Joe Gores - Cons, Scams, and Grifts

They were teaching Freddie a new trick; Freddie loved new tricks. Even so, Willem’s voice on the speaker said, “Once more to be sure.”

Brantley carried the envelopes into the cage. Freddie selected one, slapped it against his forehead, held it there. He shut his eyes. He swayed. He opened his eyes and tossed the envelope, still sealed, into a waste bin attached to the wall under the observation window. Then he turned to his computer. After a moment of unmerciful mugging, he started punching keys.

Words appeared on the big monitor screen behind the computer.

RED DRESS WOMAN STOP SAD. BEATRICE HAPPY IN HEAVEN. SAY BINGO GET WELL SOON.

Freddie stopped typing. No more words appeared.

“Perfect!” exclaimed Willem’s voice.

Brantley gave Freddie a handful of pumpkin seeds.

When Dan got back to the office, he asked Giselle, “Heard anything from the Gyppos lately?”

“Nada since the cops kicked us off the case.”

“Find them for me, Giselle. And quick. It’s important.”

“Okay, will do, Dan’l,” she said cheerfully.

Easier said than done. She could use none of the usual skip-tracing avenues — friends or relatives, credit or DMV applications, medical records — to find them. Gypsies left no paper trail, not even any Internet trail, because none of them ever used the same name twice.

Four hours later, she still hadn’t found a single Rom . Staley’s number at the hot-electronics shop was disconnected. So was Rudolph’s East Bay number. So was that of Eli Nicholas, the Gypsy guitarist. So were all the other Gypsy contact numbers DKA had accumulated over the years. Her Rolodex came up empty.

Had Yana disappeared also? Not likely, with the cops after her and no access to a Gypsy documenter for a passport. And it was time for Giselle to make the decision she had been mulling over since Sunday night. She dialed the contact number Geraldine had given her. The phone was picked up but nobody spoke.

“This is Giselle,” she finally told it. “Let’s meet.”

“Sappho’s Knickers,” said the phone. “Eleven tonight.”

Larry and Midori were eating pasta with mizithra sauce at the Lakeside Café on Ocean Avenue just a few blocks from the Stonestown Mall.

“We one person short in menswear,” said Midori. “Luminitsa taking leave of absence.”

Larry asked sadly, “Old Whit?”

Her nod danced lustrous black hair around her face.

“She say he’s” — she raised her eyebrows — “sinking fast?” Larry nodded. “So she gotta take care of him until he dies.”

“Smoke Gets in Your Eyes” drifted from the old-fashioned jukebox. Red candles lit the tiny tables. Cozy little place, Sappho’s Knickers. Giselle tried to imagine Ken Warren here. Or Larry, or even Rudolph. Orientation aside, few men would be comfortable in this place.

She barely recognized the woman waiting in a booth. Yana was now blond, but beyond that, by some subtle shift of attitude and skillful use of makeup, she looked just a whole hell of a lot like a very specific blonde. Giselle Marc, to be exact.

Deliberate? Very deliberate, Giselle decided, but didn’t comment on it. She was committed. She hesitated, then put a manila envelope full of money on the table.

“If I’m wrong about you...”

“You’re not,” said Yana.

She met Giselle’s eyes. Limpidly. She had succeeded in conning Giselle Marc! But she also had an absurd impulse of gratitude. Careful, Yana. That would show weakness.

“Where will you go?” asked Giselle.

“Wherever the first plane out takes me,” Yana lied. Because of a remark overheard the night she met Giselle at the House of Pain, Yana knew exactly where she was going. And what she was going to do when she got there.

It’s better than the old turkey baster.

Corinne Jones, Bart Heslip’s ever-loving lady, ran her own travel agency in the 400 block of Sutter Street. She had a classic Nefertiti profile, gleaming ebony hair to Giselle’s spun gold, café au lait skin to Giselle’s alabaster. The next evening she sat down at Giselle’s table in the Jeanne d’Arc, a French bistro in the basement of the Cornell Hotel on Bush Street.

“Great place!” she exclaimed, looking about the narrow restaurant with its snowy napery and gleaming silver.

“The food’s even better,” said Giselle.

Then she launched into an explanation of what she hoped Corinne could help her with. Corinne listened, her almond-shaped eyes brimming with good humor and intelligence.

“Are these the same Gypsies you guys messed with over all those Cadillac cars a couple of years back? The ones that Bart’s been working on in Vallejo and down in L.A.?”

“The very same. The whole tribe of them took off for parts unknown very recently, in a hurry, probably en masse by plane.”

“Charter flight? No. I doubt they could find one in a hurry this time of year. They might use scheduled flights, individually or in small groups... You have any names for me?”

Giselle handed her a list. “These are the names we know them by. Look especially for Rudolph Marino under the name Angelo Grimaldi or something really Italian like that. He’s been living over in Point Richmond, if that’s any help.”

“It might be. I’ll get on the Net tomorrow with a bunch of other local travel agents and see what I can find out.”

Scorning the creaky old elevator, Yana trudged up to her third-floor room at the Hotel Canada on Via Goito, just a few blocks from Rome’s Stazione Termini , the central train and bus terminal built by Mussolini in the 1930s, where many of Rome’s Gypsies hung out. She tossed her two suitcases on the bed, took from one a small carryall, and went out again.

Just after dark, the well-dressed young woman set her carryall down on the stazione platform. Instantly two ragged ten-year-old kids with shoe-button eyes approached her, one from either side. “Signorina!” exclaimed one of them. When she turned toward him, the other snatched the carryall.

Yana grabbed each boy by one arm, sinking her fingers into the flesh. “Muchwaya?” she demanded. They shook their heads. She let go, gestured at one boy to open the carryall. He boldly unzipped it. It was stuffed with cheap plastic toys, red and blue and yellow, silver and gold. Their eyes widened in astonishment.

“Muchwaya?” she asked again.

“ I Muchwaya Americani. Ma non sono qui, Signorina. Sono in Trastevere.”

“Trastevere?” she asked.

They both nodded and gestured vigorously. The second one said, “Trastevere, si! Il Papa. Il Vaticano. Hanno fatto una bella storia, i Muchwaya Americani!”

A pretty story? Back at the hotel, she used the lobby pay phone to call Geraldine in San Francisco and tell her about a rather astounding phenomenon that she thought might interest some of Geraldine’s friends. She was sure some of them would want to take advantage of it.

Bart bounded into DKA like he was entering the ring. He leaned across Giselle’s desk to point a demanding finger at her.

“That college roomie of yours, Sofia Ciccone, who works in Records at the Hall of Justice, has to get me a mug shot of Yana from the time she was booked for running a bogus mitt-camp.”

“Who lit your fire?” demanded Giselle. Bart flopped in the chair across the desk from her.

“I’ve never had a picture of Yana to show to Etty Mae down in L.A. It’s ridiculous!”

Giselle deliberated. If she was wrong about Yana, she would be in serious trouble for what she’d done. She sighed.

“I’ll call Sofia,” she said.

“I can’t steal mug shots for you, Giselle!”