“Now of course,” Amato said, “them guys, run dog tracks, they’re all stupid, aren’t they? Betcher ass. Dumb as shit. Never occurred to them, race track’s a good place to pass funny. No, not on your life. So they never train them tellers, look out for anything like bogus. So of course, them tellers never spot anything, the night Chubby’s there, throwing twenties around like he’s apeshit and everything, absolutely not. So they only had about nine hundred security guys and some cops and the Secret Service all over the place when Chubby comes back, the eighth race. And you know what he says? They give him his rights and everything, he don’t have to say a fuckin’ word, and if he didn’t know that already, which he should’ve, he knows now. And they tell him, he’s in the shit for counterfeit. And he looks at them and he says: ‘Jesus Christ. I put them in coffee. They don’t look new.’
“You know what he did?” Amato said. “They give him his phone call and he calls Mike. And Mike says, Mike tells him, keep his mouth shut. And Mike goes down there, and, Mike knows everybody. So he goes in, and they’re all laughing at him, and he knows it, and he asks: ‘Why?’ And they show him the reports and stuff. And then Mike’s gonna go see his client. And he walks inna cell and he looks at him and Chubby says: ‘Boy, am I ever glad, see you.’ And you know what Mike says? He looks at him, and he says: ‘Chubby, this one’s for free. Plead it.’ And he goes out.
“See,” Amato said, “that’s your main problem you got today. You got guys that know how to do things but they don’t know nothing about having no fuckin’ brains, is all. They haven’t got no imagination. The only thing they can think of to do is the first thing they can see that looks good to them. Only, five hundred guys already did it before and everybody knows what’s going on, so you automatically go out there and you do it and they’re watching for you and they get you. You got to think of a different angle, something nobody else thought of for a while, or else you got to go down to Holbrook there and you go to fuckin’ work. Everything else’s a waste of time, and it’s dangerous, too, because you’re gonna do time.”
“Okay,” Frankie said, “you’re the guy with the angle. Tell me what the angle is. Only, don’t tell me, it’s the barbut, is all. I’m not going down that alley behind Billy’s Fish some night and wind up in Everett with a couple in my head. No fuckin’ way. I want dough. I’m not getting dead, gettin’ it.”
“How about,” Amato said, “well, look, let’s talk about it. Before we decide. You think Doglover there can handle a card game?”
“Well I mean,” Frankie said, “shit. Sure, anybody can. They can find one where they can go in and they haven’t got to go up against some kind of an arsenal. Those fuckin’ things, they just got less money in them’n the barbut’s got, is all. Those things’re protected. You can’t do them unless you’re so fuckin’ dumb you actually like having everybody going around tryin’ to off you.”
“There’s one you can do,” Amato said.
“There’s ten I can do, John,” Frankie said. “I know of at least ten of them I can do. But then after, somebody, everybody’s gonna have at least eight hot ginzos out looking for me.”
“Uh uh,” Amato said. “Do this one and they’ll, they won’t even look for you.”
“Why not?” Frankie said.
“Because the minute it fuckin’ happens,” Amato said, “they’re gonna know right off, who it is.”
“For some reason,” Frankie said, “that don’t make me feel better, you know, John?”
“Not us,” Amato said. “Keep in mind, I know how these guys think. They’re not gonna think, they’re never even gonna think it might be us or even somebody else. They’re pick one guy, right off, and go find him and whack him out and that’ll be it. And you and me and that little prick, if that’s the guy we get, we cut up about forty, fifty thousand dollars. No fuckin’ sweat.”
“I don’t know’s I go for setting somebody up,” Frankie said.
“You’re not setting him up,” Amato said. “He set himself up. Mark Trattman runs this game. This’s the second game Markie’s had. The other game got knocked off. Markie did it.”
“Ah,” Frankie said.
“He did it,” Amato said, “and there was all kinds of shit. One of the guys that got robbed was a doctor, and he had a brother was a state cop, and he was mad as hell, he was gonna do this and he was gonna do that and everybody’s running around, they hadda give the guy back about, I dunno, three or four thousand, to shut him up, and they go around and see Trattman. And he puts on this great act. And they believe him.
“So everybody pisses blood for a while,” Amato said, “the way they always do when the shit hits the fan, and there’s about a month or so goes by and everybody, nobody’s running any games or anything, and then, I think it was Tommy Balls, somebody says: ‘Fuck this,’ and he hires about ten guys to stand around and opens up and nothing happens. So they all look at Testa’s game, and nothing still happens, and after a while everybody’s open again and everybody’s happy.
“So one night,” Amato said, “the guys’re hanging around and they’re talking and all, having a few drinks, and finally one of them says how it’s funny, they had that thing and everybody got all jumpy and now they’re all running again and nobody’s tried it again. Probably having more guys around, huh? Well, Markie starts laughing. See, he can’t resist it. So he tells them, he did it himself. He got two guys to come in and he did it himself. The guys got five apiece, they’re a couple guys carrying hod that he happens to know or something, and he come out of it with close to thirty.”
“He’s lucky they didn’t put him to sleep,” Frankie said.
“Well,” Amato said, “he is. But you got to understand Mark. All the guys like Markie. He’s a genuine hot shit. And look when they find out: when everybody’s open again. They’d’ve found out it was him when the games’re all closed and everybody’s hearing footsteps and nobody’s making any money, then, I think, they would’ve done it to him. But they didn’t. And then, when they did, well, what the fuck, huh? It wasn’t none of their money and just as long as it doesn’t happen again, because all the customers, you’re not gonna get them coming in unless they think it’s protected, but the protection’s really there, well, shit on it.”
“I bet it probably wouldn’t happen again that way,” Frankie said.
“And that’s the angle,” Amato said.
“What’s it good for?” Frankie said.
“I figure,” Amato said, “I was there twice. I been there twice since I got out. I run into Markie one night, I was in town seeing what’s going on and looking around and I run into him and we had a couple drinks and he says, he tells me he’s got this thing and I should come up. So, twice, both times onna Wednesday. He runs it two nights a week, Wednesdays and Fridays. Now the guys that’re there, that come on Wednesday, there’s a few that come both nights but it’s really a different group the two nights. There was probably, I would say about forty thousand flying around the nights I was there. There’s this one creep that wears fuckin’ velvet pants, and he had at least five on him both the nights I was there. So, a little more, a little less. And of course that’s just what I saw. Most guys, go to something like that, they’ll carry a little more’n what they’re gonna let you see, case they get a bad run of cards and they got to ride something out. So you go in there, you’re gonna give everybody a nice little massage and everything, you’re probably gonna come up with, say, ten more.”
“Not bad,” Frankie said.
“Now there’s guys,” Amato said, “I was there, I heard talk, see, Markie just got divorced again and apparently he had a little party, had a couple hookers come in and eat each other and everybody had a great time and some of these guys’re pissed off, he didn’t invite them. ‘Friends only, no customers,’ he says. So they get on him, and some of the Friday night guys were there and that’s how these guys find out about it. ‘They’re good customers,’ Markie said, ‘good customers’re the same as good friends, my book.’ So I got an idea, there’s more dough there onna Friday’n there is onna Wednesday. So the question is, when’re we gonna do it? And I think, I still think, a Wednesday. Friday that place’s different. During the week it’s pretty quiet, but on Fridays and Saturdays they got a lot of people coming and going, getting laid and all, and that’s just another fuckin’ thing you got to think about, parties going on and everything. And I think, I dunno, I kind of think maybe there’s some guys in there, Fridays, don’t come Wednesdays, the kind of guys I don’t want to get pissed off. I didn’t see nobody there Wednesdays, had any muscle. I think it’s better.”