Deadman's Bluff

hopped on. Late thirties, one black, the other white, they argued over who was the best golfer of all time—Nicklaus or Woods—neither man willing to back down.

Everyone got out on the fourth floor. Still arguing, the men went in one direction, Valentine and Rufus in the other. “I happened to personally know the best golfer in the world, and it wasn’t Jack Nicklaus or Tiger Woods,” Rufus said. “It was Titanic Thompson.”

Valentine had heard of Thompson. He was a famous hustler who the character Nathan Detroit in Guys and Dolls was based on. “I thought Thompson’s games were cards and dice.”

“And golf,” Rufus said. “Ti was the best. He taught me all the angles. I can beat any golfer in the world, if the money’s right.”

They reached the suite and Valentine stuck his plastic key into the door. He rarely stayed up late, and the long hours he’d been keeping were taking their toll. The security light flashed green, and he pushed the door open.

“Home sweet home,” Rufus said, sailing his Stetson into the room as he went in. “I’ll tell you a little secret about Ti. He always practiced his golf shots in the shade. That way, when suckers played him, they assumed he didn’t get out much.”

As Valentine turned to shut the door, it slammed open in his face. Pools of black appeared before his eyes and he staggered backward into a wall.

The men from the elevator rushed into the suite. The white guy was holding a nylon rope stretched between his hands, the black guy a pipe. The black guy ran across the suite and tried to smack Rufus over the head. Rufus fell on the couch.

“Don’t hurt me,” the old cowboy said. “Please don’t hurt me.”

The white guy wrapped his rope around Valentine’s neck, then spun him around and put his knee into Valentine’s back. Valentine tried to wiggle his fingers between the rope and his windpipe. It was no good.

“I’ll pay you twenty grand, cash,” Rufus said to his attacker.

“You got that much?” his attacker asked.

“Yeah, in the wall safe.”

The black guy looked at his partner, then back at Rufus. “Double it, and I won’t kill you.”

“Deal,” Rufus said.

“What about your friend?”

“What about him?” Rufus asked.

The black guy laughed harshly.

Valentine felt the fight leave his body and his legs begin to buckle. From across the room, Celebrity’s garish neon flashed through the partially open blinds. Las Vegas was built on losers, and he realized he was about to become one of them.

4

Valentine was sinking in a bottomless lake. He felt weightless and surprisingly calm. Dying isn’t so bad, he thought.

He heard a sharp crack! that sounded like thunder. The rope strangling him went slack, and fell to the floor. He took a deep breath, then spun around. His attacker was holding his arm, cursing in pain. Valentine kicked the man’s legs out from under him. Called the sweep, it was the best way to take someone down. As the man fell forward, Valentine kneed him in the face for good measure.

He heard another crack! from across the suite. Rufus stood in the middle of the living room, brandishing a bullwhip. He cracked the whip like a pro, repeatedly hitting the black guy in places that were hard to defend: his ankle, face, and crotch. Valentine had seen Rufus slip something beneath the couch a few nights before, and had assumed it was a pair of shoes.

“Look out behind you,” Rufus said.

Valentine spun around. The effort made his head throb and the room spin. The white guy had gotten up and was staggering out the door, his face a bloody mess.

“Tony, behind you again,” Rufus called out.

Valentine turned again, this time a little more slowly. Rufus’s attacker ran past him. He joined up with his partner, and their pounding footsteps reverberated down the hallway. Cracking his whip, Rufus followed the two men into the hall. His Stetson was back on his head, and he looked as regal as any cowboy had the right to look.

“Anytime, girls,” Rufus yelled, standing in the hallway. “Come back anytime.”

Valentine got his wits back, then searched the suite for a weapon. He settled on a brass flower vase sitting on the TV. It was shaped like a woman in a floor-length dress. He went into the hall with the vase clutched in his hand.

“Call hotel security,” he told Rufus.

“Sure. You okay?”

“Never better,” Valentine said.

Like Hansel and Gretel in the forest, their attackers had left a trail. Instead of bread crumbs, they’d left drops of blood. He followed them to the hallway’s end, stopping at the doorway to the emergency exit stairwell. Opening the door cautiously, he stuck his head in, staring into semidarkness.

From down below came voices. His adrenaline had burned off, and the bridge of his nose felt as wide as his head. The smart move was to retreat. He’d escaped, and that was the important thing. Only Valentine wanted to pay these jokers back. When it came to killers, he believed in the Old Testament’s advice: “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.” He went into the stairwell, and listened some more.

When Valentine returned to the suite a minute later, Rufus handed him a towel wrapped around some ice cubes. Sitting on the couch, he pressed the towel to his nose.

“I called hotel security,” Rufus said. “They’re dealing with a problem in the casino, and will be up in a few. Hey, Tony, you’ve got blood on your shirt. You okay?”

Valentine looked down at his shirt. The lower half was soaked in red.

“I’m fine,” he said.

“Well, you don’t look fine,” Rufus said.

“Okay, so I’m lousy.”

Rufus pulled a suitcase from the closet. He unzipped a pocket, removed a glass pint of bourbon, and offered it to him. “This is the finest bourbon known to man, brewed in a Mississippi bathtub by the great-grandson of Jack Daniels himself.”

“No thanks,” Valentine said. “But go ahead yourself.”

Rufus unscrewed the top and took a long pull, smacking his lips when done. Some men, like Valentine’s father, could not drink without turning into monsters. Others, like Rufus, seemed better for the experience.

Rufus retrieved the coiled bullwhip from the floor. It looked like a thick black snake whose head was hidden within its coils, and he tucked it beneath the couch.

“You always carry that around?” Valentine asked.

“Used to carry a gun,” Rufus said. “After 9/11, I started carrying the whip. In some ways, it’s better than a gun. You should learn how to use one.”

“You think so?”

“It’s like fly casting a fishing rod. Ever try that?”

“I fly-fished once on vacation,” Valentine said. “I caught the hook on my earlobe. Had to go to the emergency room at the hospital to have it removed.”

“Maybe you should stick with beating people up.”

“Thanks.”

Rufus returned his pint to the suitcase, then consulted his wristwatch. It was an old silver dollar that had been turned into a timepiece. The coin needed polishing, but probably wouldn’t see any in Rufus’s lifetime.

“Those hotel guards are mighty damn slow,” he said.

Valentine shifted the icepack on his face. A five-minute response time in a Vegas hotel was normal. Although their casinos had state-of-the-art surveillance systems, they were largely ineffective when it came to crimes against