Jack and Sheila Wilson had not let the gym bag out of their sight since they boarded America West Flight 1787, nonstop from SeaTac Airport to Las Vegas.
Right now it was nestled under Jack’s feet, next to the small overnight bag they were sharing. The moment of truth was approaching; win or lose, they’d be leaving Las Vegas in the morning. He touched his waist for the hundredth time. The money belt with the reserve fund was still there, under his shirt. They had agreed to preserve a tenth of the total amount he’d “expropriated.” God-forbid money, Jack called it.
Wilson squeezed his wife’s hand. “Nervous?” he asked.
“Petrified,” she replied, returning the pressure. “But excited. Look, Jack, I know what I said earlier. It’s just that we’ve been so honest all our lives. I never thought we’d ever get involved in … anything like this. And in a way, I never believed it was actually going to happen. But we’re in it now. And I guess whatever happens, you know, we’re in it together.”
He leaned over and kissed her cheek just as the seat-belt lights flashed on. The two-hour flight had passed in what seemed like minutes.
“In preparation for our landing at Las Vegas’s McCarran Airport,” the flight attendant droned mechanically over the speakers, “we ask you to please make sure that your seat belts are securely fastened and that your tray tables and seat backs are returned to their upright and locked positions. All carry-on baggage should be stowed under the seat in front of you or in the overhead bins. And thank you for choosing America West.”
They landed just as dusk was settling over the airport. The heat still shimmered on the desert floor, and the mountains that ringed Las Vegas took on a blue, then a purple hue as the evening light became increasingly
diffuse. With no checked baggage to collect, the Wilsons were able to walk directly out of the airport and hail the first cab in line. The illuminated triangular billboard on the vehicle’s roof advertised Tony Francisco at the Galaxy and exhorted readers to LIVE THE LEGEND. They settled back in the Whittlesea cab for the short ride to the Strip. Scrubby vacant lots riddled with billboards gave way to seedy motels, mini-malls, and apartment blocks. Then suddenly they were in another world. Confronted with the brilliance of the Strip, nature’s showy display faded behind the lights of the Tropicana, the Roman Palladium, the Flamingo, the Galaxy, and all the other brightly lit domains of decadence.
“Where are you folks from?” the driver asked.
Sheila answered, “We’re from Red—”
“Tacoma,” interrupted Wilson, nudging his wife gently. With a good-natured grin, he cupped his hand around her ear and whispered, “If we’re going to be ‘Fred and Dorothy Langdon from Tacoma,’ we might as well start now.”
She smiled self-consciously and whispered back, “Sorry—Fred, I forgot.”
Within a few minutes their driver turned left off Las Vegas Boulevard and pulled up under the giant cantilevered space wheel of the Galaxy Hotel and Casino.
Jack tipped the Latino cabdriver ten dollars and the Klingon doorman another five. “After all,” he murmured to his wife, “those Langdons can afford it.”
Jack Wilson was a native Washingtonian, born and raised within the salt smell of Puget Sound. At the age of forty-five, he was a cut below average in height, a pleasant, prematurely balding man who smiled easily and generally enjoyed life. Somewhat atypically, he was still happily married to his high-school sweetheart, Sheila. They had a son and a daughter, both now in their late teens. The kids had turned out well—there had never been a problem with drugs or alcohol or any of the other temptations to which today’s young people were exposed. For which Wilson gave full credit to Sheila’s firm hand.
Sheila was petite, dark-haired, and vivacious—and totally straight, as the kids were fond of pointing out with comic exasperation. She had planted the seeds of honesty and integrity deep into their consciousness at an
early age and tolerated no deviation from the high standards of conduct that she set for her family and for herself.
Which is why Jack Wilson had expected far more resistance from her when he proposed the Plan.
“My name is Fred Langdon,” said Jack Wilson. “I believe you have a room for us.”
