went to sleep, Friday nights were particularly hectic, and she spent an hour going through Tony’s messages. At ten o’clock the phone rang. It was Tony’s private line, and she snatched it up. It was Yolanda.

  “Can you come over here?”

  “Of course. Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine,” Yolanda said. “It’s about Gerry.”

  “Be there in five,” Mabel said. She exited Tony’s e-mail, then shut his computer down. They lived in the lightning capital of the country, and leaving the computer on was an invitation for disaster. As she rose from her chair, the business line rang. She stared at the caller ID, then brought her hand to her mouth.

  “Oh, no,” she said.

  The caller was Richard Beamer, manager of the exclusive Liar’s Club in Beverly Hills. He had overnighted a certified check two days ago and been calling ever since. And she’d forgotten to tell Tony.

  Beamer’s check lay on the desk. It was for three grand, Tony’s usual fee. She’d grown up during the tail end of the Depression and could remember eating three-day-old bread, and standing on line with a wooden bucket to scoop sauerkraut and pigs’ feet from a barrel. She answered the call.

  “Grift Sense. Can I help you?”

  “This is Richard Beamer. Did you speak to your boss?”

  “He’s on a job in Las Vegas,” she said truthfully. “He asked me to take the information. Once he figures out what these cheaters are doing, he’ll call you.”

  “They were here last night,” Beamer said. “The other members want them thrown out. My job is at stake.”

  “Then why don’t you?”

  “I can’t expel them without proof. They’ll sue the club.”

  “What game are they playing?”

  “Poker.”

  Mabel had an idea and put him on hold. From the bookshelf, she removed one of Tony’s favorites: Poker to Win, by Al Smith. Tony said that 99 percent of the guys who cheated at poker used three scams described in the book: Top Hand, the Cold Deck, and Locating. She opened the book to the table of contents and picked up Beamer’s line.

  “I’m back. Let me ask you some questions.”

  “Is Mister Valentine going to call—”

  “Do your cheaters sit beside each other when they play?”

  “Why yes, they do,” Beamer said. He sounded like someone who’d had acting lessons, his voice animated. “How did you know that?”

  “It’s common among cheaters. Now, does one of your cheaters always drop out of the game, and the other wins?”

  Beamer gave it some thought. “No. Sometimes they both stay in.”

  Mabel smiled. That ruled out playing Top Hand, which was the signaling between players of who had the strongest hand, with the weaker dropping out. “Next question. Have you seen either player spill a drink on his cards, and replace them with a new deck?”

  Another pause. “Not that I can recall. Let me guess. The new deck is stacked so they’ll win.”

  “Yes. It’s called a Cold Deck,” she said, reading from the book. “The cards are usually false-shuffled when they’re introduced into the game.”

  “I would have noticed that,” Beamer said. “I’m a card player myself.”

  “Last question. Have you noticed the cheaters comparing hands after they’ve both dropped out?”

  Beamer didn’t hesitate this time. “Yes. They do that a lot. They’ll drop out of a hand and then compare the cards they had. I thought it was harmless.”

  “They’re memorizing them,” Mabel said, having flipped to the section on Locating. “The next round, the cards are passed to one of the cheaters. He shuffles but doesn’t disturb the memorized cards. On the last shuffle, he adds twenty cards to the bottom, then offers them to his partner to be cut.

  “His partner cuts at the memorized stack and brings the cards to the top. The cheater then deals. He plays a game like Seven Card Stud, where the first two rounds are dealt facedown.”

  “The hole cards,” Beamer said.

  “That’s right. By looking at their own hole cards, the cheaters work backward in their memorized stack and know the other players’ cards.”

  “That’s it!” he exclaimed.

  “It is?” Mabel said.

  “That’s exactly what they’re doing,” Beamer said triumphantly. “They always play Seven Card Stud, where each player gets two facedown cards. You nailed it, Miz . . .”

  “Call me Mabel,” she said.

  “You nailed it Mabel,” he said. “Much obliged.”

  The line went dead, and Mabel placed the receiver in its cradle. She picked up the Liar’s Club check and gave it a kiss, then remembered that Yolanda was waiting for her.

  Mabel locked the door to Tony’s house and walked down the front path. It was a beautiful morning, the air crisp and infused with ocean spirits, and she crossed the street with a smile on her face.

  Yolanda and Gerry lived across the street in a 1950s clapboard house. The house had a screened front porch and all the original fixtures and appliances. Having them in spitting distance—Tony’s words—wasn’t easy, but Mabel had come to the conclusion that family relationships rarely were. She pressed the buzzer, and the door opened.

  “Hey,” Yolanda said. She wore a pink maternity dress, no makeup, her hair tied in a ponytail. Her brown eyes looked very sad.

  “Sorry it took me so long,” Mabel said.

  Yolanda ushered her inside, then padded noiselessly down the hallway to the back of the house. Mabel followed, glancing at the silent TV in the living room. It had a cartoon on, and there was a yellow legal pad in front of it. Yolanda had started watching the popular kids’ shows, and was rating them based on the level of violence and the content. She had decided that she was going to determine what her child watched on the boob tube.

