Chuck Freadhoff - Free Booze Tonight

by Chuck Freadhoff

  “I got an address,” she said.

  I hate to think that I could actually learn a thing or two from the Roo brothers, but perhaps I should have noticed that neither Jimmy nor James said a word.

  “How’d you do that?” I asked.

  “I told Auggie that I was going through the door to Dr. Bob’s office and demand my money back for my face lift.”

  “But you haven’t had …”

  Toughie looked at me. Probably the same look that the captain of the Titanic would have given me if I’d told him he’d just hit an iceberg. Sometimes, there’s just nothing to be gained by stating the obvious.

  Chapter 31

  We were about a block away from The Enchantment Center when I turned to Toughie.

  “If Rex the Wonder Dog is so famous, why don’t we just try the pound or an animal shelter? Someone’s bound to recognize him.”

  She gave me that look again. Like I’d just told some grizzled Army veteran that I thought invading Moscow in the winter was a splendid idea.

  “Rex the Wonder Dog isn’t an animal. He’s a guy.”

  “A guy?”

  Okay, I’m no stranger to colorful names. After all, in a roundabout sort of way I was working for a character named Vincent the Hammer. But that’s the thing. If you’re in the entertainment business and you’re going to name yourself after an animal, wouldn’t you go for something like Snake, or Tiger, or even Mad Dog? Rex the Wonder Dog sounds like a cross between Lassie and Arnold Schwarzenegger.

  “Yeah, he’s a guy,” Toughie said and exhaled deeply. “But really, he’s a dog.”

  “But you just said he was a guy.”

  She leaned a little closer, her brow furrowed. “He is. But he’s still a dog.”

  Offering a different point of view didn’t seem like a wise move at the moment. I tried to smile. “So when you say dog, you’re talking more pond scum than Pomeranian.”

  Toughie nodded. “And I was told that you were dumber than a day-old bagel. Go figure.” She looked out the side window for a moment. “But women … .” She shook her head, a wiggle of incomprehension.

  “Women what?”

  “Must be his bad boy persona,” she shrugged. “The guy gets more action than the roulette wheel at Caesar’s Palace.”

  “So, Rex is ah … .” I was searching for just the right word. “He’s ah, an escort?”

  “Nah. He’s a performer. He has this weird act. He’s a ventriloquist whose dummy is this dog named Rex the Wonder Dog. He specializes in insulting the audience.”

  I think I shook my head and shrugged.

  “Yeah,” Toughie went on, “the dog does the insulting and then the guy tries to make it right by apologizing.”

  Great, Don Rickles meets Rin Tin Tin.

  “And this works?” I asked. Now I’m not the best judge of talent. I am the guy who hired a dyslexic forger after all. But even I could see a Lassie/Arnold combo had a way better shot at success than this guy.

  “Not really,” Toughie said. “After being insulted by a dog, people tend to overlook the apology.”

  “People pay to see this?”

  “No. They pay to see the fights.”

  “Fights?”

  “Yeah, every performance turns into a bar brawl. Rex is good that way. He could incite a riot in a morgue.”

  “And the bar owner’s okay with that?”

  “Not really. Rex has lost every gig he’s ever had. A lot of people still want to beat him up. That’s why he’s so hard to find. Now, he’s playing the small places on the outskirts of Vegas.”

  “Wait a minute. I don’t understand something. If Rex isn’t really a dog, why would Delilah work for him?”

  Toughie shook her head. “She probably wouldn’t, but you never know.”

  “So if she’s probably not there, why are we going … ?”

  “Digger’s mom and Royal Rob’s mom are sisters,” Toughie said before I could finish the sentence. “So Royal Rob lets Digger think he’s being helpful, and we all play along. Don’t we?”

  The Roo boys’ heads bobbed in unison. I looked at them. They were staring straight ahead, as immobile as the guys on Mt. Rushmore. That was the second time in the last couple of minutes that they were a step ahead of me. I felt like the last man in the room to realize that pro wrestling was fake.

  “So how long do we, ah, play along?” Suddenly I had a ray of hope. Maybe Digger would spend a month or two searching and not find Delilah and no one would notice – like putting five bucks a week into the Christmas club account down at the bank. No one seems to care that it never really amounts to anything, but sliding the fiver across the counter to the clerk every week makes you feel pretty good.