“Yes, Mr. Langdon,” replied the female Galaxy desk clerk, tapping on her computer. She wore a uniform resembling that of a Romulan—or was it a Vulcan? Wilson would not have been overly surprised had Mr. Spock himself beamed down then and there to offer help with their bag. “Have you stayed with us before?”
“Ah, no—actually, we haven’t.” That much was true; they usually stayed at the Roman Palladium. No one knew them here, which was one reason the Wilsons, alias the Langdons, had selected the Galaxy for their desperate gamble. The other reason, equally crucial to their plan, was the Galaxy’s no-limit betting policy.
“I have you down for one night in a nonsmoking room with a king-size bed. Will that be satisfactory?”
“Perfect.”
“And how will you be paying, sir—cash or credit card?”
“Cash. I’ll pay now.”
“Thank you, sir.” She tapped on her keyboard. “With tax, it comes to one eighty-nine. However, I will need your credit card on file for incidentals.”
Wilson had foreseen this detail and confidently handed her a very real-looking but totally counterfeit gold American Express card. Along with a fake driver’s license and Social Security card, it had been the last of his purchases for the Plan.
Jack remembered his delight when he picked up the documents and the credit card. The old counterfeiter was a genius; his work had been perfect. And the proof of the pudding is in the eating, Wilson thought as the Galaxy’s Vulcan desk clerk handed the bogus Amex card back without a trace of suspicion. He had no intention of using the card for purchases; its sole purpose was to facilitate checking in and later to confirm his cover identity.
“Do you need any help with your luggage, folks?” the clerk asked. Jack tightened his grip on the gym bag. “No, we can take it from here.” “Enjoy your stay with us, Mr. and Mrs. Langdon.”
In the hotel room, Sheila tried to hide her nervousness. She made a great production of unpacking and arranging the contents of their single overnight bag. Her clothes went in one drawer, his in another. Nightgown and pajamas were laid out neatly on the bed; toothbrushes, toothpaste, cosmetics, and shaving kit were aligned symmetrically on the bathroom vanity.
She busied herself opening the curtains. She turned the TV on and off and adjusted the table lamps. She fussed and fidgeted, all the while maintaining a bright, nervous stream of chatter: “Look at the view, Jack. You can see the whole Strip. I just love this wallpaper, don’t you? I’ll hang our coats up in the closet. Honestly, they give you so much space in these rooms. Do you think anybody actually uses all these drawers? Have you got the extra room key in your pocket? Can we—”
Finally, Wilson could take no more. Putting his left arm around his wife’s shoulders, he held the tip of his right index finger to her lips. “Hey, relax, girl. Take a deep breath. It’s going to be all right.”
“Oh God, Jack, we’re really going to do it, aren’t we? I’m scared.”
“There’s nothing to be scared of. What’s the worst that can happen? Even if we lose, we’ve still got the reserve.” They had set aside part of the money in the event that their big gamble lost. It was only a fraction, about 10 percent of the amount he intended to bet, but it was enough to give them a bare-bones fresh start.
“You could be arrested for … embezzlement.”
“You’re having doubts again, Sheila. Look, I’ve covered my tracks pretty thoroughly. And even if they do catch me, they probably won’t press charges. Can you imagine how incompetent that would make Defcon look in the eyes of the Matsutachi people?”
“I still can’t help feeling guilty about what we’ve done.”
“I sure as hell don’t. And you shouldn’t, either. Technically, I may have committed a crime. But morally … let’s face it, they reneged on their promise to me. We’re only collecting on that promise.”
The whole sordid affair had angered and embittered Jack Wilson.
He saw it in black and white, his first inkling of the shocking news that was to destroy his career, spread over three full columns in the Sunday financial section of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. It had knocked the wind out of Jack Wilson like a blow to the solar plexus.
MATSUTACHI BUYS CONTROL OF DEFCON
TOKYO, January 6—Electronics giant Matsutachi Electric Company of Japan has purchased a controlling interest in Defcon Industries Incorporated, America’s sixth-largest defense contractor.
