Ride the Titanic! (20 page)

‘How?’

‘I’m not privy to such details. But we both know from our experience in similar situations in the past; small things at first, like work stoppages, accidents, license inspection issues. You have already experienced a few of those on this project, have you not?’

‘Yes, but. . .’

‘They seemed petty at first, didn’t they? Annoying but endurable, but if your esteemed American business partner will allow me at least one ancient Chinese saying, ‘The cricket’s song is beautiful unless he sings all night.’ I am afraid in your case this is only the overture to a symphony of trouble, so prepare yourselves.’

I say, ‘Unless we fold our tents and leave town, right?’

‘Your world of amusement park rides is much different than ours of beds and breakfasts. Yours is filled with expectation, ours is simple demand.’

‘But
Ride the
Titanic
will drive demand like nothing before. The Strip is ready for this and we’re ready to give it to them.’

‘No doubt you could, providing it came to fruition. But it will not.’

‘Why let this town die, when we can bring it back from the dead?’

‘Who is doing the bringing?’

Xia looks uncomfortable ‘What my father is saying is what Mr. Duvall says, too; we are Chinese. We represent the future, not only of gambling in Las Vegas but the world. And we are not welcome.’

I say, ‘I admit you’re one of the biggest players in the global economy, but you’re not the only one.’

Dingxang says, ‘Are you certain? Next time you’re in a store, take a look; China is on the bottom of everything you touch, except a baby. And we’re working on that.’

‘But China’s already on the strip. We’re standing right here in the
Mandarin Oriental
hotel. It’s a huge international hotel chain.’

Dingxang laughs. ‘You may know many things about amusement park rides, but not hotels. The
Mandarin Group
is everywhere; London, Hong Kong, New York, Jakarta, but it’s no more Chinese than you are. Jardene and Matheson own the chain. They’re British as bangers and mash, or fish and chips – or opium, is the better word choice. Great Britain pried open China’s strongbox during the Opium Wars, and hasn’t stopped looting us whenever they can ever since.’

Xia says, ‘That’s not true, father. Nowadays. . .’

‘We are as welcome as the plague.’ He rubs his hands together and in that moment his face shifts from professorial to strictly business. ‘So then, am I to tell my contact that despite my cautionary advice, he can tell his mysterious group of powerful, racist, power-hungry, out-of-step clients to go jump in the river? Is that is the correct expression?’

‘’The lake’ sounds better.’

‘Thank you. I need precision in my dealings with him.’

‘No you don’t,’ Xia says. ‘Because we’re going to tell him – not you.’

Her father cocks his head to one side, as if not hearing correctly, but says nothing.

‘His name please?’ Xia prompts.

A long hesitation, then a reluctant sigh. ‘Robert Grayson. An attorney I presume, considering the complexity and vagueness of his speech – or should I say threats.’

I say, ‘Name sounds familiar. Isn’t he the guy your lawyer Duvall warned us about?’

‘Can’t remember.’

‘I do. And it sounds like what Duvall warned us about is coming true.’

‘Then it’s time we stop it.’ Xia goes back to her desk. ‘Is that all, father?’

A long pause. A slight surrendering slump of his shoulders. ‘You will apprise me of Mr. Grayson’s response?’

‘When I get time, but. . .’ she gestures to stacks of paper on her desk. ‘As you can well appreciate, the hotel business is quite time consuming.’

‘I am glad I gave you a desk large enough to handle it.’

Xia bows slightly. ‘Thank you.’

‘And broad enough shoulders, too, I pray.’

She smiles. ‘That’s what Michael’s are for.’

The following night I drive Xia’s Porsche
Carrera
GT
to our meeting. Actually, it drives me. Its $400,000 price tag makes me ten kinds of nervous. Even more so when Xia informs me it can accelerate from zero to one hundred in three point-two seconds. I fumble for the ignition but can’t find it.

‘So what do you do, say ‘start’ or something?’

‘It’s on the left hand side, just like race cars.’

The V-10, six hundred-twelve horsepower engine roars like a tiger, and then crouches into a purr.

‘Sure you don’t want to drive?’