  Mabel stepped into the kitchen. It was small, with barely room for a breakfast table. She saw Yolanda moving a pile of medical books from the kitchen table.

  “Let me help you with those.”

  Mabel helped her put the books on the stove. Yolanda had been interning at Tampa General Hospital across the bay until she’d gone out on maternity leave. The hours were long, the pay lousy, and she was loving every minute of it. She pulled out a chair for Mabel, then took the one beside it.

  “What did Gerry do now?” Mabel asked, sitting.

  Yolanda let out an exasperated sigh while looking at the picture of Gerry on the table. He was dark and handsome, with a smile that could light up a room.

  “He sent me an overnight package.”

  “Is that bad?”

  Yolanda rose from her chair and took a cardboard box of
f the counter. It had an OVERNIGHT label plastered on its side. She handed it to her.

  Mabel peeked inside and felt her heartbeat quicken. She looked at Yolanda, and the younger woman nodded. Mabel removed a stack of bills and held them in her hand. Twenties and fifties, most of them wrinkled. She took out the other stacks. It looked like more than it was, but it was still a lot.

  “Did you count it?”

  Yolanda nodded. “There’s sixty-five hundred dollars in that box. I may have had a sheltered upbringing in San Juan, but I’m not dumb. Why didn’t Gerry send a check, or wire the money?”

  Mabel knew the answer, but refused to say it.

  “Because he stole the money, that’s why.”

  “You don’t know that for sure,” Mabel said. “You should give him the benefit of the doubt.”

  Yolanda stared into her guest’s face. “Tony sent Gerry to Las Vegas to learn how to card-count. I think it was a test. I think Tony wanted to see if Gerry could resist the temptation. And Gerry failed. He’s stealing from the casinos.”

  “Card-counting isn’t stealing,” Mabel said.

  “Call it what you want, it’s still wrong, and Gerry’s doing it.”

  “But he’s only been in Las Vegas for five days,” Mabel reminded her. “He couldn’t have learned how to card-count that quickly. It’s more difficult than that.”

  Yolanda considered it while staring at the stacks of money in Mabel’s lap. Lifting her eyes, she said, “Okay. If my husband isn’t card-counting, then what is he doing?”

  It was a good question, and Mabel racked her brain for an intelligent answer.

  “Let me know when you think of something,” Yolanda said, and walked out of the kitchen.

  18

  Valentine was still smarting over Wily’s crack when he walked into his suite a few minutes later. What did getting old have to do with his vision? He knew a crook when he saw one, and the man on the surveillance tape was the biggest crook of all.

  An envelope with his initials was propped on the coffee table. He tore it open and saw it was from Nick.

  Hey Jersey Boy,

  Bart Calhoun is the invisible man. All my spies could dig up was his cell #. Sorry.

  NN

  Bart’s cell number was at the bottom of the page. Valentine got a soda and went onto the balcony, his mind wrestling with how to handle this.

  He and Bart had a history. In 1980, the New Jersey Casino Control Commission had decided to try an experiment and let card-counters play blackjack at Atlantic City’s casinos. The result had been the immediate loss of millions of dollars. The experiment was halted, and the counters left town.

  Except for Bart. Bart liked the little city by the shore, and devised a unique way to keep playing. He sent teams of counters into the casinos and had them sit at different blackjack tables. When a counter determined a table was “ripe,” a signal was given—usually the lighting of a cigarette. Bart would descend, bet heavily, and clean up.

  Stopping Bart hadn’t been easy. Technically, he wasn’t counting, so barring him wasn’t an option. Valentine had solved the problem by contacting the IRS and making them aware of the gigantic sums Bart was winning. They had swooped down like vultures, and Bart had run.

  Most counters had phenomenal memories, and he was sure Bart remembered him. The question was, was he holding a grudge? There was only one way to find out. Going inside, he found the cordless phone and dialed the number on Nick’s note.

  “Who’s this?” a husky voice answered.

  “Hi. My son is enrolled at your school, and I need to speak to him.”

  “How’d you get this number?”

  “A friend gave it to me.”

  “Who’s that?”

  Valentine had learned that when you were bullshitting someone, it was best to tell as few lies as possible. “Nick Nicocropolis.”

  There was a long pause. “What’s your son’s name?”

  “Gerry.”

  The sound of a match being struck against a flint crackled across the phone line.

  “What’s this about?”

  “His wife is going to have a baby.”

  Calhoun snorted. “Figures. She’s been calling him every ten minutes. Hold on.” He put him on hold, then returned a few moments later. “Most of my students stay at the Red Roost Inn while they’re here. It’s in Henderson. 702-691-4852.”

  Valentine thanked him and started to write the number down.

  “Mind answering a question, mister?” Calhoun asked.

  “Not at all.”

  “Is this Tony Valentine I’m speaking with?”

  Valentine stopped writing. He hated it when people he’d once chased got the goods on him. “Yeah. What did Gerry do? Use his real name when he registered?”