Kenzo Onishi, chief executive officer of Matsutachi, made the announcement today at a Tokyo press conference. Defcon chairman and principal class A shareholder William B. Swinden confirmed the buyout in a simultaneous press release from his company’s headquarters in Everett, Washington. Swinden said the sale will bring “a vital new competitive edge” to Defcon, adding that the transaction had been approved by U.S. regulatory agencies in return for “significant bilateral trade concessions by Japan.
Financial details of the multibillion-dollar transaction were not released, but industry analysts believe …
That was his company they were writing about! The company he had joined twenty years ago and helped build with his blood and sweat! How could he not have known? How could those bastards not have told him? It wasn’t like Swinden to keep him in the dark. Or was it? He thought back to those mysterious recent occasions when his inadvertent interruptions of Swinden’s earnest conversations with Defcon president Fred Harris and executive vice president Harvey Feldman had been met with brief, embarrassed silences. He hadn’t attached much importance to the incidents at the time. Then there were those unexplained trips Swinden had made to Japan. It had been happening right under his nose. He should have seen it coming. What an idiot he’d been!
Jack read the article a second time, and a third. At the end of the article, a footnote directed him to the newspaper’s editorial pages.
Here the Post-Intelligencer pulled no punches. In a stinging condemnation of the foreign buyout, the newspaper mirrored his own rising anger:
THE SELLING OF AMERICA
The consumer electronics business was the thin edge of the wedge. Then came the invasion of our automobile industry. Yesterday’s announcement by Matsutachi Electric Company of its purchase of Defcon Industries Incorporated, a leading U.S. defense contractor, represents an alarming assault on one of the last bastions of American entrepreneurship by Japanese multinationals.
By relinquishing de facto control of even a small segment of this sensitive industry to foreign interests, no matter how well intentioned, we are effectively mortgaging our collective birthrights. Furthermore, in sanctioning this encroachment, the federal government is risking an increased imbalance in the balance of economic power … .
At eight o’clock that Monday morning, Wilson had intercepted Swinden in the executive parking garage beneath the Defcon One building.
“Got a minute, Bill?”
“Sure, Jack. You’re in early.”
“Obviously not early enough. I guess I missed the meeting where you advised your key people about this … Japanese takeover.”
The CEO ignored the sarcasm. “Let’s walk up together.”
“Right. Well, are you going to explain why I wasn’t told about this Matsutachi thing? Or do I just wait for another press conference and read about it in the paper?”
“Sorry, Jack, honestly. It was a tough call.” They reached Swinden’s office, and he unlocked the massive oak door. “In the final analysis, we decided we couldn’t risk a leak. You know what that would have done to share prices.”
“You couldn’t risk a leak? Goddamn it, Bill!” Wilson followed Swinden inside, controlling his temper with difficulty. “If you couldn’t trust my discretion after all these years—”
“Really, it was nothing personal, Jack. The only people besides myself who knew about the buyout were the lawyers and, ah, the Commerce Department
people. Plus Fred and Harvey, of course.” Between them, Swinden, Harris, and Feldman controlled over 50 percent of Defcon’s preferred stock.
Jack’s eyes narrowed. “What about the CFO position?” Based on Swinden’s verbal assurances, he had assumed that the recently vacated post of chief financial officer was to be his. With a salary of five hundred thousand and stock options worth over a million.
The chairman hesitated. “Ah, I’m afraid there’s been a slight … reorientation in that area—pardon the pun.” Wilson was definitely not amused. “You know how the Japanese prefer to import their own people for these top jobs, especially in sensitive areas like finance—”
“This is my life we’re talking about here, Bill! This is twenty years of helping you build this company from a hole in the wall to number six in the business! I thought I had your word—”
“We were, ah, in an awkward position—”
“Just tell me this, Bill. Am I out?”
“Of course not. As far as I’m concerned, you’re still a key player on the team.” The CEO forced a thin, insincere smile. He turned away for a moment to raise the blinds on the huge picture window that overlooked the plant, and added something which Wilson didn’t quite catch.
