“No. How does it work? Make it simple. I’m not a lawyer.”
“You make your man believe the syndicate is going after one hell of a big piece of land. Everybody puts money into the syndicate trust account, on a share basis. The trustee is one of the syndicate. In this case it would be that man I told you about. The sucker thinks everybody is putting in cash. But, by separate letter of agreement, the trustee agrees to accept demand notes from the other partners, in view of their long association and so forth. There’s a clause in the syndicate agreement permitting additional assessments. Every time one comes along, the sucker comes up with cash and the others turn over promissory notes for their assessment. Another clause in the agreement says that if anyone can’t meet an assessment, they are dealt out, and their share is divided pro rata among the other partners. Another clause says that if it is decided the operation is not feasible, the syndicate will be disbanded and the funds in the trust account divided among the partners pro rata. So you just assess him until he’s dry, cancel him out with due notice, and a little while later close up shop and divide the pie. You have to keep him thinking that the whole thing is right on the verge of turning into a big fat gold mine.”
“And you got a piece of that pie?”
“Hardly. I got a twenty-five hundred dollar fee and a five thousand bonus. I was promised ten, but after it was over there was no way I could blow the whistle on them without putting myself in a sling, and they knew it.”
“What did they take the man for?”
“About two hundred and thirty thousand. When it was too late, he went to another lawyer. That’s how the news got all over town.”
“But you can still afford to lose five hundred dollars in a bridge game?”
He put his head in his hands. “Cut it out, will you?”
“Could you rig the same kind of operation again, for my man?”
“I don’t know. It’s a lot bigger. I don’t know how good my nerve is. I’d have to bring the other man in on it. Maybe he wouldn’t want to come in alone. Maybe he’d want to use the same people as before. They’d cut themselves big pieces.”
“So how could we defend ourselves against being left the small end?”
He shook his head. “I’ve got a headache, McGee. There are ways. You work this thing out in the open. We could set up the trust account so it would require three signatures for any withdrawal, and with our promissory notes being as good as the others, we could get in for any percentage we could dicker for.”
“He’s my man. What if we go for half between
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us, forty percent for me and ten for you? And let them cut the rest up any way they want, just so they swing it.“
“But wouldn’t he know you can’t come up with that kind of cash? I think it would have to…” The bathroom door opened and Vivian stared in at us. “What the hell are you doing?”
“I’m getting rich, sweetheart. Close the door. As you leave.”. I got a duplicate of the look she gave him. She yanked the door shut.
“One other thing, Watts. I suppose you have to set up a fictitious piece of property.”
“Oh, no. That would classify it as fraud. We dealt with the executor of the Kippler tract, sixtyone thousand acres. We made legitimate option offers.”
“So where are you if he said okay, let’s deal?”
“He couldn’t. It’s all tied up by the terms of the will. But how could we know that if he didn’t tell us?”
“And he didn’t?”
“No. He wrote nice letters. Seriously considering your last offer. Must discuss it with the heirs and the tax attorneys and so on. They went in the file, in case anybody ever had to see the file. And he kept demanding a higher option offer.”
“Which required assessments. So he was coached?”
“Of course. And he got a nice little gift afterward. Hell, McGee, the whole file on this thing is clean. as a whistle.”
“Could we use the same tract again?”
“Well… not on option terms. Too much money involved this time. Maybe on a purchase basis. With a good chance of resale if we could pick it up right, say at two hundred an acre. Twelve million. Then your man comes in for one twelfth… something along that line, where it would leave enough plausible spread to assess him out of the picture. You see, you have to know just about the absolute total the sucker can come up with. Once hooked big, then they have to keep throwing more in because they think it’s the only way they can protect themselves. The beauty of it is that when it’s over, they are picked so clean there’s hardly any chance at all of them coming up with any civil action to recover, and it’s a little too clean to make it attractive to any lawyer to tackle on a contingency basis. What’s your man’s name?”
“We’ll have to think about this and talk about it later. What’s the name of your expert?”
“He might be busy with something else. You’ll get in touch?”
“Soon.”
“In the meantime, just for the hell of it, and it can’t do any harm, call your man and act excited and tell him you think there’s a chance you can get him into something that will double his money in a year. Is he interested in doubling his money?”
“He wants to be nationally known as a wheeler and dealer.”
“What line of work are you in?”
“Salvage and demolition.”
“On your own?”
“Without overhead. Whenever the right kind of job comes along, I bid it in, rent the equipment, subcontract everything I can, come out with a low profit percentage that’s big enough to live well until the next chance opens up.”
He nodded. “Very smart. Very nice. So why all this sudden larceny, friend?”
“I wasn’t the low bidder the last few times, and the operating capital is getting a little too puny.”
“How can I contact you, McGee?”
“I’m staying with friends. I’ll be in touch.”
I did not see Vivian when I left. And I would well imagine how Crane Watts would feel the next morning when he remembered the conversation. The man suddenly and artificially sobered has a period of fraudulent lucidity. He thinks he is under control, but the cerebral cortex is still partially stunned, all caution compromised. Attempts at slyness are childlike and obvious. The business of the shower had reassured him. If I was that careful to drown out any listening devices, then, hell, I had to be okay.
In the sober morning it would have a dreadful flavor to him, and he would be aghast not only at all he had told me, but at the memory of even contemplating the same sort of thing with so much money involved. He’d know it was too big for that same kind of operation.
But he was hungry. His seams were splitting and the sawdust was leaking. I wondered if he was bright enough to realize that under the seedy look of failure was an old time conscience, prodding him into self-punishment. Such as playing losing bridge for high stakes.
Now I had things to go on, pieces to pry loose. The solo operator is often invulnerable. But group operations are weak as the weakest thief in the team. An equation applies. The weakest is usually the one who gets the smallest end of the take. And knows the least. But because of the quasi-legality of this operation, Crane Watts had useful information. The big con often needs a plausible local front man. I could guess how Arthur’s money had probably been split. A hundred thousand to Stebber, fifty to Wilma, fifty to G. Harrison Gisik, the balance to Watts, Waxwell, the Kippler executor and operating expenses.
The role of Boone Waxwell troubled me a little. Beating Arthur so severely had been stupid. But maybe they felt they needed an enforcer. For whom? Watts wasn’t likely to get out of line. Perhaps there’d been a germ of truth in their story to Arthur, that Waxwell was essential to negotiations on the Kippler tract. That could mean control of the executor. And where was the coldly efficient Miss Brown? And would that cheap redhead with the improbable name-Dilly Starr-know anything useful if she could be found?