Station. “Damn, you’re good,” he said. “Hey, what are you doing right now?”
“Wishing I hadn’t answered the phone.”
“Yeah, great, fine, terrific. Listen, what do you think about this? I’m a passenger on a train, right? And I’ve got this bag, like a doctor’s bag, or maybe a briefcase, and I leave it on my seat, unattended. Go for a drink in the club car.”
“Who’d buy?”
“Ha fucking ha. Do you want to hear the grift or not?”
“Go on.”
“So okay, so when I come back, I look inside and, Whoa! My money’s all gone. Where did it go? Who stole it? And it was for my sister! Who’s a nun!”
“Your sister the sister?”
“That’s right. It was for orphans. Blind ones. Or no, not blind. What do you call it when the mouth’s all screwed up? Cliffed palate?”
“Cleft.”
“That’s the one. So anyway, I sob it up for a while, till the other passengers all pitch in to make me feel better.”
“Or maybe just to shut you up.”
“That works, too. What do you think? Class A con?”
“But nobody messed with your bag.”
“Yeah? So?”
“People will have seen that. They’ll know you’re lying.” Like everybody always knows a Mirplo is lying because that’s all a Mirplo ever does.
“Oh. Oh, yeah, you’re right. Damn, I thought that one was foolproof.”
“Depends on the fool.”
“Shit. Damn. Where am I gonna get some money?”
I suddenly had an idea. Probably a bad one, but when you can’t fight fire with fire, you fight it with fools. “I know where you can get some coffee,” I said.
I waited for Vic on a side street around the corner from Java Man, and it wasn’t too long before he drove up in his forlorn Song Serenade, an exhausted Chinese beater he called Shirley Temple and loved with all the passion a man can have for a sedan as fundamentally flawed as he is. The driver’s door squealed a pained protest as he opened it and clambered out. With his greasy hair pulled back in a lank ponytail and a flannel shirt hanging from his bony chest, he had the look of a grunge junkie, Seattle, circa 1990. “What’s the gaff?” he asked, his eyes almost wet with excitement. “Who are we taking down?”
“No gaff,” I said. “I just need you to check something out.” I gave him a description of Allie—cinnamon shag and those teal eyes being the key signifiers—and sent him in to see if she was there and who she was with. “Take your time,” I said. “Look around. Her team’ll be spread. See who she makes eye contact with.”
“Got it,” said Vic. He started off, then turned back. “Uhm …” He rubbed his thumb against his fingers.
I forked over a five spot. Vic cocked a brow. “What?” I said. “Not enough?”
“Lattes don’t grow on trees, man.” I handed him a ten. He “forgot” to give back the five. Say this for a Mirplo: they work every inch of the grift.
He sidled off. A few minutes later he returned, holding a cup the size of a tub. “Does this feel light to you?” he asked, hefting the drink. “It feels light to me. Why can’t they foam it all the way up?”
“Hey, Vic, how heavy is foam?”
“Oh,” he said. “Oh, yeah. I see your point.” He took a sip, and recoiled in pain, sloshing some of the drink on the ground, and some on his ratty jeans and bad sneakers. “Ow! Shit! I burned myself.” He eyed the cup speculatively. “Think I can sue?”
“Later,” I said. “Did you see the girl?”
“Yeah, no, she’s not there.”
“Are you sure?”
“Dude. You send me in to check out a notable rack of lamb, and you don’t think I’ll spot her? She’s not there.” He got a faraway look in his eye as he mentally called up the scene inside Java Man. “There’s … let’s see … two goth-looking counterettes, one with bad acne, the other with a lip ring which I’m here to tell you does not do a thing for her look, some sad pud pounding away on his laptop, a Brian Dennehy-looking motherfucker by the door, and a creepy wedge with a sex offender goatee reading the New York Times.”
“Did you check the bathroom?”
“Does a dog fart? I’m not stupid, Radar.”
“That’s debatable.”
“And that’s beneath you. Who is she, anyway?”
“Nobody. Just this chick I met.”
“Well, she stood you up. Wanna go shoot stick? We could hustle.”
“Vic, …” I was about to point out that you had to have some kind of skill to make the