Sucker Bet (17 page)

31

“You look like a bag of wet doughnuts,” Victor Marks said.

“It’s been a long week,” Rico admitted.

“Appearances are important,” Victor said, his tone scolding. “In this racket, they’re the most important thing you’ve got.”

They were sitting at the Seafood Bar in Victor’s favorite hangout, the Breakers in Palm Beach. The bar was an aquarium, and Victor identified the fish as they swam past. “The orange and white one is a clown fish. That one’s a purple damsel. And that big guy is a spotted eel. Every day, the eel eats one of the other fish. It costs the hotel a lot of money to keep replacing them. Know why they leave the eel in the aquarium?”

“No,” Rico said.

“Appearances.” Victor motioned for the bartender. “Two more,” he said, pointing at their glasses. When the bartender was gone, he said, “How’s the basketball scam going?”

“It’s going to be tough to pull off.”

“Of course it’s going to be tough to pull off. If pulling cons was easy, every blowhard from here to Cincinnati would be in the racket. You’ve got to play the part.”

“I’m trying.”

Victor touched Rico’s sleeve. “Look at me.”

“Okay.”

“What do you see?”

What Rico saw was the best-dressed guy in the hotel, an eighty-year-old with a perfect haircut and capped teeth and tailored clothes. He saw a guy he’d like to be one day.

“A guy on top of the world,” Rico said.

“That’s right. And I’m working a job, right now.”

“Here?”

“Yup. Surprised?”

“Yeah . . .”

“It’s called the confidence game, kid. You’ve got to exude confidence, otherwise you won’t fool a blind man.”

“What you got going?”

Victor dropped his voice. “I come here three or four times a year, and I always leave with a bag of money. Twenty grand, sometimes more. Pays for my vacation and the broad on my arm.”

Rico felt his spirits pick up. Victor did that to him. Victor was the epitome of what a criminal was supposed to be, the master of a universe of his own creating. Every pearl he passed along, Rico knew would bring him closer to his own dream.

“Come on. Tell me.”

“It’s the Titanic Thompson/Arnold Rothstein con.”

“What’s that?”

“You didn’t read the book I gave you?”

Rico lowered his head in shame. He hadn’t read a book in twenty years.

“No.”

Victor looked out the window as two well-kept women walked by. He spoke in a normal voice, no longer caring who heard. “I give you a book, you’re supposed to read it. Titanic Thompson was the greatest con man of the twentieth century. Arnold Rothstein was one of the greatest gamblers of the twentieth century. He fixed the 1919 World Series.”

“The Black Sox scandal,” Rico said.

“Go to the head of the class. One night in New York, Rothstein got into a poker game at the Roosevelt Hotel with a bunch of heavy hitters, one of whom was Thompson. Rothstein ends up losing half a million bucks. We’re talking 1927 here, which might make this the biggest pot ever.”

“Was Thompson cheating?”

“Of course he was cheating!”

Rico slumped in his bar chair. “How?”

“That’s the good part. Thompson had been watching Rothstein for years. He’d noticed that whenever Rothstein played poker, he always bought the cards himself. That way, the cards were always clean. So Thompson loaded marked decks in every gift shop and stationery store within a two-block radius of the hotel. When Rothstein showed up to the game and took two brand-new decks out of his pocket, Thompson knew they were his.”

Rico beamed. “Is that what you’re doing here, using marked cards?”

Their drinks came. Victor sipped his soda water, savoring the moment. “The hotel has its own decks of cards. I went to the plant and bribed them into changing the plates.”

“You mean
all
the decks in this joint are marked?”

“Heh, heh, heh,” Victor said.

Victor’s scam was a lot like Tony Valentine’s marked-deck scam. A real sweet deal. That was the thing about the old guys, Rico thought. They knew how to make money without getting their fingernails dirty.

Thinking about it reminded Rico why he’d asked Victor for a meeting, and he lowered his voice. “Victor, I have a problem.”

Victor was watching broads. A pair was standing outside, smiling and waving through the glass. Victor blew one of them a kiss. “I took her husband for ten grand, and she’s been flirting with me ever since. God, I love rich people.”

“A real problem.”

Victor turned in his chair. “What’s that?”

“A guy named Tony Valentine is putting the muscle on me.”

“Tony Valentine?”

“You know him?”

“He was a dick in Atlantic City. Made life miserable for me and my crew.” The fun had gone out of Victor’s voice. “What does he want?”

“A cut.”

“What for?”

“He knows about the scam I pulled at the Micanopy casino, and about Bobby Jewel.”

“How does he know that?”

“Dunno. I haven’t told the details to anybody but you, Victor.”

Victor’s eyes grew narrow. “Bull.”

“What do you mean?”

“You probably told the last broad who showed you her titties.”

“You think so.”

“Yeah. You’ve got a big mouth.”

