* * *
I FELT AS though I were in a mob of revelers at a public execution. The fat man who had clamped my shoulder was still with us, leading two security guards, pushing people out of his way. “There she is!” he shouted. “Impersonating a police officer! Lock that bitch up!”
A woman fell, and a man tripped over her. The brass horns in the band were ear-splitting. Someone with horrendous breath was yelling incoherently in my face. I had no idea who he was.
“What do you want?” I yelled.
“My wife is having a heart attack!” he said. He looked around desperately. “Help me get her out of here!”
“I’m sorry, I can’t help you,” I said.
Sherry grabbed my arm. “Look! On the other side of the craps table! The guy in the panama hat! Is that him?”
Smiley was standing alone, as though no one was in the building except him and Jimmy Nightingale. I saw him reach into his right-hand pocket. I began fighting my way toward him. It was like swimming with a bag of rocks strapped on my back.
* * *
CLETE SAW SMILEY moving toward Jimmy Nightingale and Bobby Earl, a hand in his pocket, a sweet look on his face. Clete reached inside his coat for his snub-nose. But he didn’t pull it from its holster.
“Is that him, Mr. Purcel?” Jody said. “Is that him? What are you waiting on, sir?”
Let it happen, a voice said. You’re not God.
“You’ve got to, Mr. Purcel,” Jody said.
“Got to do what?” Clete replied, as though drugged.
“Stop whatever is happening.”
“Get out of here, kid,” Clete said.
“This is my job. I was trying to help you.”
“That man up there is shit. Don’t let him ruin your life. Now beat it before I knock you down.”
Jody tried to get around him. Clete hit him in the chest with an elbow, then saw Smiley ease a small revolver from his pocket and lower it by his thigh and begin walking rapidly toward Nightingale.
Clete burst from the crowd and crashed through Jimmy Nightingale’s security people, his gun falling from its holster. He tackled Jimmy and slammed him to the carpet just as Smiley fired one shot, then a second one. Clete could hear the breath wheeze out of Jimmy’s chest and feel the spray of spittle on his cheek. When Jimmy tried to get up, Clete mashed his head into the carpet with a forearm. The casino turned into bedlam.
* * *
EVERYONE AROUND SHERRY and me either ran for the exits or cowered on the floor. Sherry squatted behind me, pulling a revolver from an ankle holster, trying to see beyond the beverage table where Clete and Jimmy Nightingale were. She pushed past me, touching my shoulder to steady herself, her face tight and pale, like that of someone looking into an arctic wind. I stood up next to her, my nine-millimeter in my hand. “You see him?” I asked.
“Who?” she said.
“Smiley.”
“No.”
“Circle to the left, I’ll go right,” I said.
“Roger that.” Then she said, “Oh, fuck.”
“What do you see?” I said.
“That kid. He’s got a gun. He looks like he’s about to piss his pants.”
Amid the sea of people on the floor, we saw a young security guard walking toward the drink and food tables. He was pointing a white-handled snub-nose revolver, a .38, with both arms extended in front of him. The snub-nose looked exactly like Clete’s.