Sin City by Harold Robbins Read Free Book Online Page A

there’s a sea monster in Walker Lake. Could be the dinosaurs are its cousins.”
    Walker Lake was the thirty-odd-mile-long lake on the north side of Hawthorne. It was said the lake was bottomless. Occasionally a fisherman disappeared and they’d be a lot of talk about the sea monster. The navy had a big research and bombing range at the lake.
    â€œThe navy keeps the monster a secret because it’s using it for research,” Gleason said. “The monster is left over from the time when Nevada was at the bottom of a primeval sea, even before Lake Lahontan covered most of the state a couple million years ago. Back in those days dinosaurs swam in it, but they all died when the sea dried up, all except this one.”
    â€œNaw,” Gibbs said, “The navy created the monster by feeding it radiation, like those giant ants created by the atomic bomb.”
    The two argued about sea monsters and giant insects the rest of the way into Hawthorne.
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    We staked out the El Capitan Club, the only casino of any size in town. Even at that, it was a small fry compared to a place like the Harold’s Club in Reno. I sent Gibbs around to one entrance and I took the other, with Gleason hanging out with me. We each carried a shoebox with black and brown wax polish, a brush, and a shine rag, and offered a quarter shine to every man who came by, along with a Pink Lady pamphlet. Most of the passersby were sailors and marines and they were more interested in the pamphlet than a shine.
    â€œSpit shine, just two bits,” I told two marines, handing them each a pamphlet.
    â€œOkay, kid, but if I can’t see my face in it, you don’t get paid.”
    The two looked over the pamphlets as I got down on my hands and knees. Gibbs’s old man had been in the army and he’d taught us how to spit shine. You put on polish, and get a shine going, then spit on the toe and keep applying more spit, polish, and elbow grease.

    â€œHey, kid, you get a bonus for every trick turned by guys who go there?” the one I was shining asked.
    I spit on his shoe and looked up. “Naw, just a dime for each pamphlet I hand out.”
    â€œYou ought to ask for a bonus. Or offer extras. Sell rubbers.”
    â€œHe can take it out in trade,” his buddy laughed. “Hey, kid, you ever fuck any of them yourself?”
    I flushed. “Yeah, all the time. Try Patty, she’s the best lay.”
    After his buddy left, I thought about his comments. I knew what rubbers were. I heard Hop and Patty’s husband joking about them: Hop said it was like taking a shower with a raincoat. I was sure I could make more money selling rubbers to guys than handing out pamphlets and polishing shoes, but they were only sold behind the counter in drugstores and you had to be a grownup to buy them.
    I passed out all fifty of my pamphlets and had made two dollars on shines by the time it was to hit the carnival. Gibbs had passed out only half of his.
    â€œI threw the rest in a trash can.”
    â€œYou only get paid half,” I told him.
    â€œHell, no, just tell MaryJane you passed them all out.”
    â€œYou don’t cheat the customers,” I sneered, repeating what Betty had said many times. “You get half.”
    â€œUp yours.”
    â€œUp yours, too, you queer.”
    â€œAsshole.”
    â€œDip shit.”
    We kept it up until I ran out of insults and had to pay Gibbs a quarter. Gleason then took on Gibbs in cussing and lost. Gibbs had the dirtiest mouth in school. He even knew a Mexican word for a woman’s twat. You had to admire that kind of knowledge.
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    A carnival was my favorite of all things. Bright lights all over, with a rainbow of colors in red, blue, green, yellow, on everything, flashing and pulsating, the fun music that made you want to pick up your feet and open your wallet, the breathtaking Ferris wheel taking you up higher and higher, the big disk that spun while you sat in