A Shared Confidence (23 page)

“Sorry, Stanton, but this whole deal's getting too screwy for me. I'll find another place to stash my money. You're on your own with this one. Giarelli's your problem.”

Stanton reached out and seized my forearm, leaning in close.

“Forgive my speaking bluntly, Mr. Shaw. The fact is, I could easily ruin your participation in this building purchase you have planned by speaking to your co-investors. I have no doubt I could learn their names and locate them if I wanted to.” I'd never seen this side of Stanton. Of course, the man was desperate. He continued:

“And if you'll recall what Mr. Giarelli said to you in your suite Wednesday night – the night of poor Mr. Ryland's murder – he informed you that this is as much your problem as it is mine. I urge you to remember that, sir. I certainly have no compunction against helping Mr. Giarelli remember it.”

I called Stanton a filthy name.

“Be that as it may,” he said, unfazed, “I require your help. And as you value your life, you will give it to me.”

I was
back in my suite at the Lord Baltimore that evening when a frantic knocking sounded at the door. I answered it to see Penny standing there, flushed and worried.

“Giarelli has your friend Jennings,” she said, brushing past me and heading straight to the liquor cart.

“I know. I met with Stanton today.”

She poured herself a tot of rum and slammed it down.

“Dev, what are you going to do?”

“I don't know yet.”

“Was this part of your plan?” she asked, helping herself to another pour.

“I sent him to the hotel bar when I knew Giarelli and his men would be there,” I admitted. “I thought maybe giving Giarelli the idea that Stanton had pulled a fast one on him…but I didn't expect Giarelli would kidnap the boy!” I walked over to where Penny was standing; the liquor cart was seeming like a good idea just then.

“And he thinks Jennings is a federal agent,” Penny mused, taking it a bit slower with her third drink as I made my first. “Even for a gangster…This guy's bad news, isn't he, Dev?”

“Worse than I thought.”

“He actually did okay at the poker game the other night,” she said absently. “Jennings.”

“Did he?”

“Are you worried about him at all?” The girl was actually peeved, which spoke something about her character.

“Of course I'm worried. But Jennings is a cool hand. He won't try to do anything stupid.” I thought for a moment of Jennings' mother, a short, stocky, red-headed woman who liked the idea of her son being under my influence, but had made it clear to me what I could expect if anything untoward ever happened to him.

“So what are you going to do?” she repeated.

I shrugged. “What can I do? I'm going to help Stanton so I can get Jennings back.”

“Help him with what? Four hundred gees worth of phony cashier's checks?”

She had me there. The first two checks I'd given Stanton had been perfectly legit, taken from the hefty loan Kelly Shaw had acquired from Beldham & Morrissey. Obviously, I didn't have access to over ten times that amount, though. The remaining four cashier's checks were completely bogus, courtesy of a forger named Ferrier. Stanton would accept the checks since I'd already given him thirty thousand dollars in legitimate ones, but he'd find out these new ones were fake the minute he tried to cash one. Unless, I realized, Ferrier's work was so good that even the banks took them as the real McCoy, in which case I'd have a whole new set of problems to deal with.

“What about these John Laws you're working with?” asked Penny. “Can't they help you?”

“They're federal, honey.” I took a drink of the bourbon and ice I made for myself. “They'd have to put in four formal requests and sixteen memos to their bosses first. Can't wait that long. Besides, they wouldn't give a damn about one private detective's leg man; they're after Giarelli.”

“But kidnapping, surely they can do something about–”

“Shut up and let me think!” I looked down at her concerned blue eyes. “Sorry, Penny.”

“It's okay,” she said softly. “This guy Jennings, he isn't just an employee to you, is he?”

“No, he isn't.”

“You know I'll help you if I can.”

“Thanks, Penny. I'm going to need you to.”

She stayed mute while I paced around the room, lost in thought. After twenty minutes or so, I started telling her what I wanted.

