Waitress: No, I don’t go to school.
Att’y: Oh? Why not? Are you sick?
Duke: Never mind that. We came here for tacos.
[Pause.]
Att’y: As your attorney I advise you to get the chiliburger. It’s a hamburger with chili on it.
Duke: That’s too heavy for me.
Att’y: Then I advise you to get a taco burger, try that one.
Duke: . . . the taco has meat in it. I’ll try that one. And some coffee now. Right now. So I can drink it while I’m waiting.
Waitress: That’s all you want, one taco burger?
Duke: Well, I’ll try it, I might want two.
Att’y: Are your eyes blue or green?
Waitress: Pardon?
Att’y: Blue or green?
Waitress: They change.
Att’y: Like a lizard?
Waitress: Like a cat.
Att’y: Oh, the lizard changes the color of his skin . . .
Waitress: Want anything to drink?
Att’y: Beer. And I have beer in the car. Tons of it. The whole back seat’s full of it.
Duke: I don’t like mixing coconuts up with beer and hamburgers.
Att’y: Well, let’s smash the bastards . . . right in the middle of the highway . . . Is Boulder City somewhere around here?
Waitress: Boulder City? Do you want sugar?
Duke: Yeah.
Att’y: We’re in Boulder City, huh? Or very close to it?
Duke: I don’t know.
Waitress: There it is. That sign says Boulder City, OK. Aren’t you from Nevada?
Att’y: No. We’ve never been here before. Just traveling through.
Waitress: You just go straight up this road here.
Att’y: Any action up there in Boulder City?
Waitress: Don’t ask me. I don’t . . .
Att’y: Any gambling there?
Waitress: I don’t know, it’s just a little town.
Duke: Where is the casino?
Waitress: I don’t know.
Att’y: Wait a minute, where are you from?
Waitress: New York.
Att’y: And you’ve just been here a day.
Waitress: No, I’ve been here for a while.
Att’y: Where do you go around here? Say you wanted to go swimming or something like that?
Waitress: In my backyard.
Att’y: What’s the address?
Waitress: Um, go to the . . . ah . . . the pool’s not open yet.
Att’y: Let me explain it to you, let me run it down just briefly if I can. We’re looking for the American Dream, and we were told it was somewhere in this area. . . . Well, we’re here looking for it, ‘cause they sent us out here all the way from San Francisco to look for it. That’s why they gave us this white Cadillac, they figure that we could catch up with it in that . . .
Waitress: Hey Lou, you know where the American Dream is?
Att’y (to Duke): She’s asking the cook if he knows where the American Dream is.
Waitress: Five tacos, one taco burger. Do you know where the American Dream is?
Lou: What’s that? What is it?
Att’y: Well, we don’t know, we were sent out here from San Francisco to look for the American Dream, by a magazine, to cover it.
Lou: Oh, you mean a place.
Att’y: A place called the American Dream.
Lou: Is that the old Psychiatrist’s Club?
Waitress: I think so.
Att’y: The old Psychiatrist’s Club?
Lou: Old Psychiatrist’s Club, it’s on Paradise . . . Are you guys serious?
Att’y: Oh, no honest, look at that car, I mean, do I look like I’d own a car like that?
Lou: Could that be the old Psychiatrist’s Club? It was a discotheque place . . .
Att’y: Maybe that’s it.
Waitress: It’s on Paradise and what?
Lou: Ross Allen had the old Psychiatrist’s Club. Is he the owner now?
Duke: I don’t know.
Att’y: All we were told was, go till you find the American Dream. Take this white Cadillac and go find the American Dream. It’s somewhere in the Las Vegas area.
Lou: That has to be the old . . .
Att’y: . . . and it’s a silly story to do, but you know, that’s what we get paid for.
Lou: Are you taking pictures of it, or . . .
Att’y: No, no—no pictures.
Lou: . . . or did somebody just send you on a goose chase?
