1 The Reluctant Dick - The Case of the Not-So-Fair Trader (21 page)

“Just dropped in to see what condition my condition was in.” A unique reference to the 1970’s breakout hit of Kenny Rogers and his First Edition, featured in one of my favorite films,
The Big Lebowski
.

“Get out.”

I take a seat next to Doris.

“I do not appreciate your intrusions into my life, Mister Sherlock,” Doris says. “I have had calls from my bank, phone company, credit bureaus, and friends, telling me my accounts are being audited.”

“That wasn’t me.”

“I don’t care who it was
.
I want it stopped. You have no right to delve into my personal matters.” Doris speaks tough.

“I don’t, but the other two detectives do. They’re the ones doing all the delving.”

“I want it to cease immediately,” she says and adds, “
a
nd I want my share of the twelve million dollars.”

Heffelfinger has been quiet during Doris
’
and my friendly meet
-
and
-
greet. His fingers tap nervously on his adding machine.

“Why did Alvin bounce you off the payroll?” I ask Doris,
though
the question is really aimed at the money-man.

“You would have to ask my husband that question,” Doris says.

“He’s not available,” I say. “Would his accountant know?”

“There were fewer and fewer dollars available for payout.” The taciturn man finally speaks.

“Did you come off the rolls, too?”

“No.”

“Millie?”

“No.”

“Seems you got the short end of the stick there, Doris.” I face Heffelfinger. “Why?”

“Alvin’s orders.”

I turn back to Doris. “He was going to divorce you; wasn’t he?”

“No.”

“And I bet you signed one son-of-a-bitch of a prenup.”

Heffelfinger answers me with his eyes.

“No, our marriage was solid,” she tries to argue, “rock solid.”

“Bad choice of words.”

Doris agrees with me, but won’t admit it.

“I bet you curse the day you signed your name to those papers.”

“I’m set for life, no matter what happens,” she proclaims.

“And that’s why you’re here this morning
? T
rying to get an advance to pay off your tab at the Ritz?”

Heffelfinger answers me for the second time without speaking.

“Should have gone with the junior suite instead of the master, Doris. He who will not economize will soon agonize.”

Doris takes her purse, “You are a disgusting man, Mister Sherlock,” and storms out of the office.

“How could anyone who quotes Confucius ever be considered disgusting?” I ask Heffelfinger who folds his arms across his chest.

He shrugs.

“I have a feeling I just did you a favor.”

“What do you want?”

“I need a record of all the trades Alvin made in the past six months.”

“Can’t.”

“He used a computer,
there has to be a record.”

“Gone.”

“How about the clerk who made the trades?”

“Gone, too.”

“Where?”

“Don’t know.”

“What was his name?”

“Joey Villano.”

“Sounds like a character out of a TV show.”

“He looks like one, too.”

I sit back and try to reason with the man. “I know you have copies, why don’t you just hand them over, and I’ll get out of your hair?”

Heffelfinger takes my request as a personal affront as he runs his fingers over his mostly bald pate. “Can’t.”

“Why not?”

“Because someone already was here to claim that prize.”

18

Bureau of incompetence

Standard operating procedure was that an applicant had to have earned a law degree or a CPA to get into the FBI. This is not the case any longer, but the uppity attitude the educational requirement fostered remains alive and well inside the Bureau.

There are over eight hundred FBI agents in the Chicago office, more people than an entire day shift at the Ford Assembly plant on the South Side. Must be more crime than Fords around these parts. The offices are in the Dirksen Federal Building in the Loop. I have to visit three floors before I find the correct reception area.

“Excuse me
,
I need to speak with the agent involved in the investigation of illegal trading at the Board of Trade.” I smile at the camera photographing me as I speak to the receptionist.

“And you are?” She speaks with a lazy, distant timbre in her voice.

I show her my license.

“Are you here to sell insurance
? B
ecause, if you are, I have to tell you, we don’t allow solicitation on the premises.”

“No, I’m an insurance investigator.”

She clicks her thumbnail back and forth on the edge of the laminated card. “How would you know, sir, that there is an agent involved in such an investigation?”

“I’m a good investigator.”

“Sir,” she speaks in a drone of a tone, “if there was an agent, and I’m not saying there is, in an investigation of the Board of Trade, and I’m not saying there is an investigation
; but if there was
it would be classified
,
and he or she would not be available to outsiders such as you.”

I raise one finger to halt our conversation, pull out my cell phone and dial.

“No cell phones, sir
,
you’ll have to go outside,” she orders.

I keep my finger raised to keep her at bay until Norbert answers my call.

“Who’s the FBI guy on the Board of Trade case?”

Norbert says, “Guy named Romo Simpson.”

“Romo
. W
ho the hell would ever name their kid Romo?”

“Mister and Mrs. Simpson,” he answers.

I hang up my phone, smile again for the camera. “I’d like to speak with agent Romo Simpson.”

Her voice changes not one iota. “And who should I say is calling?”

“Alvin J. Augustus.”

She glances back to my license. “That is not the name on your insurance badge.”

“I go by an alias, since I’m still wanted in a few states.”

I wait about fifteen minutes,
during
which time the reception phone does not ring and no other guest arrives. This would be a perfect place for Alvin’s fired receptionist, if her career as a dental hygienist doesn’t pan out.

