3 Favor

by Parnell Hall

  The depth of my expectations, my worst-case scenario, had me running around the outskirts of Atlantic City for three days signing up broken arms and legs for Richard Rosenberg.

  However, the odds of that happening were actually poor. See, I have a map of New Jersey—I have to with all the sign-ups I do there. I’d had it right there in my briefcase when Richard had asked me how far it was to Atlantic City, but I hadn’t let on. As soon as I got out to my car, however, I whipped the map out and confirmed my suspicions. Sure enough, as I’d thought, there was no way Atlantic City was only sixty-nine miles away. The map didn’t list distances from city to city, so there was no way to figure the actual mileage unless I wanted to add up all the five- to ten-mile distances between the little arrows, which I certainly didn’t. But it wasn’t necessary. Atlantic City was south of Philadelphia. There was no way it was in beeper range.

  Which was great. I’d been told to stay on the beeper, and I’d stay on the beeper, and when I got back and innocently reported that I hadn’t been beeped, there’d be nothing Richard could do about it, because it would be Wendy/Cheryl’s fault. I’d be the good soldier, just following orders.

  I was tooling down the Jersey Pike and gloating over that when my beeper went off. Damn. The best laid plans of mice and men. I checked my watch. It had only been a half hour since I’d left the office. Too soon. There was no way to pretend I was already out of beeper range. I could pretend I’d forgotten to switch it on, but then it would be my fault. My best chance was to call in, and hope the beep was just routine and they hadn’t discovered the mistake. I cursed Richard, cursed Wendy/Cheryl, shut off the beeper, and pulled into the next Roy Rogers/Bob’s Big Boy on the pike.

  I called the office, waited for the tone, and punched in my calling card number.

  Wendy/Cheryl answered the phone.

  “Agent 005.”

  “Stanley,” came the voice of Wendy/Cheryl. “Glad I reached you.”

  “Oh?” I said, my spirits sinking.

  “Yes. I have an assignment for you.”

  What a relief. Never have I been so happy to get an assignment. I’d knock it off like that, and hustle out of beeper range.

  Wendy/Cheryl gave it to me. It wasn’t a sign-up. It was a picture assignment. A client had fallen down on the basement steps of a house in Linden, New Jersey, and Richard needed pictures of the broken steps.

  I told Wendy/Cheryl I’d take it.

  “Fine,” she said. “Where are you now?”

  “In Elizabeth. Right near there. I’ll take care of it.”

  “Fine. Just be sure you write it down.”

  That was strange. I always write my assignments down. “What do you mean?”

  “That you got the assignment in Elizabeth, New Jersey. Richard said to tell you your time and mileage start there. So don’t charge him from Manhattan.”

  I groaned. What a cheap prick. But I wasn’t about to argue. I got off the phone fast before anyone thought about the beeper.

  I got off the turnpike at the Elizabeth exit and sped down to Linden, which was a whopping four miles on the odometer. It was several more before I found the address, since I didn’t have a detailed street map of the area, and there was no answer at the client’s phone number Wendy/Cheryl had given me. That wasn’t surprising. I figured it was the wrong number anyway.

  The address was probably also wrong, but that didn’t matter. With the client not answering the phone, there was no way to check it. I’d been assigned it, so it was my job to do it, and if it turned out it wasn’t the right address, it wasn’t my fault, and I’d get paid for it anyway.

  But the main thing was getting it done so I’d be off the hook and could head south. I asked directions four times, and half an hour later found myself cruising down the street where the client, one Raymon Ortega, presumably was injured.

  One of the things about Richard’s clients is, a lot of ’em don’t have any money, and the neighborhoods they live in leave a lot to be desired. This neighborhood was no exception. The houses were in remarkably poor repair, and the one I wanted was the worst of the lot. It was a two-story frame house that had presumably once been white with green trim. The most recent coat of paint was at least twenty years old, and had not worn well. The shutters, those that remained, dangled, sometimes by a single screw. Most of the panes of glass in the curtainless windows were broken. And the front door looked suspiciously as if it would fall off the hinges the moment I knocked on it.