At nine
o'clock Sunday evening, Stanton and I were at the door to Giarelli's suite on the sixth floor. Stanton knocked once and one of the goons opened the door to admit us. He frisked Stanton, then tried to frisk me, but I pushed his hands away and brushed past him. I needed to set a tone with these people if my plan was going to work.

Giarelli sat in an armchair, wearing a black pinstripe this time and puffing his usual cigar. No sign of Jennings.

“I don't see no cash,” Giarelli commented.

“We have something better for you,” I told him, then took two cashier's checks out of my pocket and held them up. The second goon snatched them from me and took them to his boss, who gave them an unimpressed glance.

“What the hell is this? You think I'm dumb enough to take a check from a goddamn counterfeiter?”

“They're cashier's checks,” I explained. “You can take them to any bank and get them cashed on the spot. No questions asked.”

“Like hell,” Giarelli spat.

“You don't like the cash you got, you don't want checks. What do you want, Giarelli? Beads and blankets?”

“Watch your mouth, funny man,” he warned.

I stood there with my hands in my pockets.

“I hear you got some hot shot Secret Service guy working for you,” I said. “Have him look at the checks. He can tell you they're real.”

For a moment, Giarelli did nothing. Then he signaled to Goon Two. The man went over to the bedroom, opened the door, made a gesture, and Jennings came walking out, looking very little the worse for wear. Our eyes met briefly but neither of us reacted.

“Can you tell if these are good?” he asked.

“Of course,” Jennings answered smoothly. “Counterfeiting involves all types of currency. Cash, check, coin, deeds, bearer bonds. We're thoroughly trained at the Treasury to recognize any kind of–”

“Just give 'em the once over,” Giarelli commanded. Jennings took the checks from him, ran his fingers over the surface, snapped them between his hands a couple of times, held them up to the light, looked at me quickly, then made his verdict.

“These are real,” he said.

“You're sure?”

“I'm positive.”

Giarelli sat and thought for awhile, puffing away at his cigar. Stanton and I waited.

“Okay,” he said at last. “Here's what we do. You two take these checks to my bank in Delaware. You bring me back the cash. Then we're square.”

“What the hell's it matter what bank?” I asked, annoyed. Stanton stood stiffly beside me, saying nothing.

“Because I trust the people at my bank not to cash these with funny money, smart guy. Got a problem with that?”

“Your bank open this time of night?”

“It will be in the morning. Get some shut-eye. You two got a drive ahead of you.”

“Maybe you should have the Treasury guy go with us,” I suggested. “Make sure, if you're that worried about getting more phony bills.”

“The Treasury guy stays here,” Giarelli said with finality.

“That's what he says or that's what you say?”

Giarelli looked coldly at me and set his cigar down in the ash tray.

“Mind your own business, Shaw. Right now, your business is to drive up to Delaware and get me my goddamn money like you was supposed to do the other night.”

“Mr. Giarelli,” Stanton began, finally finding his voice, “if you're quite convinced the money I gave you last night is worthless, may I ask for it back?”

“What do you want with funny money?” Giarelli asked suspiciously.

“What do you want with it?” I shot back.

He glared at me a moment, then turned back to Stanton.

“You get it back when I get my real two hundred grand. Now get out.”

Stanton and I headed toward the door. I stopped and looked over at Jennings.

“Blonde hair,” I observed. “Oiled and parted on the left.”

“What are you on about, Shaw?” Giarelli demanded.

“Just this, Mr. Giarelli. You have friends, don't you?”

“Lots of 'em.”

“So does this man,” I said. “They're called feds and these people look out for their own. And they have a lot more guns than you. And kidnapping is a federal offense. If I were you, I'd make sure this Treasury agent doesn't have a hair out of place when he leaves here tomorrow morning.”

I looked contemptuously at the goons.

“Especially if you only have two guys in town with you.”

Giarelli picked his cigar back up and took a puff.

“Get moving, Shaw.”

Stanton and I headed out the door.

