Oh, we’re gonna walk up and down Fremont for a couple hours. Wave some homemade signs around. Yell no blood for oil. That sort of thing. You can come too, if you want. Bring fifty or sixty friends. It’d be great to have more ex-military.
Curtis wonders if Kagami is baiting him, like last time with Gitmo. He tells himself to keep cool, then realizes that he’s not upset, then wonders whether he ought to be. I’ll be in Philly next weekend, he says. But I appreciate the invite. You think you’ll get a good crowd?
Kagami shrugs. We marched from Bellagio to the Trop back in January. Drew a couple hundred people for that. I hope we get at least that many this time.
I guess that’s pretty good for Vegas.
There’s a solid group of anti-nuke folks out here, what with the old Nevada Test Site, and now Yucca Mountain. Plus there’s the university, and sometimes the unions. The Culinary got over a thousand pickets out on the sidewalk in front of your hotel when it opened back in ’99. You should get off the Strip sometime, kid. There’s a lot of stuff going on out here that you don’t know about.
I didn’t have to leave the Strip to figure that out, Walter.
Kagami grins. Still striking out on Stanley?
I’m not even swinging anymore, Curtis says. He looks evenly at Kagami for a moment, hoping to spot something in his face or his posture, some hint, but he knows that this is hopeless. Walter, he says, do you know a guy named Graham Argos?
Doesn’t ring any bells. Who is he?
He was on the team of counters that hit AC over Mardi Gras. He’s here in town now. I got a call from him last night on my cell.
Did he give you any leads?
No. I think he’s looking for Stanley too.
Kagami chuckles, shakes his head. I hope Stanley’s getting a kick out of this, he says. For years it seemed like Stanley was just part of the landscape out here. People took him for granted. Now all of a sudden everybody’s looking for him, and nobody knows where the hell he is.
I think you know where he is, Walter.
Kagami’s smile is steady, his expression unchanged.
I think Stanley’s got a firewall set up, Curtis says, between the people who know where he is and the people who know what really happened in Atlantic City. I don’t think you know what happened in Atlantic City.
Kagami remains statue-still, but his eyes flicker evenly across Curtis’s face, his chest, his hands. Taking him in. Curtis feels like he’s being sliced up, sorted into piles. I have to admit, Kagami says, that I am pretty curious about that.
Yeah. Me too.
Kagami shifts his weight, crosses his legs. Did you get the latest bulletin? he says. As of last night, the Casino Gaming Bureau is no longer running the show at the Spectacular. It is now a Major Crimes investigation.
Curtis blinks. What happened? he says.
Well, it seems that a couple of days ago this old geezer was out on Absecon Bay in his Boston Whaler. Trapping crabs. The old guy hauls in one of his traps—
Kagami hold out his hands as if cradling a regulation football.
—and there’s this enormous blue crab in it. A real monster. And the crab is gnawing on a chunk of human foot. Foot belongs to a Southeast Asian male in his late twenties or early thirties. The missing dealer from the Point is a twenty-eight-year-old Korean kid. So. Everybody say hello to the Major Crimes Division.
Curtis is aware of his pulse, an impatient tap in his neck and temples. He looks out the window. A long way off the ground. This is fucked up, Walter, he says.
A little more than you signed on for, ain’t it, kid?
Curtis stares at the table, rotates the empty mug beneath his fingers. Picturing Damon in the Penrose Diner. His red-rimmed eyes. His ripped sleeve. It was maybe a bad idea to drink the Irish coffee. He thinks he can feel the tower swaying in the wind, but there isn’t any wind. Walter, Curtis says, I’m not gonna ask you where Stanley is. I will ask you this. Did you put Graham Argos onto me? Did you give him my number?
You got a reason to think I did?
He tried to make me think he got it from a bartender or a pit boss or somebody. But I think he got it from you. He knew that I’d talked to you. And he knew Damon sent me out here. Only you and Veronica knew that. He hadn’t talked to Veronica.
What’s your point, kid?
That was not a nice surprise for me, man. That dude makes me nervous.
Yeah? Kagami says. Well, no shit, Curtis. He makes me nervous too. I was hoping you guys would short each other out.
You could’ve given me a heads-up. Why didn’t you call me?
Because I don’t like you, kid. You give me a bad feeling.
Kagami says it softly, almost apologetically. He crosses his arms over his chest, turns to look down at the Strip.
Curtis lets that hang for a few seconds, breathing in and out. You don’t even know me, man, he says.
Let’s just say that what I do know does not endear you to me.