The Girl With the Long Green Heart

by Lawrence Block

  She said, “Barnstable, good morning.”

  I said, “I had one grunch but the eggplant over there,” and she hung up.

  I was not calling just to keep Helen happy in her widowhood. This was more of the illusion. Phones ringing show that an office is in contact with the outside world. All of this helps, not on a conscious level but right back at the base of the mark’s mind.

  The more elaborately you do this, the better off you are. Cutting corners is always dangerous. When a store is set up perfectly, it gives you so great an edge that you can clean your mark and blow him off and leave him so sold that he simply refuses to believe he’s been conned, no matter what. I knew a stock mob that set up a bucket shop that came on stronger than any Wall Street office ever did. They had four marks on the string at once, and they scored with three and let the fourth off because it looked as though he might tip. One of the mooches figured things out a few days later, and the police wound up picking up the other two losers and telling them they bad been had.

  They had been so well sold that they would not believe it. And when the bulls took one of them by the hand and led him back to the office of that very friendly stockbroker, he wouldn’t believe it when the suite of offices turned out to be very empty. He was sure he was on the wrong street. He made the cop check out some other addresses, because he was utterly sold on the legitimacy of that bucket shop.

  I kept calling our offices. Not constantly, because we weren’t supposed to be all that active. Just often enough so that Gunderman would hear a phone ring every once in a while. He might not take conscious note of it, but it would make an impression.

  Once Helen put me through to Doug. I told him the weather was nice and the Yankees were in last place and ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny. He said things like Mmmmm and I don’t think so and You’d better check it more carefully. Somewhere in the middle of one of my sentences he told me to call him back, he was busy, and I should go into it in detail. Then he hung up on me and I went and had another cup of coffee.

  Then I called again, later on, and Helen told me that our boy was gone. “I’ll put Doug on,” she said.

  “That’s a sweet friend you’ve got,” he told me. “Robbing that clod makes me feel like Robin Hood.”

  “You didn’t take a shine to him?”

  “I hated him. I figured the frail was exaggerating, but he’s even worse than she said.”

  “How did it go?”

  “The right way. Come on up and I’ll tell you about it.”

  “Do you have to?”

  “Huh?”

  I told him that I hadn’t had any sleep. He laughed. “Stage fright? An old hand like you?”

  “Partly stage fright, I suppose. Mostly some things I wanted to think about. By the time I felt like sleeping I couldn’t, because I had to be able to meet him on time. I’ve been walking around on adrenalin for a couple of hours and I’m just about out of the stuff. I think I’ll sack out and catch you later.”

  “Good enough. Oh, Johnny—”

  “What?”

  “Don’t go back to your hotel. He told me he has to catch a plane this afternoon. I doubt that he made reservations. You don’t want to be asleep at your hotel when he calls. And your desk clerk might screw things up and tell him. Go to a decent hotel and get a good flop.”

  “Where?”

  “Not the Royal York if he’s there. Just a minute. Oh, hell—go to my place. You remember how to get there?”

  I’d been to his apartment a few times. I told him I remembered where it was.

  “The door’s open,” he said.

  “You don’t lock it?”

  He laughed. “I never lock my door,” he said. “I trust people, Johnny. I’ve found most people are basically honest.”

  Thirteen

  I spent the afternoon and most of the night at Doug’s apartment. Our respective roles gave him one substantial advantage. As bossman, he was supposed to live it up in a fairly plush apartment. Lackey that I was, I had to make do with a third-rate hotel.

  I was back at my third-rate hotel the next day when Gunderman called me. The operator made sure that I was really me, and then I heard Evvie’s voice in the distance telling him that she had John Hayden on the phone, and at last his voice boomed in my ear.

  “Where the hell were you yesterday? I stuck around waiting for you to call and calling you and not reaching you, John. I wanted to get together with you before I flew back, and then I tried you last night and couldn’t get hold of you. Got a girlfriend to keep you busy?”

  “I was tied up during the morning,” I told him. “And then Mr. Rance said you’d gone straight back to Olean, so I didn’t try you at your hotel.”

  “Well, I didn’t want him thinking how close we’re working on this, John. I’ll tell you one thing, though. I like this Doug Rance of yours.”

  “He’s quite a man.”

  “I’ll go along with that. I’ll bet his background’s good. His family. His father had money, didn’t he?”

  “I believe so.”

  “It shows. I understand the English say it takes three generations to come up with a gentleman. I don’t know if they’re not a little off on their timetable, but they’ve got the idea. You can always tell whether or not you’re dealing with someone who’s . . . well, call it quality. I’m as democratic as the next person, John, but I’d be a damned fool if I didn’t know there’s a difference between a man like Rance and a man whose father cleaned out toilets for a living.”

  Doug Rance’s father didn’t clean out toilets for a living. He was an auto mechanic, fairly competent when he was sober, which was not his natural condition. He was generally out of work, and he bought himself a case of cirrhosis of the liver and died of it. I did not pass this data on to Gunderman.

  “I think he liked me, John. Talk to him?”

  “Not at length.”

  “And?”

  I hesitated. “I think you’ve got a very good chance,” I said finally.

