Honorata didn’t want to be alone in the suite. If she opened the blinds, then the lights of the Strip made the room bright as day, but sitting with them shut made her feel claustrophobic. She had not been outside once. She thought about going down to the casino. At night, the play was more serious. People stayed longer at the same machines, they were less likely to look up when a leggy woman brought them another drink. There was almost always a group of loud young men.
She turned from one side to the other, bunching up a pillow against her stomach, and then throwing the pillows aside, lying spread eagle without a sheet over her. Honorata checked the clock beside her bed: 2:18. She got up, drank some water, picked up one of the chocolate coins left every night on their bed, set it down again. She tried sitting on the chaise near the window. She had already examined everything in the room. Finally, as if it were a talisman, she picked up the bucket of El Capitan coins and shook them slightly. They weren’t money; they’d be useless in Chicago. She might as well play them now.
Downstairs, she turned away from the side of the casino where she thought Jimbo was. She walked toward an older area of the floor, marked by a lower roof and a general sense of abandonment. The space was nearly empty, and Honorata wondered why the El Capitan had not updated it; why it didn’t look like the rest of the gleaming, throbbing casino. Maybe some people liked this sort of thing, but Honorata could almost smell the sadness in the place. In the corner, a man wearing a black shirt played a poker machine. Nearby, an older woman played another; she was smoking a cigarette and a half empty pack of Camels teetered at the edge of her seat.
There was a showroom over here, which Honorata had not noticed before. A sign read “Psychedelic Sixties Revue, Playing Nightly in the Midnight Room.” She wandered over, and pulled on the door to see if it was open. It was, but when she peeked inside, the room was dark, and the air smelled of dust and smoke. Behind her, the luminous face of a Megabucks, one of the giant slot machines that was almost always in use, stared blankly. Honorata had watched hordes of people play these, feeding their coins in quickly or slowly, kissing their fingers or their wives, rubbing a button, a penny, a rosary before pulling the handle.
She knew Megabucks was for fools. But Honorata didn’t much care. She would play out the coins. It would take awhile, and perhaps she would get tired. She was far from Jimbo. It was quiet, and she didn’t feel like talking to anyone. No one had even come to bring the smoker a drink.
She hit on the fourteenth pull.
Forty-two tokens in.
The machine exploded. A round light on the top spun like a police car flasher. There were bells, horns, dings, the whooping sound of a siren. Honorata cracked her knee as she jumped up; her first impulse was to flee.
Within seconds, people started running toward her: a cocktail waitress, a valet attendant, the woman with the cigarette, two young men—the collars of their pastel shirts turned up, one with a cigar, the other with flushed cheeks—all running at her. She heard excited yells and then someone clapping. She looked at the machine: “Jackpot! $1,414,153.00! Winner!” flashed across the top. She heard someone say “Get Mr. Wohlmann, in the VIP room,” and time stopped, sound stopped, the room went pale.
There was a huge bouquet of flowers, champagne, the hotel photographer. The owner of the hotel hurried in, his hair sticking up and his tie slightly crooked, as if he had not stopped to shower when he got the call. He was young. He knew Jimbo. He kept saying things like “No problem, man. We’ll have this worked out.” And then he would look at her, give her another hug, ask her how she was feeling, again, again, again.
The shock of the initial excitement was wearing off.
She had been dizzy with the chaos of it. With the intensity of everyone’s interest: the people who worked at the casino, the ones who were gambling, the boss who had clearly been home asleep. Jimbo had gotten to her side within minutes. And right away, she realized that something had changed. He hesitated before he gave her a hug. He seemed uncomfortable.
Everyone was calling her Mrs. Wohlmann. She heard a casino employee spelling out her name for a reporter: “R-i-t-a W-o-h-l-m-a-n-n.” Honorata said nothing. The casino owner called her “Mrs. Wohlmann” too. He said that Mr. Wohlmann had been a special guest for twenty years, that it was exciting that the El Capitan’s first Megabucks hit had been for a patron they valued so highly. His mother would want to say hello too.
Honorata stayed quiet, but she let them drape a mink coat over her shoulders. “For the photo,” someone said. Honorata was not sure what was going to happen, but she could feel Jimbo’s fear. Like a tide pulling at their feet. The casino’s print department made a large check, five feet long, which said that one million, four hundred and fourteen thousand, one hundred and fifty-three dollars would be paid to Rita Wohlmann. Rita and Jimbo posed with the owner, and the photographer took that shot, and then another just of her.
At six in the morning, a small woman, only slightly larger than Honorata, entered. She was elegantly dressed, in a pale-pink nubbly suit, with an ivory silk blouse and tall ivory shoes that showed off her narrow heel and the bone at the top of her foot. Her hair was a neat, dark bob, and she did not look like she had just gotten out of bed. Her makeup was perfect; she smelled lightly of perfume.
“Marshall, did you get up out of bed to come here?”
“It was three o’clock. Yes, I got out of bed.”
The elegant woman lifted her face to her son’s, and he kissed her cheek lightly.
“Thank you, honey. I really appreciated that sleep.” She turned to a man wearing the casino’s black-and-gold uniform.
“Carmine, get us some breakfast. We can eat at the back of the club. I want to congratulate our winners.”
She stepped forward then.
“James. It’s always lovely to see you. And this is your wife? Is this your first time in Vegas? Did you have beginner’s luck?”
Honorata nodded her head, but she felt suddenly overwhelmed. They all knew Jimbo.
“Please, will you join me for breakfast? You must be very tired, but you can sleep all day.” She turned to Jimbo. “Are you still planning to fly out today?”
“I don’t know. We’re a little discombobulated, June.”
“Then stay for breakfast. That will give Marshall time to do all the paperwork. Winning Megabucks does not protect you from Uncle Sam, you know.”
Honorata felt the fear rise in Jimbo. With every minute, she felt stronger, cleaner. Something had changed. More than the money.
Marshall was talking to Jimbo.
“Sir, thank you for the identification cards. The feds are really strict with us. Since your wife is a native of the Philippines, and her name is different on her passport, I will need to see your wedding license. That’s the only way that I can deposit the money.”
Jimbo explained that they were engaged, but not yet married. “Is that a problem?” he asked.
“Of course not. Technically, the money is hers. If she wants to take it and go, we can’t stop her. We’ll just need her account information, and she can sign the paperwork.”
“She doesn’t have a bank account. We’ll set one up now. We can go to a bank here and do it.”