by James Swain
He pulled the thickest envelope from the stack. Inside was a certified check for three thousand dollars, his usual fee, along with several decks of playing cards and a letter from the manager of the Golden Dragon Casino in Macau.
He’d worked for casinos in Macau before. It was a strange place. Gambling was the number one source of revenue, with prostitution a close second. It could be reached by boat from mainland China, and every day, thousands of rich Asian businessmen made the trek and descended upon the island’s casinos like hungry locusts.
According to the letter, one of the Golden Dragon’s blackjack tables was bleeding money, and the casino’s head of security, an Aussie named Crawford, was convinced the cheaters were using “paper,” which was cheater’s slang for marked cards. The problem was, Crawford couldn’t find the marks.
Crawford had never used Valentine for a job before. But according to his letter, he’d heard through the casino grapevine that Valentine was good at reading paper, so he’d taken a chance and overnighted a few decks, along with his money. Crawford was desperate.
Valentine was good at reading paper. Twenty years policing Atlantic City’s casinos had exposed him to hundreds of marked-card scams. So many ways existed to mark cards that he’d developed a test that was as good as any for finding the work. It required a normal deck of cards, which Crawford had sent him straight from the plant.
The Golden Dragon used cards manufactured by the United States Playing Card Company in Cincinnati, Ohio. They were thicker than regular cards, so that the ink wouldn’t rub off after continued use. Opening the normal deck, Valentine removed a single card and held it next to a suspected marked card beneath the light on his desk.
To the naked eye, the two cards looked identical. But that didn’t mean anything. He placed the marked card beneath the normal card. Then, he snapped the normal card away and stared intently at the marked card for several seconds.
He did this twenty times. By the twentieth time, his eyes had found the marks. They were in the center of the card, white, and almost microscopic. Cheaters called them block-outs. Usually, cheaters marked cards at the table with a substance called daub, or with lipstick or nicotine. The Golden Dragon’s cards were being marked by a professional on the outside, then brought into the casino by an employee. Which meant it was an inside job.
He put the cards down and smothered a tired yawn. Tomorrow was judo practice. He went three times a week to a dojo in Clearwater and always tried to get plenty of sleep the night before. He would call Crawford tomorrow and break the bad news. He started to turn off the light on the desk, then stared down at Crawford’s letter. His eyes caught the last line on the page. Management’s given me twenty-four hours to solve this.
He flipped the FedEx envelope over and stared at the label. It had been sent yesterday morning. Which meant Crawford’s hourglass had just about run out. He didn’t know the man but couldn’t help feeling sorry for him. He found Crawford’s phone number on the letter and picked up his office phone.
It was tomorrow in Macau. Crawford was at work, watching his blackjack tables through the monitors in the casino’s surveillance control room. Valentine explained what he’d found, and took Crawford through the test with the two cards. Crawford let out a laugh when the marks on the cards became apparent.
“Would you look at that? They’re right in front of my nose.”
“You’ve got a rotten employee bringing the cards into the game,” Valentine said.
“That would be the dealer at the table,” Crawford said. “He’s got a real gripe with management. Only one problem, though.”
“What’s that?”
“These cards won’t hold up as evidence.”
Valentine had started to file the Golden Dragon’s marked cards with the hundreds of similar marked casino decks he kept in a drawer. “Why not?”
“My casino is filled with cigarette smoke. You can hardly read the cards when they’re faceup. No judge will believe this is anything more than a printer’s mistake.”
Valentine smiled into the phone. He’d liked how Crawford had reacted to seeing the marks. Like he knew he’d been bested and didn’t mind learning something new. Valentine said, “You’ll need to take the judge through the snapping test. Then show him how the snapping test is no different than when the cards are dealt from a shoe. The cheater stares at the shoe and frames the cards as they come out. Whenever a marked card is dealt, the eye instantly knows.”
Crawford let out another laugh. “If I had a hat, I’d take it off to you, mate.”
“You’re welcome,” Valentine said.
“One more request. The gang we suspect is in the casino right now.”
Valentine smothered another yawn. “Want me to look at them, see if I can tell who’s doing what?”
“I’d be forever in your debt,” Crawford said.
Valentine booted up his computer. He subscribed to a high-speed Internet service called Road Runner, and within a minute, he was staring at a live surveillance picture of the Golden Dragon’s blackjack pit, courtesy of a feed from Crawford’s computer.
“Who’s winning all the money?” Valentine asked.
“Mr. Chan, the gentleman at third base,” Crawford replied.
Third base was the very last seat at the blackjack table. Mr. Chan, a diminutive man in his forties, was standing behind his chair, drinking and smoking and banging his hand on the table on every round. Crawford was right: The casino’s visibility was lousy, and there was no way Mr. Chan was reading the cards. Which meant someone else at the table was reading them and secretly passing the information to Mr. Chan.
Valentine brought his face inches from the computer screen. The table had seven players, and a crowd stood behind the table, clapping and making a lot of noise. One guy stood out. He was thin, wore glasses, and was staring at the dealer. Gambling was part of the Asian culture, and as a group they were passionate about it. Except the thin guy. He was as stiff as a statue.
