Chapter 31
A thousand orange flames flickered on the surface of the immense black St. Lawrence below. The Christmas decorations affixed to the De La Concorde overpass swayed lugubriously in the wind. I was calm. I kept glancing up at the rear-view mirror, as if to make sure the person in the back seat was really me. The taxi had the road to itself. The faint gleam of its headlamps lit the road ahead. The silhouette of Notre Dame Island stood before us. After the bridge we took a wide road next to a body of water. To my left the South Shore lights danced in the fog clinging to the river. A limousine languidly slipped by, stealthy as a spaceship. In the distance ahead a spiky ivory apparition gleamed in the night. A comforting warmth enveloped me and slowly resolved into the languorous relaxation that precedes a surge of adrenaline. The intensity of this sensation never dulled.
The taxi dropped me off in front of the casino. It was lit so brightly it might as well have been noon. Next to another limousine, a group of tourists were chatting away in an unfamiliar language. The women wore fur coats. White-gloved doormen opened doors. I went in and felt immediately at home, like entering a place you’d been a thousand times before. I was already a bit high.
I crossed the lobby. Ponds and fountains dissected banks of slot machines. I walked toward the row of cashier’s booths. They looked like the counters of a venerable bank. Behind golden bars, tuxedoed attendants converted bills into chips. I changed all the cash in my pockets, close to three-hundred dollars, and was given little plastic coins in return. In this new form, the money felt stripped of half its value.
I took in my surroundings. Chandeliers overhung a sprawling atrium ringed by mezzanines and upper floors. The railings and balustrades were plated in gold, the ground covered in plush burgundy carpeting. Everything around me sparkled with the ersatz shine of fake antiques. The burble of fountains blended in with the faraway babble of gamblers. Even the stairs were covered in burgundy carpet. I climbed them. I peered over the railing onto the sprawling labyrinth of the lobby below. The slot machine sounds reminded me of video games. The machines themselves were nothing like the ones in bars: they were much bigger and looked straight out of another era.
I passed two large, grand dining rooms full of white-clothed tables whose cutlery gleamed even in the dim light. Tables were arranged in a loose circle around a small, untended bar. There wasn’t a soul in the room. I went exploring. Each dining room led to yet another, like in a hall of mirrors. Each room seemed to silently await guests who would never arrive.
I continued my journey, traversing a massive room of deserted blackjack tables.
On a raised platform, five or six old men who looked like the ones who whiled away their days in front of the video poker machines on Rue Ontario had gathered around a racing game. They leaned on the rails of their Lilliputian hippodrome, cheering on miniature metal horses.
The next floor was cut into three sections. Each was full of gamblers. Every inch of flooring was carpeted with a red, purple, and brown hexagonal motif. You could see the downtown lights through a row of high windows. On one side were blackjack tables. Almost all were occupied. Gamblers waiting for a spot to free up watched the action play out on the baize. Some took notes. A woman in her early fifties with a porcine face and fat fingers, shoved into a sequin dress several sizes too small, was boasting loudly behind her stacks of chips. She had a laugh that squeaked like an unoiled hinge. When she won, two or three spectators clapped, perhaps hoping for a piece of her good luck.
Farther off in the distance lay poker tables peopled by a clutch of laconic, bored-looking players. The ante was too high for me. I wandered on. New sections and rooms kept opening up, each one begetting another, as in a dream.
On the other side were roulette tables. Again the ante was too rich for my blood. A gambler was swearing at the croupiers. He’d probably just lost more than every one of my Trattoria paycheques combined.
Now I reached the baccarat tables. Here the ante was much lower. I took a seat, and placed my tokens on the felt in front of me. The croupier welcomed me politely. He was in his sixties and as immaculately uniformed as any Tsar or Kaiser’s valet. I was surrounded by chubby Asians with sad looks in their eyes. A waitress in a white shirt and bowtie appeared to offer me a drink. The taste of red ale from the Roy Bar still clung to my mouth. I thought it over, then ordered a vodka rocks.