Victor was talking to him like he was a punk, showing no respect. Rico didn’t like it. “The only person I told the details to was
you
, Victor.”

Victor took out his wallet and threw down his resort charge card, money not allowed on the property. The bartender said, “On the house, Mr. Marks,” and Victor put the resort card away. Under his breath he said, “Are you accusing me of ratting you out?”

“You’re the only one who knows.”

“You came to
me
six months ago, asked me to teach you the ropes. Said you wanted to screw a bookie out of a few million. So I taught you the rackets. And this is my reward?”

Rico grabbed the older man’s sleeve. “I didn’t tell
nobody
else.”

Victor slapped his hand on the bar so hard that a school of tiny fish disappeared. The bartender hurried toward them, a worried look on his face. Victor waved him off. Shaking free of Rico’s grasp, he said, “Go back to New York, kid. You’re out of your league down here.” Then he straightened his jacket and walked away.

Rico got out of the Breakers, but just barely. Two mean-faced security guards appeared within moments of Victor’s departure. They followed Rico to the valet stand and watched him get into his limo and drive off, the one in shades scribbling down his license number. Staring at them in his side mirror, Rico let out a stream of obscenities.

He drove through Palm Beach, drawing stares from other limo drivers, who wore hats and neckties. He needed another driver, someone to play the part, so he could play
his
part. Victor was right. Appearances were everything.

He drove west until he saw signs for the Florida’s Turnpike. There was no doubt in his mind that Victor had told someone. And that someone had told Valentine. It could have been anyone—a mutual friend, even a barber—but Rico had to find out who it was, before he told someone else.

He got on the turnpike and headed south. He needed to put the screws to Valentine and make him talk. Which was what he probably should have done in the first place.

Fishing out his wallet, he removed the napkin that Gerry Valentine had scribbled his phone number on, and dialed it on his cell phone.

“Fontainebleau hotel,” an operator answered.

This was going to be too easy, he thought.

32

The scene at the Virgin store got ugly fast.

Nigel’s turn on the drums had been advertised in the newspaper and on the radio. The crowd had come to get a taste of the old-time mayhem that only he could produce, his wild-eyed, manic intensity one of the few lasting images of the cocaine- and booze-injected rock and roll of the early eighties.

The record promoter tried to defuse the situation by grabbing the mike and telling a few bad jokes. Someone in the crowd threatened to kick his bonded teeth down his throat. Candy ducked out the back door and circled the building. The pink limo was parked out front, but she was not sure she wanted to be associated with it.

Instead, she started walking to the Delano and immediately regretted it. She was dressed like a streetwalker, and cars did the slow crawl down the street, a few male drivers waving handfuls of bills, trying to entice her to jump in.

Candy cursed them, and Nigel for reducing her to this. It was one thing to be a whore. It was something else entirely when the man you loved made you feel like one.

Her stilettos left puncture wounds on the Delano’s wood floors. The Rose Bar sat off the lobby, an unfriendly space with muted lighting.

“Where is he?” she demanded of the bartender, knowing that it was to the bottle that her lover had surely run.

Polishing a highball glass, the bartender pointed in the direction of the bungalows. Candy stormed out.

She had to pass through the patio restaurant to reach the bungalows, and a couple she’d chatted with in the pool now avoided making eye contact. Why had she let Nigel talk her into wearing these horrible clothes? It made her so angry, she wanted to kill someone.

The bungalow was empty. Nigel’s clothes sat in a pile on the bathroom floor, his bathing suit gone. She changed into a bikini, then searched for something sharp to plunge into her lover’s heart when she found him.

A few minutes later she did. He was sitting on the shore a hundred yards from the hotel, a bucket of Shiner Bocks by his side, the incoming tide splashing on the soles of his feet. His body was big and milky white, his back covered with curls of graying hair. Shielding his eyes from the sun, he stared up at her.

“With that?” he said.

Candy looked down at the hotel corkscrew clutched in her hand.

“You’re going to kill me with that?”

No one was around. Yes, that was exactly what she was going to do.

Her lover shook his head. “Be serious, my dear.”

She halved the distance between them, wondering how he’d look with the corkscrew sticking out of his ear. Oblivious to the danger he was in, Nigel patted the blanket.

“Sit,” he said.

“Fuck yourself.”

“Please.”

“You think I wouldn’t do it?” she said through clenched teeth.

“Not if you thought you were going to get caught.”

She looked up and down the empty beach. “Caught how?”

“There’s a young fellow from the hotel sitting in the bushes, smoking a joint. When I’m finished with these beers, he’ll take the bucket to the hotel bar and get a refill. It’s called the deluxe service. I pay for it.”

The intoxicating smell of reefer floated above the salty air. She threw the corkscrew against Nigel’s back, then marched over to the palmetto bushes and saw the employee sitting in the sand, having a little fun. He was jet-black, from one of the islands, and Candy stuck her hand out.