Romo Simpson comes into the lobby.

It takes me about six seconds to size him up, three of which I
spend
reading an old copy of
Field and Stream
. W
hy the FBI would subscribe to this publication is a mystery to me.

Agent Romo wears a blue suit, rep tie, and a white shirt so starched it could stand up by itself
. H
e looks exactly like all the other agents wandering the halls. Good cover, men. He’s in his mid-thirties, probably has 2.3 kids at his suburban home, and his wife drives an American made SUV. He has that nervous energy of youth bubbling out of his pores
.
“Mister Augustus, I presume?”

“He couldn’t be here, so I came in his place. Richard Sherlock.”

We shake hands. He sits down in the chair across from me and notices the magazine in my hands.

“I’m not really into this,” I explain. “My idea of camping is two John Denver records in a Holiday Inn.”

He remains stiffer than his shirt. “Yes?”

“I am trying to find out who killed Alvin and I thought I’d stop by and see why you were investigating his trading practices.”

“Who said I was doing that?”

“You offered him immunity for turning state’s evidence.” I have no clue that anyone made Alvin this offer, but I throw it out to see if I can get a rise out of Romo.

“We did?”

“I’ll take that as a yes,” I say and quickly continue. “You needed a player who knew everybody and everything going down on the floor to make a case, so you picked Alvin.”

Romo’s eyelids flick twice. He should never attempt a career playing poker.

“Alvin would be the perfect squeal, except that old Alvin could have been the biggest perpetrator of the crimes being investigated
,
and you’d find yourself in betwixt and between.”

I’ve struck a tender nerve
. H
is eyelids are flapping faster than a butterfly’s wings. “Come with me,” he says.

I pick up my license on the way past the receptionist. “It was a pleasure, Miss.”

Romo leads me into a small conference room, closes the door behind him and points me to the middle chair. I sit and immediately fondle the poorly hidden small microphone in the cup of pens and pencils in the middle of the table. “What I say isn’t going to end up on one of those reality shows on TV, is it?”

Romo sits and rolls up his sleeves, cracking some of the starch in his shirt. “You think he was killed to keep him from talking?”

“I don’t know. The more I dig
,
the more reasons and people I find that wanted poor Alvin in the grave.” I fold my hands together to convey an air of innocence. “Did you figure out how he was skimming the fat off the soup?”

“We have a pretty good idea.”

Yeah, right.

“I got a guy who could figure out the trading patterns in about an hour, if you want to hand over the last month or two of his records.”

“I can’t do that
. I
t’s classified.”

“I promise I won’t tell.”

Romo tightens his already taut tie.

I reach into my jacket pocket and pull out a copy of the photo of the guy seen coming out of the condo on Astor Street. “You know who this is?”

He studies the picture, turns to the telephone console, pushes a button and says “Delia, could you come in here a second?”

A career secretary enters. She’s about ten years from retirement, but obviously wishes she was much closer.

“Make me a copy, then put this guy through the system.”

“Yes, Mister Simpson.” Calling this guy Mister is a true chore for this poor woman.

“We’ll find out,” Romo assures me.

“Will you let me know
too?”

He thinks this over. “I’ll have to clear it with my supervisor.”

“It seems only fair.”

“What else do you have for us, Mister Sherlock?”

“Actually, the reason I came here was the reverse of that process.”

“You know I can’t discuss the status of an ongoing investigation.”

“I’m not supposed to do that either, but seeing we’re rowing in the same boat…”

“FBI policy.”

“So, if I figure out how it all worked, how Alvin manipulated the market, before and after you made the deal with him and
including
the fact he probably scammed the Bureau in the process, you wouldn’t want me to tell you?”

“I didn’t say that.” Romo’s eyes are blinking faster than a strobe light.

“Thank you for your time, Agent Simpson, you have been more than informative.”

“I have?”

“Yes, quite.”

I have left poor Romo with the problem of figuring out what he has unknowingly let out of his bag. This will ruin the rest of his day.

___

In any investigation, it is often more important to find out what people don’t know, than it is to find out what they do know. In this case, the FBI doesn’t know how the Board of Trade is being manipulated. All they know is that cash is disappearing at an alarming rate. With no solid evidence, the FBI makes a deal to find out what they don’t know. This is risky, because once the cat is out of their bag, all the rules change. They deal with Alvin, who tells them what he wants them to know -- not what he knows -- because he knows they are in no position to make a deal. The FBI is now stuck, Alvin knows they are onto him, so Alvin can change his M.O. to work around the FBI and point the finger at the other guys who don’t know what he knows. Old Alvin turns out to be one sharp cookie, at least until his skull got crushed.

My rule of thumb on deal-making is: you make a deal only when you have to make a deal, unless you’re a TV game show host.

Anyway, Romo’s non-information assures me that Alvin was certainly not losing money hand
-
over
-
fist due to lousy gambler’s luck and addiction
as
Heffelfinger claimed. He has also told me a clock was ticking,
that
there were more people involved than merely Alvin, and
that
we’re not talking a few quarters being pilfered out of weekly milk money. Any case big enough for the FBI to put a hotshot like Romo Simpson on it is a big case.