Then I took out my key chain, unhooked my penlight, put it between my teeth and heaved myself up into the ceiling.
“Are you sure it’s removable ceiling tiles?” I’d said to Jack. “If they’ve plastered since you were last there, we’re in trouble.”
“Gallagher doesn’t redecorate. If it works, it stays.”
This plan was my idea. Jack had his own-which went something along the lines of “cheat, get caught, get taken into the secured area and demand to see Gallagher.” And my role? Just play along in the casino, then enjoy my evening gambling while he risked broken fingers with Gallagher’s security team. When I’d suggested this enhancement, I’d expected him to balk, but he’d only thought for a moment, then said, “Yeah, that’s better.” The balking came later, as we’d prepared our strategy, and he’d realized how much danger I was putting myself in.
“It’s no worse than your plan,” I’d said. “With yours, you’re relying on the guards to deliver your message… and Gallagher to accept it, rather than take advantage of the chance to beat the crap out of you for refusing his jobs. With mine, I do the delivery, and Gallagher has no choice but to accept it. Worst thing that can happen? I can’t get to Gallagher, and we’ll be back to your idea.”
“Or Gallagher gets you. Holds you hostage.”
“He has to catch me first.”
When Jack didn’t smile, I’d said, “You seriously think he can take me that easily? I’m careful, Jack. One wrong look from the guy, and I’m back up in that ceiling. See if he can follow me there.”
“Wouldn’t fit.”
As I squeezed into the gap between the beams and the floor above, I saw Jack’s point. Tight quarters up here. Not bad, though. I’d been in worse.
Still, Jack hadn’t seemed satisfied, kept poking and prodding, making sure I was prepared.
“I can do this,” I’d said finally, exasperated. “If you didn’t think I could, why let us get this far with the plan?”
Silence. After a moment, he’d said only, “Be careful.”
“I always am.”
Something had passed though his gaze, but he’d dropped it before I could get a good look.
I checked my compass. North-northwest was that way. Down on all fours again, flashlight between my teeth, and I was on the move. Dust swirled up with every step. Despite the contacts, my eyes watered, and more than once I had to stop and chomp down on the flashlight to swallow a sneeze.
“Take this,” Jack had said, thrusting the map at me. “Keep it handy.”
“I won’t need it,” I’d said.
“Humor me.”
I had, but I didn’t take the map out now. I didn’t need to. In high school, I’d spent a summer working as a guide in Algonquin Park, and the first thing I’d learned was not how to repel black bears and blackflies, but how to memorize maps. Nothing destroys tourists’ confidence-and a guide’s chance at a tip-so much as having her stop in the middle of an endless expanse of forest to pore over a map.
From below came muted whispers of conversation against the backdrop of the constant whirs and dings of distant slot machines. As I crossed one room, the sound changed to a steady clinking, a river of chips going through a mechanical counter-the sound of broken marriages, busted kneecaps and shattered lives. Never saw the appeal of gambling. Not with money, anyway. The risk of parachuting or white-water rafting is one thing-you know the odds are in your favor. But casino gambling? Just take a look at the owners, and how they live, and tell me where you think all that money is going.
I supposed it was all about the threat of risk and the possibility of reward. But the risk of financial ruin was, for someone who’d been there, not enough to get my heart pumping. Not like this-the thrill of true danger, crawling into the unknown.
Regular spelunking is risky enough. But there, in a cave, you have partners who can go for help and, most times, the biggest danger you face is broken bones. Here, if I fell, I’d be exposed as a thief or, worse, an assassin. Men like Gallagher didn’t handle either by simply breaking bones.
And with spelunking, it’s all about the journey, the thrill of knowing every move you make could land you in a crevasse, that you can try your damnedest to control every variable, but you still leave something to chance. The goal is the simple satisfaction of survival. Here, there was more. Not just increased stakes, but an actual prize. A name that could rip the mask from the Helter Skelter killer.
Crawling through this ceiling was the ultimate extreme sport. Or, perhaps, only the precursor to it.
As I moved, the clatter of coins gave way to slurping, interspersed with moans set to a sound track of “yeah, baby, that’s right, baby, uh-huh.” I listened for the familiar wocka-wocka music of a seventies porn movie. Yes, I knew what porn movies sounded like. When you’ve worked in a testosterone-dominated occupation, you have two choices: lecture the guys on the political incorrectness of watching porn with a female co-worker or laugh it off with cracks like, “Hey, how come
As I shimmied forward, being careful not to disturb the video watchers below, a shaft of light glimmered up through a fist-sized hole in the ceiling tile. Below it, I could see a balding head. The rafters on either side had pipes running over them. No detours possible. Damn. I eased back onto my haunches, took the flashlight from my mouth, turned it off and tucked it into my pocket. Then forward again, relying on the hole for light. I inched to the edge and peered down.
Below was a middle-aged man, his hands wrapped around a bleach blond head bobbing in his lap. He continued his porn star dialogue and she continued slurping, making way more noise than was necessary for the act-at least, as far as I remembered it. I was tempted to look around for the video camera. The man groaned and exhorted the woman to “Take it in. Take it all in,” which, from my vantage point, didn’t look very difficult. I crawled over the hole. Not like either of them was going to look up anytime soon.
As the live porn sound track faded, I put the penlight back in my mouth and pushed on. Only a few more rooms to cross now. In spite of the racket from the distant casino and the filth of seriously overlooked housecleaning chores, more than once a sudden grin almost sent my flashlight tumbling to the ceiling tiles below.
“Spelunking,” I’d said when Jack had expressed some doubts about the wisdom of rafter-crawling. When his look demanded an interpretation, I’d said, “You know. Exploring caverns, caves, natural tunnel systems, that sort of thing.”
His look didn’t change.
“It’s a sport,” I’d said.
He’d shaken his head, as if unable to believe anyone would voluntarily do such a thing.
“What about getting down?” he’d said. “Long jump. You fall? He’ll hear.”
I’d rolled my eyes. “I’m not planning to fall…or jump. I’m going to abseil.”
The look again. When I’d opened my mouth to explain, he’d lifted his hand and shaken his head. “You can do it? Good enough. Just be careful.”
I paused for another compass check, realized I’d veered off at the last turn and backed up a few steps. Then there it was: the final marker-a tangle of wires that snaked the feed of every security camera into Gallagher’s room. He’d be alone. Both Evelyn and Jack had sworn there was little question of that. Seemed Gallagher was antisocial as well as agoraphobic. He spent his nights locked in his control room, watching his money roll in.
Despite their assurances, I wasn’t taking anything on faith. I stretched out across two rafters, grabbed a third with one hand, then lowered my head down as close to the ceiling tiles as I could get without slipping. A moment’s pause, to double-check my balance, then I reached down with my free hand, hooked my fingertips around a tile edge and eased it to the side. It moved less than a half-inch, just enough to open a crack to the room below. And there sat Maurice Gallagher.
“He’s a big guy,” Jack had said.
He wasn’t kidding. Evelyn had called Gallagher a spider, and I couldn’t imagine a better metaphor. Gallagher was obese, at least four hundred pounds, with sticklike arms and legs, and a too-small, round head. He wore his dyed red hair slicked to each side, the part a blazing white stripe of pasty flesh that made his two patches of hair look like giant arachnid eyes. A spider, perched in his lair, watching his prey buzz about in the casino, entangling themselves in his web.
