Is it disgust?
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
I have time to think about things now.
Seven years, maybe out in five, if things fall my way. And there are other possibilities. Elihu Katz is a minor contributor to one of the candidates for California governor. The Democrat is a bit of a dark horse, but if he wins, and then does a lousy job, and then gets turned out of office after one term, I may find myself one of the beneficiaries of a last-minute flurry of gubernatorial pardons. Admittedly it sounds like a long shot, but in my situation you need to hope.
Needless to say, Agents Warren and Davies were not happy that I turned up at the Cahill Street station instead of Sustevich, or instead of one of his men. But they were phlegmatic about it. They never did find Sustevich: He simply disappeared, and left his briefcase full of diamonds behind. Whether the Professor is comfortably ensconced in a dacha outside Moscow, reading tracts on economics; or if he was killed by the angry stakeholders of “Eurobet” is still a topic of some debate. But it hardly matters. The FBI’s six-million-dollar task force was a smashing success nonetheless, for it was able to announce a major arrest: a career white-collar criminal who manipulated stock prices and committed securities and wire fraud. All my profits from the scheme—some twenty-five million dollars—were disgorged and will be used to fund future white-collar fraud investigations. Somehow, my partner, Ed Napier, escaped attention and prosecution. Maybe he was accidentally overlooked. Or maybe those million-dollar campaign contributions, to both parties, are valuable, like casino chips you save for the last big bet.
Speaking of casino chips, Napier recently completed the Tracadero deal, using cash I helped him raise. Demolition on the old site starts next month, and a new casino, The Inferno, thematically based on Dante’s poem, will be complete in two years. It is said that the employees will dress in red and will carry pitchforks and shoes with specially fitted cloven hooves.
For what it’s worth, Napier has been a gentleman. He sent a letter to me here in Lompoc, full of innuendo, in which he said, essentially, that there will be a job waiting for me when I get out, assuming that I don’t make a stink about him and what we did together. Even without his letter, I wouldn’t have caused trouble—it goes against my code; it’s not what you do to your partner.
And I won’t need Napier’s money when I get out. To the dismay of his family, Mr. Santullo changed his will a few weeks before he died, and he left his Palo Alto property to me. The Arabian and his wife have gone to court to contest the will. They accuse me of manipulating the old man. Their evidence: that I helped him pay his bills. My lawyer says that—despite the fact that I am a con man, and in prison for fraud—I have a good shot at keeping the property. If I ever get my hands on it, I should be able to sell it to a developer who will, I’m sure, build an office building on the site where Mr. Santullo as a young man used to entertain his friends and drink highballs. If it works out, I’m expecting a cool two million dollars in cash.
Jessica Smith has not visited me, or written, or called. I wrote her a letter when I first arrived here, but I have not yet received a response. I think she is angry: angry that I used her, and that I never told her the truth about the con. But how could I? Until the very end, I wasn’t sure if she was the one trying to con me.
This is what I explained in my letter to her. I thought she would understand. After all, she is a professional. This is what we do for a living. We mistrust. We cheat. We pretend.
But as I said, she has not written back. However, I have not given up. Each day, and each mail call, brings new hope.
Toby has not contacted me, either. I try to be philosophical about this. I think maybe my son needs time to figure out how he feels about me. At some point in the past, surely it must have been hatred. Why else would he have tried to con his own father?
But over time, perhaps his feelings will change. Every year I spend here in Lompoc is a year that Toby lives free, a year that Toby can simply carry on with his own life, unburdened by me or the choices I’ve made.
Finally, I suppose it shouldn’t matter what Toby thinks of me. My choosing to come here, in his place, is my own reward, my own redemption. It shouldn’t matter whether Toby knows this, or not.
Right?
My ex-wife, Celia, visited the other day. It’s funny, isn’t it, that in the end, she’s the only one I have left. She said she was still living with Carl, but that she has her doubts about him and is thinking of leaving. She said Toby moved back to Aspen, or somewhere farther east, and calls her occasionally, out of breath and full of boyish enthusiasm about some new venture or idea he’s kicking around—a coffee shop where you are given a book with your latte and must complete a quiz before leaving; a dance club where the floor is a giant mattress; a home delivery service for cigarettes and beer.
I asked Celia if Toby ever mentioned me in any of his phone calls. She looked down at the table for a moment, thought about it, and then looked up. “Yeah,” she said. “Toby loves you.”
And even though I knew she was lying, it was still good to hear.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
People who read Con Ed often ask where one learns how to pull off a con. One reader wondered (flatteringly, I admit) whether at some point in my past I myself was a con man. Alas, the reality is much less interesting. A lot of a writer’s work entails reading the work of other (in my case, more talented) writers. I am thus extremely indebted to the following authors and works:
Faron, Fay. Rip-Off. Cincinnati: Writer’s Digest Books. 1998.
Hyde, Stephen, and Geno Zanetti, eds. Players. New York: Thunder’s Mouth Press, 2002.
Marlock, Dennis M. How to Become a Professional Con Artist. Boulder, CO: Paladin Press, 2001.
Maurer, David W. The Big Con. New York: Anchor Books, 1999.
Sifakis, Carl. Frauds, Deceptions, and Swindles. New York: Checkmark Books, 2001.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Matthew Klein graduated from Yale University in 1990. He attended Stanford Graduate School of Business, in Palo Alto, during the Internet boom years, but he dropped out of school a quarter shy of graduating, to help run a technology company he founded. He lived in Silicon Valley for almost a decade and started several technology firms, which collectively raised tens of millions of venture capital dollars, and employed hundreds of people . . . before they went bankrupt and disappeared. Although Matthew is not a con man, some of his prior investors might disagree. Today he lives near New York City, with his wife, Laura. He writes novels and runs Collective2.com, a trading-related software company.
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