Catch Me If You Can Page 0,75

girl. But apparently I had now. However, I still wanted her in my bed, and having established her true calling, I made an attempt to establish her price. What the hell, I had plenty of money. "Uh, $300?" I ventured.

She grimaced prettily and shook her head. "No, I'm afraid $300 isn't enough,' she said.

I was astonished. Obviously I'd been cavorting in luxury for years without knowing the value of the wares I'd enjoyed. "Oh, all right, let's double it and say $600," I said.

She gave me a coolly speculative look. "That's closer," she said. "But for a man of your means, I should think it would be higher."

I looked at her and was irritated. I had established and followed a certain felonious code of ethics since taking up crime as a profession. Among other things, I'd never diddled an individual. For instance, I'd never purchased a wardrobe or any other personal item with a hot check. Too many department stores and business firms held an individual salesperson responsible for bogus checks. If a salesman took a check for a suit, and the check bounced, the cost of the suit came out of the clerk's salary. My targets had always been corporate targets-banks, airlines, hotels, motels or other establishments protected by insurance. When I splurged on a new wardrobe or anything else of a personal nature, I always hit a bank or a hotel for the needed cash.

It suddenly occurred to me that Cheryl would make a lovely exception to my rule. "Look, we could stand here all night and argue price," I said. "I hate quibbling. Instead of going to my place, why don't we go to your apartment, spend an hour or so there, and I'll give you $1,000."

She reached for her purse. "Let's go," she agreed. "But I don't have an apartment at the moment. I lost my lease and I'm staying at a hotel in Miami Beach." She named the hotel, which was one not too far from mine, and we were there within thirty minutes.

She was inserting her key into the door of her suite when I turned, saying, "I'll be right back."

She grabbed my arm. "Hey, where're you going?" she asked, somewhat agitated. "You're not going to back out, are you?"

I took her hand off my arm. "Look, you don't think I carry $1,000 in my pocket, do you?" I said. "I'm going downstairs and cash a check."

"At three-thirty in the morning!" she exclaimed. "You're not going to get a check cashed for that amount at this hour. You couldn't get one cashed for $100."

I smiled loftily. "I think so. I know the owners of this hotel. Besides, this is a certified cashier's check, drawn on the Chase Manhattan Bank in New York. It's like gold here. I cash them all the time."

"Let me see it," she asked. I reached inside my jacket pocket and extracted one of the Chase Manhattan counterfeits I'd acquired before coming to Miami. It was in the amount of $1,400. She examined the voucher and nodded. "It is like gold," she agreed. "Why don't you just endorse it over to me?"

"Uh-uh/' I declined. "This check is for $1,400. We agreed on $1,000, and while $400 isn't that important, a deal is a deal."

"I agree," she said. "So endorse it. I'll give you the $400." She dug in her purse and came up with a thin sheaf of $100s, from which she took four and handed them to me. I endorsed the check and handed it to her.

I have the sequel from what reporters call "reliable sources." Several days later, when her bank informed her the cashier's check was a counterfeit, she called the Dade County Sheriff's Department, furious. She eventually was contacted by O'Riley.

"Why'd he give you this check?" asked O'Riley.

"That doesn't matter," she snapped. "He gave it to me, and it's bad, and I want the bastard caught."

"I know," said O'Riley. "But I also need to know how this man thinks, so I can catch him. Your description fits Frank Abagnale, but he's never given any bad paper to an individual. He doesn't even pass bad paper in retail stores. Why, all of a sudden, is he giving a square John, and a beautiful woman at that, a worthless check for $1,400? What was the purpose?"

O'Riley is something of a con artist himself. He obtained the full story from her. "I don't mind his getting a free piece/' she concluded bitterly. "Hell, I've given it away before. But that