James Swain - Gift sense

"You mean what I just did could have gotten you fired?"

"Yes, sir. Nick's afraid of getting ripped off."

"Doesn't want to make that twenty-six million payoff unless he has to, huh?"

"You got that."

"Mind if I examine your bride?"

"Be my guest."

One-Armed Billy was made of cast iron and had six reels and a single pay line-line up the cherries and win the jackpot. It was an antique, its popularity probably the only thing keeping it from the scrap heap. Today's slots were computer driven, with microprocessors controlling the reels and sophisticated silicon chips to deter tampering. Slots like Billy were easily ripped off, but Valentine didn't think Nick had anything to worry about. By law, all gaming areas in a casino had to be under the watchful eye of a surveillance camera. Slots came under the heaviest scrutiny, and Billy's alcove had two ceiling-mounted pan/tilt/zoom cameras, commonly called PTZs.

"Why's Nick so paranoid?" Valentine asked.

Joe shrugged his broad shoulders. "Beats me. I just do what I'm told, you know?"

"Sure. I'd better run."

"Don't go turning up any more dead guys."

"I'll try not to," Valentine promised.

"I figured you'd be back in Florida counting your money," Sammy Mann said from behind a gauzy white curtain.

Valentine stood in an otherwise empty hospital room, a plastic bag from the gift shop dangling between his hands. Shadows played on the curtain's hot fabric, and he watched a nurse stick a needle in Sammy's arm.

"Ouch," Sammy yelped. "Take it easy, will you, honey?" To Valentine, he said, "So how's the joint holding up without me?"

"Nick's got Wily running security."

Sammy emitted a deathly groan, its timbre sending a shiver down Valentine's spine. He whisked away the curtain to see the nurse frantically shaking her patient. Sammy looked like he'd just checked out and the poor nurse looked ready to join him. Valentine caught the nurse's eye, then grabbed the black onyx ring on Sammy's third finger and tugged. Sammy's eyes snapped open.

"That's not funny," the patient said.

"You know what they say. You can't take it with you."

The nurse got out of their hair. Valentine tossed the gift-shop bag onto Sammy's chest and pulled up a chair. Sammy was in traction, his left leg dangling from a Rube Goldberg contraption hanging from the ceiling. He wore a loose-fitting cotton gown that exposed the tired, ropy flesh of his neck and spindly arms. On the night table sat the TV remote, a buzzer for the nurse, water, and a stack of crossword puzzle books. Sammy beamed as two decks of Bees, one red, the other blue, fell from the bag.

"You remembered," he mumbled.

"I figured you still practiced," Valentine said.

"Every day."

Tearing away the plastic, Sammy removed the red deck from its cardboard box. Tossing away the junk cards and jokers, he began to expertly riffle-shuffle and cut the cards on the sheet, which lay flat across his stomach, the pasteboards moving with such unerring precision that even to Valentine's trained eye there did not appear to be a hint of subterfuge. Squaring the deck, Sammy turned the cards face up and ribbon-spread them in a wide arc. Not a single card was out of the deck's original order.

Valentine let out a whistle. Back in the fifties, a New Jersey certified public accountant named Herb Zarrow had devised a revolutionary way to false-shuffle a deck, the mechanics perfectly miming a real mix. Sammy's rendition was pure poetry, and Valentine guessed he had a game on the side he was working; probably a bunch of old geezers he squeezed for pocket change.

"I need your help," Valentine said.

"You still on the case?"

"Nick's got me on a new assignment. He wants me to find Nola."

"Has Cupid's bow struck again?"

"Afraid so."

"I think Nola's dead," Sammy said.

"I don't," Valentine replied. "But I'd like to hear your theory."

Gathering the cards, Sammy spoke as if he'd already given the matter serious thought. "I think Nola went to Mexico with some cockamamie notion that she could rip off Nick and pay him back for humiliating her. Sonny played along until he realized she was the perfect patsy."

"Learned how to read her and sent her home?"

"Exactly. There's no law against reading a dealer. He's done nothing illegal, and neither has she."

"Then why did do you think he killed her?"

"Because she knows where he lives. Mexico City isn't as far away as you might think. She's a risk."

"And he kneecapped you for old times' sake," Valentine said.

"Exactly. You agree?"

"I'm sticking with my original theory."

"Which is?"

"Nola is as crooked as a corkscrew," Valentine said. "There's something bigger going on here, just like you said two days ago. Fontaine spent a long time planning this one, and Nola helped him."

Sammy boxed the deck, deep in thought.

"How's Wily really doing?"

"He's trying," Valentine said.

"Like a dog trying to walk on its hind legs?"

Valentine smiled. "Something like that."

"One day, I caught Wily eating fried chicken behind the craps table. The guy shooting the dice is taking us to the cleaners. Wily goes over and throws the chicken bones under the table. I ask why, he says, 'Well, it was bad luck for the chicken, wasn't it?'"

"The place hasn't fallen down yet," Valentine said. "He's beefed up security, has everybody on his toes."

"I begged Nick to do that years ago. We get so many hustlers it isn't funny."

"Why's that? The $4.99 buffet?"

"Very funny," Sammy said, suddenly getting cranky. He pushed a button and the bed tilted so he was sitting erect. "When it comes to running a casino, Nick's the squarest operator around. He gives people better value. We play handheld games of blackjack, and at craps we let punters press their frontline bets up to ten times at stake. That's true odds. Tell me another house on the Strip that does that."

There were a handful of casinos on Fremont Street that shaded the odds in the player's favor, but Valentine knew of no others on the Strip, which was where all the action was.

"None."

"None is right. You don't have to cheat very hard to tilt the odds Nick's giving. When I arrived, the place was a candy store."

"Why doesn't Nick play the same odds as everyone else?"

"I tried to talk him into it," Sammy said. "Nick wouldn't budge."

"Why not?"

"He's got principles."

Valentine thought Sammy was making a joke, and he laughed.

Sammy's face turned to a snarl. "You spent your whole life in Atlantic City," he said, making it sound like grade school. "Las Vegas is different. The turnover at most casinos is a hundred percent. Nick's a saint compared to the rest of these owners. He's got profit sharing and health insurance. This stay ain't costing me a dime. What more can I ask for?"

Valentine looked around the room, which was sleek and contemporary. What was missing was a get-well card, or flowers, or balloons. But maybe that was too much to ask for. In that regard, Las Vegas really was different.

"I had a visitor yesterday," Valentine told him.

"Someone I know?"

Valentine told him about the cowboy's visit and Fontaine's threat.

"You think it was the same guy that kneecapped me?"

"Sure do," Valentine said.

"How the hell did he get into your room?"

"Someone inside the hotel gave him a key."

Sammy sat up very straight. "Who?"

"Could be anybody. A dishwasher, a bellboy, even Wily."

"Jesus Christ." The head of surveillance turned pale. "Okay, so what are you going to do?"

"Find Nola," Valentine said.

"If she's still alive, you mean."

"Trust me, she is."

Sammy took the blue Bees out of their box and put them through the motions. Valentine had watched a lot of top-notch mechanics over the years, but no one in Sammy's league. Others manipulated the cards; Sammy's fingers made love to them.