"My consigliere," continued Gobbo, "happens to be right here. He has all the deeds and shares right in that briefcase. Show the kid," he ordered.
A scholarly Italian stepped forward, adjusted his glasses and opened his case. He took out a huge stack of deeds and maps and laid them where Heller could see them and still watch the room and started leafing through the documents. That done, he took a bundle of stock out, showed Heller it was all of the authorized issued shares of the Scalpello Casino Corporation of New Jersey and left them in a pile on a chair.
"Well..." said Heller.
"Good thinking," said Gobbo. "Show him the contract," he ordered the consigliere. To Heller, he said, "I had this drawn up just in case you saw it our way and your own, too."
The consigliere laid the contract on a table to Heller's right. He tendered a pen.
Gobbo said, "You better use your own name, not that of Johnny Cattivo. We happen to know he's dead and you, I might point out, are not a ghost. When we saw this I.D. on the floor this afternoon, we checked on the computers. So at supper we had your pocket picked. The man got your real wallet before he tried to lift your gun. Only one man would have Johnny Cattivo's passport and that would be Jerome Terrance Wister."
The gunmen in the room stiffened, took their hands out of their pockets, showed empty, open palms and backed up.
Gobbo continued, "And so it says, directly on your own passport and driver's license." He opened the wallet he had taken out and read it. "Jerome Terrance Wister, the Whiz Kid himself. So maybe you didn't bribe the croupiers. Maybe you had a system, the first one in history that worked. But however that may be, not even Brinks could get that dough out of Atlantic City tonight or any other time, so you better sign that contract purchasing the whole of Scalpello Corporation. And with your right name."
"If you look at that passport you will find that it says," said Heller, "that Wister is only seventeen. As a minor, the contract would not be binding."
"Well, I'm looking at this passport," said Gobbo, "and I find that Wister had a birthday just three days ago and is eighteen and according to the new laws of New Jersey, that's of age. It's legal as legal. Call it a birthday present, and a nice one at that. Five casino hotels and all those other things. I got a notary right here, ready to witness the signatures. You're buying the whole thing for 'one dollar and other legal considerations.' I'll even leave the two G's in your wallet when I give it back so you can pay me the dollar out of your own money and no hanky-panky. It's not even bought with gambling winnings and all these here can witness it is so. So sign and give me the privilege of wishing you a Happy Birthday."
Heller took the pen and signed. Gobbo, his son and the consigliere also signed as the only ones who held shares. The notary notarized everything.
Then Gobbo put his hand on the contracts, holding them to the desk. "You get these as soon as you produce the money. Don't be uneasy. We are all just honest businessmen here. And you can even take Don Julio along and blow his guts out if, when you give us the money, we don't give you the contracts. He's my own son. How can you lose?"
Heller touched his collar. He said, "Dear, would it be convenient for you to bring the money to room 201? It is on the second floor. Just look at the numbers and arrows. I am sure the armed men here will give you no trouble."
They waited.
There was the clang of an elevator. Then sounds of something coming down the hall. A gunman there, keeping his hands very empty, gingerly opened the door.
A big laundry cart rolled in, piled to the top with laundry bags. What appeared to be an old chambermaid stood up. It was the Countess Krak dressed in hotel worker clothes and lines of age drawn on her face.
"Mother of God," said one of the men, "I passed her three times with that cart when we were looking on the sixth floor!"
But Gobbo was not interested in who had brought the cart in. He stood up. He signalled. The consigliere and two others began to lift the bags out. They opened the covering laundry sack and peered in at the money. They turned the open ends, one after the other, to Gobbo.
He went over and into each sack plunged his hand and verified there was no stuffing but money. He looked at many of the bills to make sure they were not counterfeit.
Bags were lying all over the floor! Big and fat.
Gobbo clapped his hands together twice and, with a gesture, had the bags closed and piled back into the laundry truck.
The capo then, with a gesture, had two men speed the laundry cart out of the room.
Heller's gun came up. But Gobbo was walking over with the contracts. Gobbo waited until he heard the elevator door bang shut and the car start down. With an elegant bow he handed the contracts to Heller. Then, with a very imperious gesture, like an orchestra conductor, he began to wave his arms at the men in the room.
"Happy Birthday," said Gobbo, in English.
The others in the room immediately began to sing. They sang:
Happy Birthday to you,
Happy Birthday to you,
Happy Birthday, dear Whiz Kid,
You've been fun to screw.
Then they all started laughing.
Gobbo said, "Put your gun away, Whiz Kid. Nobody would think of shooting you, now that you are the sole owner of the Scalpello Casino Corporation and all its vast properties. Three days ago, the New Jersey Gambling Commission told us that at the end of the week all our licenses were going to be cancelled for nonpayment of bribes and ordered us to sell the whole thing to anyone else who would buy it.
"But you see, Whiz Kid, nobody at all would touch any part of this corporation, for at noon tomorrow, by the clock, the Grabbe-Manhattan Bank, that owns all the mortgages, first and second, on all these hotels and property, is going to foreclose and take over everything it owns. They even blocked efforts to file bankruptcy by threatening criminal proceeding on other counts against the directors if we did.
"All the money that you won, Whiz Kid, went through the computers as legal gambling losses paid out to unknown people. It's all laundered money and untraceable. So you let us follow the New Jersey Gambling Commission ruling and it's you that Grabbe-Manhattan will now be foreclosing on! AND you've given us all these lovely millions as run money to go someplace nice and retire on. So Happy Birthday, Whiz Kid. The Virgin Mary herself must have sent you. Although, when we spotted you earlier today, I will admit we gave her lots of help."
He went over to his desk. He took a letter basket and piled a few personal knickknacks in it. He handed the basket to Don Julio to carry and directed him out the door.
The rest of the men filed out. Gobbo, the last one at the door, made a sweeping gesture with his hand. "It is all yours, Wister. Every bit of it. But there's just one more thing. I don't know why they call you the Whiz Kid. You're the dumbest (bleepard) in a business deal that I ever met!" He bowed. He was gone.
Heller stood there for a moment. Then he dived for the phone. He punched the buttons frantically.
A sleepy voice at the other end said, "Hello."
Heller shouted, "IZZY! HELP!"
The next day I lay in bed, overtaken by uncontrollable bursts of chuckling. I had been up all night due to time differences between Turkey and Atlantic City, and would have slept all morning in any event. But every time I thought of getting up after that, I would go into spasms of guffaws and would have to lie back.
Clever, clever Gobbo Piegare! What a friend I had in him! Between spasms of glee, I pondered the possibility of awarding him in some way: maybe send him a stuffed bluejay, that ace of robbers, mounted on a gold base. Or maybe get Senator Twiddle to put him up for the Congressional Medal of Honor or get Rockecenter's attorney Bury to nominate Piegare for the Nobel Prize as hit man of the year.