  “Naw, he used a phony,” Calhoun said. “He just looks like you. It’s a funny world. You ran me out of Atlantic City, and now your son is learning to be a crook.”

  “Hysterical,” Valentine replied.

  Calhoun hung up on him. Valentine smiled, happy he’d gotten in the last jab. He punched in the number for the Red Roost Inn.

  Gerry was lying in bed in his motel room when the phone rang. He tried to imagine who it was. Yolanda? Or his father? He didn’t want to speak to either one, fearful of the tongue-lashing he knew was coming. Better to let his caller leave a message.

  The ringing stopped. He waited a minute, then went into voice mail and found a message. His father, sounding pissed off.

  “Your wife is worried sick, and so am I,” his father said. “I’m staying at the Acropolis. 611-4571. Suite Four. Call me when you get this. You hear me?”

  Gerry realized he was grinding his teeth. Leave it to his old man to track him down. He’d call his father back, but not right away. He erased the message and climbed out of bed.

  He took his time dressing. He hadn’t slept much, too worried by what had happened at the MGM Grand. There was no doubt in his mind that he’d gotten photographed, and that his face was now in a computer. His days of rat-holing chips for Amin and Pash were over.

  But that didn’t mean they couldn’t make money together. He had an idea, a really good idea. But he needed to run it by Pash first. He went to the door that separated their rooms and knocked. Pash appeared, holding a toothbrush.

  “Want to take a road trip?” Gerry asked.

  “What do you have in mind?”

  “A whorehouse.”

  Pash smiled, the toothpaste making him look like he was foaming at the mouth.

  “A wonderful idea,” he gushed. “Let me tell Amin.”

  Gerry stared through the open door. Amin lay naked in bed, staring at the mute TV. He watched Pash tell him he was going out. Amin cast him a disapproving stare. Pash shrugged and went into the bathroom. A minute later he emerged with his hair freshly parted and smelling of aftershave.

  Great, Gerry thought.

  Pash pulled out his cell phone when they were on the road, and called a brothel. They were legal in every county in the state with less than four hundred thousand residents. Gerry pulled into a convenience mart and went inside.

  When he came out, Pash was in the middle of a heated negotiation. Pash’s taste was for dark-skinned girls, and he knew to call ahead to avoid being disappointed. He also knew it was best to hammer out a rate before stepping foot in a place.

  “Hey,” Pash said, cupping his hand over the mouthpiece. “The madam said she’ll give us a deal for two. What kind of girl you want?”

  Gerry sucked on his Slurpee. He’d planned to take Pash to the brothel and pretend none of the ladies were to his liking. “I’ll decide when I get there,” he said.

  “Come on, what do you want?”

  “Do your own deal,” Gerry said.

  “But—”

  “I’m doing this for you, buddy.”

  The words were slow to sink in. Pash’s face brightened. “You are?”

  “Yeah,” Gerry said. “You need to get laid.”

 
Nevada had thirty licensed brothels, or ranches as everyone liked to call them. Pash had decided that he wanted to try the Chicken Ranch.

  “Everyone says it’s the best,” he explained to Gerry.

  It was in a burg called Pahrump, the town a shining example of what would happen if the nation’s gun laws were repealed. In Pahrump, rifles and shotguns were displayed in gun racks of every pickup, the locals proud of their Wild West heritage.

  “There’s the sign,” Pash said excitedly.

  A billboard loomed ahead. HIT THE GAS! THE WORLD-FAMOUS CHICKEN RANCH, FIVE MILES. They pulled into the gravel lot a few minutes later.

  It resembled an oversized motel, with rocking chairs on the front porch and smoke pouring out of a stone chimney. As they got out, Gerry spied a surveillance camera perched beneath the corner of the building.

  A plump, grayish woman greeted them at the door. She reminded Gerry of his Cub Scout den mother. It was a bad image to be carrying around inside a whorehouse, and he tried to erase it from his mind.

  “You must be the fellow I spoke to earlier,” she said to Pash.

  “That’s me,” Pash said brightly.

  “You like dark.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Very dark?”

  She made it sound like he was ordering chicken. Pash nodded vigorously.

  “You came to the right place, young man. The Chicken Ranch was voted best brothel in Nevada last year. Best accommodations, best food, best bar, and best of all—”

  “The best women,” Pash jumped in.

  “You saw our ad.”

  “Yes. Your Web site is very good, too.”

  She slung her arm through Pash’s and escorted him inside. Gerry stayed two steps behind, grateful she hadn’t latched onto him. Maybe she’d spied the hesitation in his face, or the cowardice in his eyes. He and Yolanda had stopped having sex months ago, and he’d sworn he wouldn’t touch another woman.

  Crossing himself, Gerry went inside.

  Thirty minutes later, Pash was wearing a FRESHLY PLUCKED AT THE CHICKEN RANCH T-shirt while eating pancakes at a diner down the road.

  “Why did we have to leave so fast?” he asked.