  “We’ll give him today,” Toughie said.

  I looked out the window at the summer heat waves rising off the desert. A dust devil was spinning sand and dirt in the air and kicking a tumbleweed toward an outcropping of sun-bleached rocks.

  “And then?” I asked.

  “I’ll find Delilah. Really, shouldn’t take more than a couple of hours, if you know what you’re doing.”

  And once Toughie found Delilah, I’d have to choose — a rug in the mountains or eternity without sunscreen. It looked like I’d be cashing in the Christmas club account early this year.

  Chapter 32

  Rex the Wonder Dog was playing the early afternoon show at the River Queen Café and Casino, a wide spot on a two-lane about five miles outside of Vegas and a couple of hundred miles from the nearest river. We walked in just as some guy in a pink polo shirt, madras Bermuda shorts, and flip flops, was rushing the stage.

  Rex was on a stool near the center of the stage, the dummy on his knee. Rex saw the guy coming, dropped his dummy, and tumbled off his stool, trying to get away.

  “Shit,” Toughie said and headed for the guy in the Bermuda shorts. Toughie’s big, but she can move. She got to the guy just as he was pulling back an arm, ready to throw a punch. She caught him by his white belt and pink collar, hoisted him up, and carried him out of the casino like she was toting a sack of potatoes. A moment later she was back.

  “Who was that?” I asked.

  She shrugged. “Either a pissed-off customer or a jealous husband.”

  Toughie headed toward Rex and I followed. I took in the place as we went. The River Queen had a Mississippi Riverboat theme — out front there’d been a miniature paddleboat on a slab of blue cement and a greeter dressed up as Maverick — an old guy in a moth-eaten vest who looked like he longed for his old glory days at Wall Mart. Inside murals of a genteel south with lots of mansions, moss, and bales of cotton covered the walls. I think the idea was to project a certain My Old Kentucky Home charm. To me it looked like Huck Finn’s whorehouse.

  Not a big crowd. A few retirees feeding their pensions into the slot machines, a couple of ex-footballers gone to fat at the black jack tables, and three bored cocktail waitresses old enough to be on AARP’s speed dial. Toughie had told the Roo brothers and Digger to wait outside, so she and I and the dude in the Bermuda shorts were the only ones paying attention to Rex.

  Rex started to get back on his stool, but saw Toughie coming, and tried to move to the rear of the stage. Toughie held up her hands.

  “Just want to talk, Rex,” she said.

  He nodded, picked up his dummy, and got back on the stool. The dummy looked like the offspring of a one-night stand between Howdy Doody and Deputy Dog — little-boy cute in a jowly sort of way. When we were close to the stage, the dummy’s head swiveled toward Toughie and it’s mouth opened. Toughie raised her eyebrows. The dummy’s mouth closed. Rex might not be a success, but apparently he wasn’t stupid.

  “We’re looking for someone,” Toughie said.

  “Isn’t everyone, chweetheart?” the dummy said, doing a not half-bad Bogart.

  Rex grinned. It was a sly grin. I’d never met the guy, but I knew the type — the bad boy that girls just couldn’t resist. Not Attila the Hun kind of bad, but the one with
a smile that says with a little love and understanding he could be redeemed. His hair was greasy and his eyes were bloodshot, too. Yup, a reclamation project. What young woman could resist? It’d be like asking a German to resist tidying up — it’s just not in the genes.

  Toughie took the picture of Delilah from her pocket and held it up. “You know her?”

  The dummy’s head swiveled from Toughie to the photo of Delilah. “Before and after for a Slim-Fast commercial, right?”

  I reassessed my estimation of Rex’s IQ.

  “Very funny,” Toughie said. She rested her right hand on the dummy’s head and looked at Rex. “I beat you up, I go to prison. I beat the dummy to death, the Chamber of Commerce gives me a medal.”

  “Don’t I get a last cigarette?” the dummy asked.

  “What’s it going be, Rex?” Toughie said.

  “Sorry,” Rex said and glanced at the photo again. “I know her from Facebook – she joined my fan club.”

  “And?”

