then,” Tony said. “If you’re sure you don’t mind, Vito.”
“Go to bed,” Vito said.
When she had closed the door behind her, Mr. Rosselli said, “I like her. She’s a nice girl, Vito.”
“Yeah, Tony’s all right,” Vito agreed.
“Vito, I’m going to tell you something, and I hope you’ll believe me,” Mr. Rosselli said.
“Why shouldn’t I believe you?”
“You should. When I asked you to come by the Warwick for a couple of shooters, a couple of laughs, that was all I had in mind. You believe me?”
“Absolutely. And I wanted to come, and if I had the clothes, I would have. Next time.”
“Right. Next time,” Mr. Rosselli said. “But between the time I seen you and the plumbers . . . what’s all that going to cost you, by the way?”
“A fucking bundle is what it’s going to cost me. Those bastards know they’ve got you by the short hair.”
“Yeah, I figured. Well, what the hell are you going to do? You can bitch all you want, but in the end, you end up paying, right?”
“Right.”
“Like I was saying, Vito, between the time I was at your house and tonight, something has come up. We got a little problem that maybe you can help us with.”
“What kind of a problem?”
“You ever hear of the guy that broke the bank at Monte Carlo?” He waited until Vito nodded, and then went on: “We had a guy between nine o’clock and nine-fifteen tonight, that goddamned near broke the bank at Oaks and Pines.”
“No shit?”
“Sonofabitch was drunk, which probably had a lot to do with it, a sober guy wouldn’t have bet the way he did.”
“Like how?”
“He was playing roulette. He bet a hundred, split between Zero and Double Zero. He hit. That gave him eighteen hundred. He let that ride. He hit again . . .”
“Jesus!”
“That gave him, what? Thirty thousand, thirty-two thousand, something like that.”
Vito thought: Jesus Christ, that’s the kind of luck I need!
He said, “I’ll be goddamned!”
“Yeah,” Mr. Rosselli agreed. “At that point, right, a good gambler, a good sober gambler, would know it was time to quit, right?”
“You said it!”
“This guy let it ride,” Mr. Rosselli said, awe in his voice.
“Don’t tell me he hit again?”
“Okay, I won’t tell you. With the kind of luck you’ve been having, it would be painful for you.”
“He hit?” Vito asked incredulously.
“You understand how this works, Vito? Let me tell you how it works: A small place, like Oaks and Pines, it’s not the Flamingo in Las Vegas, we have to have table limits.”
“Sure,” Vito said understandingly.
“On roulette, it’s a thousand, unless the pit boss okays it, and then it’s twenty-five hundred. Except . . .”
“Except what?”
“You can let your bet ride if you win,” Mr. Rosselli explained. “You’re a gambler, you understand odds. The chances of anybody hitting the same number twice in a row are enormous. And hitting it three times in a row? Forget it.”
“Right,” Vito said.
“The house understands the odds. And it would be bad business to tell the players when they’re on a roll, that they can’t bet no more, you understand?”
“I understand. Sure.”
“By now, the pit boss is watching the action. They do that. That’s what they’re paid for, to make judgments, and to keep the games honest . . . you would be surprised, even being a cop, how many crooks try to hustle someplace like Oaks and Pines . . .”
“I wouldn’t be surprised,” Vito said solemnly.
“So the pit boss is watching when this guy hits three times in a row. And he knows he’s not a crook. He’s a rich guy, coal mines or something, from up around Hazleton. But when this guy says ‘let it ride’ . . . and he’s got thirty-two thousand, thirty-three, something like that, the pit boss knows he can’t make that kind of a decision, so he suspends play and calls Mr. Clark. You know Mr. Clark?”
Vito shook his head, no.
“Mr. Clark is the general manager of Oaks and Pines. Very fine guy. So the pit boss calls Mr. Clark, and Mr. Clark sees what’s going on, and he makes his call. First of all, he knows that the odds against this guy making it four times in a row are like . . . like what? Like Paulo here getting elected pope. And this guy is a good customer, who’ll be pissed if they tell him he can’t make the bet. So he says, ‘Okay.’ Guess what?
“You won’t believe it. Double Zero. It pays sixteen times the thirty-two,