Valentine relayed his suspicions to Crawford, then said, “See if you can pull the thin guy with glasses off the floor without arousing suspicion.”
“Got it,” Crawford said.
Soon, an attractive hostess appeared by the thin man’s side and spoke to him. The thin man nodded and walked out of the picture with the hostess.
“You were right,” Crawford said a few minutes later. “We took the thin man into a back room and frisked him. He’s wearing a thumper.”
Valentine banged his desk with his fist. He felt just as excited as the men on the screen. He had been catching cheaters for a long time but still got a thrill when he nailed someone. Thumpers were simple electronic transmitters that sent signals to other players at the table. The person on the receiving end—in this case, Mr. Chan—wore a buzzer against his leg, which would vibrate for a second or two each time the thumper was pressed. On the computer screen, Valentine saw Mr. Chan look around, no doubt wondering where the thin man with the thumper had gone. Mr. Chan scooped up his chips, preparing to leave.
“Your suspect is about to run,” Valentine said. “Want to have some fun?”
“What do you have in mind?” Crawford asked.
“I have a trick I used to pull on cheaters in Atlantic City I caught wearing thumpers. Who has the thumper right now?”
“One of my men on the floor.”
“The thumper has a switch to increase or decrease the power of the charge. Tell your guy on the floor to increase the power and start sending signals to Mr. Chan.”
Crawford made the call on another phone. Valentine stared at the screen. So many people were crowded around the blackjack table that Mr. Chan was having a hard time making a hasty getaway. Holding his chips protectively against his chest, he tried to push his way through. No one budged.
“Here goes,” Crawford said.
Suddenly Mr. Chan’s right knee convulsed into the air and nearly hit him in the jaw. Valentine jerked the phone away from his ear as Crawford exploded with laughte
r. Mr. Chan’s leg flew into the air again. He looked like a marching soldier. A look of panic spread across his face. His leg flew into the air a third time, and he dropped his chips. Sensing something was wrong, the crowd parted, then watched as he convulsed around the floor, his leg flying into the air every few seconds, as if keeping time to a beat that only he could hear. Crawford laughed so hard he sounded like he was crying.
“We call that doing the Funky Chicken,” Valentine said.
“You Americans have the best senses of humor,” Crawford replied. “Thanks for sharing.”
Hanging up, Valentine endorsed Crawford’s check, then added it to the stack sitting on his desk awaiting deposit. It had been a good week, yet it didn’t change how he felt. Money had never made him feel better.
He pushed himself out of his chair. He’d stayed up too long and no longer felt tired. His office phone rang again. He glanced at the caller ID and saw that it was his neighbor Mabel Struck. Mabel was the most important woman in his life. A retired Southern lady, she ran his consulting business, cooked him a hot meal when he needed it, and kept him from killing his son, Gerry, who’d moved across the street with his wife and newborn daughter two months ago.
“I hope I didn’t wake you,” Mabel said.
“I was working on a case,” he replied. “I figured it was time to start tackling this work that’s been piling up.”
“Are you feeling better?”
Better was a relative term when your mood was lousy. Mabel knew about the situation with Lucy Price and had been intercepting her phone calls on a daily basis.
“A little,” he said.
“Glad to hear it. Do you have your television set on? There’s a special report from Las Vegas. Something terrible has happened.”
“Let me guess. One of the casinos had a losing night.”
“Tony, this isn’t funny. There’s a bad fire at one of the hotels.”
He walked out of his study with the cordless phone cradled in his neck, his bare feet making the hardwood floors creak. He lived on Florida’s laid-back west coast in a New England–style clapboard house. The house was sixty years old and had withstood a dozen hurricanes and tidal surges. Everything about its construction was solid.
He switched on the TV in the living room. He was a news junkie, the set always tuned to CNN. A picture of a burning hotel appeared, the flames dancing fifty feet in the air. The caption said it was the Riverboat. He knew lots of people there. As deadly black smoke poured out of the hotel’s windows, a feeling of helplessness sunk him into his La-Z-Boy.
“You still there?” his neighbor asked.
He’d forgotten the phone was still pressed against his ear. “Yeah.”
“You watching?”
“Uh-huh,” he grunted.
“I’d thought you’d want to see it. I remember you saying you had several friends there.”
The picture switched to one from a helicopter, and Valentine found himself staring at the side of the hotel. The camera zoomed in on a man standing on a balcony. He was balding and overweight, and was climbing over the railing as flames danced around him. He crossed himself, then stared directly into the camera. The camera did a close-up on his face.
“Don’t show it,” Valentine said to the screen.
The man on the balcony hesitated. There was a courage in his eyes that you didn’t see very often. The look of someone who’s accepted his fate. He opened his mouth.
“I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country,” he yelled at the camera.
Then he jumped.
3
Max Duncan, a twenty-eight-year-old blackjack dealer, watched the first fire trucks pull in front of the Riverboat Casino across the street. More trucks followed, along with dozens of wailing police cruisers. The joint must be on fire, he thought.
Max wanted to go to the windows and have a look; only, house rules forbid him from leaving his table. There was a famous story about a dealer who left his post to help a man having a stroke and was fired on the spot.
