Before I could figure that out, the front desk called and told us they were comping our room for the four days. “Because of the-why?”
“For our loyal customers. Just say thank you, Mr. Nelson,” the clerk said, laughing. So I did.
I set down the phone and tried to clear my head. Was I still asleep? Did I need another shower? I shivered in the air conditioning. What the hell were Cynthia and Herb up to? I pulled on my jeans and started to search the room. When I was an MP in the army I never had to do searches, but I knew how it went, cushions, drawer bottoms, mattresses. But the room was clean. No money, no telegrams, no answers. Herb’s suitcase was standard issue JC Penney with his dashing polyester wardrobe to match.
I tried to call my sister again but got her machine. I told it, “This’ll be the end of the world, all right, if you don’t tell me what the fuck is going on.”
Herb was groggy when I finally found his room in the hospital.The nurse left us alone, said I only had a few minutes. I got to the point.
“What’s this about money you wired home?”
He moaned and shut his eyes.
“Herb, who hit you?” He moaned again. “What the hell is this about? Are you in trouble?”
His eyes popped open and he murmured an affirmative. “Casino,” he whispered.
“Have you been counting cards or something?”
He gave one last dramatic groan and promptly fell asleep. Even as mad as I was I couldn’t shake him awake, not with his bandaged head and IVs going in and out. One side of his face was purple and swollen. I backed out, wondering if the man with the tire iron would give it another go. It seemed unlikely in a hospital. The nurse told me Herb was still in serious condition with a traumatic head injury and I wouldn’t be able to take him back to Minnesota for at least a week.
In the lobby of the hotel I plugged quarters into the pay phone instead of the slots. I needed to talk to Cynthia but she wasn’t home again. What the hell? It was past midnight there. I left another pissed-off message that wouldn’t make her call me but made me feel better.
The hotel’s gambling halls were thick with tourists, nicotine-stained fingers checking cards, rubbing felt, massaging temples. Plump ladies flushed with excitement; young kids kicking the slots. I ordered another gin and tonic and watched the mass of humanity go about what had to be one of our stupider pastimes. Had Herb been scamming the casino somehow? He was a terrible gambler, in my humble opinion, although I didn’t play with him all the time. I got bored with blackjack and would watch craps for awhile or spin the roulette wheel. When I got back to the table, Herb would have moved around, found a dealer he thought was luckier, and usually told me he was down a few hundred and trying to make it back. Hey, weren’t we all.
No, Herb hadn’t won a bunch of money gambling. He wasn’t a good enough actor to hide that from me. I’d known him since he and my sister started working at the same firm, a couple years after I got out of the service. In my real estate office I sent him clients now and then, and there hadn’t been any complaints. Before our divorce my wife and I socialized with Herband Cynthia a couple times a month, barbecues, movies, dinner. Herb treated my sister pretty well, considering she could be a raging banshee when she got wound up. She used to whale on me when she was a teenager, like when we had to can her from the band. If only she hadn’t worn those black leather hot pants.
That REM song she sang me ran over and over in my mind. What did she mean, the end of the world? Was she running away from Minnesota, from her home, with Herb or without Herb, with whatever money he had wired her? And where was that from anyhow? Would she be at Mom’s? Doubtful. At her friend Louise’s in St. Paul?
Something about her response to Herb’s getting thrashed bugged me. Was it the money she was worried about-or Herb? She hadn’t offered to come take care of him, even though he was in the hospital. Those of us who loved her realized practical jokes and gruesome Halloween costumes are more her style than maternal instincts. My little sister. She made you want to sigh sometimes.
Instead of sighing I opted for drinking. I couldn’t leave on my flight in the morning anyway. It was going to cost me something to get that changed. I hit the payphones again and called the airline, begging for understanding. I must have sounded pathetic because they left the tickets open, to use when Herb recovered.
I tried Cynthia again and this time she answered.
“Baby sister. If you don’t explain this to me I’m gonna have to strangle you.”
“Aaron.” She yawned. “I’m asleep.”
“Talk to me. Now. Herb said something about a casino. Is he in trouble? Who beat him up?”
“I don’t know.” She had a pouty way even in her voice. “He’s a grown man. He does what he pleases.”
“I don’t think it pleased him to get pistol-whipped.”
“Mmm. Maybe not. But he went to Vegas. He took the chances.”
“What chances?” The gin began to churn in my gut.
“With the casino. Oh, I can’t explain it, Aaron.”
“What casino? This one, where we’re staying?”
“Yes and no. I’m hanging up now.”
I looked at the receiver, cursed, and banged it down. Too cheesed off to sleep, I hiked up and down the Strip in the nightand the neon, pounding the pavement until the edge wore off and I could sleep.
Slipping the key card into the lock, pushing open the door, the first thing I saw were the polka dot boxers my ex-wife had bought me strewn across the purple carpet. My suitcase lay open, upside down. Herb’s suitcase, minus the things I’d taken to the hospital for him, had been jumped on by somebody large, its sides caved in. Drawers hung open, chairs were overturned, a good tossing had by all. And by somebody as pissed off as I’d just been, somebody who hadn’t found what they were looking for. Unless it was polka dot boxers.
I spent a few minutes straightening up and put on the deadbolt and chain. Apparently Herb had some money that was either somebody else’s or they thought they deserved it. That wouldn’t be gambling winnings. But a casino was involved. This casino didn’t seem upset with us. Why did they comp the room? What had we done to deserve a free room besides lose a few thou? That couldn’t be very unusual. Neither of us was a high roller. An idea bubbled up like tonic water. Was Herb a thief? My head hit the pillow with that unhappy thought.
In the late morning I killed my headache with a greasy three-egg breakfast and a swim in the pool. My pale Midwestern skin hadn’t seen this much sun since childhood summers at Rainy Lake with the leeches and mosquitoes. These days air conditioning was my summer weather of choice.
But all this avoidance, pretending to be simply on vacation, didn’t make me quit cogitating about Herb and Cynthia. Two American kids doing the best that they can, I hummed to myself as I dressed and drove to the hospital again. A little ditty by John Mellencamp that I used to love to play on the guitar. I wondered why I had stopped playing (I knew when-after I married Jeannie) and promised myself for only the five-millionth time that I would start again. It never happened, in the same way that Jeannie and I never worked on our marriage. Sooner or later you forget the fingering.
Herb seemed perky this morning, or at least more alert than yesterday. He said he felt a lot better.
“I think I can leave tomorrow, I’m working on my doctor.” He glanced furtively at the door and winced as the pain of the quick movement hit him.
“You don’t look so good, old buddy. You better stay flat for a few more days. The nurse said a week would do you good.”
“A week!” He wrinkled his nose and lay back on the pillows. “I gotta get out of here.”
“Don’t worry about it. I fixed the tickets. The hotel comped our room. Things will be okay.” Tell me this is the end of it, big fella. I squinted at him. He seemed nervous. Maybe it was time for his meds. “Did you talk to Cynthia?”