“Give me that,” she said.

He obeyed, and she took a monster hit, then handed it back to him. “Thanks.” Then she walked back to where Nigel sat.

“Feel better?” her lover asked.

Candy helped him polish off the remaining Shiner Bocks. The tide was coming in, and their suits quickly filled with sand. A fresh bucket of beer appeared. Nigel opened two.

“I’m from Middlesbrough,” he said. “It’s a factory town in the north of England, known for its mills. I used to work in one, dying white lace. I learned from my father, who learned from his father, who didn’t graduate the sixth grade. My father was a little better: He made it through high school.”

He clinked his bottle against hers, his eyes swimming. “So did I. And vocational school. But I still went to work in the mill. One of those stupid family traditions, I suppose. Not that it was a bad life. Just horribly dull. On weekends, I got drunk in the pub.”

Candy was on her third beer. The sun was hot; tomorrow she’d be as pink as a lobster. She looked into Nigel’s face. She was still mad at him. “So?”

“I’m getting to the good part,” he said, wiping his mouth on his wrist. “I knew these blokes who had a band. They called themselves One-Eyed Pig. I would go to gigs with them, help them set up. They paid me in beer.” He smiled, the bottle inches from his lips. “One day, the lead singer, Troy, calls me up, says he has a problem. The band’s drummer quit. Troy offers me the job.”

“And a star was born,” she said sarcastically.

His eyes narrowed. “Not really. I don’t play the drums.”

“Very funny.”

“I’m not a musician. Troy wanted me to fake it for a gig in the next town. I would pretend, and they would play a tape.”

“How do you pretend to play the drums?”

“The drumsticks were made of Styrofoam. No sound.”

A big wave came in and knocked her back a few inches. Nigel, a hundred pounds heavier, was unaffected. She scampered back to her position.

“The gig was in this huge dance hall,” he went on. “At first, I was scared, but then I realized that this was the only time I was going to get a taste of being famous, so I jumped around and did crazy things with the sticks and made a complete horse’s ass of myself. The crowd was mostly dopey kids. They loved it.

“There was a record producer there. Bloke named Flash Summers. Liked to wear outrageous designer clothes and have an underage girl hanging on each arm. He signed us up on the spot.”

“But you don’t play.”

“It didn’t matter. Flash loved me. Said I was the greatest natural showman he’d ever seen. He wrapped his arms around me, said he was going to make me famous.”

Another wave came in. Nigel held Candy’s hand so she was not dragged backwards. They were big hands, yet also soft and gentle. “The band was born that night,” he said. “Flash knew it, the crowd knew it, and we knew it. We cut our first album the next week.”

“Who played the drums?”

“A studio musician they hired.”

Candy stared out at the endless stretch of blue. She had seen Nigel play, remembered it as clearly as what she’d had for breakfast. The AIDS concert in New York’s Central Park. She’d watched it on TV, Nigel’s maniacal solo piercing the still night air. That couldn’t have been a recording.

“But I saw you play,” she insisted.

“Where?”

“On television, from New York.”

He took the empty beer bottle from her hand, replaced it with a fresh one. “Another hoax, I’m afraid. After the album went platinum, we were expected to tour. Flash knew we couldn’t do concerts with a tape and survive, so he put this drummer in a hollowed-out amplifier directly behind me. He would play, and I’d fake it.”

“In an amplifier?”

“He was a dwarf. Flash found him in the Tom Thumb circus.”

Candy put her hand over her mouth. “Cut it out.”

“I’m serious,” he said. “Guy could play any instrument. Sing, too. He’s out in Vegas now.”

“Doing what?”

“A mean Elvis Presley impersonation. He wears one of those white leather outfits with all the lace. Calls himself Elfis.”

Candy didn’t see the monster wave roll in. As laughter poured out of her mouth, it hit her in the face, and she went under.

“I want to ask you something,” she said after they burned up the sheets with their lovemaking.

“No,” he mumbled, his face buried in the pillows.

She shoved him playfully. “Come on.”

He rolled over on his side. “What?”

“Why do you hang out with guys like Rico? What is it going to get you, except in trouble?”

He thought about it for a while, his finger tracing a heart in her bare midsection.

“Do you know what it’s like to have everything handed to you, and you didn’t do anything to deserve it?”

Candy shook her head no.

“It
sounds
great,” he said. “And in the beginning, it is. Like one of those great Charles Dickens tales about a young boy being mistaken for a prince and given the run of the castle. It’s fun, but then it starts to wear thin. You’re not the person people think you are. The person you really are, you can never go back to being. It’s like dying, and waking up in someone else’s bloody body.”

He touched her chin, then managed a faint smile. “I hang out with guys like Rico for the same reason that I gamble. It makes me feel alive.”