“What did you say, Bill?”
“Hmmm?”
“I didn’t quite hear that.”
“Oh, I just said, ‘At least as long as I’m around.’”
Jack Wilson leaned over his boss’s desk and stared directly at him. “At least as long as you’re around? I see. And precisely how long will that be?”
Bill Swinden avoided eye contact, and Jack knew. Right then and there, he knew that it was over. “I’ve signed an eighteen-month contract with Matsutachi,” said Swinden lightly. “To smooth out the transition. After that, who knows?”
Well, I guess I do now, thought Wilson. You deceptive bastard, you’ve negotiated yourself a sweet little deal with your new masters—and totally abandoned the people who helped you on the way up. Your word isn’t worth shit. You’ll serve a year and a half of well-paid servitude, then you’ll get that megabuck golden handshake. You’ve taken care of number one quite handsomely. But where does that leave me? I’ll be forty-seven years old with two kids in college, nothing in the bank, and more than likely no job.
The Plan had occurred to Jack Wilson during their last trip to Vegas. He and Sheila had flown in for the weekend, right after the bad news about Defcon. They needed to get away and forget their worries about his future, at least for a couple of days. Wilson was playing at a twenty-five-dollar-minimum craps table in the Roman Palladium and had engaged the floorman in idle conversation during a lull in the activity.
“That was some hot streak huh?” The previous player had held the dice for close to twenty minutes before he finally “sevened out.” Like the majority of crapshooters, the man had been playing the pass line, betting that the first number he rolled would repeat before a seven came up.
“Yeah, he was hot, Mr. W. And he walked away a winner. Most of ’em don’t.
“I know. They get greedy and they give it all back.”
“And then some. How do you think we pay for all these lights?”
Wilson chuckled. “Losers are what keep you guys in business.”
“True. But we let just enough folks win to keep ’em coming back. Yesterday we gave away two hundred large to a guy from Philly.”
“Jesus, you mean he won two hundred thousand dollars? How much was he betting?”
“Well, the limit here is five thousand on any line bet.”
“That’s gotta be about the highest on the Strip, huh?”
“Just about. Mind you, there are some casinos that’ll let you bet any amount you want.”
Something clicked in Wilson’s mind. Any amount you want.
“No kidding. Ah, which casinos are we talking about here?”
“Well … there’s Binion’s Horseshoe Club downtown. And the Galaxy right here on the Strip.” Wilson had never visited either establishment. “I hear the Galaxy faded half a million dollars on one pass for some Arab king last year.” The floorman paused. “Don’t tell me you’ve got that kind of money burning a hole in your pocket, Mr. W!”
Wilson thought for a moment.
“Not yet,” he replied. “Not quite yet.”
Convincing Sheila was the hardest part of the Plan.
“Honey, are you asleep?”
She snuggled closer to him. “That depends. What did you have in mind?”
“Not that.” He smiled. “Not right now, anyway. I wanted to talk to you about the work thing. What if I told you I had a way for us to come out of this mess with all the money we’d ever need for the rest of our lives?”
“I’d listen!”
“So listen. But you’ve got to promise to hear me out, okay? No matter how crazy it sounds, just hear me out.” She nodded, frowning slightly, and he paused to organize his thoughts. “How can I explain this? Okay. You recall that movie we watched on TV the other night? Going in Style? About the three old guys who rob the bank. George Burns was in it. And Art Carney. And who was the other one … ?
“Lee Strasberg.”
“Right. Lee Strasberg. He dies after the robbery. The other two take some of the money and fly to Vegas and win a fortune at craps.”
“I remember you laughed and said you wished it were that easy.” She sat bolt upright in bed and looked wonderingly at her husband. “Jack, you’re not planning to rob a bank?”
“Not exactly. But what if I … in effect … borrowed some money from the company? Then I doubled it at craps, kept the winnings, and returned the original amount? They’d never know.”
“But wouldn’t that be … embezzlement?”
“Not really. Not if I paid it back.”