  It didn’t, however. In fact it was quite solid. It was also locked. And no matter how loud I pounded, no one came to open it.

  I know a TV detective can open a door with a hat pin. I can’t. The only way I know to deal with a locked door is to stand in front of it and look stupid.

  I stood in front of the door looking stupid and pondering my next move. I’ve had situations like this before in the course of my job, so I know how to deal with them. And the way you deal with them is, if there’s any way possible, you do the assignment. You do it because (1) you won’t get paid for it until it’s done, and (2) you don’t want to come back.

  So I circled the house, looking for a way in. A cellar door, one of those connected to the house at a forty-five degree angle looked promising, but proved to be locked. However, I found I was able to walk up it and reach the window in the wall above. Since a pane of glass was missing, it was a simple matter to reach in, unlock and raise the window. I did so, climbed up and dropped through.

  I found myself in a kitchen that bore no signs of human occupancy. There was dirt, filth and rotten garbage everywhere. I’d have been willing to bet no one had lived here for years. But that wasn’t my fault. I didn’t know when the accident had happened. As far as I knew, this was the house and I was gonna take the damn pictures.

  I went to what I presumed was the door to the cellar. It was. I tried the light switch just inside the door. As expected, nothing happened. And it was pitch dark in the basement. That made no difference in terms of the pictures—with the flash my Cannon Snappy 50 can shoot in the dark—but it made a difference to me. After all, as far as I knew, one person had already broken a leg on these stairs.

  I went down the stairs very cautiously. There was a handrail, but I couldn’t really see it, and I couldn’t count on it not to give out on me halfway down.

  I reached the bottom. I heaved a sigh of relief and grabbed my camera, which was hanging under my coat by a strap over my shoulder and around my neck. I snapped on the flash, took two steps back to get the right angle. And took a shot of the stairs.

  He was standing in the shadows by the stairwell. The flash lit him up in bold relief, made him look larger than life and scary as hell.

  He would have looked scary anyway. He had bushy black hair, a bristling black beard and wild, glowing eyes. I know part of it was the flash, but I swear his eyes would have glowed on their own. He was dressed in what could best be described as rags. They weren’t, they were clothes, but they were so covered with dirt and grease that it was impossible, for instance, to say if the shirt was solid or plaid. The face was also covered with dirt and grease. As were the hands.

  It was the hands that caught my attention. To be more precise, it was the right hand.

  That was the one holding the knife.

  “What the fuck you want?” he growled.

  What I wanted was to get out of there alive. I didn’t express the thought, however. Instead I tried to keep from peeing in my pants and tried to think of what to say.

  You see, there was nothing I could do. As I said, I don’t carry a gun or any other means of protection. The only thing I have going for me in an emergency is my quick wit.

  Which seemed to have deserted me. My mind was racing. I tried to see the situation from his point of view. I was wearing a suit and tie—I always do when I’m on the job—so there were only two things the guy could think: I was either a cop or a damn fool.

  I was so scared I couldn’t think of a thing to say. Which is why I r
esorted to the truth.

  “You own this building?” I blurted.

  He gawked at me. “Fuck no.”

  “Then you got nothing to worry about,” I said. “I’m a private detective, and I’m employed to take pictures of these stairs so some guy named Raymon Ortega can sue the owner and make a shitload of money.”

  The minute I said the word “money” I made a face like a golfer who’d just topped a drive. What a stupid thought to put in his head. Money. The guy’s eyes gleamed even more when I said it. And now his lips parted in a hideous grin, revealing gleaming, pearly white teeth.

  And then he started for me.

  For a second I thought I was going to faint.

  And then he was on me, reaching out and grabbing, and—

  He pumped my hand up and down, grinning like a zany, as if his face was going to crack. “Me! Me!” he said, nodding and grinning. “You work for me! Me! Raymon Ortega!”

  I couldn’t believe it. Wendy/Cheryl had gotten one right.

