Ride the Titanic! (15 page)

On the surface, banks appear woven into the fabric of the parent nation’s economy, but in truth they exist to serve their stockholders’ needs regardless of national boundaries. Fortunately for Xia and me, enough of them have decided their stockholders can benefit, thanks to an ocean liner named
Titanic
that never made it to New York on her maiden voyage.

Long live the memory of those beautiful ocean-going liners.

In their place jumbo jets cross oceans, and business jets like Xia’s
Gulfstream
making its final approach to McCarran International. Its cabin craftsmanship oozes the same elegance the Guggenheims demanded in their first class suite on the
Titanic.

As usual, I have the entire fifteen-passenger compartment to myself. Too self-conscious to do anything other than read and sleep during my three and a half-hour flight, I still can’t get used to the fact that a guy like me is sitting inside one of the world’s most expensive bizjets.

The flight attendant informs me the bathroom wood trim is Tambootie – whatever the hell that is – and the console tables made from East Indian Rosewood with Zebrawood trim. The poor man, having nothing to do, finally disappears into the forward galley, leaving me to take turns sitting in each of the white leather seats, like Goldilocks in search of her perfect bed. Only difference being, they all feel just right. Every stitch in the white leather seats is mathematically perfect in its spacing, as is the alignment of the joining seams. I finger the stitchery and can’t detect the slightest irregularity.

My luxury tour ends, when after landing and taxiing to the executive jet tarmac, the plane’s forward entry door swooshes open, the air-stairs glide down, and Nevada’s hot, dry, unforgiving, baking heat blasts inside to steal my breath away.

The blazing sun momentarily blinds me as I step outside to behold Xia standing at the foot of the stairs, utterly composed, hands at her side, looking up at me the way Mona Lisa must have gazed at Leonardo.

‘They’re waiting for us on the strip,’ she says.

‘Who’s ‘they?’’

No answer.

She leads me to a black Mercedes limousine parked nearby. Inside I meet real estate attorney, Louis Duvall, an elegant, white-haired, elderly gentleman, who extends a slender hand to shake mine and then almost breaks it with a surprisingly strong grip.

‘Ah, the Mad Hatter himself,’ Duvall says. ‘Such a pleasure.’

My puzzled look prompts him to explain. ‘Young man, your through-the-looking-glass ride is going to rival Alice’s for sure. Such a mad idea.’

‘You don’t approve?’

‘Quite the contrary. It’s going to revolutionize the strip. Never been anything quite like it before. Except. . .’

‘Except?’

‘Oh, back in the late 90s a fellow dreamed of a
Titanic
parked on the strip like a beached whale with hotel rooms inside. Dreadful notion. Like sleeping in a casket if you ask me. And, oh yes, he had an iceberg-shaped hotel of some sort too, with roller coasters and other things too macabre to recall. Anyhow the planning board vetoed it. No surprise there. The sewage alone would have been impossible to handle, let alone his water demands.’

‘But they approved ours.’

Duvall modestly examines his gold-headed walking stick but says nothing.

Xia adds, ‘That’s because, among many other details, Mr. Duvall made our presentation. Thanks to his efforts, the board unanimously approved.’

Duvall points his stick at me. ‘Dazzling promotional video your company produced, Mr. Sullivan.’

‘Mike, please.’

‘Mike it is. And that video of yours made all the difference. Held them captive like children at a double feature with free popcorn.’

‘There’s no such thing as double features anymore, Louis.’ Xia says,

‘Another reason why this sad world becomes sadder by the day.’

He falls silent as our limousine whooshes out of the airport.

Moments later we pass the iconic blue and yellow 1960s-style,
Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas, Nevada
sign that towers over the median strip, signaling the beginning of a ride in its own right: ‘Doing the Strip.’

On the map it’s called ‘Las Vegas Boulevard.’ If you want to see what it looks like on your computer, use
Google Earth
to cruise down the main drag while sliding your mouse left and right to see what their position-tracking camera car saw the day it mapped the craziest street in America.

But if you want to FEEL what the strip looks like, you’ve got to come here for real. As proof, even though it’s the middle of the day, the crowds swarming along the sidewalks are as intent on mindless distraction now as they will be at three in the morning, only difference being that instead of the eyeball-aching hot sun lighting their way to fun and frolic, neon lights and LEDs will take over and tug them off to paradise.

