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Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas :: Thompson Hunter S.
Страница: 23 из 255Nothing too good for high rollers…
And on Monday morning the same plane - the casino’s plane - flew him back to the Monterey airport. The pilot lent him a dime to call a friend for a ride to Carmel. He was $30,000 in debt, and two months later he was looking down the barrel of one of the world’s heaviest collection agendes.
So he sold his store, but that didn’t make the nut. They could wait for the rest, he said - but then he got stomped, which convinced him that maybe he’d be better off borrowing enough money to pay the whole wad.
Mainline gambling is a very heavy business - and Las Vegas makes Reno seem like your friendly neighborhood grocery store. For a loser, Vegas is the meanest town on earth. Until about a year ago, there was a giant billboard on the outskirts of Las Vegas, saying:
DON’T GAMBLE WITH MARIJUANA!
IN NEVADA: POSSESSION - 20 YEARS SALE - LIFE!
So I was not entirely at ease drifting around the casinos on this Saturday night with a car full of marijuana and head full of acid. We had several narrow escapes: at one point I tried to drive the Great Red Shark into the laundry room of the Landmark Hotel - but the door was too narrow, and the people inside seemed dangerously excited.
We drove over to the Desert Inn, to catch the Debbie Reynolds/Harry James show. “I don’t know about you,” I told my attorney, “but in my line of business it’s important to be Hep.”
“Mine too,” he said. “But as your attorney I advise you to drive over to the Tropicana and pick up on Guy Lombardo. He’s in the Blue Room with his Royal Canadians.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Why what?”
“Why should I pay out my hard - earned dollars to watch a fucking corpse?”
“Look,” he said. “Why are we out here? To entertain ourselves, or to do the job?”
“The job, of course,” I replied. We were driving around in circles, weaving through the parking lot of a place I thought was the Dunes, but it turned out to be the Thunderbird or maybe it was the Hacienda
My attorney was scanning The Vegas Visitor, looking for hints of action. “How about “‘Nickel Nick’s Slot Arcade?’” he said. “‘Hot Slots,’ that sounds heavy… Twenty - nine cent hotdogs..
Suddenly people were screaming at us. We were in trouble. Two thugs wearing red - gold military overcoats were looming over the hood: “What the hell are you doing?” one screamed. “You can’t park here! ’
“Why not?” I said. It seemed like a reasonable place to park, plenty of space.
And on Monday morning the same plane - the casino’s plane - flew him back to the Monterey airport. The pilot lent him a dime to call a friend for a ride to Carmel. He was $30,000 in debt, and two months later he was looking down the barrel of one of the world’s heaviest collection agendes.
So he sold his store, but that didn’t make the nut. They could wait for the rest, he said - but then he got stomped, which convinced him that maybe he’d be better off borrowing enough money to pay the whole wad.
Mainline gambling is a very heavy business - and Las Vegas makes Reno seem like your friendly neighborhood grocery store. For a loser, Vegas is the meanest town on earth. Until about a year ago, there was a giant billboard on the outskirts of Las Vegas, saying:
DON’T GAMBLE WITH MARIJUANA!
IN NEVADA: POSSESSION - 20 YEARS SALE - LIFE!
So I was not entirely at ease drifting around the casinos on this Saturday night with a car full of marijuana and head full of acid. We had several narrow escapes: at one point I tried to drive the Great Red Shark into the laundry room of the Landmark Hotel - but the door was too narrow, and the people inside seemed dangerously excited.
We drove over to the Desert Inn, to catch the Debbie Reynolds/Harry James show. “I don’t know about you,” I told my attorney, “but in my line of business it’s important to be Hep.”
“Mine too,” he said. “But as your attorney I advise you to drive over to the Tropicana and pick up on Guy Lombardo. He’s in the Blue Room with his Royal Canadians.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Why what?”
“Why should I pay out my hard - earned dollars to watch a fucking corpse?”
“Look,” he said. “Why are we out here? To entertain ourselves, or to do the job?”
“The job, of course,” I replied. We were driving around in circles, weaving through the parking lot of a place I thought was the Dunes, but it turned out to be the Thunderbird or maybe it was the Hacienda
My attorney was scanning The Vegas Visitor, looking for hints of action. “How about “‘Nickel Nick’s Slot Arcade?’” he said. “‘Hot Slots,’ that sounds heavy… Twenty - nine cent hotdogs..
Suddenly people were screaming at us. We were in trouble. Two thugs wearing red - gold military overcoats were looming over the hood: “What the hell are you doing?” one screamed. “You can’t park here! ’
“Why not?” I said. It seemed like a reasonable place to park, plenty of space.