S
tanton met me in the
lobby the next morning and we drove to Delaware in my hired Cadillac. He didn't seem much in the mood for conversation, which suited me fine; I needed time for a little review.

At present, two hundred thousand dollars' cash was sitting in a valise in Casper Giarelli's hotel suite at the Lord Baltimore Hotel, two floors above my own. The money was good, but Giarelli had been convinced it was counterfeit by a man known to him as Secret Service Agent John Galen. This same man was known to Clay Stanton as small-time con operator Tom Shandle – the information provided to Stanton by his cronies in the confidence trade who enjoyed a good poker game now and then. This same man was known to me, of course, as Brad Jennings, one of my best and most loyal operatives. It had been part of my plan for Giarelli to be convinced that Stanton had paid him off with funny money. Only now it seemed that Jennings, under the guise of Galen, was something of a permanent guest in Giarelli's hotel suite.

Penny Sills knew that Jennings was my man and was aware of his present danger (and seemed genuinely concerned about it). Penny also knew that federal lawmen were moving in on Stanton, and that she'd better play on my side if she didn't want another prison stretch.

F.B.I. agent Joshua Mattling was trying to bring down Clay Stanton to appease one of Stanton's former marks, a U.S. senator, but was more interested in nailing Giarelli. Mattling had offered me both protection and assistance (even a job!) for helping him with the Stanton case so he could clear his plate and go after the bigger fish.

So far as I knew, neither Mattling nor any of the other feds and Pinkerton's men knew of my brother Nathan's embezzlement problems, and only Straker knew of Secret Service Agent John Galen (though he didn't know Galen was actually Jennings).

Was I leaving anyone out? Well, there was Ethan Ryland, another of Stanton's former marks and a recent debtor to Giarelli. That debt had been canceled, though, the hard way. There was also Townsend, the local private detective I'd hired and whose wire recorder I had borrowed (which had all kinds of interesting stuff on it by now).

As for money, I was currently sitting on about twenty thousand dollars. Ten was from a forty-thousand-dollar loan from my brother's bank made to Kelly Shaw, and thirty grand of that had been spent in cashier's checks given to Clay Stanton for “investment purposes”. Stanton had already cashed the checks, of course, which would hopefully make him less wary of accepting larger checks from Shaw. I should be able to make that thirty grand back with the upfront interest I was charging Stanton for the two hundred thousand dollars I was lending to him to get Giarelli off our backs. Jennings had brought me fifteen gees from a poker game the other night, and a little over a third of that had gone to making the first payments on three bogus loans at Nathan's bank that the embezzlers had stuck him with. Add the forty grand Nathan had loaned Kelly Shaw, and I needed to make sure that close to $180,000 (less first month's payments) was accounted for before the fat lady hit that high C.

And however this came off, it would be extremely helpful if I could arrange for the F.B.I. to nail Stanton. That could go a long way toward smoothing out any rough edges I might not be able to handle myself.

If it sounds like just another day at the office, it most certainly was not. Real life private detectives, I reminded myself, serve subpoenas and check out insurance claims and find missing persons and charge cuckolded spouses good money to help them realize their worst fears. They don't take on gangsters and try to go toe-to-toe with seasoned, experienced confidence men. They don't impersonate federal agents and do business with known forgers and drop off illicit payments late at night in quiet hotel rooms with dangerous thugs and murdered corpses.

How did I get roped into all this again? Sure, it was for family – my older brother whom I hadn't seen in five years and who'd asked for my help in a telegram. This was supposed to have been a short trip. Fly out, listen to Nathan's problem, offer my advice, and fly back. I hadn't set out from the start to spend over a month in Baltimore and put myself – and possibly Jennings – in danger. But here I was, and as much as I was annoyed with myself, I had to admit that some part of me found this whole thing exhilarating. Nerve-wracking and at times scary as hell, yes, but damned if this didn't beat tipping a bellhop somewhere so I could hide in a closet and take dirty pictures of some guy's wife doing her own version of the Lucky Lindy with her husband's best friend.