Baccarat isn’t hard to wrap your head around. It’s kind of like War. The croupier deals two hands from the shoe, one for the “banker” and one for the “player.” You can bet on the player, on the banker, or on a tie. And since you can go double or nothing, it’s possible to start out with a little and win a lot.
An LCD panel behind the croupier displayed the results. My vodka arrived, buried in ice. I took a sip. My temples were burning. I loved savouring the moment before laying my very first bet.
I checked the last results before joining the game. The house had won five hands in a row. I took another sip and bet three twenty-dollar chips on the “player.” The croupier dealt a five for us, then a jack for the bank, followed by a three for us and a four for the house.
I won the hand, and learned that face cards counted as zero. The croupier distributed each player’s winnings. He slid three twenty-dollar chips toward me. The hair on the back of my neck stood on end.
I doubled my initial bet: six chips, player.
Queen for us: nothing.
I took a deep breath. My fingertips were on fire. I kept my eye on the baize.
Eight for the bank. Eight.
Seven for the bank. Seven.
Six for us. Six.
Eight for the bank. Fifteen.
No: five. Multiples of ten didn’t count.
I thought that was it, but we got a third card.
A five. Which made ten, so our total was zero.
Six for us; zero for the bank.
I’d won again. Just barely this time.
I was given another six chips, plus the ante. I stacked them on top of my others, in little columns. Then I picked up ten chips and placed them in the centre of the table, betting on a tie. I didn’t realize that the chances of a tie were microscopic.
One of the Asian guys, with a toothpick between his lips, was fiddling nervously with his tokens and staring at the centre of the table. Two others crossed their arms after placing their bets. I felt like all eyes were on me.
King for us. Zero.
Six for the bank. Six.
Ace for us. One.
Four for the bank. Zero.
Nine for us. Zero.
Tie.
The table cried out in astonishment. Toothpick man congratulated me in English. So did the croupier, a model of restrained politeness.
The croupier placed eight hundred-dollar chips on the baize and pushed them toward me. My bet had quadrupled. My hands were shaking. My eyes were dim. The scoreboard formed a halo around the croupier, a pointillist red and yellow aura.
I tried to calm down, and assessed the results. I bet two chips on the bank. Adrenaline was coursing through my every limb.
Two for us. Two.
Ace for the bank. One.
Five for us. Seven.
Eight for the bank. Nine.
The round was over. No third card. Player won. I was having trouble grasping what was happening.
I felt my heart pounding, crashing like thunder in my head. The croupier gathered up my two chips. I put down two more, right away, in the exact same spot. The bank won. The croupier raked up my bet, plus the two chips I’d lost on the previous hand. I took it as a warning.
So feverish I could scarcely concentrate, I did some calculations. I had fourteen-hundred dollars in tokens. I counted again, short of breath. The idiot grin refused to leave my face. It seemed impossible. If I added my winnings to what was left in my account, I had more than enough for the print job. I’d alm
ost won back everything I’d stolen from the band. I counted again, just to be sure. With my paycheque, I’d even have a little extra left over. I could pay back Marie-Lou when she finally calmed down.
I looked around for a booth to cash in my chips. There weren’t any on this floor. They were all downstairs, in the lobby. I went down toward the stairway, through the roulette section. I walked up to one of the tables. A handful of fifty-year-olds were leaning over the rectangular table. There was something enthralling about roulette, like watching a campfire. I felt like I was in a movie. A hazy montage from all the James Bonds and Scorsese flicks and the rest of the forgettable Hollywood gambling scenes flashed before my eyes. One of the gamblers gave off an acrid, peppery cigar stench. A gold watch hung from his wrist. He chewed gum as he stared at the red, green, and black squares.
