As a reward of sorts, Nolan had been set up at the Tropical, a motel with four buildings (sixteen units each), two heated swimming pools (one outdoor, one in) and another central building that housed the supper club whose pseudo-Caribbean decor gave the place its name. Actually, the Tropical was a trial-run center where potential managers for similar but bigger Family operations were given a try. Nolan had been in the midst of just such a trial run when nearly half a million bucks of his (with which he was set to buy into one of those bigger Family operations) was stolen and eventually went up in smoke. Since his agreement with the Family had been to buy in and since he no longer could, Nolan was asked by Felix — the Family lawyer through whom Nolan had been doing all of his Family dealings of late — to stay on at the Tropical and supervise other trial runs, sort of manage the managers.
It was a terrific deal as far as work load compared to salary went. Pretty good money for sitting around bored, only Nolan didn’t like sitting around bored. In his opinion sitting around bored was boring as hell, and his ass got sweaty besides. He guessed maybe he’d been part of the active side too long to chuck it completely, even if he did find the prospect of no longer having to duck Family bullets a nice one.
Earlier this month Nolan had struck out in response to the boredom of the Tropical. The nephew of an old business partner of his had been tagging along with Nolan lately, and he and this kid, Jon, had pulled a heist in Detroit just last week that had run into some snags but eventually came out okay, resulting in a good chunk of change ($200,000 — in marked bills, unfortunately, but easily fenced at seventy cents on the dollar), and now Nolan was again in a position to buy in.
Only not with the Family. Because a condition of Nolan’s present employment with the Family was that he was not to engage in heists anymore. The Family had gone to great lengths to build a new identity for him, an identity that had everything from credit cards to college education, and they did not like their employees (those involved in the legitimate side of their operations, anyway) risking everything by doing something stupid.
Like pulling a heist.
So Nolan was frustrated. He had money again, but no place to spend it. He had a job again, managing a supper club and motel, which was ideal, but the job was numbing and thankless and paid okay but not really enough to suit him. He had his freedom again, with no one in particular trying to kill him, but it was an empty freedom. He was on a desert island with Raquel Welch and he couldn’t get it up.
He was sitting in the basement of Wagner’s house. The basement was remodeled. There was a bar at the end opposite the couch Nolan was sitting on. Between the bar and the couch most of the space was taken up by a big, regulation-size pool table. The lighting was dim, but there was a Tiffany-shade hanging lamp over the pool table you could turn on if need be. There was a dart-board, a poker table, a central circular metallic fireplace, all of which was to Nolan’s right. It was obviously a bachelor’s retreat, in this case an aging bachelor. Wagner had been married once but just for a short time, and that was a lot of years ago. There were framed prints of naked sexy women on the dark blue stucco walls: Vargas, Petty, Earl Moran. Good paintings, but very dated: Betty Grable-style women, Dorothy Lamour-style women. The fantasy of a generation that grew up without Playboy let alone Penthouse; the fantasy of a generation that masturbated to pictures of girls in bathing suits. The fantasy of Wagner’s generation, an old man’s generation.
Nolan’s generation.
Nolan was fifty years old and pissed off about it. Wagner was his friend, but Wagner irritated him, because Wagner was only a few years older than Nolan and was an old fucking man. Wagner was going on his third heart attack. Wagner’s doctor had told him to quit smoking. Wagner’s doctor had told him to quit drinking. Wagner had done neither, and was on his way to his third heart attack.
Wagner was down at the bar end of the room, building drinks. He was a small, thin, intense man who was trying intensely not to be intense any more. He had the pallor of a man who just got out of prison, though it had been maybe twenty-five years since his one prison term. Wagner was lucky he hadn’t spent more time in stir than that, the way Nolan saw it. Wagner had been a box-man, a professional safecracker, and, what’s more, he’d been the best and, as such, in demand; but instead of picking only the plums, Wagner had taken everything he could, every goddamn job that came his way. That was stupid, Nolan knew. You take only a few jobs a year and only the ones that smell absolutely 100 percent right. Otherwise you find yourself in the middle of a job as sloppy as Fibber McGee’s closet and afterward in a jail cell about as big. Otherwise you find yourself with a bunch of punks who afterward shoot you behind the ear rather than give you your split.
Of course Wagner’s skill contributed to keeping even the most ill-advised scores from being sloppy, and that same skill made him worth having around, so perhaps, Nolan conceded, perhaps Wagner had some assurance of not being crossed, even by punks. But none of that had mattered a damn to Wagner. Wagner had been the intense sort of guy who had to work, had to work all the time, much as possible, and Nolan knew the little man was lucky he was alive and out of stir. Lucky as hell.
Another thing about Wagner, he’d saved his money. Wagner had dreamed of retiring early and getting into something legitimate, more or less. It was a dream Nolan could understand; he had it himself. The difference was Nolan’s fifteen-year savings turned to so much air when a carefully-built cover got blown, making it impossible for him to go near the bank accounts where even now that money was making tens of thousands of dollars interest every year.
Wagner had been lucky. He got out early (age fifty) and with a nest egg so big Godzilla might’ve laid it. He bought the old Elks Club in Iowa City and turned it into a restaurant and nightclub combined. The old Elks building was three floors, counting the remodeled lower level, which Wagner converted into a nightclub below, supper-club above, and banquet room above that. It was Nolan’s dream come true, only Wagner’d made it work where Nolan hadn’t.
But Wagner’d made it work too well. Wagner went after the restaurant business with the same vengeance he had heisting. And at fifty-two he’d had his first heart attack. Slow down, the doctor said, among other things. At fifty-three he’d had his second heart attack. Slow down, goddamn it, the doctor said, among other things. And now, at fifty-four, he was on his way to his third and had, on the spur of the moment, invited his old friend Nolan over to ask him if he wanted to buy in and be his partner and take some of the load off and help him avoid that third and no doubt fatal heart attack.
Wagner looked relaxed, anyway. He was wearing a yellow sports shirt with pale gray slacks, like his complexion, only healthier. Nolan was dressed almost identically, though his sports shirt was blue and his pants brown.
Their clothes began and ended the similarity of the two men’s appearances. Wagner was white-haired, cut very short but lying down, like a butch that surrendered. His face was flat: his nose barely stuck out at all. It was a nebbish face, saved only by a giving, sincere smile. Nolan’s face, on the other hand, seemed uncomfortable when it smiled, as if smiling were against its nature. He was a tall man, lean but muscular and with a slight paunch from easy days of Tropical non-work. He had a hawkish look, high cheekbones and narrow eyes; perhaps an American Indian was in his ancestry somewhere. His hair was shaggy and black and widow’s peaked, with graying sideburns. He wore a mustache, a droopy, gunfighter mustache that underlined his naturally sour expression. Nolan did have a sense of humor, but he didn’t want it getting around.