Jesus, Caine, I thought to myself, what's gotten into you? You could easily end up behind bars for all the stuff you've done so far, or shot dead by a gangster. Your brother could end up in jail as well, or at least disgraced and lose his whole family. I liked to think of myself as a careful, competent professional, the kind who takes risks when they're necessary, not for the thrill of it. I decided I blamed Jennings. Having Adventure Boy along on all this, his boundless enthusiasm and lazy, nerveless calm in the face of danger – and then I thought of Jennings' current predicament, and my mind snapped back to what was important. I put away my pointless musings and introspection and I focused on the details, on the next step and on possible outcomes. Was I taking the best course of action for the people who mattered in this? The least foolhardy path with the best chance of success? Was I still planning in terms of ways out if a seam blew at some particular point? Was I putting more emphasis on what needed to be done rather than what I might want to do? Was I, in short, acting like a professional?

Yes, I decided for now that I was.

I pulled the Caddy into the little Delaware town that Giarelli had specified and followed his directions to the small bank near the center of it. Stanton looked up at the unprepossessing structure, a one-story building of simple brick and wooden shingles. Through the windows we could see a few people sitting at desks and behind the counter. A recent storm had blown the sign down from the roof, and it lay smashed up at the side of the building. We could barely make out the name of the place on the splintered remnants.

“Are you certain you followed the directions correctly, Mr. Shaw?” Stanton was looking at the place with the same skepticism I had on my face as I checked the written directions again.

“This is what he wrote down,” I said. “This has to be the place.”

“Hardly the sort of institution I would expect a man like Mr. Giarelli to have his money in,” Stanton said.

I shrugged. “Guys like him, I've seen it all kinds of ways. Some of them keep their money in big banks in bigger cities. Some like to use little, out-of-the-way places like this. The bank examiners and other regulatory types don't make it out so often, may not notice large sums of money passing through.”

“That's true, I suppose,” said Stanton, still eying the place dubiously.

“Come on, we'll know soon enough.”

We went inside and the woman behind the counter gave us a helpful smile. Stanton presented two of my phony cashier's checks that he had filled out in his name, explaining that he would like to have these cashed. It had been my idea for Stanton to fill them out; better him than me if something didn't go right.

“Certainly, sir. One moment, please.” She called over an older gentleman who also looked over the checks and politely asked to see some identification from Mr. Stanton. I nudged his elbow as he took out his wallet, and he remembered what Giarelli had told us earlier.

“Nice, friendly place you have here,” Stanton said. “I can see why my friend Mr. Giarelli prefers to do business with you.”

“Why thank you, sir,” said the older gentleman, the hint of a knowing smile on his face. It was clear now there would be no problem cashing the checks.

“Hey, while we're here,” I said, taking out my wallet, “can I pick up some silver bullion?”

“Certainly, sir,” replied the older gentleman affably. He turned to the girl next to him. “Miriam, see to this gentleman's request, won't you, please?”

He disappeared in the back for a few moments. Stanton looked at me and I gave a curt shake of my head that meant “Not now”.

As most people know, paper money in this country is printed in the form of Federal Reserve Notes or Silver Certificates (and a few Gold Certificates that you don't see so often these days). With Silver Certificates like the kind I'd just handed to the woman, you can walk into any bank and demand that the bill be exchanged for the equivalent amount of silver. It's the law. You can get silver dollars or bullion depending on what the bank has in the vault. Printed money has to be backed by something or the whole system collapses. Used to be just gold long ago, so silver was a step down, really.

Twenty minutes later we walked out of the bank carrying a satchel with two hundred thousand dollars cash and a smaller satchel containing fifty dollars worth of silver ingots at that day's valuation.

“What was the point of the silver?” Stanton asked once we were back in the car.

“Tokens,” I answered. “Something to hand out to my business partners at the Liberty Silver Mining Company once I make it back out to Colorado.”

“Why bother with that now?” Stanton asked. “I thought that venture was at least over a month away.”