‘They need to see a man behind the wheel when we pull up.’

‘But we’re going to the
Mandalay
. A valet will take the car.’

‘They’ll still be watching, trust me.’

‘There’s that ‘they’ again.’

‘Be quiet and drive.’

I pull out onto the strip but stay in the right hand lane. The dazzling sight of the costly Porsche turns the heads of the sightseers and gamblers flowing along the sidewalks.
Bellagio’s
water show is going great guns with its pulsing, dancing, gushing fountains lit from within and without, attracting people like moths to a watery flame.

I point it out to Xia. ‘We’ll draw twice the crowds and skim half for ticket sales. Guaranteed.’

She smiles but says nothing. The
Eiffel Tower
glides past on our right; its lacy steel framework, reaching up into the indigo-blue, cloudless night sky.

‘Pretty stars tonight,’ I say.

‘They are.’

I grip the wheel and take a deep breath. ‘So, I’ve been getting heat about not having a contract.’’

‘Between?’

‘Us.’

‘From?’

‘My wife. . . Ellie, too.’

‘Know what your problem is Michael? You’ve got too many damned women telling you how to live your life – including me – when you’re doing just fine on your own. Pull over for a second. We need to talk.’

‘Now women are even telling me how to drive.’

She laughs as I ease the car to a halt near the entrance to the pyramid-shaped
Luxor
. Its nighttime signature
Skybeam
spotlight on the pointed tip of the hotel stabs straight up into the sky like an accusing finger.

I say, ‘Forty-two billion foot candles that baby puts out. You can read a book from ten miles up, and. . .’

‘Cut the geek talk and look at me,’ Xia says. The ice-blue light from the instrument panel washes over her face, making her even more exotic. ‘We’re about to put our necks on the block with this Grayson guy, so how about we make sure we’ve got a ‘we’ thing going between us. Okay?’

I nod, as usual at a loss for words whenever I look into her eyes.

‘Did you and Geena sign a pre-nup?’

‘No.’

‘Exactly. Your word was your bond. To have and to hold, sickness and health, rich and poor ‘til death do you part. You said that to each other.’

‘Yes.’

She takes my hands. ‘That letter of agreement we signed? We both know it’s just a piece of paper, so’s a hundred-page contract, and lawyers eat paper for breakfast. No way. The water’s rising fast on this thing and I’m not letting go of you, Michael Sullivan. Not ever. That’s my contract. Will you ever let go of me?’

I grip her hands. ‘Not ever.’

‘Partners?’ she whispers.

‘Partners.’

‘Seal it with a kiss?’

I can’t help it. Her lips are perfect.

I expect a posh office for our meeting with Grayson, but after surrendering the
Carrera
to an eager valet, who almost faints at the sight of such an exotic creation, a bland-faced, business-suit-wearing young man meets us in the
Mandalay Bay’s
vast lobby and steers us into an elevator that drops into the bowels of the building.

From here he escorts us along a deserted service corridor, while answering every who-what-where question I ask with a polite smile and closed mouth. I finally get my fill of the silent treatment and stop.

‘Either you answer my questions, or we’re walking the other way.’

‘Sir, I’m under strict orders not to speak unless it’s an emergency.’

‘This is an emergency. Where the hell are we going?’

‘I’m sorry, but. . .’

I grab Xia’s hand. ‘C’mon, we’re out of here.’

We manage a few determined steps in the opposite direction before he calls out, ‘Please, sir, Mr. Grayson is waiting.’

‘In the heating ducts or the standpipes?’

Fear wipes the smugness off his face. ‘Just ahead. You’ll see. And if we don’t show up. . . .’

‘What? He’ll kill you?’

‘Worse.’

Minutes later, another elevator ride – up this time – and the doors slide open onto the blazingly bright lights of a lobby, its walls wrapped by a 360-degree LED video screen jam-packed with a kaleidoscope of
Coca-Cola
brand images: children, families, ice cubes, baseball players, flamenco dancers, and carpenters, competing for space on an ever-changing electronic canvas trumpeting the consumption of soda.