Att’y: It’s sort of a wild goose chase, more or less, but personally, we’re dead serious.
Lou: That has to be the old Psychiatrist’s Club, but the only people who hang out there is a bunch of pushers, peddlers, uppers and downers, and all that stuff.
Att’y: Maybe that’s it. Is it a night-time place or is it an all day . . .
Lou: Oh, honey, this never stops. But it’s not a casino.
Duke: What kind of place is it?
Lou: It’s on Paradise, uh, the old Psychiatrist’s Club’s on Paradise.
Att’y: Is that what it’s called, the old Psychiatrist’s Club?
Lou: No, that is what it used to be, but someone bought it . . . but I didn’t hear about it as the American Dream, it was something like, associated with, uh . . . it’s a mental joint, where all the dopers hang out.
Att’y: A mental joint? You mean like a mental hospital?
Lou: No, honey, where all the dope peddlers and all the pushers, everybody hangs out. It’s a place where all the kids are potted when they go in, and everything . . . but it’s not called what you said, the American Dream.
Att’y: Do you have any idea what it might be called? Or more or less where it might be located?
Lou: Right off of Paradise and Eastern.
Waitress: But Paradise and Eastern are parallel.
Lou: Yeah, but I know I come off of Eastern, and then I go to Paradise . . .
Waitress: Yeah I know it, but then that would make it off Paradise around the Flamingo, straight up here. I think somebody’s handed you a . . .
Att’y: We’re staying at the Flamingo. I think this place you’re talking about and the way you’re describing it, I think that maybe that’s it.
Lou: It’s not a tourist joint.
Att’y: Well, that’s why they sent me. He’s the writer: I’m the bodyguard. ’Cause I figure it will be . . .
Lou: These guys are nuts . . . these kids are nuts.
Att’y: That’s OK.
Waitress: Yeah, they got new laws.
Duke: Twenty-four-hour-a-day violence? Is that what we’re saying?
Lou: Exactly. Now here’s the Flamingo . . . Oh, I can’t show you this; I can tell you better my way. Right up here at the first gas station is Tropicana, take a right.
Att’y: Tropicana to the right.
Lou: The first gas station is Tropicana. Take a right on Tropicana and take this way . . . right on Tropicana, right on Paradise, you’ll see a big black building, it’s all painted black and real weird looking.
Att’y: Right on Tropicana, right on Paradise, black building . . .
Lou: And there’s a sign on the side of the building that says Psychiatrist’s Club, but they’re completely remodeling it and everything.
Att’y: All right, that’s close enough . . .
Lou: If there’s anything I can do for ya, honey . . . I don’t know if that’s even it or not. But it sounds like it is I think you boys are on the right track.
Att’y: Right. That’s the best lead we’ve had for two days, we’ve been asking people all around.
Lou: . . . I could make a couple calls and sure as hell find out.
Att’y: Could you?
Lou: Sure I’ll call Allen and ask him.
Att’y: Gee, I’d appreciate that if you could.
Waitress: When you go down to Tropicana, it’s not the first gas station, the second.
Lou: There’s a big sign right down the street here, it says Tropicana Avenue. Make a
right, and when you get to Paradise make another right.
Att’y: OK. Big black building, right on Paradise: twenty-four-hour-a-day violence, drugs . . .
Waitress: See, here’s Tropicana, and this is Boulder Highway that goes clear down like that.
Duke: Well, that’s pretty far into town then.
Waitress: Well, here’s Paradise split up somewhere around there. There’s Paradise. Yeah, we’re down in here. See, this is Boulder Highway . . . and Tropicana.
Lou: Well, that’s not it, that bartender in there is a pothead too . . .
Att’y: Yeah, well, it’s a lead.
Lou: You gonna be glad you stopped here, boys.
Duke: Only if we find it.
Att’y: Only if we write the article and get it in.
Waitress: Well, why don’t you come inside and sit down?