  “And I got a message from her. She said she was coming to Vegas and asked if I needed an assistant. I explained that I don’t have real dogs but suggested we get together for a drink sometime.”

  “And?”

  “Nothing. She never showed up.”

  “Any idea where she went?”

  “Topeka,” the dummy said. “Or was it Toledo?”

  Toughie looked at me. “Don’t you just love the smell of fresh sawdust?”

  “Wait,” Rex said. “I don’t know where she went. I really don’t.”

  Toughie headed toward the door. I followed. She stopped and glanced back at Rex.

  “The guy I threw out of here?” Toughie asked.

  “He’s a bartender.” Rex pulled a face.

  “So?”

  “So, my timing was off, that’s all.”

  “Your timing?”

  “Yeah. Last night, I propositioned the right woman at the wrong time.”

  I waited. Toughie stared. Rex shrugged, then added. “His wife — at the bar — while he was working.”

  Right, I thought.

  Chapter 33

  Royal Rob was holding a tube of sunscreen the size of a casaba melon when we got to his poolside cabana at the Alcatraz. We’d gone straight there from the River Queen.

  Toughie and I had come out of the River Queen, Digger hopping from one foot to the other in front of his toadstool car like a child with bladder control issues. He’d jerked his thumb in the general direction of downtown Vegas the moment he’d seen us.

  “I just talked to Royal Rob. He’s angry that you haven’t called.” Digger looked directly at me. “He thinks you’re going to run.”

  Toughie stared at Digger. “Tell him we’re looking.”

  Digger balled his fists, put them on his hips and barked, “No. Royal Rob wants an update. Now. In person.” He’d hit the last three words hard, apparently trying for a tough guy delivery, but his voice had kicked up a notch with each syllable, he’d he come across more whiney dachshund than Dirty Harry.

  Okay, I wasn’t too worried about Digger. He was pretty much a lap dog, but from what I’d seen of Royal Rob, I figured he was more a pit bull wolf mix with serious identity issues. Plus, he seemed generally pissed off at the world. I didn’t see any point in adding to his anxiety.

  “Let’s go see him,” I said and Toughie nodded.

  She’d pulled open the door of the Continental and settled into the back. “Back to Alcatraz,” she said.

  Pretty soon, I was following Toughie across a pool deck as wide as Waikiki Beach and filled with women in suits so small if they put all the material together it wouldn’t make a loincloth for a parakeet. Any other day, I’d have been distracted by that sea of Barbie-size bosoms but that melon-sized sunscreen in Royal Rob’s hand pretty much captured my attention. Okay, I’ll admit ointment over ogling isn’t the most macho reaction, but in my own personal pecking order of natural urges, continuing to breathe is pretty much at the top.

  Toughie and I stopped just inside the cabana’s shady area. Royal Rob looked at Digger one step behind us. “Go get yourself a soft drink,” Royal said and waved Digger away.

  “But … .” Digger started to protest.

  Royal Rob bounced the sunscreen in his hand and looked pointedly at him. Digger scurried away.

  “I just got off the phone with Vincent the Hammer,” Rob said. “He’s wondering where Delilah is.”

  Toughie grunted. “If we hadn’t had to waste half-a-day chasing Digger’s delusions we might have her with us by now,” she said.

  “Yeah, family. What can you do? Mom would get pissed if I sent Digger to sleep with the scorpions. So what’s your next move?”

  “I made a few phone calls before I caught up with Digger and the Roo brothers this morning,” Toughie said. “I’ve got an idea or two. I’ll know where she is in a few hours. But I gotta leave Digger and the Roo brothers behind.”

  “Okay, I’ll have Digger babysit Joey.”

  “I’ll go with Toughie,” I offered. Hanging out with Digger was definitely not my idea of a good time, like Snow White waking up after a sloppy kiss to find Dopey leering at her instead of Prince Charming. Plus, if Toughie found Delilah I had to be there. After all, I was the one facing the final Jeapordy question, rug or no rug?

  Rob and Toughie turned to me, the way my mom looked at me the time I asked if I could go play on the freshly-tarred street. Like it’d be amusing to watch for a while, but in the end cleaning up the mess just wouldn’t be worth it.

