Catch Me If You Can (14 page)

One day I returned from foraging among Berkeley ’s money houses to find there was no room in either my suitcase or my duffel bag for clothes. They were both full of loose bills. I was stealing faster than I could spend. I took $25,000, went to a San Jose bank, rented a safe-deposit box under the name of John Calcagne, paid three years’ rent in advance and stowed the cash in the box. The next day I went to a bank in Oakland and repeated the procedure, using the name Peter Morelli.

Then I went back to San Francisco and fell in love.

Her name was Rosalie and she was a stewardess for American Airlines. She lived in an old house with five roommates, all stews for American, too, and I met her when I encountered the six of them on a bus returning from the airport. They had been to the airport on legitimate business. I had been there perpetrating a little light larceny. We started dating that same night.

Rosalie was one of the loveliest women I’d ever met, and I still think so. She had frosted blond hair and, as I learned quickly, something of a frosted nature. At twenty-four she was still a virgin, and she informed me on our second date that she intended to stay chaste until her wedding day. I told her I admired her attitude, and I did, but it still didn’t stop me from trying to undress her anytime we were alone.

As a companion, Rosalie was delightful. We shared an enjoyment of music, good books, the ocean, skiing, the theater, travel and a score of other pleasures and pursuits. Rosalie was devoutly religious, and like me a Catholic, but she did not insist that I attend mass with her.

“Why don’t you preach to me about my sins?” I asked her in a bantering tone one day after picking her up at church.

She laughed. “I don’t know that you have any, Frank,” she replied. “You sure don’t have any bad habits that I’m aware of. I like you like you are.”

I found myself getting closer to Rosalie each time I was with her. She had so many good qualities. She seemed the epitome of the kind of woman most young bachelors dream of finding for a wife: she was loyal, clean-cut, intelligent, even-tempered, considerate, lovely and she didn’t smoke or drink. She was all apple pie, American flag, mom and sis and spring rolled up in a Girl Scout sash.

“Rosalie, I love you,” I said to her one night.

She nodded. “I love you, too, Frank,” she said quietly.

“Why don’t we go visit my parents and tell them about us?”

Her parents lived in Downey, south of Los Angeles. It was a long drive, and en route we stopped and rented a cabin near Pismo Beach. We had a wonderful evening, and when we resumed our journey the next morning, Rosalie was no longer a virgin. I really felt bad about it, for I thought I should have been more considerate of her virtue, which I knew full well she valued highly. I apologized repeatedly as we drove down the coast in her car, which she had insisted we use.

Rosalie snuggled up to me and smiled. “Stop apologizing, Frank,” she said. “I wanted to do it. Anyway, we’ll just add that one to our wedding night.”

Her parents were nice people. They welcomed me warmly, and when Rosalie told them we were going to be married, they were enthusiastic and congratulated us warmly. For two days all I heard was wedding plans although I hadn’t actually asked Rosalie to marry me. But it seemed taken for granted that I had, and her parents obviously approved of me.

But how could I marry her? She thought I was Frank Williams, a Pan Am co-pilot with a bright future. I knew I couldn’t maintain the pose if we were married. It would be only a matter of time before she learned I was really Frank Abagnale, a teen-aged swindler with a phony front and a dirty past. I couldn’t do that to Rosalie, I told myself.

Or could I? I had $80,000 or $90,000 in cash, ample funds to finance the beginning of a marriage. Maybe Rosalie would believe me if I told her I didn’t want to fly anymore, that I’d always wanted to own and operate a stationery store. I didn’t, really, but it was the one honest trade in which I was versed. I dismissed the idea. I would still be “Frank Williams,” and Frank Williams would still be a hunted outlaw.

What started as a pleasant visit turned into an ordeal for me. I felt I really loved Rosalie, and I felt I really wanted to marry her, but I didn’t see how under the circumstances.

