Stephen Cannell - King Con

Once they were parked next to the Winnebago, Beano reached over and honked the horn. The door to the motor home opened and Victoria watched as a tall, handsome, gray-haired man, about sixty-five, came down the steps. He had the sincere, confident look of a corporate executive, only he was dressed in blue jeans and a T-shirt. Beano got out of the car and gave John a hug. Once Victoria was out, Beano introduced her.

"John, this is Victoria Hart. She's gonna be a lugger on this hustle." Victoria didn't know what the hell a lugger was, and it sure didn't sound too flattering, but she smiled and nodded anyway.

John shook her hand and looked at her carefully. "You're the Prosecutor in Trenton, aren't you? The one who was gonna put Carol on the stand?" His voice was deep and rich, but there was bitter accusation in it.

"I'm sorry," she said softly. "It went wrong. That's why I'm here."

John looked at her. His hooded eyes gave her nothing. Then he turned to Beano.

"Got a little problem with the motor home hook-up," John said. "The mooch in the front office needs a cool-out. He wants a hundred dollars in advance. He was gonna throw me out when I didn't have it. I told him you'd give it to him, but watch him, he's no laydown."

"I'll go take care of it. Then we're gonna go over to a jewelry store called Rings 'n' Things. Look it up in the phone book over there," Beano said, pointing to a phone booth by some picnic tables. Then he grabbed a hundred dollars out of the pickle jar and went to the office to pay for their hook-up.

The first disagreement came that night at dinner. Beano, John, and Victoria had found the jewelry store, which was under the roof in Bally's Casino. They drove to the hotel, which was a towering monument to bad taste and electricity. The porte cochere glimmered with twinkling lights. The casino was on the Boardwalk and faced the dark blue swells of the Atlantic. The jewelry store was inside, just off the casino. Big interior glass windows looked out on the gaming tables and contained rings and bracelets that were on display there. Victoria thought the jewelry was incredibly ugly… chunky, overdone pieces with too many chipped diamonds. They glittered classlessly and competed for attention with the spinning, ringing slots across from the store. In one window there were men's pinkie rings that looked big enough to anchor a boat. Beano suggested they eat in the casino dining room, and they found a table near the back. The room was dark. Beano explained that casinos all over the world were designed with no clocks and no windows, so the players at the tables wouldn't see any change in time or sunlight. Time stood still in a casino. The management didn't want the losers looking at their watches. They sat in Bally's Bicycle Room, named after the Bicycle cards all casinos used. The best bets on the menu were steak and beer.

"Okay, Victoria," Beano said after the food arrived, "I need to know more about these guys."

"Like what?"

"Any offshore stuff. Do the Rinas have interests in any banks, any savings and loans? Eventually, we gotta get to their big money."

She looked at them for a long moment and then started sawing on her overcooked steak." I thought we were gonna sell Joe and Tommy a pearl, whatever that means."

"We're gonna sell them a pearl for the front money, but that's not the scam. That only finances the scam. The opening act of this scam has gotta get deep into their pockets. We gotta take these goombas for a million dollars or more, and we gotta set it up so they start accusing each other. We gotta get them going. We need a team of operators working. I need to pull in some more people."

"Tell me about this pearl thing first," she persisted, trying to cover her shock at the million-dollar size of the scam.

"She's not being too cooperative," Paper Collar John said in his soft baritone voice.

"She's a lawyer," Beano said. "Whatta you expect?"

"I forgot that," John deadpanned.

"You guys gonna tell me what we're going to do, or are you gonna just sit here wasting time, taking target practice on the legal profession?"

"Okay," Beano said. "The deal is, you and I are gonna be lovers. How do you like it so far?" She showed no reaction. "I'm Bubba Budweiser from Locadocious, Texas. You're Rhonda Roundheels from right here in town. You're gonna dress up in hooker spandex and paste yourself on me like wet clothing. And you're gonna laugh and giggle at everything I say, and I'm gonna be pinching your ass and telling you you're the sweetest little piece of fluff this side of Red Gulch. Then, while you simper and fawn, I'm gonna buy you a twenty-millimeter black pearl."

"Really?" she said deadpan.

"Yep."

"Not on the best day you ever had."

"I thought you wanted to be in on this."

"I do, I just don't have a real strong stomach."

"Listen," Beano said, leaning in and lowering his voice, "if you think I'm interested in copping a free feel, forget it. That's not what I'm looking for." She was really pissing him off. "What I need is your help to pull this off. I can go hire a hooker, but then we got an accomplice who's probably not too smart and will turn us in for money. You said you wanted to be in this… You might as well learn to be a player."

"I'm not gonna dress up like a whore."

"There ain't much you will do, is there?" Beano said, slipping back into his native South Carolina accent, which he had all but lost, except when he was truly pissed off. "You wanna have a piece of everything. But you won't tell me nothing 'cept what you think is important. Don't matter you never stole nothing in your life, you're gonna be the expert, gonna approve everything. You wanna tell me and John how to run this game? You wanna dole out information? What the fuck good does that do?" He was almost yelling.

"Calm down, Beano," John said.

Beano leaned back and rubbed his eyes. "You're right. She gets to me, John. Maybe it's just 'cause I feel so shitty about Carol… or maybe it's 'cause she and I are just oil and water, I don't know. All I know is, I wanna do this, and all I get outta Miss Hart here is stupid questions and reasons why what I'm trying ain't right. We won't have any coordination this way. We're gonna crash and burn."

Victoria watched as he bolted out of his chair and went to the bathroom at the far end of the room.

They hadn't planned it in advance, but they'd done so many scams together since Beano was six, John knew Beano was going to throw a fit and leave the table the minute Victoria got stubborn. He left John to be the "singer" and do Beano's commercial for him, the way it was supposed to be done.

"Good goin'. I never saw anyone get to him like that before," John said, laying down a primer coat of guilt.

"Hey, Mr. Bates, if you two think I'm going to be a silent partner here, then you're in for a startling disappointment."

"He's good, Miss Hart. Beano could sell Ebenezer Scrooge Christmas trees. There's no grifter on this planet with more natural talent and I seen most of them." His voice turned rich and velvety. "Maybe you should know he grew up with Carol Sesnick. Ever since they were nine or ten years old, they were like brother and sister. He loved her. He ain't gonna show you how much 'cause he's a sharper, and a sharper don't let his feelings show. But his heart's all wrapped up in this thing. I personally think that's real dangerous when you're running a sting. You need to be detached. Him gettin' angry like he just done is a bad sign. If we fail with a mark like Tommy Rina, we're gonna be hanging out with a buncha engine blocks at the bottom of some lake."

Victoria didn't answer, but when Beano finally came back from the men's room, she could see he had water in his hair. She wondered if he had put his head in the sink to cool down. Once he was seated they sat in silence for a while, picking at the overcooked food.