Duke: We’re trying to get as much sun as we can.
Att’y: She’s going to make a phone call to find out where it is.
Duke: Oh. OK, well, let’s go inside.
EDITOR’S NOTE (cont.):
Tape cassettes for the next sequence were impossible to transcribe due to some viscous liquid encrusted behind the heads. There is a certain consistency in the garbled sounds however, indicating that almost two hours later Dr. Duke and his attorney finally located what was left of the “Old Psychiatrist’s Club”—a huge slab of cracked, scorched concrete in a vacant lot full of tall weeds. The owner of a gas station across the road said the place had “burned down about three years ago.”
10.
Heavy Duty at the Airport . . . Ugly Peruvian Flashback . . . ‘No! It’s Too Late! Don’t Try It!’
My attorney left at dawn. We almost missed the first flight to L.A. because I couldn’t find the airport. It was less than thirty minutes from the hotel. I was sure of that. So we left the Flamingo at exactly seven-thirty . . . but for some reason we failed to make the turnoff at the stoplight in front of the Tropicana. We kept going straight ahead on the freeway, which parallels the main airport runway, but on the opposite side from the terminal . . . and there is no way to get across legally.
“Goddamnit! We’re lost!” my attorney was shouting. “What are we doing out here on this godforsaken road? The airport is right over there!” He pointed hysterically across the tundra.
“Don’t worry,” I said. “I’ve never missed a plane yet.” I smiled as the memory came back. “Except once in Peru,” I added. “I was already checked out of the country, through customs, but I went back to the bar to chat with this Bolivian cocaine dealer . . . and all of a sudden I heard those big 707 engines starting up, so I ran out to the runway and tried to get aboard, but the door was right behind the engines and they’d already rolled the ladder away. Shit, those afterburners would have fried me like bacon . . . but I was completely out of my head: I was desperate to get aboard.
“The airport cops saw me coming, and they gathered into a knot at the gate. I was running like a bastard, straight at them. The guy with me was screaming: ‘No! It’s too late! Don’t try it!’
“I saw the cops waiting for me, so I slowed down like maybe I’d changed my mind . . . but when I saw them relax, I did a quick change of pace and tried to run right over the bastards.” I laughed. “Jesus, it was like running full bore into a closet full of gila monsters. The fuckers almost killed me. All I remember is seeing five or six billyclubs coming down on me at the same time, and a lot of voices screaming: ‘No! No! It’s suicide! Stop the crazy gringo!’
“I woke up about two hours later in a bar in downtown Lima. They’d stretched me out in one of those half-moon leather booths. My luggage was all stacked beside me. Nobody had opened it . . . so I went back to sleep and caught the first flight out, the next morning.”
My attorney was only half listening. “Look,” he said, “I’d really like to hear more about your adventures in Peru, but not now. Right now all I care about is getting across that goddamn runway.”
We were flashing along at good speed. I was looking for an opening, some kind of access road, some lane across the runway to the terminal. We were five miles past the last stoplight and there wasn’t enough time to turn around and go back to it.
There was only one way to make it on time. I hit the brakes and eased the Whale down into the grassy moat between the two freeway lanes. The ditch was too deep for a head-on run, so I took it at an angle. The Whale almost rolled, but I kept the wheels churning and we careened up the opposite bank and into the oncoming lane. Fortunately, it was empty. We came out of the moat with the nose of the car up in the air like a hydroplane . . . then bounced on the freeway and kept right on going into the cactus field on the other side. I recall running over a fence of some kind and dragging it a few hundred yards, but by the time we got to the runway we were fully under control . . . screaming along about 60 miles an hour in low gear, and it looked like a wide-open run all the way to the terminal.
My only worry was the chance of getting crushed like a roach by an incoming DC-8, which we probably wouldn’t see until it was right on top of us. I wondered if they could see us from the tower. Probably so, but why worry? I kept the thing floored. There was no point in turning back now.
