Aces and Knaves

"I have to pick him up from pre-school."
    I had met Emilio a few times and he seemed like a good kid, although we would have to be careful if he was with us. Children cooled passion. Suddenly I didn't care. I wanted to be near Esther anyway. Was this love? "Why don't I take you both out to dinner?" I asked.
    "Why don't I cook dinner for the three of us? If you don't mind Emilio being there."
    "I don't mind. I'll keep him out of your hair." I had played with my niece and nephew a few times. It was fun to be with kids, as long as you didn't have to be around them all the time.
    "He'd love to show you his frog."
    A voice over the intercom said, "Karl Patterson, please call the front desk."
    Esther gave me her telephone receiver and pushed a button. The receptionist told me Pat Wong was on the line. She connected us and I said hello.
    After a few preliminaries, Pat said, "My uncle is in town. He wants to meet you."
    "Okay. How about tomorrow?"
    "He's leaving tomorrow. It has to be tonight."
    My heart sank. I wanted to kiss him off. But it might be important—for Ned, for Dionysus. After a pause, during which my conscience struggled with my desire to be with Esther, I said, "Okay. Where and when?"
    When I hung up the phone Esther had a look of concern on her face. "Bad news about your father?"
    "No. But I'm going to have to cancel dinner."
    "That's all right."
    She was being nice. But it wasn't all right.
    ***
    Pat had asked me to pick him up at an apartment east of Lincoln Boulevard. The skuzzy side of Santa Monica. Cracked sidewalks, barred windows and houses that needed painting. Trash in the side yard. Still, if these were the worst slums Santa Monica had to offer they beat the hell out of most cities.
    The address Pat had given me was a small house that had evidently been split into two or three apartments. I pulled into the driveway and shut off the engine. Pat immediately appeared through a doorway.
    As he got into the car I could see that he was overdressed for the area, with a nice shirt and tie, pressed slacks and polished black shoes.
    After he said hello he added, "I'm staying here with a friend until I have enough money to get my own place."
    That explained the unrecognizable voice on the answering machine. I asked him where we were going. He said the Beverly Hills Hotel. I laughed and said, "I'm not sure we can get there from here. Are you serious?"
    Pat laughed too, and said, "My uncle always stays at the Beverly Hills Hotel. He's made a lot of money in real estate. I worked for him for a while—until I got into trouble. Speaking of work, I just got off a little while ago, but since we're going to an up-scale place I kept my uniform on."
    "Uniform?"
    "Yes, I got the job as airport shuttle driver. They make us wear a tie."
    "Congratulations."
    "Thanks. And thanks again for your help with the computers. And to everyone at Emerge."
    Actually, getting to the Beverly Hills Hotel wasn't difficult at all. Take Lincoln north to Sunset Boulevard and head east on that winding and dangerous street, the graveyard for many a Chevrolet Corvair in the sixties, or so the story goes. I wished I were driving the Jaguar, with its superior handling ability, but even the Toyota far outperformed the Corvair, which was supposed to be so bad that Ralph Nader wrote a whole book about it and established a name for himself.
    ***
    I told myself it was better to suffer minor embarrassment from leaving a Toyota with a parking valet than to risk damage to a more expensive car. In any case, the young man who didn't speak much English didn't seem to care what kind of car I drove as he handed me a parking stub.
    A number of uniformed employees hovered about and one held the front door of the hotel for us, but Pat knew where he was going. There was no smiling girl to bow us into the elevator like the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo had featured when my father stayed there, but other than that I suspected the service here was first rate.
    The room that appeared before us when the door was opened to Pat's knock was more luxurious than I had anticipated, with expensive antique furniture. In fact, it must be a suite because there was no bed in evidence and I doubted that the Beverly Hills Hotel used hide-a-beds.
    I gathered that the man who answered the door was not Pat's uncle from the way he bowed to Pat. He led us through a doorway into another room, still with no bed but with a desk and a telephone.
    The man who sat at the desk was small and gray,