However, Rosalie thought she was going to marry me. And her parents thought she was going to marry me. They happily charged ahead, setting the date for a month hence, making up a list of whom to invite, planning the reception and doing all the things parents and a daughter do when the girl’s about to become a bride. I took part in many of the discussions, outwardly happy and eager for the day, but inwardly I was tortured with guilt, burning with shame and totally miserable. I had told Rosalie and her parents that my parents were on a European vacation, and they agreed they should wait until my parents returned, which I said should be within ten days, before finalizing any plans.

“I’m sure your mother will want to have a hand in this, Frank,” said Rosalie’s mother.

“I’m sure she would,” I lied, although I was sure my mother would like to get her hands on me.

I didn’t know what to do. I was staying in Rosalie’s home, in the guest room, and at night I’d lie in my bed and I could hear the murmur of her parents’ voices in their room across the hall, and I knew they were talking about their daughter’s marriage to such a fine young man. It made me feel rotten.

One afternoon Rosalie and I went bike riding and we ended up in a park, sitting under a giant shade tree, and Rosalie, as usual, was chattering about our future-where we’d live, how many kids we’d have and so on. I looked at her as she talked and suddenly I felt she’d understand, that she loved me enough to not only understand but to forgive. One of the traits I loved most in her was her compassion.

I put my hand gently over her mouth. “Rosalie,” I said, and I was surprised at my calmness and composure. “I need to tell you something, and I want you to try and understand. If I didn’t love you so much, I wouldn’t tell you this at all, for I’ve never told anyone what I’m going to tell you. And I’m telling you, Rosalie, because I love you and I do want us to get married.

“Rosalie, I am not a pilot for Pan American. I’m not twenty-eight, Rosalie. I’m nineteen. My name is not Frank Williams. My name is Frank Abagnale. I’m a crook, Rosalie, an impostor and a check swindler, and I’m wanted by the police all over the country.”

She looked at me, shocked. “Are you serious?” she finally said. “But I met you at the airport. You have a pilot’s license. I’ve seen it! You have a Pan Am ID card. You were in uniform, Frank! Why are you saying these things, Frank? What is the matter with you?”

She laughed nervously. “You’re kidding me, Frank!”

I shook my head. “No, Rosalie, I’m not. Everything I’ve said is true,” I said, and I laid it all out for her, from the Bronx to Downey. I talked for an hour, watching her face as I talked and seeing her eyes mirror in turn horror, disbelief, agony, despair and pity before her emotions were hidden behind a curtain of tears.

She buried her hands in her hair and wept uncontrollably for what seemed an eternity. Then she took my handkerchief, wiped her eyes and face and stood up. “Let’s go back home, Frank,” she said quietly.

“You go on, Rosalie,” I said. “I’ll be there shortly, but I need to be alone for a while. And Rosalie, don’t say anything to anyone until I get there. When your parents learn about this, I want them to hear it from me. Promise me that, Rosalie.”

She nodded. “I promise, Frank. I’ll see you later.”

She pedaled off, a lovely woman reduced to a forlorn figure at the moment. I got on my bike and rode around, thinking. Rosalie hadn’t said a lot, really. She certainly hadn’t told me everything would be all right, that she forgave me and we’d be married anyway. I really didn’t know what she was thinking, or what her reaction would be when I reappeared at her home. Should I even go back? All I had at her house were some sports clothes, a couple of suits, underwear and shaving kit. I’d left my uniform in my motel room in San Francisco, and I had my fake ID and phony pilot’s license in my pocket. I had never told Rosalie where I lived. I’d always called her or gone to her home. When she asked me once, I told her I lived with a couple of kooky pilots in Alameda and they were so weird they wouldn’t have a telephone or television in the apartment.

That had seemed to satisfy her. She wasn’t at all an inquisitive person, tending to take people as they presented themselves. That’s one reason I enjoyed her company and had dated her more than usual. I felt safe around her.

But I didn’t feel safe at the moment and I was beginning to doubt the wisdom of my impromptu confession. I forced myself to brush aside my misgivings. Whatever else she might do, in light of what she now knew, Rosalie wouldn’t betray me, I told myself.

I contemplated phoning her to get a reading on what her feelings were now, but decided to face her and press for a decision. I approached her home from a side street and just before reaching the corner I stopped, laid the bike down and walked along a hedge bordering a neighbor’s yard until I had a view of her house through the foliage.