The croupier welcomed me. She was every bit as polite and elegant as her colleague at the baccarat table. The minimum bet was a hundred dollars. I decided I could afford it. The second the ball started spinning and dancing, with its little dry rapping sound, the euphoria I had felt earlier returned. It was invigorating, delicious. The little ball came to rest on twenty red. The croupier announced the result. I didn’t understand a thing. It didn’t matter. The man in the gold watch doubled the bet he’d placed on the second twelve. He’d also won eight-to-one on his other bet straddling seventeen, eighteen, twenty, and twenty-one. The croupier collected the other players’ losses with a golden rake.
I bet on black again. Same amount as before. The croupier spun the wheel and dropped the ball. Thirty-five black up. I won back what I’d lost the round before. The euphoria was still with me.
I bet again, copying my neighbour’s tactic: two hundred-dollar chips on ten-eleven-twelve-thirteen, and three more chips covering one through twelve. My legs were strafed with pins and needles, my knees numb and liable to buckle beneath me. Two centuries came and went as the wheel spun around and around and around. Finally the ball came to rest on twenty-one red. My five chips were raked up. After that I started betting randomly: twenty on the twenty-one, sixty on black, a hundred on odds, two hundred straddling sixteen and nineteen. The ball danced. Zero. The croupier raked up the chips.
I placed my two remaining hundred-dollar chips on the baize, and bet on ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, and fifteen. The croupier let me know that I’d win five times my bet if any of those numbers came up. The euphoria crystallized in every limb. I stood perfectly still. I watched the ball dancing among the lacquered numbers of the roulette wheel. I clenched the table edge hand so hard my knuckles turned white. The ball finally dropped into its little hollow. The croupier announced the winning number. I didn’t hear her. I was overtaken by vertigo. She raked up the last of my tokens. The faces around me clouded over. Everyone, including the croupier, retreated behind indistinct, pale masks.
A minute later I was standing in front of one of the twenty Desjardins ATMs scattered throughout that floor, draining my account. I went back to the baccarat table I’d played earlier. The same players were still there, their expressions unreadable. The impeccable old croupier greeted me again. I sat down and bet, my head empty, my eyes glued to the green baize. The bank won. I bet another hundred-dollar chip on the player.
Three for us. Three.
Queen for the bank. Nothing.
Jack for us. Three.
Four for the bank. Four.
Ace for us. Four. Tie.
The croupier raked up my chips along with those of the other losers. I sniffed. Put a new token on the table, betting on a tie. The cards fell, one after another.
Seven for the player. Ten for the bank. My token was raked up. I felt like I was drowning in the buzzing in my ears. I was cut off from the rest of the world, sucked by a powerful orbit into the far reaches of the night. If my mother lay dying fifty feet away, I wouldn’t have gotten up from that table to help her. Almost all my faculties were numbed, anaesthetized. No matter how badly I wanted to stop I kept right on betting, fastened to my chair by the tingling of thousands of pins and needles up and down my spinal cord. There were the bets, and my hand, and the baize. There was the slow, silent music of the spheres, nebulae of chance and time collapsing endlessly in upon itself. All around me the other players sat behind stacks of chips that just kept growing. Though I didn’t move a millimetre from my chair, my own stacks were dwindling, my chips disappearing as if I were tossing them into a black hole. I bet my very last chip, on a tie. The perverse logic in my delirious brain was telling me I could win it all back in a single hand that way. The player side won. The croupier swept up my chip. I vacated my seat for another player and wandered aimlessly on unsteady legs through the games rooms where I watched other people winning, stacking up piles of chips. I was incapable of formulating a single thought. I couldn’t have told you my name. I penetrated deeper into the casino, devastated. I was moving but within me the void was total. There was no feeling, no language, just an abyss of night and emptiness.
Around six-thirty in the morning I walked out of the casino. The cold rose up off the river on the wings of a biting, implacable wind. Finding an exit took eons. With my hands in my pockets I walked until I reached the bus stop, to wait for the shuttle to Jean-Drapeau Metro station. I got in line behind a group of ten other dispossessed persons with glassy eyes and downcast faces. Dawn was slow to come. The downtown lights sparkled from across the river. I closed my eyes.
