Catch Me If You Can Page 0,54

blocks or sheets. Anybody could do it, really, with a little training."

Her name was Pixie. I leaned over and kissed her on the forehead. "Pixie, how'd you like to go home tonight, by air?" I asked.

"You're kidding me?" she accused, her eyes wary.

"No, I'm not," I assured her. "I'm an airline pilot for Pan Am. We don't fly out of here, but I have deadhead privileges. I can get you a seat to Phoenix on any airline that serves Vegas from there. All it'll cost is a little white lie. I'll say you're my sister. No other strings attached, okay?"

"Hey, all right!" she said delightedly and gave me a big bear hug.

While she packed, I bought her a ticket, paying for it in cash. I took her to the airport and pressed a $100 bill in her hand as she boarded the plane. "No arguments," I said. "That's a loan. I'll be around to collect one of these days."

I did get to Phoenix, but I made no effort to contact her. If I had, it wouldn't have been to collect but to pay off, for Pixie let me into the mint.

The next day I sought out a stationery printing supply firm. "I'm thinking of starting a little stationery store and job printing shop," I told a salesman.

"I've been advised that an I-Tek camera and a small offset press would probably meet my initial needs, and that good used equipment might prove just as feasible from an economic standpoint."

The salesman nodded. "That's true," he agreed. "Trouble is, used I-Tek cameras are hard to come by. We don't have one. We do have a fine little offset press that's seen very limited service, and I'll make you a good deal on the press if you take it along with a new I-Tek. Let you have both for $8,000."

I was somewhat surprised by the price, but after he showed me the machines and demonstrated the operating procedure of both, I felt $8,000 was a paltry sum to invest in such gems. An I-Tek camera is simply a photoelectric engraver. It photographically produces an engraving of the original copy to be reproduced. The lightweight, flexible plate is then wrapped around the cylinder of an offset press, and the plate prints directly on the blanket of the press, which in turn offsets the image onto whatever paper stock is used. As Pixie said, anybody could do it with a little training, and I acquired my training on the spot.

The I-Tek camera and the small press, while not overly heavy, were large and bulky, not objects to be carted around the country as part of one's luggage. But I planned only a limited ownership of the machines.

I located a warehouse storage firm and rented a well-lighted cubicle for a month, paying in advance. I then obtained a cashier's check for $8,000 and bought the I-Tek camera and the press and had them delivered to the storage room. The same day I made a round of stationery stores and purchased all the supplies I needed-a drawing board, pens and pencils, rulers, a paper cutter, press-on letters and numerals, a quantity of safety paper in both blue and green card stock of the type used for the real expense checks and other items.

The next day I closeted myself in my makeshift workshop and, using the various materials, created a 16-by-24-inch facsimile of the sham Pan Am expense check I'd been reproducing by hand. Finished, I positioned my artwork under the camera, set the reduction scale for a 2›V2-by-7V2-inch engraving and pushed the button. Within minutes I was fitting the plate around the drum of the press and printing sample copies of my invention.

I was astonished and delighted. The camera reduction had taken away any infractions and discrepancies in lines and lettering as far as the naked eye could discern. Using the paper cutter, I sliced one from the card stock and examined it. Save for the four smooth edges, I might have been holding a genuine check!

I ran off five hundred of the counterfeit checks before shutting down the little press and abandoning both it and the I-Tek camera. I went back to my hotel room, donned my pilot's uniform, stuck a packet of the checks in my coat and went out to buck the tiger.

The tiger, for me, was a pussy cat. I ironed out Vegas like a bed sheet. That afternoon and night, and the following day, I hit nearly a hundred casinos, bars, hotels, motels,

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