“That’s fine, but what if you lose?”
“The way I figure it, even if we do lose, we’ve still got about a ninety-five percent chance of getting away with it.” As a certified public accountant, Jack was on familiar statistical ground now as he explained the odds. “First, we’ve got close to a fifty percent chance of winning immediately, in which case I return the money I ‘borrowed’ and all our problems are solved.
“Second, if we don’t win, I calculate the chances of the auditors spotting the discrepancy and linking it to me are about the same: fifty percent. Fifty percent of fifty percent leaves about a twenty-five percent downside risk. Which is the same as seventy-five percent in our favor.
“And we wouldn’t bet all the money. We’d hold back a reserve to tide us over in case we did lose.
“Third, if we lose and if I get caught, what are the chances they’ll prosecute? One in five? Big corporations avoid publicity about these
matters like the plague. It makes them look incompetent. Twenty-five percent divided by five works out to maybe a five percent element of risk.”
Sheila was dubious. “How do you intend to double the money? Most of the time you play craps, you lose.”
“I know. But that’s because I make a lot of bets. And every time I make a bet, the house edge gets bigger. This time, I intend to make one bet, and only one bet, at the most favorable odds they offer.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Okay, honey, let me explain. Suppose the house advantage is one percent. And suppose every bet I make carries an even-money payoff, like the pass line with no odds. If I start with, say, a hundred dollars and bet it a dollar at a time, reinvesting the winning bets, on average I’d win ninety-nine dollars and lose a hundred and one. By reinvesting, I’d actually be putting two hundred dollars into play … and wind up losing two dollars, which is one percent of the money I’d bet. If I kept playing, I’d lose on average one percent on every sequence of bets, and eventually I’d lose it all. Or just not be left with enough to cover the table minimum.” He paused. “Now, supposing I took that same hundred dollars and bet it all just once. The odds against me would be only one percent. In other words, forty-nine and a half percent of the time, I’d win; fifty and a half percent of the time, I’d lose. That’s what I meant when I said we’d have close to a fifty percent chance of winning.”
“It’s still a bit confusing. You know I’ve got no head for numbers.” Sheila tried to absorb her husband’s logic. “What you’re saying is that the more you play, the less chance you have of winning.”
“Right. And the less you play, the better your chances.”
“How would you get the money out of the company?”
“I’d submit dummy invoices and pay them to ourselves.”
“You could do that?”
“Easily. Don’t forget, I’ve been with Defcon for twenty years and I know the accounting system inside out … mainly because I designed it.”
“How much would you … take?”
He told her, and she gasped. “You can’t be serious.”
“I am. Dead serious.”
“I don’t know, Jack. All our lives we’ve been honest—”
“And look where it’s got us.”
“We don’t know for sure you’ll lose the job. Maybe—”
“There are no maybes. Swinden as good as told me in his office.”
“Oh, Jack, it’s scary. This just isn’t like you.”
“I know. But I’ve done a lot of thinking lately.”
“What about the kids? All their lives I’ve tried to teach them honesty. How do we tell them?”
“How do we tell them we can’t afford to pay for their college tuition anymore? How do we tell them their parents are broke? They don’t need to know what we’ve done.”
“There must be another way.”
“Sure. We can scrimp and get by somehow. Maybe I could get part-time work doing people’s books. You’d probably have to get a job to help out. There wouldn’t be any more company car. We’d have to give up the house—there’s still ten years left on the mortgage. Not to mention the taxes and insurance. And forget about the charge accounts at Neiman’s and Sears. We’d be Kmart shoppers.”
Sheila felt herself weakening, falling into her husband’s mind-set. “Maybe you could get another job in the industry—”
“We’ve already talked about that. At my age I’ve got about as much chance of landing an equivalent position as a snowball in hell. Come on, babe, what have we got to lose? There’s only one chance in twenty that we’ll (a) lose, (b) get caught, and (c) get prosecuted. It’s still a gamble, but the odds are way better than just waiting for the ax to fall at Defcon.”
