“Hey, Cheech,” I said. “I’m a jerkoff?” I laughed. Then I started walking around the table to leave the baccarat pit and made sure to pass close to him. He could no more resist taking a swing at me than a crooked croupier palm a stray hundred-dollar chip.
And I had him cold. Or I thought I did. But Cully and the two big hoods had miraculously come between us. One hood caught Cheech’s fist in his big hand as if it were a tiny ball. Cully shoved his shoulder into me, knocking me off stride.
Cheech was screaming at the big guy. “You son of a bitch. Do you know who I am? Do you know who I am?”
To my surprise the big hood let Cheech’s hand go and stepped back. He had served his purpose. He was a preventive force, not a punitive one. Meanwhile, nobody was watching me. They were cowed by Cheech’s venomous fury, all except the young croupier with the diamond ring. He said very quietly, “Mr. A., you are out of line.”
With incredible whip like fury Cheech struck out and hit the young croupier right smack on the nose. The croupier staggered back. Blood came billowing out onto his frilly white shirtfront and disappeared into the blue-black of his tuxedo. I ran past Cully and the two hoods and hit Cheech a punch that caught him in the temple and bounced him off the floor. And he bounced right up again. I was astonished. It was all going to be very serious. This guy ran on nuclear venom.
And then the ladderman descended from his high chair, and I could see him clearly in the bright lamp of the baccarat table. His face was seamed and parchment pale as if his blood had been frozen white by countless years of air conditioning. He held up a ghostly hand and said quietly, “Stop.”
Everybody froze. The ladderman pointed a long, bony finger and said, “Cheech, don’t move. You are in very big trouble. Believe me.” His voice was quietly formal.
Cully was leading me through the gate, and I was more than willing to go. But I was really puzzled by some of the reactions. There was something very deadly about the young croupier’s face even with the blood flowing from his nose. He wasn’t scared, or confused, or badly hurt enough not to fight back. But he had never raised a hand. Also, his fellow croupiers had not come to his aid. They had looked on Cheech with a sort of awestricken horror that was not fear but pity.
Cully was pushing me through the casino through the surf-like hum of hundreds of gamblers muttering their voodoo curses and prayers over dice, blackjack, the spinning roulette wheel. Finally we were in the relative quiet of the huge coffee shop.
I loved the coffee shop, with its green and yellow chairs and tables. The waitresses were young and pretty in spiffy short-skirted uniforms of gold. The walls were all glass; you could see the outside world of expensive green grass, the blue-sky pool, the specially grown huge palm trees. Cully led me to one of the large special booths, a table big enough for six people, equipped with phones. He took the booth as a natural right.
As we were drinking coffee, Jordan came walking by us. Cully immediately jumped up and grabbed him by the arm. “Hey, fellah,” he said, “have coffee with your baccarat buddies.” Jordan shook his head and then saw me sitting in the booth. He gave me an odd smile, amused by me for some reason, and changed his mind. He slid into the booth.
And that’s how we first met, Jordan, Cully and I. That day in Vegas when I first saw him, Jordan didn’t look too bad, in spite of his white hair. There was an almost impenetrable air of reserve about him which intimidated me, but Cully didn’t notice. Cully was one of those guys who would grab the Pope for a cup of coffee.
I was still playing the innocent kid. “What the hell did Cheech get sore about?” I said. “Jesus, I thought we were all having a good time.”
Jordan ’s head snapped up, and for the first time he seemed to be paying attention to what was going on. He was smiling too, as at a child trying to be clever beyond its years. But Cully was not so charmed.
“Listen, Kid,” he said. “The ladderman was on to you in two seconds. What the hell do you think he sits way up there for? To pick his fucking nose? To watch pussy walk by?”
“Yeah, OK,” I said. “But nobody can say it was my fault. Cheech got out of line. I was a gentleman. You have to admit that. The hotel and the casino have no complaint about me.”
Cully gave me an amiable smile. “Yeah, you worked that pretty good. You were really clever. Cheech never caught on and fell right into the trap. But one thing you didn’t figure. Cheech is a dangerous man. So now my job is to get you packed and put you on a plane. What the fuck kind of a name is that anyway, Merlyn?”
I didn’t answer him. I pulled my sports shirt up and showed him the bare front chest and belly. I had a long, very ugly purple scar on it. I grinned at Cully and said to him, “You know what that is?” I asked him.
He was wary now, alert. His face hawklike.
I gave it to him slow. “I was in the war,” I said. “I got hit by machine-gun bullets and they had to sew me up like a chicken. You think I give a shit about you and Cheech both?”
Cully was not impressed. But Jordan was smiling still. Now everything I said was true. I had been in the war, I had been in combat, but I never got hit. What I was showing Cully was my gallbladder operation. They had tried a new way of cutting that left this very impressive scar.
Cully sighed and said, “Kid, maybe you’re tougher than you look, but you’re still not tough enough to stay here with Cheech.”
I remember Cheech bouncing up from that punch so quickly and I started worrying. I even thought for a minute about letting Cully put me on a plane. But I shook my head.
“Look, I’m trying to help,” Cully said. “After what happened Cheech will be looking for you, and you’re not in Cheech’s league, believe mc.”
“Why not?” Jordan asked.
Cully gave it back very quick. “Because this Kid is human and Cheech ain’t.”
It’s funny how friendships start. At this point we didn’t know we were going to be close Vegas buddies. In fact, we were all getting to be slightly pissed off with each other.
Cully said, “I’ll drive you to the airport.”
“You’re a very nice guy,” I said. “I like you. We’re baccarat buddies. But the next time you tell me you’re going to drive me to the airport you’ll wake up in the hospital.”
Cully laughed gleefully. “Come on,” he said. “You hit Cheech a clean shot and he bounced right up. You’re not a tough guy. Face it.”
At that I had to laugh because it was true. I was out of my natural character. And Cully went on. “You show me where bullets hit you, that doesn’t make you a tough guy. That makes you the victim of a tough guy. Now if you showed me a guy who had scars because of bullets you put into him, I’d be impressed. And if Cheech hadn’t bounced up so quick after you hit him, I’d be impressed. Come on, I’m doing you a favor. No kidding.”
Well, he was right all the way. But it didn’t make any difference. I didn’t feel like going home to my wife and my three kids and the failure of my life. Vegas suited me. The casino suited me. Gambling was right down my alley. You could he alone without being lonely. And something was always happening just like now. I wasn’t tough, but what Cully missed was that almost literally nothing could scare me because at this particular time of my life I didn’t give a shit about anything.
So I said to Cully, “Yeah, you’re right. But I can’t leave for a couple of days.”
Now he really looked me over. Then he shrugged. He picked up the check and signed it and got up from the table. “See you guys around,” he said. And left me alone with Jordan.
We were both uneasy. Neither of us wanted to be with the other. I sensed that we were both using Vegas for a similar purpose, to hide out from the real world. But we didn’t want to be rude, Jordan because he was essentially an enormously gentle man. And though I usually had no difficulty getting away from people, there was something about Jordan I instinctively liked, and that happened so rarely I didn’t want to hurt his feelings by just leaving him alone.