Seizing the moment, Billy Joe dropped his brown paper bag, grabbed the cloth bag, and started running. He ran into the woods with the men’s screams and Boss’s snarls ringing in his ears. Billy Joe had no idea why Boss decided to attack and at that point he didn’t care.
Billy Joe didn’t stop running until he got home. Pa still wasn’t there. He must really be tying one on at Lonzo’s. In the security of his bedroom, Billy Joe opened the bag and breathed a sigh of relief. It was full of money. Ten thousand dollars just like they’d promised and all in brand new twenty dollar bills. They must have just drawn it out of the bank. Billy Joe hid the money under his mattress and fell asleep thinking about a certain redheaded fancy lady he knew who worked at Lonzo’s.
The sun shining in his bedroom window awakened Billy Joe the next morning. He had a leisurely breakfast and took his second cup of coffee out on the front porch. Pa’s truck was parked out front. Billy Joe hadn’t heard him come in, but that wasn’t unusual. Billy Joe was a sound sleeper.
About fifteen minutes later Boss came walking into the yard, no worse for the wear and tear. Ignoring Billy Joe, he went to his customary place under the porch to lie down.
Billy Joe got dressed and puttered around the house most of the day trying to figure out how to explain his new-found wealth. He knew Pa would want to know where he got the money when Billy Joe walked into Lonzo’s that night. Billy Joe finally decided that since he turned eighteen today, and was legally an adult, he didn’t have to explain anything to anybody.
About four that afternoon, Billy Joe showered, dressed, and put some of the money in his wallet. He had hoped to get a ride to town with Pa, but Pa was still asleep. He figured that now that he was an adult it wouldn’t look just right if he rode his bicycle into town. He decided he would hitchhike and was walking down the road when Sheriff Hamilton pulled off on the shoulder in front of him and stopped. The sheriff got out, the deputy stayed put. “Afternoon, Billy Joe,” said Sheriff Hamilton, smiling.
The sheriff had never been nice to him before, and it made Billy Joe nervous. “Hello, sheriff.”
“Got some news you might be interested in. You remember those two guys I stopped down by the lake yesterday, don’t you? Well, it turns out they got killed by some drug dealers over in New Orleans. Seems they tried to sell them some flour. Imagine them trying something that stupid. Funny thing is, they were both covered with bite marks from a large animal. Isn’t that odd?”
“Yeah, I guess so,” said Billy Joe, wondering how much the sheriff knew.
“You know what else those guys were into? Counterfeiting. They made counterfeit twenties. Not very good ones. Not good enough to fool anyone who was paying attention.”
Billy Joe’s heart sank. Damn! All that money was counterfeit. There went his birthday celebration.
“Get in, Billy Joe,” the sheriff said, smiling again and opening the car door.
“W-W-Why? What’d I do?” Billy Joe asked, trying to keep from panicking.
“Nothing. At least nothing I can prove. I saw you all dressed up and I just figured you were going to town to register to vote and needed a ride. I’m always available to assist my constituency, you know.”
Tall Tommy and the Millionaire
by S. S. Rafferty
Thank God February has only twenty-eight days because it is the worst month for business at the bistro I own on Third Avenue. Right after the holidays my society swells start their exodus to Palm Springs, the Riviera, or places that are invariably named Costa Del Something and cost del everything. By February first, I could rent the joint out as a warehouse or a branch of Campbell’s Funeral Home. This can be very depressing to a standup comic like me, so in February, I relax the house charge account limit and let my riffraff pals in for the company of it. Costly, but comforting. Without an audience, I veg out.
The only problem is on the first Monday in the month. The assemblage in the bar lounge is paying more attention to Tall Tommy Tanuka than they are to me.
Ingrates.
But who’s to cavil. Tall Tommy is the best in his business, which is being a professional liar. I don’t mean like an ad man or a PR guy — mere pikers. Tall Tommy is world class in mendacity, and he makes one swell living at it, too, which is another reason not to cavil because at least he’s paying cash for his potables.
You see, Tall Tommy Tanuka sells lies to people in tight spots. For instance, let’s say a guy gets lost with a bimbo for a couple of days and wants to go home to wifey. What excuse is he going to use? Most of us would come up with some wimp-type lie that a cloistered nun could see through. But call in Tall Tommy, and man, you’ve got yourself a beauty, a scenario complete with all the trimmings. He is so good that in his presence polygraph machines blow fuses and truth serum curdles.
So it’s around eleven P.M. of this Monday in a dreary February, and Tall Tommy is telling us about a mob type who’s on his deathbed over in Jersey and calls for Tanuka’s services. The hood knows that his minutes are numbered, and he wants a great story to tell St. Peter so he can get inside the gates of heaven. It’s the high point, the apex, of Tall T’s career — he’s going to put one over on God. Now that’s chutzpah; that’s a pro!
His rendition is so terrific it is moving Barry Kantrowitz, my partner (and former agent, when I was working the flat floors on the road) to tears.
“You know, Chick,” Barry says to me, “this is the ligner of ligners. Even God would believe him!”
I didn’t get to answer him because there was someone at my elbow, someone I was glad to see because he is my favorite millionaire and we sorely needed another paying guest. Jay Porter Pemberton is a Wall Street type, old money, stuffy, but a very nice guy. He looked awful.
“Could I speak with you privately, Chick?”
My “sure, Jay Porter,” and his “privately” didn’t make a dent in Barry, who came along with us to the back office. Pemberton didn’t seem to mind, so I let it ride, but I thought he should have stayed. One of these days he’s going to need a plausible fib to tell the Big Booking Agent in the Sky. Boy, does he have things to answer for — like screwing up my career.
I grabbed the chair behind the desk before Barry could get to it. A guy behind a desk is always in control. Barry flopped on the leather couch, but Pemberton preferred to pace up and down like that poor puma I love over in the Central Park Zoo. (I’m going to turn that blue-eyed thing loose someday.)
“Why don’t you take a seat, Jay Porter? The broadloom needs a rest.”
“Chick,” he said nervously, taking one of the Eames chairs facing me, “I came to you because I haven’t any place else to turn. You’re experienced in such matters, and...”
He had taken a paper from his jacket pocket and was waving it about as he rambled on. I reached over and took it from him. Rude, perhaps, but the suspense was becoming too intense. It was a Xerox copy of a letter from a lawyer in Providence, Rhode Island, to someone named Samson Velker on East 89th Street in Manhattan, advising him of a legal strategy. It seems Jay Porter had been playing kissy-kissy with Velker’s wife, Gina. Now I understood the “you’re experienced in such matters” statement. I wasn’t insulted — a guy with three divorces behind him is beyond insults.
Barry gets into the act by coming to the desk and reading over my shoulder. “Having a conversation with a man’s wife is criminal?” he asks. “A million dollar conversation!”
“Criminal conversation is a concept in common law,” Jay Porter explained. “It gives a spouse the exclusive privileges of sexual relations with his partner. I looked it up. Rhode Island is a common law state.”