Aaron stared at it numbly. “You think I’d write something like that?” Golding demanded. “You couldn’t think I’d write shit like that in a million years.”
“Then why?” Aaron asked, his voice full of tears. “Why would they do something like that to my little brother?”
“I’ll tell you why,” Golding said harshly. “Because you’re a Jew, that’s why. Because they think if that little girl had been hurt or killed, it’s your fault, just because you’re a Jew. You and your little brother could have been in Kalamazoo since before she disappeared, and they’d still pick you for it. Look, Aaron, leave this to me. I know how to take care of the shitheads like this.”
“But how do you even know who they are?”
Golding’s laugh sounded more like a curse, “Listen, Aaron, any good businessman has to keep his eyes open for shits like these. You never know when you need the information.
“You want to go back to the hospital, no? McSorley!” he called out to the gorilla standing by the door. “Get the car!” He turned to Aaron. “McSorley will drive you there. I know you’re worried about the kid-what’s his name, Milton?”
“Max.”
“Okay, so it’s Max. You go be with Max.”
“But the police…”
Golding snorted. “The police! Listen, I wouldn’t faint with surprise, one or more of the slime under those white sheets they wear could be cops. Aaron, I keep on top of this stuff. I’m a businessman!” And with this rousing speech, he reached up to pat Aaron reassuringly on the shoulder and gave him a gentle push toward the door.
At the hospital, Aaron sat in his brother’s room, worrying. Never mind the restaurant. He’d give up the damn restaurant, he’d go back to Akron, he didn’t care. Just let Max live. Outside, the town was stirring, with no sign that something terrible had happened.
Some time in the late afternoon an orderly arrived pushing a wheeled stretcher. With a nurse helping, he got Max on the stretcher and went off down the hall-“X-rays,” the nurse told Aaron. The bed was still empty when the doctor came in; by that time Aaron had convinced himself that he’d never see his little brother alive again. But the doctor’s news was good. Good? Beautiful!
“It will take a while, but he’s going to be all right.”
“Thank God,” breathed Aaron. And when the orderly brought his brother back to the room, Max actually was able to open his eyes and manage a weak smile at Aaron before shutting down again.
Aaron spent the night at his brother’s bedside. Some time around five in the morning there was a commotion in the street; shouts, automobiles racing down the Strip. Aaron thought “drunken tourists” and forgot it until he heard the local radio station when he went home to change.
“The mangled body of Jonathan Whately, rumored to be the organizer and head of Las Vegas’s clandestine Ku Klux Klan, was found this morning at the edge of town. The police have no information on how he was killed. Several other Las Vegas residents suspected to be Klansmen seem to have left Las Vegas in a body, a welcome departure for all the good citizens of our town concerned.”
L’Envoie
Max did recover, after many weeks in the hospital. When he was discharged he moved in with his brother Aaron at Golding’s hotel, the Golden Peacock. They were living there rent-free, as befitted the most highly valued member of the hotel staff.
“Listen, it’s not for your good, it’s for mine,” Golding told Aaron. “That jerk I got in the kitchen can’t cook for shit. We’re gettin’ real high-class customers here. They want real high-class food. So I’m makin’ you my top chef.”
Aaron’s dream had come true. He moved his knives to the hotel kitchen without ever setting foot back in Aaron’s Eats. An entrepreneur from Los Angeles was delighted to clean up the mess that Max’s attackers had left. He transformed the site into a high-end women’s clothing and jewelry boutique.
An acquaintance of Golding’s taught Max to serve as croupier at the roulette table, and what with that and a changing supply of attractive and more or less unattached young women, he settled in.
Molly married the head of the Production Engineering department at Topnotch Tire, had four children in quick succession, and never did come out to see Las Vegas.
THE MAGIC TOUCH: A PETER PANSY DETECTIVE YARN by A. B. Robbins
Howie Tabor had the fastest hands in town. None of the pros on the Vegas Strip, nor any of the street magicians on either coast, could do up-close magic like Howie. The only thing that kept Howie from the pro ranks and a career on stage was his speech: Howie made Gomer Pyle sound like Laurence Olivier.
One Sunday afternoon, Howie stuck a single silver dollar into Big Beulah and hit the two-million-dollar jackpot. He now hadenough money to buy the upscale tricks and illusions that set the big acts apart, and decided to make a run at a stage career. His idea was to develop a show that would not require him to speak. One murder and a few bizarre events later, I was in Las Vegas at Howie’s hire to find out “Whut in the hayell wuz goin’ awn.”
My shingle reads Peter Pansy∼ Private Eye, and, please, no wisecracks about the name. I used to be one of those by the book, gold-badge guys out of L.A. Robbery/Homicide. Now my beat is what I ever-lovingly refer to as Beverly the Hill.
As is my habit, I was sitting in my office at Numero Uno Rodeo Drive, wearing Gucci loafers, an Armani suit, Lagerfeld shirt, and a gold lamé shoulder holster, in which I keep “Golda,” my gold-plated.357 with mother-of-pearl grips. I was laid back, listening to the honeyed tones of Johnny Mathis, sipping on a Perrier, just waiting for who knows who, to come in and ask me to do who knows what, who knows where, when I got a phone call from my friend, Kam. I met Kamal Masik during my stint with Robbery/Homicide when he joined an investigation. He is an ex-Navy seal and real-life tough guy. Kamal, with his history of covert legal violence, is now the leading female impersonator in Las Vegas, yet he still does work he can’t talk about for one of those government alphabet agencies. Kam is my closest friend and a sometime work associate. It was he who recommended me to Howie.
I took advantage of the opportunity and drove my XKE, top down, to Vegas. When I pulled off of I-15 at Tropicana Avenue, I called Kam. He said to meet him and Howie at his place. Place my ass. Palace was more like it. They were waiting out front as I drove up. Kam, his olive complexion and Mediterranean look enhanced by Las Vegas solar power, looked as if he stepped from the cover of GQ. However, when he spoke, you didn’t know if you were going to get a young Anthony Quinn or Jane Russell.
“Peter, Howie. Howie, Peter,” Kam said.
“Ah’m pleasured to makin’ yer ’quaintance, Mister Pansy,” Howie said. “Thissa here’s a awful mess we got.” He was a good looker, a bit under six feet, muscular, and smart. He just sounded funny.
If you want big tricks built, Vegas was the place to be. If you had an idea, there were geniuses who could make it happen; or, better said, make it appear to happen. Choreography, original music, costuming, staging, everything you needed, just around the corner. Think of the stunts you’ve seen on TV, the Statue of Liberty, the Empire State Building, elephants, lions, tigers, and bears, oh my… all of them made to vanish before your very eyes. The competition is fierce, and industrial espionage, better known to us commoners as stealing, runs rampant. It appeared someone out there didn’t want another player on the field and was willing to stop at nothing to accomplish that end. The police literally didn’t have a clue. Now it was my turn.