No Such Creature

Max had all his life been one of those blessed individuals who have the knack of being able to drift off anywhere, any time. He was as comfortable in the Rocket’s queen-size bed as if he had been born in it. But now he lay on his back, staring at the ceiling and listening to the persistent crump, crump, crump of some dimwit’s subwoofer a few trailers away. He thought of the upcoming show, going over in his head the various roles he, Owen, Pookie and Roscoe would play.

Then time left him for a while-he had no idea for how long-and when he came to himself again, he was assaulted by the acrid smell of cigar smoke. Some droop-lip trailer trash, no doubt clad in overalls and baseball cap, was sneaking a midnight smoke outside the Rocket. And then a noise, a rustling sound. A newspaper?

He sat up, goggle-eyed.

There was a man sitting in the corner of his tiny bedroom reading the Los Angeles Times. Curlicues of smoke and the crown of a fedora were visible above the headline: TRUMAN VETOES TAFT-HARTLEY.

“Who the hell are you?” Max managed to say. Smoke was stinging his eyes and throat. The man paid him no attention, hidden behind his paper. “What do you want?”

A rustle of paper as the Times was lowered. The man’s features were hidden in the shadow of his hat brim. He sat forward, bringing his face into the light. His left eye was no more than a blood- filled socket, the lower half of his face a mask of gore.

“They got me, Max. I was having a great time, but they got me.”

“What are you talking about?” Max’s lower lip trembled so that he could barely form the words. “Who got you?”

“New York. Who else?”

Max gathered the bedclothes around his chest. He hadn’t been this frightened since prison.

“You’re Bugsy Siegel.”

“Bugsy.” The man puffed hard on his cigar so that the tip glowed neon red. “I’ve killed guys for calling me that.”

“But you’re dead.”

The man shrugged. His suit was big in the shoulders, a wide chalk-stripe riddled with bullet holes from which wisps of smoke were coiling. His face minus the blood and with both eyes in place would have been handsome. A part of Max’s brain registered that this was not Bugsy Siegel but Warren Beatty playing Bugsy Siegel.

The gangster raised a finger to his face. “Got me in the bridge of the nose. Right through the newspaper.” He held the Times and blew a thin plume of smoke through the.45-calibre hole. “Force of the thing blew my eye out. Stings, too.”

Bugsy got up and came around the side of the bed, reeking of blood and cigar.

“No.” Max cowered against the bedboard. “Get away from me.”

“I only came to warn you.”

“Stay away.” When the apparition didn’t move, Max added, “Warn me of what?”

“Same thing’s going to happen to you.”

“No, no. I won’t let it. Now get away. Get away from me. Please.”

“Here.” The thing held out its hand. “Take it as a reminder.”

“Get away, I tell you. I don’t want it.”

“It’ll help you see it coming.”

“I don’t want it, blast you.”

“Take it!”

The voice would not be denied. Max’s hand travelled of its own accord out from under the bedclothes, palm up. Into it, the creature pressed a flesh-hot eyeball.

Max screamed and tried to throw it away, but it refused to leave his hand. He screamed and screamed and covered his head with his blanket and curled himself into a damp ball. He remained that way for some time, listening for the sound of the newspaper, but there was nothing. Eventually he heard worried voices. He lowered the blanket just enough to look into the alarmed faces of Owen and Sabrina.

NINE

You would never have guessed that the man who was standing before the grill, flipping pancakes and whistling a tune from Gilbert and Sullivan, was the same man who had been quivering in his bedclothes scant hours before. But that was Max. Owen had never met anyone else who could change so completely from one mood to another, often mixing despair and sunshine in the confines of a single hour. Now he was pouring pancake batter into artful shapes-Marilyn Monroe, Mickey Mouse, a tapir (or so he claimed)-and chatting away as if he had passed a peaceful night of sweet dreams.

After breakfast, Sabrina called several hospitals until she established that William P. Bullard, hotel security agent and man of God, had been admitted to one of them with a concussion. Then Max and Owen dropped her at his neat little bungalow so that she could pack her things. The front lawn of cedar chips was surrounded by a very solid-looking white picket fence, and this was set off by a lawn jockey, also painted white, who proffered a welcoming lantern in the brilliant Nevada sun. Promising to retrieve her shortly, they went to meet Pookie and Roscoe at the Desert Inn coffee shop.

Roscoe was seated at a table for four by the window, a cup of black coffee steaming beside him. He was absorbed in a dog-eared paperback of Ripley’s Believe It or Not.

“It contains nine trillion gallons of water,” he said as they sat down. “And it’s the largest man-made lake in the world.”

“Lake Mead,” Owen said. “I read it online when we were planning the trip.”

“Lake Mead is correct,” Roscoe said. “You look like you got hit by a truck.”

“The lad takes after his guide and mentor,” Max said. “Last night, defending a damsel in distress, he repeatedly attacked a pious baboon.”

“Yeah? Kicked his ass, I hope.”

Owen shook his head. “He was pounding the crap out of me until Max knocked him out with a parking meter.”

“Unusual choice,” Roscoe said.

Max threw his arm around Owen. “A veritable lion, this lad. Takes after his uncle. Where is Pookie?”

Roscoe shrugged.

“It’s not like him to be late.”

The waitress came over and they ordered coffee. She was a skinny, friendly woman who asked them where they were from. It turned out that her enthusiasm for New York, Broadway in particular, was boundless, dwarfing her excitement about the weather and American Idol, which was also considerable.

“I don’t like this,” Max said when she was gone. “Pookie has many defects, but tardiness is not among them. Give him a call.”

Roscoe pulled out his prepaid cellphone and dialed. After a moment he said, “Not answering. I’ll leave a message.” Then, into the phone, “Hurry up. We’re waiting.”

The coffee came and Max explained the upcoming show to Roscoe. Roscoe asked some questions, and by the time they were finished their coffee Pookie was forty-five minutes late.

“I don’t like it,” Max said again. “If it was you, O base Hungarian, I wouldn’t give it another thought. I would assume you were playing a high-stakes game of trivia somewhere. But Pookie? Something’s wrong.”

“You want me to go check on him?” Roscoe said.

“No, no. You get on the road to Tucson. We’ll roust the errant Pookie and meet up with you there.”

Roscoe left soon after. He was travelling separately from Pookie anyway-a security precaution Max insisted on.

Owen drove them a couple of blocks up the Strip to the Disney-style castle complete with multicoloured