“Things change fast in business,” I said. “I'd tell you more, but you've already threatened to queer my building deal.”

“I was in rather desperate circumstances,” Stanton responded apologetically. Now that we had Giarelli's money, he was calmer and reverting back to his more genteel self. “I'm sorry if it seemed–”

“It didn't seem, Stanton. It was. But don't worry about it. That's in the past.”

We drove a few more miles in silence, then Stanton asked casually, “You're still wanting to have me invest the remainder of the money you set aside?”

I didn't answer, apparently distracted by other thoughts. Let him sweat awhile, I thought.

We stopped for lunch in a small cafe just inside the Maryland border. We'd each taken a bite of our sandwiches and I told Stanton I'd take my thirty thousand dollars now.

“I beg your pardon, Mr. Shaw?”

I rolled my eyes at the obvious evasion.

“I've made you the loan as I said I would. The deal was fifteen percent interest upfront. I want that money before we go to see Giarelli.”

“I didn't bring it with me,” he answered.

“Fine, we'll stop and pick it up on the way.”

“I wasn't expecting to, that is, you told me you didn't want the money until Monday at the earliest. That being the case, I made some stock purchases with it yesterday.” Typical con man, I thought. Now that he thought he was out of danger, or would be soon, he was loathe to hand over the same money he'd almost thrust into my hands the other night. Typical con man or typical business man?

“Then you can sell some shares when we get back into town,” I said simply, and went back to my meal.

“Yes, well, the thing is, Mr. Shaw–”

“The thing is, Mr. Stanton, you'll give me my thirty thousand dollars today or Giarelli doesn't get his money.”

He looked at me askance for a moment.

“Wouldn't that put us both in a rather untenable situation, Mr. Shaw?”

“Yes, it would. Both of us. Are you willing to risk that?” I looked back at him calmly. It was a game of chicken now.

“You'd risk your life over thirty thousand dollars? A man of your means?”

“The question is, Mr. Stanton: Are you willing to risk yours to find out?”

I was
sitting in the car outside First Quality Investors, waiting for Stanton to cash out some stocks. I smiled to myself, wondering how hard he was having to work to sell this to the shills inside. Just another thirty thousand boys, the same thirty I brought back to you yesterday. I'm this close to collecting another three hundred thousand from the mark, free and clear. Just stick with me another day or two and you'll all get a cut.

He came back out with my money. I counted it in front of him. Slowly. Twice.

“It's too bad we don't know any counterfeiters,” I mumbled.

“What on earth for?”

“So we could stiff Giarelli,” I said.

“Have you taken leave of your senses, man?”

“Think about it, Stanton. You said it yourself, that Secret Service agent wants out of there. He knows the only way he'll gain his freedom is to authenticate our next payment. We could walk in there with Confederate bills and he'd swear it was real money.” I laughed aloud at this. “Think of it, we'd be replacing counterfeit counterfeit money with real counterfeit money.” I laughed again and Stanton looked at me like I'd lost my mind.

“And when Mr. Giarelli took this money elsewhere, to a bank, say, and discovered it to be counterfeit?”

“He'd probably be all the way back to Chicago by then. Anyway, it was just a thought.”

“It doesn't strike me as very clear thinking, sir, I must tell you.”

“No matter. About the other two hundred thousand or so I want to stash for awhile…”

“Yes?” he asked hopefully.

“I'm still in with our original deal. But I still want to wait until we know Giarelli is off our backs.”

Stanton wouldn't be able to complain too much. He'd be getting his own two hundred thousand cash back from Giarelli in less than an hour, plus the considerable advantage of no longer having Giarelli interested in him. And he had more than that amount to look forward to courtesy of entrepreneur Kelly Shaw.

“Splendid,” said Stanton, and I put the car into gear.

We both
strolled into the Lord Baltimore and asked the front desk to call up to Mr. Giarelli's room. The dignified concierge leaned in close and lowered his voice.