Parked in front of Rosalie’s home was an L.A. black-and-white, and a second vehicle, which, while not-marked, was plainly a cop car, was parked in the driveway. A uniformed policeman was in the squad car scanning the street.

My lovely Rosalie had finked on me.

I went back to the bike and pedaled off in the opposite direction. When I reached the downtown district, I parked the bike and caught a cab to the Los Angeles airport. Within thirty minutes I was in the air, returning to San Francisco. I was plagued with a feeling I couldn’t identify the entire trip, and the nebulous emotion stayed with me as I packed, paid my motel bill and returned to the airport. I bought a ticket to Las Vegas, using the name James Franklin, and I left the Barracuda in the airport parking lot, the keys in the ignition. It was the first of many cars I purchased and abandoned.

I was still possessed by the odd feeling during the flight to Las Vegas. It wasn’t anger. It wasn’t sadness. It wasn’t guilt. I couldn’t put my finger on it until I stepped off the plane in Nevada. Then I identified the emotion.

It was relief. I was happy to have Rosalie out of my life! The knowledge astonished me, for not six hours past I’d been desperately seeking a way to make her my wife. Astonished or not, I was still relieved.

It was my first trip to Las Vegas and the city was everything and more than I’d imagined. There was a frantic, electric aura about the whole city, and the people, visitors and residents alike, seemed to be rushing around in a state of frenetic expectation. New York was a city of leisurely calm in comparison. “Gambling fever,” explained a cabbie when I mentioned the dynamic atmosphere.

“Everybody’s got it. Everybody’s out to make a killing, especially the Johns. They fly in on jets or driving big wheels and leave on their thumbs. The only winners in this town are the houses. Everybody else is a loser. Take my advice-if you’re gonna play, play the dolls. A lot of them are hungry.”

I took a suite at a motel and paid two weeks’ rent in advance. The registration clerk wasn’t impressed at all by the wad of $100 bills from which I peeled the hotel charge. A big roll in Vegas is like pocket change in Peoria, I soon learned.

I intended Las Vegas to be just an R amp; R stop. I followed the cabbie’s advice and played the chicks. He was right about the girls. Most of them were hungry. Actually hungry. Famished, in fact. After a week with some of the more ravenous ones, I felt like Moses feeding the multitudes.

However, as the Good Book sayeth: He that giveth unto the poor shall not lack.

I am feeding a famished gamin poolside. She has been living on casino free lunches for three days while trying to contact a brother in Phoenix to ask for bus fare home. “I blew everything,” she said ruefully while devouring a huge steak with all the trimmings. “All the money I brought with me, all the money in my checking account, all I could raise on my jewelry. I even cashed in my return airline ticket. It’s a good thing my room was paid in advance or I’d be sleeping on lobby couches.”

She grinned cheerfully. “Serves me right. I’ve never gambled before, and I didn’t intend to gamble when I came here. But the damned place gets to you.”

She looked at me quizzically. “I hope you’re just being nice, buying me dinner. I know there’re ways a girl can get things in this burg, but that ain’t my style, man.”

I laughed. “Relax. I like your style. Are you going back to a job in Phoenix?”

She nodded. “I am if I can get hold of Bud. But I may not have a job if I’m not back by Monday.”

“What do you do?” I asked. She looked the secretary type.

“I’m a check designer for a firm that designs and prints checks,” she said. “A commercial artist, really. It’s a small firm, but we do work for a couple of big banks and a lot of business firms.”

I was astonished. “Well, I’ll be darned,” I ventured. “That’s interesting. What do you do when you design and print a check?”

“Oh, it depends on whether we’re making up plain checks or fancy ones; you know, the kind with pictures, landscapes and different colors. It’s a simple operation for just plain checks. I just lay it out on a big paste-up board however the customer wants it, and then we photograph it with an I-Tek camera, reducing it to size, and the camera produces an engraving. We just put the engraving on a little offset press and print up the check in 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.”