I’ve been here twice before: once for a friend’s wedding and the other time for an amusement park ride conference. Both times were a blur. Vegas does that to you and I don’t know how it happens, except maybe the combination of little sleep and too much food and drink breaks down social restraint barriers, making us easy prey for the passing delights available at every turn of our dizzy, dazzled heads.

Duvall waves his walking stick in the general direction of the glittering black pyramid that sets the fantasy tone at the southernmost start of the strip. ‘Couldn’t pay me to stay at the
Luxor
. Such rooms. All angles and slants.’

Xia says, ‘Ours will be different. All history and charm.’

‘Fifteen hotels on the strip, sixty-two thousand rooms, did you know that, my dear?’

‘It’s actually sixty-three thousand, four-hundred nineteen rooms, and yes I do know. And soon another hotel, adding four thousand more rooms when the
White Star Grand Hotel
arrives.’

‘Love your hotel’s name. ’

After we spent twenty-thousand on a branding company that promised the world and delivered nothing, Xia boldly bought up rights to The
White Star Line
, the steamship company that owned the original
Titanic
: As proof, the most recent promotional video of the finished hotel features a long sweeping row of the company’s signature red flags with a white star in the center, waving proudly along the curved entrance road to guide the guests to the most unique-looking hotel in the world.

Meanwhile, as we drive along, the stream of people straggling along the strip thickens more and more. Heads are turning, people pointing up.

‘What’s going on?’

Xia says, ‘They’re here for the same reason you are.’

A frown mars Duvall’s otherwise perfect aquiline face. ‘You know, dear, when you push that button, all hell is going to break loose.’

‘It’s supposed to.’

‘I mean a different kind of dynamite. When the
Paradise
drops, so does your Garden of Eden, if I may beg a metaphor. This place is going to explode, if we can believe Robert Grayson’s dire warnings.’

Xia smiles. ‘I’m paying you to keep that from happening. Besides, there’s no such thing as the mob anyhow. At least not nowadays. Except in your dreadful American movies.’

The castle-like
Excalibur
Hotel glides past on our left, all Camelot towers and tiny flags opposite the
Tropicana
on our right; a faceless high-rise slab of nothingness. I’ve heard enough of their cryptic conversation and pipe up.

‘Dynamite? The Mob? What’s going on that I don’t know about?’

Xia says, ‘Louis raises a valid point, although I’m trying to minimize it.’

‘You can’t.’

‘I can try.’ She takes both my hands and leans closer. ‘Look at my face, what do you see?’

I try to remain professional, but Xia is so beautiful. Most humans are drawn to symmetry. It’s in our genes. Balance comforts us. In my case I am hypnotically drawn to symmetry, and when I behold her perfectly balanced features, how her eyes and nose are in perfect ratio to her forehead and cheekbones, surrounded by her carefully coiffed short hair, I literally go stupid.

‘I said look at me.’

‘I am looking.’

‘No you’re not. You’re staring. Close your mouth.’

‘Sorry.’

‘What do you see here?’ She touches the inner corner of her eye. Wide hazel eyes nestle peacefully in the delicate epicanthic folds of skin that give Asians their distinctive feature.

I almost say, ‘Your beautiful eyes.’ But instead mutter stupidly, ‘Eyes.’

‘Correct. And my esteemed counsel is convinced that we are not simply building a new hotel, casino, and ride attraction complex in Las Vegas, but in fact, the Red Chinese are invading red-white-and-blue America, and the mafia dons who live in secret rooms in the tops of every casino in town will make sure we never get any further than the blueprint stage.’

She pauses, leans over and wiggles Duvall’s walking stick. ‘Did I get that about right, Louis? What am I missing?’

‘You’re missing the fact that I’m right and you’re wrong.’

‘In what way?’

‘They’re hanging fire until the
Paradise
drops. Once it does, watch your little dream of sailing a ship in the desert hit quicksand. And don’t say I didn’t tell you because I just did, and Mike is my witness.’

‘Nonsense.’

Louis stiffens and starts to speak, thinks better of it, then can’t help himself. ‘I knew your father when he had nothing but the clothes on his back and a family to feed.’

‘Please, not that story again.’ She touches my hand. ‘We have a guest.’

‘Your partner is hardly ‘company’ in this mad venture of yours, so he may as well know too.’ Louis turns to me. ‘Xia’s father disapproves of this project. He considers it far too much of a gamble.’

