Long walks were a form of meditation. Once inside a casino, meditation was not an option.
*****************
Noise and light bloomed around Matt like a migraine headache as he pushed through the darkened entry doors. The slot-machine jingle sounded like Christmas, but the spirit of Las Vegas' eternal gambling season was receiving, not giving. People, machinelike themselves, sat before clanking, gear-spinning mechanisms that spit back the occasional coin like bad change.
When Matt removed his gloveless right hand from his pocket, his palm was damp. But the plastic-laminated sketch of Cliff Effinger was impervious now to heat and moisture, preserved.
Matt wondered who to approach. Was he expected to tip for attention? If so, he'd be broke within days. Once more he mentally rehearsed his story. Lying, or even bending the truth, still took a lot of rehearsal. He was the opposite of a con man, he wanted to sell the truth even when he knew there would be no takers.
"Excuse me."
The waitress wore something shiny and slithery and scanty, but her face beneath the cheap, harsh makeup was even bleaker.
"Yeah, hon?" Bright tone, the better to cadge tips.
"I'm looking for someone. You might have seen him." Matt flashed the sketch in the insufficient light that was always bright but as tremulous as a firefly.
"Somebody cared enough to do a portrait," she commented. "Relative of yours?"
"My ... brother."
"You're a lot younger than he is, hon. A lot cuter too." Her blackened lashes lowered to the sketch, her comment a fact, not a flirtation.
"My mother ... married twice."
Her eyes rolled. "Mine too. And believe me, number two was no improvement. Hey! At least they married." She frowned at the shiny plastic. "That cowboy type is rare these days. They're up in Colorado now, all the Stetson boys. This guy looks a lotta years behind the times."
"He did . . . drop out of sight."
"Maybe. I mighta seen him, oh, couple months ago. Not a regular, though. Want a drink?"
She tilted her round glass-laden tray to him.
"Isn't that somebody else's?"
She shrugged. "I can get 'em another one of whatever you take where that came from.
They're all free in the gaming area. You look like you could stand some warming up. It's cold out there on the Strip tonight. Stay here and run the slots a while. I come by regularly."
Matt shook his head, closing his fingers over Effinger's too-good likeness. Should he ask someone else? Maybe.
The waitress had minced away on her Temple-like high heels. She was old for the outfit, and probably knew it. It was cold out there on the Strip.
Matt wandered away from the clattering slot machines into the blackjack and craps areas.
He couldn't envision Effinger playing baccarat. The dealers watched the cards, the cameras hidden in the ceiling above watched the dealers and the players and the pit bosses kept an eagle eye on everybody.
He'd talked to one before and found him forthcoming. Older men, seasoned in smoke-filled rooms clinking with ice in glasses. Heavyset usually. The casino's authority figures, not unlike bishops. On a chessboard, he remembered, a bishop could move diagonally. In the church, the bishop's only option was up . . .
If he thought of these men as bishops, he would get on with them better. But no "Your Reverences," only an inner air of respect. Perhaps that's what the heads of crime families expected too.
*********************
"Excuse me. Has this man been in here recently?"
The man eyed Matt, ruling out cop and P.I. with expert speed. "Lost relative."
"Right."
"We get a lot of those. And they appreciate it if we don't mention it even if we did see 'em.
That's why cameras aren't allowed in the casino area."
"The reason isn't security?"
"Nah. Not our security, anyway. It's theirs." He gazed out on his rowdy flock with a shepherd's satisfaction. "Don't want the folks back in Pineapple Junction to see 'em."
"This guy's a gambler, all right." Matt weighed his forthcoming lies, wondering which false tack would be most effective. "We lost track of him, and now Mom's gonna die. She's all we got left. And there's... a lot of money involved."
"And you're lookin' for him? I would think you'd want the lost sheep to stay lost."
"Oh, no. I'd never do that."
"What are you? Jehovah's Witness or something? You're way too straight for this town, kid."
"I know," Matt said with a sad smile.
The pit boss grabbed the sketch to hold it up to the light. He might also have been holding it up so a hidden camera lens could record it.
Matt's fingers itched to reclaim the likeness. Someone might want Effinger to stay lost.
But now he was stuck surrendering his passport to Effinger to some unknown factor. Maybe other people didn't think Effinger was dead either. Maybe someone still wanted him dead, if he weren't already.
"What's this guy's name?"
Matt shrugged. "I guess he would have used whatever worked. We're hoping if we can get him home, we can get him into a recovery program."
"Sure, sure. I get a finder's fee?"
"I'm sure . . . Norbert will be very generous when he finds out what's waiting for him at home."
"Norbert! They all have dumb names like that, the losers."
Matt flushed. He should have had a fake name on the tip of his tongue, not whatever his subconscious chose to dredge up. St. Norbert.
"Not your fault," the guy said, handing back the sketch. "Saw him a couple months ago, but he moved on. Used to get sloshed and talk about coming into big money. Lousy craps player, which is the way we like 'em. Ended up on the nickel slots. What a piker. Maybe when he gets home and grabs some of that moolah he'll come back and improve his rep around here. Try up the street at The Slottery. He was tapped out when he left here."
"Thanks."
Matt walked away through the crowds and the clatter, mentally repeating the key phrase like a sin that needed confessing. "Used to talk about coming into big money." If the big money wasn't Effinger's to come into, someone might have wanted to kill him. But why fail? Why plant Effinger's ID on a corpse close enough to his own physical description to confuse matters? And why hang around town when he was supposed to be dead? Even an imbecile would know enough to get out of sight and keep out of sight.
Matt felt like an imbecile himself. Maybes weren't good enough. Maybe he needed a new set of maybes, like maybe he needed something he didn't have: Cliff Effinger's rap sheet. Maybe Molina would let him see it, or at least sum it up. Matt stomped down the Strip sidewalk, finding his new boots clunky and clumsy.
The Hesketh Vampire was an evil influence. It was changing the way he dressed as well as the way he got around town. Maybe it would change the way he thought too. Maybe that wasn't so bad. He suddenly wanted the details of that rap sheet so badly he itched all over with impatience. He was a blind man, stabbing in the dark. If Molina was going to sic him on Effinger indirectly, he needed more than he had. Under the bright lights, his watch read 10:15 p.m.
Where would Molina be now? Home, probably.
Discouraged, he dragged his way back to the Vampire, blazing like irradiated platinum under the bright light it was parked beneath for security reasons, the presumption being that thieves wouldn't mess with such a visible target. Max Kinsella was right, maybe. Bold and noisy and brash is the best disguise in Las Vegas.
Matt finally knew where he should go, and unlocked the Vampire. The boots were tough enough to kick back the steel stand and come away unscuffed.
He knew where he was going now, and suddenly feared he might be too late. It was a long shot, but after all the tepid inquiries tonight, he suddenly felt lucky.
Odd that his arena of luck was so far from the Strip.
**************
The restaurant lot was half empty. A week night didn't keep people up at all hours, even in Las Vegas, and especially in the residential areas where the nine-to'fivers lived.