  7.

  I GOT BEEPED AGAIN before I even got back on the Jersey Turnpike.

  I called in and Wendy/Cheryl gave me a picture assignment to shoot a broken sidewalk in Rahway. I shot it, got beeped again, and was directed to shoot a defective swing in a public playground in Perth Amboy.

  By now even a dunce like me had figured out what was going on. Richard, pissed off at the thought of my leaving him in the lurch, had sent the paralegals to the files to pull out every old pending photo assignment they could find in New Jersey. I didn’t care, just as long as it kept them all too busy to think about the beeper range.

  I shot the defective swing (which had long since been fixed, but that wasn’t my problem), got on the Garden State Parkway, and drove like the wind out of beeper range.

  Atlantic City is about one hundred twenty miles from New York, if you’re keeping count. I was, and I loved it. Seventy-five miles is just the maximum limit they guarantee the beeper will work. It’ll go further than that. But over a hundred, no way.

  I got off the Garden State Parkway at Exit 40, and cruised down 30 East with the blessed sound of silence in my ears.

  My hotel was on Route 30, just a few miles down the road in Absecon, right where the travel agent had said it would be. It was 5:30 when I checked in. Richard’s office was still open—Wendy and Cheryl stay on the phones until six—but they weren’t beeping me. What a surprise.

  I registered at the desk, lugged my suitcase up to the room. I went back downstairs and asked the girl at the desk if she knew where Traymore Avenue was. She certainly did. It turned out it was just about a mile from the hotel, back up 30 the way I’d come and turn right at the McDonald’s. I didn’t even have to buy a map.

  I went out, hopped in my car and drove over there. The address turned out to be your basic two-story middle-income house and yard on a pleasant tree-lined street of similar structures. The double-door of the two car garage was closed, so presumably both vehicles were in, although I couldn’t tell. It wasn’t dark enough yet for lights to be on, so I couldn’t really see anything through the windows, though, to be perfectly honest, I didn’t really want to. I figured there was nothing to do tonight, anyway. All I wanted to do was verify the address and familiarize myself with the house. I figured to start in the morning.

  The question nagging at me, of course, was: start what? I figured the question would keep for the morning, however.

  Meanwhile, hey! Here I was in Atlantic City. I’d never been in Atlantic City. But I’d certainly heard enough about it, what with New Yorkers always talking about it, and what with all those ads on TV. And I figured, hey, if Harold was mixed up in something shady, what would be more logical than that it would have to do with gambling?

  I thought about that some, and then I went out and had some dinner, and then I thought about it some more, and the long and the short of it was before too long I talked myself into the notion that it would be a pretty good idea for me to familiarize myself with the local casinos.

  With this virtuous idea in mind, I bought a street map for a buck fifty from a vending machine in the hotel lobby, and headed out for playland.

  It turned out the street map was entirely unnecessary. When I got back out to the back parking lot, I could see them there, lit up against the sky across the bay. Tall buildings with neon lights on top. Could this be it? Could this be the city of gold?

  I got in my car and headed out. Screw the map. It looked like 30 East would get me there, so that’s what I took. Immediately I was assaulted by signs, “BEST NAME IN GAMING FOR FIFTY YEARS.—HARRAH’S.” “HOLLYWOOD EXHIBIT—FREE ADMISSION—SANDS.” “MEET BUCK BUSTER—THE DOLLAR SLOTBUSTER’S BEST FRIEND.—CAESAR’S.” And the buildings were getting closer and closer across the bay. “BEST NAME IN SLOTS—BALLY’S.” “120,000 IN JACKPOTS PAID HOURLY—RESORTS.”

  I followed the flow of traffic, and before I knew it I was driving down Atlantic Avenue, and all the casino hotels were coming up on my left. Signs were now proclaiming free parking in this city of gold. I succumbed to the lure, hung a left, and soon found myself in the parking lot of Bally’s Park Place Hotel and Casino. The attendant took my car key, gave me a ticket and told me to have it validated by the cashier so as I wouldn’t have to pay him for the parking. I thought that was right nice of him.