  “No,” Rob and Toughie said in unison.

  “Wait a second,” I said. “Delilah doesn’t know Toughie. She may run again. Delilah knows me. And I can use my charm.”

  Royal Rob grunted. “I had a dog like you once. He was a mutt, so dumb and so ugly he looked like he’d been made out of spare parts, but he did have a certain charm.”

  I wanted to object but didn’t have a clue where to start.

  “You can find Delilah?” Royal Rob asked.

  “Absolutely,” Toughie replied.

  “Okay, take Spare Parts here with you,” he said and grinned like he’d just won the lottery.

  I should have been pleased, too, I guess. If we found Delilah and we brought her back to the Royal Alcatraz, I’d have only one mob boss who wanted to kill me instead of two. When your odds of living past the next installment of Good Morning America have just doubled it should alter your mood a bit. Like learning that Typhoid Mary is still dead. Not cause for wild celebration exactly, but reason to have a little faith in the future.

  Not how I felt. The idea of delivering Delilah to this guy reminded me of Ken from Kinkos and Davey the semi-illiterate music critic eating those pretzels in the bar – something you just wouldn’t do if you had all your faculties about you.

  Royal Rob put the tube of sunscreen on the table beside him and nodded to Toughie.

  “What’s Vincent the Hammer going to say about the Roo boys not watching over Joey the Door Stop?” he asked.

  Door Stop? I was trying to decide if Door Stop was an upgrade from Spare Parts when I noticed the water wings. Rob had one on each arm. They were shaped exactly like Donald Duck – yellow, with an orange beak and wearing little sailor outfits — but they both had blood-shot eyes the size of saucers. Probably some cheap Chinese knock offs. It made me think of the time I’d seen a Disney musical done by transvestite impersonators. It was pretty cool for a few minutes, but once you noticed that Cinderella was six foot three with a five o’clock shadow, the magic sort of disappeared.

  The Donald on Rob’s right bicep was just below a tattoo of a dagger dripping blood. The duck on his left arm partially covered a tattoo of a snake intertwined with barbwire.

  “Joey?” Toughie said and shrugged like she’d forgotten I was there. “I’ll talk to Vincent. I’ve known him for a while. He’ll understand.”

  She stepped out of the cabana, walked to the edge of the pool, and reached for her belt. For a second I was afraid
she was going to undress and go for a quick dip – a vulture amid an arboretum full of peacocks - a sight I really didn’t want to see. Then she pulled her phone from her belt and I exhaled.

  “Joey, a word,” Royal Rob said.

  I turned. He was smiling. The ducks seemed to be grinning, like they enjoyed nestling next to daggers and cozying up to barbed wire. Maybe Donald was doing drugs. If the word got out, it’d set the whole “Just Say No” campaign back a generation or two.

  “So, Joey, just because Digger isn’t with you, I don’t want you getting any ideas.”

  “Not a worry. Ideas aren’t my strong suit.”

  “So I hear.”

  Now how was I supposed to respond to that? Here’s a mob boss wearing stoned rubber duckies on his arms and he’s telling me I’m a couple of horse power short of a full V 8. I didn’t see much advantage in arguing. I just nodded.

  “I’ve got lots of friends in Vegas, you know,” Rob said. “I’ve got friends at the airport, at the bus station, at the car rental places, at Yellow Cab, too. I know when people try to leave town.”

  “I’m sure the Nevada Transportation Authority appreciates the help,” I said.

  His eyes narrowed. “So, you’ll bring Delilah here, right?”

  “Absolutely,” I said. From the corner of my eye, I caught Toughie nodding toward the street. “Gotta run,” I said.

  I reached Toughie, just as she was putting her cell phone away.

  “Vincent the Hammer says if you don’t bring Delilah back to L.A. in the next twenty-four hours, he’ll come here and kill you himself.”

  The last three words helped me make an iron clad, carved-in-stone, irrevocable decision about what I’d do when we found Delilah. No question. My mind was made up.

  I glanced back at Royal Rob. He was squirting sunscreen on his harry arms and rubbing it in. The Donalds were bouncing merrily as he moved. He grinned at me, his capped teeth as big and shinny as a line of new refrigerators. I instantly reconsidered my decision.