Stephen Cannell - King Con

"Buncha cheap fucks," Duffy muttered, as he picked up the dice.

"Come to Daddy. Seven come eleven," and he pitched the dice to the end of the table and they came up nine.

"Nine. The point is nine."

Beano could tell from the phone calls and the furtive looks that they were about to get closed down. He nudged Duffy in warning, so Duffy didn't go for the loadies and instead rolled the casino dice. After three rolls, he sevened out. The crowd around the table let out a sad collective breath and the dice were passed.

"Cash me in," Duffy growled.

"This table's closed while we do the count," Buzini instructed, but the other players stayed there and watched as the old man's chips were counted. The process took almost fifteen minutes.

"One million one hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars. How do you want that, sir?" Luke Zigman asked.

"Cash fucking money," Duffy yelled, and the people at the table laughed.

They rolled a cart out from the cage and made a big deal of counting the money and laying the packs of bills in Duffy's lap. Beano had brought the small, blue folding bag which, had Buzini and Zigman stopped to think, would have seemed very strange. Beano packed the money into the bag. Once it was all in, he started to roll Duffy out of the casino. Security guards were everywhere now and Duffy, with the bag on his lap, was stopped from leaving just a few feet away from the casino main entrance. Buzini stood in front of them, blocking their exit. "I'd like to buy you a congratulatory drink; maybe we could get some pictures of you with the money for the newspaper. It's good for the casino to publicize big winners," he said, as thirty or so spectators gathered around.

"Don't drink. Hate having my picture took," Duffy croaked, but now he was shaking so badly that he was actually wiggling all over the chair. Several of the Security men had their hands on the arms of the chair so Beano couldn't leave.

"Harry, you're about to have one a your seizures," Beano warned.

"You sure we can't put that money in the safe for you?" Buzini said.

Then the sound of sirens could be heard in the distance and Duffy looked up at Arnold Buzini, rolled his eyes back in his head, and suddenly convulsed. His legs shot out straight and his neck went rigid. He catapulted out of the chair, onto the floor.

"Oh, my God, he's having an epileptic fit," Beano screamed, pumping the atmosphere with adrenaline and confusion. "Call a doctor! Call an ambulance!" he shouted.

Duffy was on the floor; his legs shot out, his back arched, he gagged as he inhaled.

The cops from the Bahamian Patrol now came running into the casino. Several of them were met by the Assistant Manager and led off to the tenth floor to find bags of pure heroin that were planted in Duffy's room.

Duffy was convulsing terribly. A ring of people stood helplessly with their hands up to their mouths in horror.

During all of this, Beano had managed to slip silently out of the casino with the bag full of money. He moved to the parking lot, and Victoria pulled up in the blue van. He jumped in the back. Roger-the-Dodger put his paws up on the seat and looked back at him.

An ambulance arrived a few minutes later and the attendants ran inside. When they reached Duffy, he appeared to be unconscious. When they pried open his mouth, they found he had swallowed his tongue. They cleared it out to open the airway.

"This man is in critical condition," a paramedic announced.

"Where the fuck is the other guy?" Buzini said, finally realizing that Beano had disappeared with the cash. "The guy with the bag. Where's the guy with the bag?" Buzini said, in a panic.

But Beano wasn't in the casino.

The paramedics pushed Buzini out of the way. They got the roiling stretcher from the back of the ambulance and loaded Duffy aboard. They wheeled the unconscious man out and into the back of the yellow and white ambulance. Then, with red lights and sirens, they roared away, heading for the Community Hospital, ten miles to the west. Nobody noticed the van that followed.

Fit-Throwing Duffy sat up in the back of the ambulance and looked at the startled paramedics.

"I'm okay now. Feel much better. Thanks," he said. "I'll just get out here."

"Lie down, mon," the startled attendants ordered. Duffy got off the rolling stretcher and moved to the back of the ambulance, but the door was locked. Duffy tried to open it but couldn't.

"Get back on that stretcher," the young Bahamian paramedic commanded.

"Go fuck yourself," Duffy shot back.

They were now almost to the hospital. Beano could see that Duffy wasn't going to be able to get out unless they did something drastic. "Gotta stop the ambulance," Victoria said, picking up his exact thought. She gunned the van, shot around the ambulance, hit the brakes, and threw the van into a four-wheel drift right beside the ambulance. Once she was sideways in the lane next to the ambulance, she floored it; the tires caught hold, smoking and squealing on the pavement. She was now perpendicular to the ambulance, and as the Bahamian driver hit the brakes in panic, she T-boned the yellow and white ambulance, pinning it against the curb. The ambulance and van both smoked to a stop. Roger was thrown off the seat to the floor with a yelp. Beano jumped out and yanked open the back door of the ambulance. Duffy leaped out and ran for the van. Beano wasn't far behind. An ambulance attendant had jumped out and was running after them, but Victoria now had the van in reverse. She backed up and skidded the van around and cut the attendant off. The van engine was smoking, the radiator leaking water. Beano and Duffy jumped in the open door on the opposite side as the ambulance attendant banged on Victoria's locked door, trying to pull it open.

"Come back here, that's our patient," the attendant screamed as Victoria floored it and squealed away, heading in the opposite direction.

Beano looked over at her, surprised, as Roger-the-Dodger jumped back up on the seat between them.

"You okay?" Victoria asked Duffy, who nodded.

"Not my best fit but certainly in the top ten," Fit-Throwing Duffy grinned, as they roared away.

They could hear sirens coming toward them. Beano knew that Buzini was heading toward them with the police. "Turn right, across the field!" he yelled.

Victoria turned the blue van right and crashed through a fence and drove across the soft ground. She could barely control her progress in the soft dirt but managed to keep the van slip-sliding on course, heading southwest. The van fishtailed and threw up a plume of brown dirt that was visible from the road in the lightening sky. Through the back window, Beano could see the cop cars pull up and park next to the ambulance. Several of the police, plus a fuming Buzini, got out and looked at them across the field. They had gained distance, but now the police cars backed up and gave chase, roaring out through the broken fence, across the field after them.

They arrived at the Deep Water Airfield at five past six; the morning sun was just over the rim of the hill.

"If my cousin Lee isn't on time, we're all going to jail," Beano said as Victoria pulled the van onto the runway tarmac and came to a screeching stop. Parked at the end of the runway was a red and gray King Air twin-engine plane.

"There," Duffy said, pointing.

Victoria floored it. By now the police cars were in view, coming along the airport frontage road, their sirens braying. Victoria drove the van full-speed to the plane. Beano jumped out before Victoria had even brought it to a complete stop. He ran to the pilot leaning against the wing. "Lee, get this thing up right now!"

Leland X. Bates looked off at the approaching squad cars and shook his head in dismay.

"Usually you're a little smoother than this," Lee said, moving quickly into the plane. The squad cars were now on the runway and racing toward them.