She was silent, her brow knotted in indecision. “Let me think about it.”
Neither of the Wilsons got much sleep that night.
The next morning over coffee, Sheila said: “I’m getting goose pimples just thinking about it. But those corporate cannibals really owe you. Let’s just do it.”
For Sheila Wilson, it was her husband’s remark about shopping at Kmart that finally tipped the scales in favor of the Plan.
In the hotel room, Sheila appeared thoughtful. “Jack, since we’ve gone to all this trouble, why don’t we just …”
“Just what, babe?”
She hesitated, unsure of the morality of what she was about to propose. Then she plunged ahead. “I mean, now that we’re criminals anyway, why don’t we just keep the money? Why gamble it?”
“We’ve talked about that.”
“I know, but—”
“Look, Sheila, I don’t want us to be criminals. I don’t want us to be forever looking over our shoulder. I want us at least to have a fair shot at replacing the money. That way I can thumb my nose at Matsutachi and Defcon and Swinden and his cronies with a clear conscience.”
“I suppose you’re right.”
“I know I am. Besides, I’m kinda looking forward to our big gamble. Can you imagine the rush when we win!”
“If we win.”
“George Burns and Art Carney did it. And they started out with a lot less cash than us.”
She perked up. “And they didn’t have me coaching them.”
“That’s the spirit.” He hugged her.
“You know, I’m amazed that we could fit all that cash into one gym bag. Maybe we should buy another one to take our winnings home in.”
“If—or should I say, when—the Plan succeeds, we’ll buy a whole new set of Gucci luggage. And we won’t even ask the price.” Jack Wilson held his wife a little tighter. “Hey, babe, I’ve got an idea,” he said. “Let’s go downstairs and hit the crap tables.”
Just as the Wilsons stepped off the elevator at the casino level, the Galaxy’s star attraction, the giant Saturn rocket, embarked on its hourly spectacular. A floor-shaking rumble emanated from powerful hidden speakers as a disembodied voice deeper than that of James Earl Jones counted down the seconds. “ … T minus three seconds … two … one … we have ignition!” Brilliant red, orange, and yellow fire spewed from the mighty exhaust manifolds in holographic splendor as the rocket actually appeared to lift off, rising higher and higher in the great atrium. Realistic plumes of liquid oxygen blended with swirling clouds of simulated exhaust at the base of the rocket while the thunderous sound effects peaked to a mighty crescendo.
The fiery exhaust died away, the sound faded, and the smoke cleared. The deep voice continued: “The Galaxy welcomes you to the future—the future of mankind, the future of entertainment. We hope you enjoy your visit, and we invite you to explore with us the wonders of the universe at our Final Frontier theme area, open daily from eight A.M. to midnight. And may Lady Luck smile on you in the Galaxy’s fabulous casino … .”
She’d better smile on us, Jack thought, shrugging off a feeling of unreality as he and Sheila walked hand in hand toward the dice tables.
They stopped at a five-hundred-dollar-minimum game. There were only two other players at the table, high rollers with respectable rows of black, white, and yellow chips in their racks. Both were betting with the dice.
“I think this is our table,” Wilson whispered to his wife.
“I’m so nervous,” she replied. He squeezed her hand.
Jack gathered his resolve and caught the eye of one of the floormen. “I’d like to make a large bet,” he said, indicating the gym bag.
“No problem, sir,” the floorman replied. “We have no maximum limit here. How much did you have in mind?”
Wilson took a deep breath. “A million and a half,” he said casually.
At precisely five P.M. Jurgen Voss initialized a preprogrammed sequence of commands that generated a direct voice connection between his computer and a telephone on the twelfth floor of an office tower in downtown Panama City.
Dan Shiller listened as the phone rang twice and a voice answered.
He spoke briefly, then motioned to Jurgen to sever the connection.
“I did not understand all this banker said,” Voss commented.
“He said exactly what I expected him to say,” Shiller replied. “The money isn’t there.”