“Are you okay?” he said, his voice soft now, seeming genuinely to care.
“I–I think so.”
He put his hand on her shoulder, gently. “Maybe we oughta get you to the hospital. Have you checked up.”
“It’s not that serious, Ben. I’m just…embarrassed.”
“Sure you are.” He smiled a softly wry smile. “Who isn’t?”
She managed to smile back at him, despite the caking blood on her cheek.
“Nate,” Siegel said to me, “why don’t you drive Miss Hogan back to the Last Frontier. She needs some rest.”
“Sure,” I said. “If that’s okay with Miss Hogan.”
She nodded, smiled bravely.
Siegel patted her cheek-the unbloodied one-and gave her a warm smile. His blue eyes seemed almost to twinkle. Fuck him, anyway. I had more hair than he did.
I walked her out to the Buick I was using. Guided her by the arm; just being helpful. Strictly business. Siegel’s gopher. Until tomorrow, and the hell with this noise.
We drove in silence; it wasn’t far.
I walked her to her room.
She paused at the doorway, her back to me. “Thanks, Nate.”
“Are you okay, kid?”
“Not really.”
“I’d offer you some company, but I don’t think you really want any.” Not mine, anyway.
“No…I don’t. But thanks. Thanks for not rubbing it in.”
“That’s okay.”
“You said all along she was dangerous.”
“She is dangerous. It could be a gun next time.”
She nodded. “I know. I’ll be careful.”
“Do that, would you?”
She went in, and I walked away.
Then she called out to me. “You could see I was right, though, couldn’t you?”
“What?”
“He doesn’t love her. He hates her. It was me he was concerned about.”
Right. That’s why he had his gopher drive you home.
“Sure, baby,” I said, and walked on out.
When I got back to the Flamingo, Siegel was sitting in the bar. It was not his usual wont to hang out there, nor was it his wont to drink a double Scotch. He was doing both.
“Rough,” I said.
“Yeah,” he said. He gestured to the stool next to him.
I sat. “How’s Virginia?”
He shrugged. “She’s sleeping it off in the penthouse. I went up there and we went a few more rounds. I belted her in the belly and she puked. Got it out of her system, anyway.”
Ain’t love grand.
“Ben, uh…”
“You’re not gonna take my offer, are you?”
I shook my head no.
“You don’t like it.”
“What?”
“Me and your ex-girl.”
“Well, I’m not going to scratch your face over it, Ben. But I probably like it just a little less than Ginny does.”
He sighed. Nodded. “Fuckin’ broads, anyway. Too bad.”
“You mean it could’ve been the beginning of a beautiful friendship?”
He smirked. “Something like that, pal.” He raised his glass to me.
“Besides,” I said, not having a glass to raise, “I’m like you. I like running things. I like having my own agency. It started out just me, in a little ratty office, fourteen years ago. And now I got people working for me, and I’m moving into a big modern office. I got dreams, too, Ben. And they don’t include the Flamingo.”
He was nodding, slowly. “Fair enough. When you leaving?”
“Monday. And I don’t particularly want to work tomorrow.”
“Fine with me. I haven’t paid you yet, have I?”
“Just expenses as we’ve gone along. You promised me ten grand, you know.”
He nodded again. “Yeah, and you earned it. I oughta pay you a bonus, but I been told to watch my spending.”
I gave him a rueful grin. “Just my luck I’m where you decided to start.”
Of course, bad as my luck had been running, it was still better than Siegel’s. He told me to meet him in the counting room at 3 a.m., and he’d pay me, in cash. And I found him there with that familiar, sick, ashen look.
“Fuck,” he said, sitting at the table, money boxes before him, pit boss lurking nearby, staying out of the boss’s way but ready to be at his beck and call.
“How bad is it?” I asked, leaning against the table.
“Bad. Another thirty grand.”
“Christ…”
“If this keeps up, I’ll be down a hundred thou by weekend’s end.”
“You got to close up, Ben. You got dishonest sons of bitches on that floor, watched over by other dishonest sons of bitches, I’m afraid.”
“I’ll put the fear of God in ’em,” he said, with nasty resolve. “Better still, I’ll put the fear of me in ’em.”
I ignored that. “I think you ought to close up, and do some new hiring, and wait till the hotel’s open.”
“What the fuck do you know about it?” he spat.
I shrugged. “Why don’t you just pay me and I’ll go. Pay me while there’s still some cash in the till.”
He shook his head, his expression softening. “Sorry, Nate. Sorry. I’ll think about what you’re saying. Your advice has been good so far. I’ll think about it.”
“Good enough, Ben.”
He counted me out nine grand in hundreds, and another grand in fifties and twenties and a few tens.
“Let me know what you’re gonna declare on your taxes,” he said, “so we got our stories straight.”
“Good idea,” I said, folding the hundreds into one thick wad, the other grand of smaller bills into another. Put them away. A lot of money, but I earned it.
I was shaking hands with Siegel when Chick Hill came rushing in.
“Benny!” he said. “You gotta come quick! She’s killed herself, I think she’s killed herself!”
“Tabby?” he said, standing, eyes wide.
Chick nodded, pointed back behind him.
“Nate,” Siegel said, his eyes desperate, moving away from the table, “can you lend a hand?”
I nodded, and we rushed out through the lobby around to the patio and across the terrace garden to the unfinished hotel building.
“She’s swallowed a bottle of sleeping pills,” the frantic Chick explained. “I don’t think she’s breathing…”
“How’d you happen onto her?” I asked him, as we crossed the lobby to the private elevator.
“I wanted to check up on her,” her brother said. He looked with wounded eyes at Siegel, as we boarded the tiny elevator. “I heard you beat her up, Ben.”
“Shut up, Chick,” Siegel said tightly, looking upward, as if willing the elevator to rise more quickly.
We found her on the pink sheets of the big bed, on her back; she was still wearing the torn gown, one breast exposed, her eyes closed, a faint bluish tinge to her cheeks. Siegel bent over her.
“She’s breathing,” he said. “Shallow but breathing-get me some cold wet towels!”
Chick wetted some down in the nearest bathroom, on the floor of which I found the empty pill bottle. The kid handed Siegel the towels and he began slapping her with them.
“Wake up!” he said. “Goddamnit, wake up!”
Chick stood off to one side, helpless, near tears.
I said, “Ben, look, let’s get her to the hospital, get her stomach pumped. I can pull my Buick in the construction access out back. I’ll go right now, what do you say?”
He was cradling her in his arms now; he looked up at me, with a haunted expression, and nodded.
“Can you two haul her down okay?” I asked.
Siegel nodded, said, “Go on, get the car!”
I did.
Southern Nevada Hospital was five miles away, on Charleston Boulevard. Traffic was heavy, and I had to weave in and around it, hurtling along at upwards of eighty miles an hour.
Virginia Hill, dead to the world, was between Siegel and me in the front seat; he had his arm around her, holding her close to him, soothing her like a sleeping baby. Chick was riding in the back, nervous with worry.
“Step on it!” Siegel yelled at me.
“I am.”
“Goddamn stupid bitch,” he said, but quietly, in that previous, soothing voice. “Why did she have to do it?”
I pushed the Buick harder; the speedometer’s needle quivered at ninety. A siren cut the night behind us.