“Chris—you look roughed up . . .”
“What the hell is happening?”
“Yeah. Bit lively, isn’t it?” He glanced back at the devastation, shook his head. “Great cinema. At least, I hope it is . . .”
“What’s happening? These guys won’t tell me anything!”
“Ah.” He ran a hand over his scalp. Water dribbled down his face, dripped off his nose. “I suppose it’s what you’d call a hostile takeover. Bit more hostile than expected, to be honest . . .”
He’d been watching McAvoy. Now he looked a question at me.
“Yeah,” I said. “That’s him.”
“Serious?” He raised the camera, but the soldier glared at him, and he put it down again. To me, he whispered, “Is he ill?”
“They jumped him. He’s pretty shaken.”
“I was expecting somebody more . . . you know.”
“Proactive?”
“Yeah. Pretty much.”
“Perhaps he was, once. You seen Angel?”
“No.”
“Shit. She might have got out, I don’t know—”
“It’s not as bad as it looks. I don’t think anybody’s seriously hurt, and . . .”
“Tell me what’s happening.”
“Well, it’s . . . sort of complicated. And I thought you’d be, you know, informed . . .”
The sprinklers stopped. Water gleamed in beads over the slot machines, slithered down the screens. It dripped from ceiling fixtures and the leaves of potted palms, it dribbled down the walls. A gentle pattering sound filled the air. The fighting, too, had ended, as suddenly as any barroom brawl. We were taken from our refuge, led into the hall. The air felt damp. It stank of smoke.
“Fucking mess,” I said.
“They’ll have it back to normal by tomorrow,” Silverman said.
“I am so comforted by that.”
My feet squelched in the sodden carpet.
Silverman seized my arm. He pointed. “’Scuse me. I need a shot of this—”
He ran a few paces, dropped on one knee, raised the camera.
I followed his direction with my eyes.
A small but regal-looking group was now making its way between the blacked-out slot machines. At their head I saw a shortish, strutting figure in a white suit. Dim light left his hair a deep shade of maroon, and he gestured furiously, issuing orders right and left. Runners came and went. Others pressed around. As he walked, a makeup woman deftly stepped ahead of him to add a little blusher to his cheeks, expertly dab his nose.
He marched right up to Silverman. He stood scarcely a yard away, the camera angled up at him. He understood instinctively that such a shot would make him seem a giant, a colossus, striding through the world. He raised his arms, opened his mouth, ready to make some rousing, thunderous speech.
Then he saw McAvoy.
His brow creased up. His mouth worked. His arms came down. He pointed, and his lips moved, but he couldn’t find the words. “You—” he said.
His index finger wagged like a baton, beating on the air with vicious, angry force.
“You little shit.”
Edward Ballington had come to town.
Chapter 57
The Bug
“Get the lights on. I want full lights here. Where’s the tech crew?”
His head was back, his shoulders swung. He swaggered through the wreckage like an emperor.
Behind him lay a trail of sodden footprints, silver with reflected light, fading as the carpet pile eased back into shape.
“That man.” He pointed. “Have him clean the bar. Get this place working. I want everything—everything working. How many staff are still here?”
No one answered. He grabbed the nearest of his entourage, seized him by his shirtfront and almost pulled him off his feet.
“How many?”
“I can—I can check, sir.”
“Good. You fucking check for me, all right? You fucking do that.”
Still the man hesitated. It was barely a second; but Ballington thrust his head forward, till they were nose to nose.
“Run, you jackass!”
Two yards on, we came upon our first real casualty.
He lay, curled up, half under the blackjack table, as if he had wedged himself in there to hide. His hair was gray, cut short; he wore a silk shirt and slim-cut jeans. There was blood smeared on his face and clotted in his hair. As we approached he moved one arm, but couldn’t raise it, and it flopped down on his belly. A moan came from his lips.
And Ballington stopped dead.
He had been talking, but he broke off, mid-sentence, staring at this figure, folded up there like a broken doll.
I genuinely thought he looked confused. As if he’d never once imagined people might be hurt, or even killed in the attack.
He waved away his underlings, advancing cautiously. He squatted on his heels, leaned over, inspecting the man’s damaged face. Then, with one hand, he started picking through his bloody hair, hissing and tutting to himself, as if examining his monthly balance sheet.