A parachute and a pair of shoes were all we found of him. Parachute, unopened. Shoes, his Bergavilia’s size 10 ½ double E.
No blood or footprints. Not a trace of him.
They brought the dogs in. They kept running in a circle around his parachute and shoes as if he was pacing circles in the red dirt before exiting the stage of the world. Stage left? Stage right? You tell me.
They brought in a thermal imaging device to check under the landing zone. The techs got excited when they found something moving three feet down until they realized it couldn’t have been longer than six inches and attributed it to a prairie dog.
They even brought in Organix. an experimental compound that reacts to any organic matter. After the techs sprayed it, the parachute and his shoes lit up neon green so bright it was visible under the punishing sun of an Arizona summer. But nothing else.
The polygraphs on the film crews, flight crew, later his agent, girlfriend, relatives, and anyone who could remotely be considered part of his entourage? They all passed.
Tony “The Rainman” Rain billed himself as “The World’s Greatest Illusionist.” The fact that his show at the MGM Grand was sold out 3 years in advance meant a lot of people agreed with him. The guy was worth an estimated $1.2 billion, landed in People Magazine’s “10 Sexist Celebrities” list 6 years running, and was engaged to Mavue, a former model turned chart-topping mega-superstar pop chanteuse. If that’s the word. I don’t know. I still listen to Zepplin.
So did Tony Rain die? His body was never found.
Get kidnapped? Plenty of people wanted a piece of a fortune that remained untouched nearly 40 years later.
Fool us cops and everyone in his life? How could 63 people all pass a polygraph without there being one or two weak links?
How we missed it, I don’t know. If we had looked at it the following way, maybe we’d have solved the case.
Imagine you have a roomful of high school students, most of who have failed – miserably failed – every physics test, quiz, or homework assignment their teacher has given. On the final exam, most miraculously end up with C’s and B’s, with a small smattering of A’s.
What happened? Ask the guy who graded the test, he’ll know.
No one ever thought to test the tester.
And why would we? Sam Haines, the polygraph expert on Rain case, had been with the FBI for 38 years and enjoyed a distinguished career full of citations, awards, and medals.
And gambling debts.
Sam made a deathbed confession. He was into the mob for sixty large. Rain’s people approached him with an offer of 4 mil – cash. Sam was retiring in 2 years anyway. And he liked having ten fingers.
Tony Rain did jump from the plane. He landed safely 2 miles away and drove off in a black Land Rover never to be seen again.
The crew flew in a drone to carefully place a second unopened parachute and his shoes at the LZ exactly as we found them.
As for the circling dogs? Rain ran on a treadmill every day in his mansion. They rigged a way to collect his sweat and put it into a container no bigger than a tube of lipstick. They also rigged the drone to repeatedly press the pump on the cylinder and flew in a circle to leave his scent.
Why go to the trouble? Maybe the showman in him wanted to give everyone a final flourish. Don’t ask me. Ask him.
If you can find him.
Tony Rain performed the greatest illusion of his career – he had disappeared from his own life.
Again though, why?
That one I can solve. It’s called “The Good Old Days” syndrome.
There’s a subclass of very successful people – tech mavens, actors, music stars – who are miserable with their success. The lead singer of a band that just celebrated its 40th anniversary looks back on the years they spent playing shitty dives for 10 people, driving around in a van, and considers them the best years of his life. He hadn’t become himself yet. There was no pressure. No obligation to please anyone or live up to the band’s standards.
Remember, this is a subclass. Mick Jagger doesn’t mind flying in a private jet, staying in the best hotels, having all the best things in life.
But for some people, the best things in life could be that ratty East German military jacket you bought at Goldberg’s Army and Navy when you were twenty. Or the torn scarf you wore to all your auditions because that was the scarf you wore when you landed your first part in the chorus of West Side Story.
I know – not for a fact, but I know – Tony “The Rainman” Rain is walking around the streets of Manhattan or Brooklyn with a deck of cards in his pocket that comes out whenever he sees the right kid. He dives into his bag of tricks and chooses one he developed when he was 19 walking those same streets when he didn’t have two dimes to rub together. When he’s done, the kid’s eyes are as big as saucers and Rain feels like he is 19 again.
Only he’s flush – with more dimes than he can ever spend.
Turns out he paid off his accountant too.
[Image Credit : Photo by Hassaan Here on Unsplash]
Tom Busillo’s writing has appeared on McSweeney’s, PANK, and Apiary. He is also the author of the 2,624-page, unpublishable, book-length conceptual poem “Lists Poem: Top 10 Top 10 Top 10 Top 10 Lists (11,111 Lists).” After that lengthy journey, he’s focusing almost exclusively on much shorter work. He lives in Philadelphia, PA.