The pit boss hurried past Max’s table. He was a tough nut named Harry. Every day before the shift started, Harry made the dealers assemble in the employee lounge and on an easel wrote a single word in giant letters: WIN.
After a minute Harry returned, his face cast in stone. Max tried to get his attention.
“Harry, what’s going on?”
“Deal your game,” Harry snapped at him.
Harry made it sound like a threat. He made everything sound like a threat. Max looked at the elderly woman sitting at his table. Her name was Helen, and she was a retired bookkeeper. Helen had won the first bet she’d made a few hours ago, and allowed the memory to take up permanent residence in her imagination.
“Place your bets,” Max said. “You know what they say. You can’t win if you don’t play.”
“You can’t lose, either,” she replied testily. The cards had punished her since her first win, but she’d hung tight and almost pulled even. She placed a green twenty-five-dollar chip in the betting circle.
“Be nice,” she said as Max dealt.
Her two cards totaled sixteen. Helen had a stiff, the worst hand possible. She slapped the table hard.
“Now, now,” Max said. “Be kind to the furniture.”
More fire trucks raced past the casino. Someone opened one of the front doors, and the trucks’ wail filled the interior like a chorus of screaming cats. A chip girl walked past the table, and Max caught her eye. “What’s going on?” he asked under his breath.
“There’s a fire over at the Riverboat.”
“Is it bad?”
“People are jumping from the balconies.”
“Jesus,” he swore under his breath.
“Hit me,” Helen said.
Max looked at her. She’d heard everything the chip girl had said.
“Come on, lady,” he said testily. “Show some respect. People across the street are dying.”
“It’s no surprise,” she said, talking in a loud voice. “The owners rushed to make their grand opening. A lot of palms got greased to get the building up to code. Now, hit me.”
Max dealt her a four, giving her a twenty.
“Was that so hard?” she cackled, her foul mood vanishing.
Helen had started the evening with five hundred dollars, dropped to twenty, and was now slightly ahead. Max wanted to tell her to go home, but the rules prohibited it. He watched her slide all her chips into the betting circle.
“Let it ride,” she said.
The table limit was five hundred. Max called the pit boss. As Harry approached the table, Max said, “Lady wants to bet the kaiser roll.”
“She counting?” Harry asked.
“Naw.”
“Let her.”
The other blackjack tables were clearing out, the players going to the windows or walking outside to watch the fire. Helen ignored their departure, her eyes fixed on the plastic shoe as if the next card to be dealt contained the secret to the universe.
Max dealt the round. They both had twenty. A push. It seemed sinful to be gambling while people were dying; only, Helen didn’t see it that way, her mouth working a two-hour-old piece of gum like a piece of cud.
Max dealt another round. This time, Helen had twenty, while he had sixteen. He drew a card and snapped it over: a five. The retired bookkeeper gritted her teeth and swore.
“Always the big ones,” she said as Max took away her chips.
“Seems that way, doesn’t it?” Max said.
Busted, Helen got up to leave. An overweight man had walked into the casino and stood behind her, holding her chair. Helen thanked him, then made a funny sound. Max followed her gaze. The overweight man was soaking wet, his shoulders and balding head sprinkled with shiny slivers of glass.
“Where are your shoes?” Helen asked.
“Lost them,” the man said.
He took Helen’s chair and pulled his body close to the table. Helen hung close to his side, w
aiting to see what he was about to do. Riffling his pockets, the man scowled; no wallet. Removing his watch, he dropped it on the felt table and pushed it toward Max. “How much will you give me for this?”
“I’m sorry, sir,” Max said, “but house rules prohibit me from pawning chips.”
“Anyone ever tell you that you sound like a robot?” the man asked. Turning to the retired bookkeeper, he said, “How about you? It cost me eight hundred.”
Helen appraised the timepiece. Placing it on the table, she said, “It’s broken, mister. You just come from across the street?”
The man stared at the shattered face of his Movado. “That’s right.”
“You jump into the pool or something?”
The man pointed at the watch. The hands were frozen at 12:05. The retired bookkeeper nodded, understanding immediately. The man said, “I jumped through the skylight in the spa’s roof and landed on some mattresses lying in the pool. They broke my fall. When I pulled myself out of the water, I discovered my shoes were gone.”
Helen took the seat next to him. “What’s your name, mister?”
“Ricky Smith.”
“This is your lucky day, isn’t it, Ricky?”
“It sure is. I won twenty grand earlier.”
“Twenty grand! What were you playing?”
“Blackjack.”
Helen looked into the young man’s eyes. A silent understanding passed between them. Taking her purse from her pocketbook, she extracted a twenty tucked behind a picture of her cat. “When I was growing up, my mother made me carry a hidden twenty whenever I went out. I thought it was stupid until a boy tried to rape me on a date. I ran and ended up calling a cab. Guess what?”
“What?” Ricky said.
“The fare came to exactly twenty dollars.” She dropped the grainy bill on the table and slid it toward Max. “Chips, please.”
Max took the twenty, called out “Changing twenty,” and shoved the money into the drop box in the table with a plunger. Then he took four red five-dollar chips from his rack and slid them toward Ricky.