Xia laughs. ‘Then we picked the perfect town to do it in, didn’t we?’

‘He also happens to love his daughter enough to override his objections and allow her to risk the full amount of her partnership in the Zhu family holdings and invest it in this scheme of yours.’

I say, ‘It’s not a scheme, it’s a ride, and Xia has the numbers to prove it. We’ll not only make a decent return on her investment, but we have the potential to. . .’

‘IF they let you build it,’ Louis says.

‘I don’t understand.’

And I really don’t. There’s something in the Las Vegas air that makes you crazy, no matter how sane you think are when you first get here.

‘Don’t misunderstand me,’ Duvall’s voice smooths out like a
Gulfstream
reaching cruising altitude. ‘I’ve secured the required building permits, Xia’s signed the appropriate zoning documents, and we’ve got the green light to go from the city fathers.’

‘So?’

‘So. . .Xia’s Asian features represent the beginning of the end for Las Vegas. The control of gambling in America will soon fall into Asian hands. And who profits? Not the aging dinosaurs, I can promise you that.’

‘Why should they?’ Xia says. ‘Their time has passed.’

‘Try telling them that.’

‘Don’t worry, I will.’

Duvall sighs. ‘I’m afraid you’ll never get the chance. They’ll shut you down long before.’’

I say, ‘Excuse me, but just who the hell is this ‘they’ you’re talking about?

‘Nobody,’ Xia says.

‘Yet,’ Louis adds, eyes closed, conversation ended.

Xia leans forward and looks out the window. By now the crowds jam the sidewalks like it’s Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade, except it’s ninety-one hot, cloudless degrees, and they’re wearing shorts, halter tops and flip-flops as they continue pointing up to the sky as if witnessing the Second Coming.

‘Here we are,’ Xia says.

The limousine swings left off the boulevard and heads for the
Mandarin
. But instead of stopping at the hotel entrance, we drop down into the underground garage and spiral round and round into its concrete depths and finally arrive at a subterranean bank of elevators. The driver hurries around to open the door, but Xia beats him to it, motions me out and then turns to Louis.

‘Come on, we don’t want to keep our audience waiting.’

‘Can’t. Got a Trade Council brief due tomorrow morning and I haven’t even started.’

‘Can’t it wait?’

‘If you don’t mind delaying your start date, absolutely.’

‘You know that’s impossible.’

He waves her away with an elegant gesture of dismissal. ‘Go get thrown out of paradise, Eve, and take Adam here along with you.’

She slams the door but has a smile on her face as she grabs my hand and tugs me toward the elevator. ‘You heard what God Almighty said.’

Minutes later, after an express ride in an elevator that makes no stops, thanks to Xia’s override card, the doors open onto a brightly-lit maintenance corridor with overhead piping carrying plumbing and electric to places unknown. I follow her past fire department standpipes and banks of circuit panels hiding who knows what.

‘Nice place you got here,’ I say. ‘Mr. Wu do your interior design?’

Xia says nothing, but manages a dismissive grunt just as she arrives at an exit door. Not hesitating, she BANGS the crash bar, it swings open, and a wave of Las Vegas dry heat washes over us as we head outside onto the hotel rooftop.

‘What do you think?’ Xia says. The wind gusts madly and she brushes her hair away from her face which – to me – looks feverish.

From almost fifty stories up, the strip sprawls out before us like gigantic Lego creation of oddly shaped buildings, a gigantic Ferris wheel, the Eiffel Tower, and
Bellagio’s
dancing fountains, surrounded by the distant roar of traffic, and most importantly, when Xia grabs my arm and turns me around, the empty shell of what once was the
Paradise Towers
, an H-shaped, double high-rise complex directly across from our vantage point, about a quarter mile away.

‘Bye, bye baby,’ Xia says.

Like some giant monster came along and poked out all its eyes, hundreds of broken window frames let in the desert light from the opposite side. Thick, black electrical cabling crisscrosses the vast expanse of the building facade, connecting a multitude of electrical circuits controlling detonators programmed to trigger combined packages of nitroglycerin and dynamite.

As each explosion obliterates key internal structural supports, gravity will take over and yank down the tired-out and beat-up hotel along with an ocean of memories, both grand and sordid. But mostly sordid.