My attorney was hanging onto the dashboard with both hands. I glanced over and saw fear in his eyes. His face appeared to be grey, and I sensed he was not happy with this move, but we were going so fast across the runway—then cactus, then runway again—that I knew he understood our position: We were past the point of debating the wisdom of this move; it was already done, and our only hope was to get to the other side.
I looked at my skeleton-face Accutron and saw that we had three minutes and fifteen seconds before takeoff. “Plenty of time,” I said. “Get your stuff together. I’ll drop you right next to the plane.” I could see the big red and silver Western jetliner about 1000 yards ahead of us . . . and by this time we were skimming across smooth asphalt, past the incoming runway.
“No!” he shouted. “I can’t get out! They’ll crucify me. I’ll have to take the blame!”
“Ridiculous,” I said. “Just say you were hitchhiking to the airport and I picked you up. You never saw me before. Shit, this town is full of white Cadillac convertibles . . . and I plan to go through there so fast that nobody will even glimpse the goddamn license plate.”
We were approaching the plane. I could see passengers boarding, but so, far nobody had noticed us . . . approaching from this unlikely direction. “Are you ready?” I said.
He groaned. “Why not? But for Christ’s sake, let’s do it fast!” He was scanning the loading area, then he pointed: “Over there!” he said. “Drop me behind that big van. Just pull in behind it and I’ll jump out where they can’t see me, then you can make a run for it.”
I nodded. So far, we had all the room we needed. No sign of alarm or pursuit. I wondered if maybe this kind of thing happened all the time in Vegas—cars full of late-arriving passengers screeching desperately across the runway, dropping off wild-eyed Samoans clutching mysterious canvas bags who would sprint onto planes at the last possible second and then roar off into the sunrise.
Maybe so, I thought. Maybe this kind of thing is standard procedure in this town . . .
I swung in behind the van and hit the brakes just long enough for my attorney to jump out. “Don’t take any guff from these swine,” I yelled. “Remember, if you have any trouble you can always send a telegram to the Right People.”
He grinned. “Yeah . . . Explaining my Position,” he said. “Some asshole wrote a poem about that once. It’s probably good advice, if you have shit for brains.” He waved me off.
“Right,” I said, moving out. I’d already spotted a break in the big hurricane fence—and now, with the Whale in low gear, I went for it. Nobody seemed to be chasing me. I couldn’t understand it. I glanced in the mirror and saw my attorney climbing into the plane, no sign of a struggle . . . and then I was through the gate and out into the early morning traffic on Paradise Road.
I took a fast right on Russell, then a left onto Maryland Parkway . . . and suddenly I was cruising in warm anonymity past the campus of the University of Las Vegas . . . no tension on these faces; I stopped at a red light and got lost, for a moment, in a sunburst of flesh in the cross-walk: fine sinewy thighs, pink mini-skirts, ripe young nipples, sleeveless blouses, long sweeps of blonde hair, pink lips and blue eyes—all the hallmarks of a dangerously innocent culture.
I was tempted to pull over and start mumbling obscene entreaties: “Hey, Sweetie, let’s you and me get weird. Jump into this hotdog Caddy and we’ll flash over to my suite at the Flamingo, load up on ether and behave like wild animals in my private, kidney-shaped pool . . .”
Sure we will, I thought. But by this time I was far down the parkway, easing into the turn lane for a left at Flamingo Road. Back to the hotel, to take stock. There was every reason to believe I was heading for trouble, that I’d pushed my luck a bit far. I’d abused every rule Vegas lived by—burning the locals, abusing the tourists, terrifying the help.
The only hope now, I felt, was the possibility that we’d gone to such excess, with our gig, that nobody in a position to bring the hammer down on us could possibly believe it. Particularly not since we’d signed in with the Police Conference. When you bring an act into this town, you want to bring it in heavy. Don’t waste any time with cheap shucks and misdemeanors. Go straight for the j