‘All roads lead to
SkyHi
,’ Xia says.

Hard not to notice this Ferris wheel landmark whenever you land at McCarran airport. The five hundred-foot diameter wheel dominates the south end of the boulevard, while its competition, the
High Roller
, anchors the north end. What
SkyHi
has over its competition is a massive LED screen that occupies the center of the wheel like a gigantic hubcap brazenly displaying ads, like at a drive-in, but five times bigger and ten times brighter and turning, turning, turning. Last night when I landed at the airport,
Nike’s
curvy ‘Swoosh’ logo lit up the strip like a low-hanging crescent moon. Tonight
Coca-Cola
’s iconic logo rules the world.

‘This way please.’

The young man escorts us past a long line of customers waiting to buy tickets to ride the wheel. A bored attendant waves us through and down the corridor, where, instead of the prison-like lighting of a service passageway we just came from, this one dazzles with more ‘drink Coca Cola’ images swooping along the LED covered walls.

Our escort scurries ahead to the boarding platform just as one of the twenty-person gondolas glides to a stop. He opens the doors like a Park Avenue doorman and gestures us inside with a flourish of nervous, fluttering hands. ‘Mr. Grayson, your guests have arrived,’ he says, and closes the door, every last seat empty except one at the far end, occupied by a man who stands as we approach.

Robert Grayson is kissing cousins to
Shamu
the killer whale, down to his snowy-white shirt and shiny black suit covering a firmly packed body that may or may not have been fat, but sure as hell is big, and so is his handshake when his meaty fin slaps against mine and holds fast.

‘So, the genius himself. A socko idea you dreamed up, my friend.’ He flicks around in his pool and grins at Xia. ‘And here’s the other genius, who figured out how to make it work on the strip. Like I told your father, Ms. Zhu, you’re a real credit to your family.’

‘He didn’t tell me that.’

‘You know fathers. They can be shy with the praise. Mine sure as hell was.’

I come to the point as fast as I dare. ‘If this is such a great idea, why don’t you want it to happen?’

‘Hey, time out. Don’t look at me. I’m not the bad guy. In fact. . . .’ Again the hungry grin. ‘Would you believe I’m your biggest fan? A gimmick like
Ride the Titanic
could turn this glitzy dump we call Vegas on its ear, dry it out, and make it a success again.’

Xia says, ‘Mr. Grayson, I want. . .’

‘Bob, please.’

‘All right. . . Bob. . . Why the Mr. Nice Guy routine?’

He shrugs and his suit seams tremble from the strain. ‘On a stack of bibles, I truly am your biggest fan. My clients, unfortunately, are not – whoops, here we go, hang on.’

The immense gondola begins its stately, graceful, slow revolution that will carry it, and thirty-nine other gondolas up and over the Las Vegas skyline five hundred feet below.

Grayson continues, ‘Twenty minutes is too damn long for riders to be up in this thing, but hey, it’s not my baby. Belongs to a buddy of mine, Davy Nuell, who loved them as a kid. Worked summers as a carnie all through college. Never got it out of his blood, I guess, because here he is today, worth close to two billion as a real estate developer, and running a steroid-sized Ferris wheel on the strip, making a mint, and knocking the competition dead.’

‘Only in Vegas,’ I say.

‘You got that right. Think about it: forty million people in and out of McCarran every year, fifty thousand pedestrians a day, sixty thousand vehicles, that, my friends is a hell of a lot of eyeballs looking at ads on this monster screen they’ve got blazing away. But to hell with ads, just check out the view. Fantastic. Am I right?’

Thankfully he falls silent as our gondola climbs higher and higher revealing more and more of the city in all its dressed-for-dinner, nighttime splendor. At this altitude, gone are the drunks, the litter, the abandoned cars and abandoned people. Only velvet black night remains, the perfect blanket upon which the Las Vegas Milky Way galaxy of lights spreads out like an oasis in the Nevada desert.

Grayson clears his throat. ‘Believe me, I argued just the opposite for your project but they don’t want to hear about the future. All they want to do is talk about the past – reminds me of a story – bet you’re too young to remember ocean liners.’