Peter Spiegelman - Thick as Thieves

Two men appear, both stocky with crew cuts, one holding something that looks like an old-fashioned walkie-talkie. He smiles politely and approaches Bessemer, while his partner waits, eight feet off.

“Mr. Bessemer, if you could spread your feet apart and hold your arms straight out from your sides, I’ll sweep you down real quick. Mr. Frye, you’ll be next.”

There are platters of shrimp, crab legs, and scallops on crushed ice, a tureen of ceviche, bowls of gazpacho, frosted pitchers of iced tea, and plates of sliced fruit, all on a linen-covered table, under a wide awning. Beyond the awning, there are trees with songbirds in them, and a hillside descending in terraces to the beach and the swaying sea.

“Kathy insists on a frisk,” Prager says, smiling across the table at Carr and Bessemer. “Personally, I think she likes it.”

Rink smiles just as brightly. “It’s what you pay me for, Curt, and I’m sure Mr. Frye-Greg-understands.”

Carr nods and raises a glass of iced tea. “I’m all for hobbies.”

Howard Bessemer squeezes a lemon wedge over his plate. “That other fellow you had-what was his name-he never saw the need to have me felt up.”

Carr watches over his glass as Rink seeks out Prager’s eye, and Prager nods to her minutely. “See what you were missing?” Prager says, and he dips a shrimp in red sauce and eats it.

“When it comes to security, Howie, it’s smart to change things up now and then,” Carr says. “Otherwise your boys get stale.” He looks out at the ocean, the sand, two patrolling guards; then he looks at Prager. “Your private island?”

Prager smiles. “Not an island, but private.”

“It’s nice, but don’t you miss home?” he asks Prager. “The States, I mean.”

Prager eats another shrimp. “This is home to me. It’s the only place I miss.”

“But there’s no issue with you going back stateside?”

“I go back when I need to,” Prager says. “And what about you, Greg? And you are Greg today, right-not Glenn Freed, or Gary Frain, or Craig Farley? Is Boston still your base, Greg, or are you resettling in Palm Beach?”

Carr knows he’s supposed to be impressed that Prager knows Greg Frye’s aliases, and intimidated, and he lets his face tighten. “I do business in a lot of places. People come to me if they need to, and they don’t seem to care much where I am or what I call myself, as long as I meet my obligations. Palm Beach is okay, though. The real estate market’s still plenty soft.”

Kathy Rink pats her mouth with a linen napkin. “That what you’re doin’ there, Greg, bottom-feeding?”

“That’s real estate, right? Making money off somebody else’s stupidity. Or their shit luck.”

“Too true,” Prager says approvingly. “But property’s just a sideline for you, isn’t it? I mean, you didn’t come to talk to me about mortgage financing?”

“I need a banker. And maybe it’s possible a banker could need me.”

Prager’s smile is indulgent. “They always need customers, otherwise they’d have no business. But strictly speaking, I’m not a banker, Greg-I run a holding company. And I don’t have customers, per se, I have investors-typically, quite large ones. That said, Isla Privada does own several financial institutions in Florida. If you need an account set up, I’m sure we can help you out.”

Carr spears a fat scallop on his fork. He dips it in a dill sauce and pops it whole into his mouth. “I really like your paranoia, Curt,” he says, chuckling. “But it’s a fucking conversation killer. Would it help if she pats me down some more? Maybe a cavity search?”

Kathy Rink’s laugh is throaty and loud. “Can it wait till after lunch?”

Carr winks at her and looks at Prager. “I think you have some idea what I do, and what I’m looking for. I came here to do business, not to hang out by the pool or tiptoe around.”

Prager shrugs. “As I told Bess, I’m happy to listen. But doing business is something different, Greg. The truth is, I don’t know you from Adam.”

“Howie’s not a good reference?”

“You’re here only because of his introduction. But with all due respect to Bess-and he knows I love him-an introduction is not quite the same as a reference. Bess doesn’t actually do business with you, whatever that business is-he can’t vouch for you that way. So you don’t come with the same kind of pedigree most of my new clients come with.”

“The fingerprints didn’t tell you enough?”

Prager glances at Rink. “They tell names and dates and places, Greg,” Rink says. “Which could add up to somebody interesting, or could be somebody who’s a little vulnerable.”

“Vulnerable to what?” Carr asks.

“To being squeezed.”

“Squeezed? By who?”

Rink chuckles. “It’s a long fucking list of acronyms. We’ll run out of daylight before I get through ’em all.”

Carr smiles and works some incredulity into his voice. “You think I’m a cop?”

Prager smiles back. “I don’t know enough about you to think anything at all, Greg. That’s why, for now, it’s better that I just sit and listen. If what you have to say is interesting, I may decide to spend the time and money to find out more about you-pretty much all there is to know. If not, we will have had a pleasant lunch and we’ll say good-bye.”

Howard Bessemer partly stifles a belch. He looks at Carr and shrugs. “I think that’s your cue, Greg.”

They leave Bessemer with the remains of lunch, and they walk as Carr talks-he and Prager in the lead, Kathy Rink trailing. It’s a slow saunter around the grounds, and they stop occasionally to admire the horticulture or the view, but throughout, Prager and Rink maintain a careful silence. No questions, no comments, not even a sigh. Carr has waited a long time to make this pitch, and he knows Frye’s business as well as Frye himself might, if he weren’t fictional.

“It’s a simple operation: I’m basically a middleman, a wholesaler. I buy stones in quantity-sometimes large quantities, sometimes smaller lots-and I resell them to other middlemen, or to retailers. The nature of my suppliers is such that I pay significantly discounted prices, so I can offer merchandise to my buyers at a price point way below other wholesalers, and still maintain a very fat margin. As you’d expect, it’s a cash business, end to end: my suppliers want only cash, and I take only cash from my buyers.

“I started out regional-the Boston area, and New England-but, my trip to Otisville aside, I’m good at what I do and I’ve been successful. I can handle quantity in a hurry in either direction-buying or selling-and I can ship it, so now I’ve got suppliers and buyers all over the United States and abroad. Like I said before, they come to me, and I can do business anywhere. I keep my overheads low, in part by contracting whatever services I need-security, transpo, storage, whatever-so, no employees. I spend a few months here, a few months there, but I’m based pretty much nowhere, and that’s how I like it.

“I figure my banking needs are nothing new to you. I’ve got cash to move, and to put on deposit somewhere-with somebody who’s not going to file a whole lot of paper. I want to invest what I deposit-build a diversified portfolio, nothing too aggressive, but with some international exposure. China definitely, maybe India-we can talk about it. And I need someone who can help me repatriate my assets-give them a boring history, something I can pay taxes on, though not too much. But something that’ll stand up to an audit. And of course I want access-cash on demand, wherever I happen to be, in the States or abroad.

“In terms of quantity, I’ve got ten bucks I’d want to place up front, and I’d be looking to place maybe two bucks a month afterward. Maybe more sometimes.”