  “Just a chance?”

  “For one thing, he’ll have to talk to some of the other principals. He can’t make decisions entirely on his own.”

  “If he goes for the deal, the rest of them will follow suit, won’t they?”

  “I suppose so. But there’s that Chicago group. I told you, Wally, I didn’t get to talk much with him. I know he liked you and that he was impressed with your approach.”

  “I just put my cards on the table.”

  “Well, I guess he liked that. The way I see it, you’re right on top of the waiting list. You—”

  “Waiting list!”

  “That’s right. What did you expect? The Chicago people have the inside track. If they hang onto it, they’re going to swing the deal. If they drop out, you’re home free.”

  “I don’t know if I like that, John.”

  “Look—”

  “You look, damn it. I sat there in Rance’s office and we cleared a lot of air. I’ll tell you, he didn’t know me from Adam, but by the time I left we had accomplished something. We knew each other and we liked each other, and what’s more I made him see just how sensible it was for him to deal with me. Now I’ve got my proposition hanging there and I’m supposed to wait and find out what happens next.” He paused, and when he spoke again his voice was pitched slower, his words spaced further apart. “Like proposing to a woman and having her not say yes and not say no, just keeping you waiting until she makes up her mind. A man can tire of that sort of thing.”

  I said something sympathetic.

  “These Chicago people. I hate this sitting and waiting for them to hit or strike out.”

  “I’m trying to sink their ship. What the hell do you expect?”

  “You’re trying to—”

  I let some impatience show in my voice. “Oh, hell,” I snapped. “What do you think I was doing until four in the morning? It’s going to take some doing, making them look bad to Rance and the others. I’ve been trying everything I can think o
f to throw them off the track. Don’t you think I want my cut?” I suspect he’d forgotten my cut. “And don’t you think I want to earn it?”

  “Well, I’m a son of a bitch,” he said. “I never even thought about that end of it.”

  “I can’t think of anything else.”

  “My apologies, John. You know I appreciate what you’ve done, not to mention what you’re doing. Have you got something good working?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it now,” I said. At least that saved improvising a new bit of material. “Listen, I’ve got to cut this short. I’ll be in touch with you, but don’t expect a call every hour on the hour. I’ll let you know if anything breaks either way. And don’t call me. If there’s anything to know, you’ll know it.”

  Doug thought everything was coming up roses. I wasn’t that positive now. The phone call bothered me. He’d gotten fairly belligerent at one point, and this served to point up the thin line we had to walk. We had to keep the carrot just the right distance from the donkey’s nose. Too close and he might take a sniff before biting into it. Too far away and he’d get his hackles up and never bite at all.

  So Doug was all for coasting along, then rushing into it and pulling it off fast and hard. This could not be. He had to be teased and coaxed, encouraged and yet held back.

  Evvie didn’t want me to call her any more. It was too risky, she said. She would call me when she got the chance, from some neutral phone so that there would be no record of the call. This didn’t make a world of sense but I could figure it out. She was starting to tighten up. We were coming around the far turn and the pace was beginning to get to her. No surprise there. She played the game like one born to it, but talent was never a complete substitute for experience.

  This was her first time. Everybody’s first time is a frightening occasion, especially when you’re doing little but wait for the finish. I can still remember the first long con game I ever worked, my role as minor as could be, and the sweat I worked up over it all. And by then I’d already acquired a fair background in the game. For Evvie, entirely new to it and close to the center of things, seeing Gunderman day after day, it had to be hell.

  “Maybe you did too good a job,” she said the next night.

  “How?”

  “He just won’t let go of this. He talks about it constantly, John. I don’t even understand it. It’s not as if this was going to make him suddenly rich. He’s rich already. What kind of profit does he think he can turn on this?”

  “A handy one. That’s not the point.”

  “It’s not?”

  “He got taken once, don’t forget. On a moose pasture dodge. This means getting even and then some. You know the man’s pride.”

  “Of course.”

  “That’s why he won’t let go, kitten.”

  “It just worries me,” she said. “I think what would happen if he ever found out. I get shaky thinking about it. And here I thought I was so level-headed and calm and cool.”

  “You’re doing fine.”

  “Am I? Maybe. I’ll tell you something, I don’t think I could go through this again. It’s not that bad when you know it’s one time and one time only. That makes it easier. I couldn’t do it again, though. Not ever. You used to do this all the time, didn’t you? I don’t see how you kept from flying apart.”

  “You get used to it.”

  “Are you used to it now?”

  I didn’t answer immediately. Then I said, “It comes easy. When you know how to do something fairly well and when you’ve done it for a very long time, it comes easy enough. But no, I don’t think I could go back to the life all the way. This is the last one, a final shot at the moon and for a very good reason. I wouldn’t want to go through it again.”

  “I’m—”

  “What?”

  “I guess I’m frightened, John.” A pause. “I wish you could come here. I wish—”

  “It won’t be long.”

  “No,” she said. “Not long.”

  We tortured him with phone calls. He was under orders, he was not supposed to call me and he didn’t dare call Doug. We goaded him like picadors placing darts in a bull.