  I came out of the parking lot, wondering which way to go. Silly me. Follow the people, follow the signs. I did, went in a door, down a hall, turned left and suddenly there it was. I was looking at it.

  I was astounded. I had expected a room. It was the size of a football stadium. A vast sea of gambling machines stretched out in front of me. Slot machines. One-armed bandits. And every single one of them seemed to be taken. Mostly by women. And mostly old. I wandered through the sea. In the center of the room I found the traditional gambling games. Blackjack, roulette, and craps. About half of the tables were filled. I figured that was because it was midweek. Weekends they’d probably be solid.

  I watched for a while. It was kind of interesting. At the crap table everyone was animated. The guys around the table were all talking to each other and shoving out bets. And the guy with the dice was talking to ’em as if he thought that would help. Or perhaps he’d seen a movie somewhere where crap shooters talked to dice. At any rate, he was doing it.

  Blackjack tables were different. I watched one where no one said a word. They just pointed. They pushed out their bets. The dealer would silently shove the cards out of the shoe, then look at the players in turn. If they wanted a hit, they’d point to their cards. If they didn’t, they’d wave their hand palm down over them. The dealer’d then face his hole card, deal himself cards if required, then silently pay out or collect all the bets.

  The activity at the roulette wheels lay somewhere between these extremes. Players would talk, of course, as they couldn’t reach the whole betting board, and had to tell the croupier on what numbers to slide their chips. But it was much more refined, genteel, low key. Even big wins were accepted with smug smiles rather than whoops of joy. Losses caused merely a raised eyebrow and shake of the head.

  I felt like participating. I mean, if you come to Atlantic City, you should gamble a little. I also knew I’d lose my shirt. I’ve never played craps in my life. The only blackjack I’d ever played was for fun with friends at college, and I’d always lost.

  I’d played roulette once. That was the only time in my life I’d ever been in a casino. That was an illegal casino, though. This was my first time in a legal one. In the illegal casino I’d lost fifty dollars. That time, of course, the wheel had probably been rigged. I figured the wheels in here probably weren’t. I also figured it probably wouldn’t make any difference. The odds are for the house, so eventually you’re going to lose, one way or another.

  The other thing was, all the tables, blackjack, craps and roulette, had a five dollar minimum bet. On my travel budget, that was just too steep. There was no way I was parting with that kind of money.

  I want
ed to do something, though, so I bought a roll of quarters and started playing the slots. It wasn’t that easy to do. The old ladies had ’em pretty well locked up. Oh, to be fair, there were some young ladies and some men, too, both old and young. But they were the exception. But the older ladies, middle-aged and up, were the rule.

  About four aisles down I spotted a free machine about halfway down the row. I slid in next to it.

  The woman at the machine next to me, who had just pulled the lever and set her wheels spinning, turned on me savagely.

  “That’s mine!” she snarled.

  I looked down and saw that the payoff slot was full of quarters. The woman grabbed a handful out of the slot, fed five of them into the machine, pulled the lever and, without waiting to see the result, hopped back to the other machine, repeating the process.

  I was amazed. The woman was compulsively, methodically and without a scrap of enjoyment, playing both machines.

  As I continued my tour of the floor I discovered that this was by no means rare. Many women were playing two machines. Some were playing three.

  I found what appeared to be an unoccupied machine. I stalked it carefully. Determined it to be unmarked by any tigress’s scent. I shoved quarters into it with minimal expectations and minimal results. It was fun watching the wheels revolve, but that was about it. Occasionally I hit a small payoff, ten quarters, twenty quarters max.

  I put my quarters into one of the plastic cups that were stacked next to each machine for that very purpose, and wandered around the floor, stopping now and then to play what looked like an interesting machine.

  Eventually, having fed all my quarters into one machine or another, I reached the back of the room. The sign over the door said, “Exit to Boardwalk.” That looked good to me. I went through the doors and out.