Chapter 32
I’d fallen asleep fully clothed on the couch. An entire day went by as I oscillated between dream and reality in the dark, silent apartment. Vincent had left the venetian blinds drawn. Time and again I awoke with a start and the reflex to rifle through my hiding spot next to the couch legs, to make sure my wad of bills was still there. But there was nothing left. Not even five dollars.
“Come, we’ll play in the fire,” was a line Peter Steele had added in at the end of his version of “Black Sabbath.” The song played in a loop on my Walkman as I lay inert on the couch.
I got up around 2:30. An issue of Hellblazer lay on top of my art materials on the coffee table. Vincent must have started reading it while I was gone. On the cover John Constantine was smoking a cigarette in front of a giant bingo card. The irony wasn’t lost on me. The box with the Dune series was where I’d left it by the front door of the apartment. I was calm, or maybe dead, like a lake in winter. Eventually I forced myself to get up and rinse off the cobwebs in the shower.
Greg was sitting at the staff table with a big Ziploc bag of white pills stamped with happy faces. Two by two, he was transferring them into little baggies he was putting in a fanny pack that looked like a bartender’s belt. He was acting exactly as if he was filling salt shakers or tea boxes. He said hi without interrupting his work.
Renaud was in his office. I got dressed, then went to see him. Our intrepid Chef was playing Minesweeper. He turned toward me. I shut the door.
“Uh, Renaud? I wanted to ask. . . Do you think I could get a raise?”
My voice felt snuffed out, far away. It was the first time I’d spoken since the casino.
“A raise? You haven’t even been here a month.”
His voice sounded ill at ease and a little put out.
“Well, it kind of seems . . . like I’m doing a lot. For a guy who hasn’t even been here a month.”
He smiled as he looked at me.
“You think you’re hot shit, that’s for sure.”
Years of smoking had yellowed his teeth. I realized I didn’t like his smile, or his bony cadaverous face. He went on.
“You’re a hard worker though. You look tired.”
Renaud never seemed to open up completely, always seemed to be keeping a card up his sleeve. He opened Maitre’D on the computer to check my hours for the last two weeks.
“It’s true, you’ve been working a lot.”
He scrolled through the file.
> “Wait a sec. Christian already gave you a good raise. You even make more than Eaton. The only way we could give you another raise would be to make you a cook.”
He closed the window with a click of the mouse. I fiddled with the loose board in the doorframe. I was tempted to tell him I really needed that raise, but didn’t want to come off as desperate.
“You still want to move up to the kitchen, right?”
“Yeah, for sure.”
“Give me a few days and I’ll make it happen. Now get to work!”
When I left the office Greg was gone. The ice machine was spitting out new cubes, the hum from the electrical room seemed louder. I felt sluggish, with tingling eyes. I had no clear sense of whether I’d slept or not. A memory from years earlier welled up: me and Marie-Lou, together in the mosh pit at the Megadeth show. The smell of her sweat, her toothy grin and fiery eyes. I rubbed my face and headed off to wash my lettuce.
After finishing my prep I dragged my dejected ass up the stairs. Bonnie was in the kitchen yelling at Steven. There was no reasoning with her when she was that hungover. Steven couldn’t get a word in edgewise. Bonnie was hurling her salad bowls onto Steven’s workstation and yelling to wait for the ticket before going on the mains. At the end of the bar, next to the order computer, Maude was talking with Greg, trying to convince him to go pick someone up. Renaud appeared behind me, in his coat. Maude stepped away from Greg, who bounded off to set tables with a dozen wineglasses in a single hand. She came over to Renaud, who was punching something in on the computer.
“Do you think you could stay? Just until he gets here. Just to be sure. . .”
“It’s not the first time he’s been late. He’ll get here. And the book’s almost empty.”
“C’mon Renaud, you know that doesn’t mean anything. If Bébert doesn’t show up we’ve got no one for the hotside.”
The Dishwasher Page 33