Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

up for the Drugs and Narcotics conference; me and a thousand pigs. Why not? Move coilfidently into their midst. Register at the Flamingo and have the White Caddy sent over at once. Do it right; remember Horatio Alger…

I looked across the road and saw a huge red sign that said BEER. Wonderful. I left the Shark by the phone booth and reeled across the highway into the Hardware Barn. A Jew loomed up from behind a pile of sprockets and asked me what I wanted.

“Ballantine Ale,” I said… a very mystic long shot, unknown between Newark and San Francisco.

He served it up, ice - cold.

I relaxed. Suddenly everything was going right; I wasfinally getting the breaks.

The bartender approached me with a smile. “Where yaheadin’, young man?”

“Las Vegas,” I said.

He smiled. “A great town, that Vegas. You’ll have good luck there; you’re the type.”

“I know,” I said. “I’m a Triple Scorpio.”

He seemed pleased. “That’s a fine combination,” he said. “You can’t lose.”

I laughed. “Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m actually the districtattorney from Ignoto county. Just another good American like yourself.”

His smile disappeared. Did he understand? I couldn’t be sure. But that hardly mattered now. I was going back to Vegas. I had no choice.

Part Two

About 20 miles east of Baker I stopped to check the drug bag. The sun was hot and I felt like killing something. Anything. Even a big lizard. Drill the fucker. I got my attorney’s.357 Magnum out of the trunk and spun the cylinder. It was loaded all the way around: Long, nasty little slugs - 158 grains with a fine flat trajectory and painted aztec gold on the tips. I blew the horn a few times, hoping to call up an iguana. Get the buggers moving. They were out there, I knew, in that goddamn sea of cactus - hunkered down, barely breathing, and every one of the stinking little bastards was loaded with deadly poison.

Three fast explosions knocked me off balance. Three deafening, double - action blasts from the.357 in my right hand. Jesus! Firing at nothing, for no reason at all. Bad craziness. I tossed the gun into the front seat of the Shark and stared nervously at the highway. No cars either way; the road was empty for two or three miles in both directions.Fine luck.

It would not do to be found in the desert under these circumstances: firing wildly into the cactus from a car full of drugs. And especially not now, on the lam from the Highway Patrol.

Awkward questions would arise: “Well now, Mister… ah… Duke; you understand, of course, that it is illegal to dise a firearm of any kind while standing on a federal way?”

What? Even in self - defense? This goddamn gun has a hair trigger, officer. The truth is I only meant to fire once - just to scare the little bastards.”

A heavy stare, then speaking very slowly: “Are you saying, Mister Duke… that you were attacked out here?”

“Well… no… not literally attacked, officer, but seriously menaced. I stopped to piss, and the minute I stepped out of the car these filthy little bags of poison were all around me. They moved like greased lightning! ”

Would this story hold up?

No. They would place me under arrest, then routinely search the car - and when that happened all kinds of savage hell would break loose. They would never believe all these drugs were necessary to my work; that in truth I was a professional journalist on my way to Las Vegas to cover the National District Attorneys’ Conference on Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs.

“Just samples, officer. I got this stuff off a road man for the Neo - American Church back in Barstow. He started acting funny, so I worked him over.”

Would they buy this?

No. They would lock me in some hellhole of a jail and beat me on the kidneys with big branches - causing me to piss blood for years to come.

Luckily, nobody bothered me while I ran a quick inventory on the kit - bag. The stash was a hopeless mess, all churned together and half - crushed. Some of the mescaline pellets had disintegrated into a reddish - brown powder, but I counted about thirty - five or forty still intact. My attorney had eaten all the reds, but there was quite a bit of speed left… no more grass, the coke bottle was empty, one acid blotter, a nice brown lump of opium hash and six loose amyls… Not enough for anything serious, but a careful rationing of the mescaline would probably get us through the four - day Drug Conference.

On the outskirts of Vegas I stopped at a neighborhood pharmacy and bought two quarts of Gold tequila, two fifths of Chivas Regal and a pint of ether. I was tempted to ask for some amyls. My angina pectoris was starting to act up. But druggist had the eyes of a mean Baptist hysteric. I told n I needed the ether to get the tape off my legs, but by that time he’d already rung the stuff up and bagged it. He didn’t give a fuck about ether.