  “John here, Wally. I can only talk for a minute. I think Rance will call you in a day or two at the outside. I think we’ve got Chicago hanging on the ropes—”

  “They’re out?”

  “About three-fourths out and going fast. I don’t even want to talk about the way I’ve played it, but I don’t think Rance will be in a hurry to deal with them. He may not call you, but I think he will. He’ll be anxious to talk price.”

  “You mean he’ll deal, finally?”

  “Now, I don’t think he’ll be that firm about it, Wally. He may keep it very iffy. What he’ll want to do, if he calls, is settle on a price so that he’ll have that much out of the way when the deal is in the final stages. Whatever price the two of you reach, it’ll be firm as far as he’s concerned when the time comes.”

  “Do I have room to bargain?”

  “I know what he wants.”

  “How much?”

  “He wants a hundred and a half, a hundred fifty thousand. He wants half of that in cash under the table and the other half showing on paper. Now, I have a pretty good idea what kind of a figure you can arrive at with him. Oh, God. I’ll call you back.”

  “Wait—”

  Click.

  “Wally—”

  “What the hell happened?”

  “Company I hadn’t figured on. Where was I?”

  He told me where I was.

  “That’s right. I know it’s a bargain at his price, Wally, but I don’t think you should have to pay that much. You ought to be able to get in for less than that.”

  “I don’t want to blow everything for nickels and dimes, John.”

  A born mooch. “Don’t worry about that part of it. The thing is, they’ve got the tax consideration, and that’s important to them. That’s why part of the money has to be under the table, and that’s where you have a big bargaining point.”

  “I think I see what you mean.”

  “Sure. You offer less money overall but a higher proportion in cold cash. That makes it less like haggling, too. They can accept a lower offer without losing face.”

  “I follow you.”

  “Start by saying yes to the full price, Wally. But say you’ll pay that figure on paper, period. Don’t worry about Rance saying yes to it. He won’t. He can’t.”

  “And then?”

  “Then you come back with a counter-offer. Tell him you’ll go more in cash if he wants, but you want a concession on the price. Offer him fifty each way.”

  “And he’ll take that?”

  “No, but that should open it up. I think he’ll settle for seventy cash and fifty on paper. That’s a hundred twenty thousand, and that saves you thirty thousand dollars.”

  You just have to let them think they’re getting a bargain. You have to put them in the driver’s seat, and then let them drive over the cliff. When Doug talked to him, he gave Gunderman just a little extra rope. They wound up ten thousand dollars under the figure I’d mentioned. A hundred ten instead of a hundred twenty. I’d supplied good information and Gunderman had showed himself to be a good and proper wheeler-dealer. He’d never dig his way out now. It was piled hip deep all around him, and the fool thought it smelled just fine.

  “Wally, I think you should start raising cash.”

  “Well, what the hell is this, anyway? Just Wednesday—”

  “You don’t know how these things move. Or what I’ve been going through. This isn’t a promise, but it would be good if you had the cash on you when the time came. Can you get up the dough without being obvious about it? A little here and a little there?”

  “Nothing easier.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “No problem, John.”

  No problem at all. Doug called later and told him to raise the money, that he felt the deal was ninety percent firm, that he’d
spoken with everyone on the board and every silent partner and all that was needed was the board’s formal approval. No problem, none at all. But Barnstable had better make its mind up, he wanted Doug to know. He wasn’t handing out an ultimatum, not by any means, but he had another very attractive opportunity open to him and he didn’t have the cash to swing them both at once. He’d prefer the Barnstable deal any time, but if they wouldn’t close with him soon he might not want to take the chance of losing out entirely.

  Not a bad old horse trader, Wallace J. Gunderman. A standard pitch, one you see coming all the way but one you don’t want to ignore entirely because it just might be true. A handy way to put on pressure for a closing without seeming to press too hard.

  He was good in his element. But we had never been in his element, had never played ball in his league. This was no straight deal. It was a con, and we sat and laughed at shrewd old Wally.

  No problem, no problem at all. And on an early-to-bed evening my phone jangled brittlely on the nightstand. I cursed Gunderman for waking me and hustled the phone to my ear.

  And a kitten’s voice said, “Oh, John. Oh, God—”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Could you get on a plane right away? Could you come here? Maybe I’m crazy, I don’t know. Maybe I am. It’s risky, isn’t it? We shouldn’t see each other now—”

  “Evvie, calm down.”

  Silence. Then, “I’m all right.”

  “What’s the matter?”

  “I just better see you,” she said. “I think he knows. I’m scared to death he knows.”

  Fourteen

  Somehow I beat the sun there. I spilled out of a yawning cabby’s hack and dashed up the walk to her door. There was a light on upstairs. I took the stairs two at a time. She met me at the top and collapsed in my arms. She tried to talk and couldn’t make it. I got her inside, shut the door. She still couldn’t talk. Her eyes were circled in red, her face drawn. She looked like hell. Broken by a life of unquiet desperation. Shredded; wrung out.

  I’d done the wrong thing, of course. There are two possible courses of action when things come unglued. If the end is still at all uncertain, you cool it and wait things out from a safe distance. If there is no doubt that the fit and the shan have connected, you fold up your tent and run for cover.