Brett Halliday - Lady, Be Bad

“Anything’s possible,” Shayne said easily. “But they didn’t seem too worried about me when I was out there. Up to a point, they cooperated. I didn’t find out anything that would get them into federal trouble, and that’s the only kind that bothers them. If they’d wanted to kidnap me, they would have done it before I left.”

“Then what’s your hypothesis, Mr. Shayne? That the proponents of this bill we have under consideration brought in a group of thugs to remove you before you could testify against it?”

“That’s probably more or less what happened,” Shayne agreed. “It was a stupid move, but there are stupid people in every business. I’d like to correct you on one point. I’m not testifying against the bill. I haven’t read it. I’ve been asked to appear to answer questions about the way gambling casinos operate in the one state where they’re legal.”

“Continue, Mr. Shayne.”

Shayne had recently been hired for a large retainer by two minority members of the Gaming Control Board to investigate rumors about irregularities at several large Las Vegas hotel-casinos. The public, it was felt, would have more confidence in a report by an out-of-state investigator than in anything originating within Nevada. While the senators listened attentively, Shayne explained the principle of the house percentage. The casino operators took a small piece of every dollar, varying with the type of play, a cent and a half on dice, six cents on blackjack, six or seven cents on roulette. To a winner, a 6 percent deduction was trivial, but of course all the operator had to do was continue play through a succession of wagers, and without risking his own money he would end up with everything on the table. Then Shayne moved on to the theory of streaks. A player without capital is wiped out quickly by a streak of losses, while the house waits for the turn.

For these reasons, a large-scale gambling operation can lose money only if the operators are forced to pay too highly for permission to operate. In Nevada, the gamblers avoid this hazard by being on the good side of the law. Still, being businessmen, they like to minimize their tax obligations, and before the evening’s winnings are counted, an undisclosed amount of cash is skimmed off the top, to be distributed among the owners. This is a federal offense. The Internal Revenue Service, using computers, can estimate the true profit levels of a legitimate operation. So the owners, to beat the computers, go illegitimate again, ringing an occasional shaved deck into the blackjack games, tightening the payoff screw on the slot machines, controlling the play at the roulette layouts.

Several of the senators found this hard to believe. When the legitimate profits are so enormous-

“But don’t forget we’re talking about crooks,” Shayne said.

That proved to be the most telling line in his testimony.

It made the evening news summaries and was quoted several times during the Senate debate the next day.

Shayne’s report to the Control Board had been accepted and placed on file. But payoffs to Nevada officials are simple-somebody merely puts a pail over the side and dips up some of the cash. One of the men who had brought Shayne in moved to Los Angeles, where he bought property in a high-priced residential district. The other was hospitalized after an automobile accident, which he assured everybody had been his own fault. In the carpet joints, the roulette wheels continued to spin.

Judge Kendrick asked about Nevada’s methods of licensing and control, and contrasted them with provisions in the proposed Florida legislation. Senator Maslow then took over.

Sheldon Maslow had started life as an actor, and was only now beginning to live it down. His burly good looks, his direct gaze and firmly clenched jaw seemed to appeal to women voters, especially over sixty, and there are many of these in Florida. Groups of elderly women waited in hotel lobbies for a chance to touch him. Television was his most effective medium. Reduced to the small screen, he looked like the modest, successful son every mother would like to have. In real life, unfortunately, he always seemed to be selling something.

He had wangled a place on a nearly defunct investigating subcommittee, and began a series of hearings on the links between the Mafia and certain union locals in the big cities. Two or three publicity breaks made him a statewide personality. A few minor hoodlums went to jail. Several cops resigned to take positions in private industry.

When the senate leadership, not liking his independence of the political machinery, cut his appropriations, he set up his own crime-fighting organization, raising funds from businessmen to hire a small cadre of investigators. He continued to make news, but somehow the important criminals continued to elude him.

He could be rough with hostile witnesses, but Shayne, of course, was under his protection.

“Mr. Shayne,” he said deferentially, “you’ve displayed considerable expertise on the subject of gambling and politics, and after hearing the sordid story you have to tell, I fail to see how anyone who is sober and in his right mind could vote to surrender our great state of Florida to the kind of scum and riffraff you have described so well. Now I want to solicit your opinion on a matter that is closer to home. I know you are considered something of an expert on the criminal power structure of Miami and Miami Beach. You must know a man who calls himself Sam Rapp.”

“Sure. I think his name actually is Sam Rapp.”

“Will you tell us a little about him?”

Shayne shrugged. “He’s been around. He hasn’t been arrested in twenty years, and maybe that means he hasn’t broken any laws in that time. He owns a big Collins Avenue hotel, the Regency. He’s considered by many people to be the top gambler and political fixer in the county.”

The senator’s manner became a touch less friendly. “You don’t agree with that estimation?”

“No. I don’t believe there is a top man, in that sense.”

“Isn’t Rapp generally referred to as the Prime Minister?”

“That’s what the papers call him.”

“However you rank him in the hierarchy, you would agree, would you not, with the designation of Mr. Sam Rapp as an important professional bookmaker, who consorts openly with known criminals?”

“I consort with criminals myself sometimes, Senator. It doesn’t mean anything. As far as I know, Sam stopped booking bets years ago.” He added, “I know he used to be a bookmaker because I placed my own bets with him. The statute has run on that. He always paid off promptly, which is about all you can ask of a bookie.”

The crowd laughed.

“I’m told you just returned from Las Vegas this morning. You may not have heard that Sam Rapp has raised a six-hundred-thousand-dollar war chest from his underworld colleagues to throw behind this bill.”

“They were worrying about it in Vegas. They’re three thousand miles away, but they’d lose some of their New York business. I told them not to underestimate the Florida Legislature.” He paused a beat. “Six hundred thousand isn’t enough.”

There was more laughter, and Maslow snapped, “Do you think Sam Rapp had anything to do with trying to keep you from appearing before this committee?”

“I’ll ask him the next time I see him,” Shayne said curtly.

“You don’t need to wait till you get back to Miami. You can look him up while you’re here. I have reliable information that he is registered under his own name at the Skyline Motel, Room 12-B, in the company of a young woman, one Miss Lib-” he consulted a paper-“Miss Lib Patrick. I am also informed that several senators, whose identity I am not prepared to disclose at this time, have visited Mr. Rapp and Miss Patrick in Room 12-B at the Skyline Motel. That concludes my questions, Mr. Chairman.”