so.â
âNot on dogs,â Amato said.
âHeâs just doing that,â Frankie said. âHeâs gonna use that to buy something, soonâs he gets enough. Thatâs what Iâd like to do, I got something in mind like that myself. But first I got to get the money to buy the stuff.â
âWhat is it?â Amato said.
âThereâs this guy I know,â Frankie said. âI see him, he naturally wants to know, howâre things going? So we have a couple pops, heâs buying, and we talk, and then he says, well, heâs gotta go over this place and I can come along if I want, maybe Iâll see something.
âSo we go down this place,â Frankie said, âand itâs money. All twenties. Beautiful stuff. I had, I couldâve bought some of that stuff. I hadda thousand on me, I couldâve bought twenny thousand dollars of that stuff. And I tell you, itâs beautiful. You could move it under a floodlight.â
âBetter call the guy up,â Amato said. âTell him bye-bye. Heâs gonna get grabbed. He better pass the first one inna drugstore and get himself a new toothbrush. Heâs gonna need one.â
âJohn,â Frankie said, âwrong. This stuff is really good. The paperâs good, the inkâs good, the colorsâre right. I tell you. I really looked at that stuff. The guy that madeit oughta go take some of it to the government. Itâs betterân the real stuff.â
âThe guyâs Chubby Ryan,â Amato said.
âI dunno him,â Frankie said.
âHeâs not around,â Amato said. âHeâs in Atlanta. Heâs doing ten fuckinâ years for that beautiful stuff. That funny? You know something? I agree with you. Itâs beautiful stuff. Itâs fuckinâ near perfect. But Chubby, Chubby knows a lot about printing and all of that, but, see, Chubby hasnât got no fuckinâ brains. Just like your friend, there, Doglover. Heâs all right. He just donât know anything. Guys like him, the guys youâre always hanging around with, well, theyâre the only guysâre stupiderân Chubby. Because all that stuffâs good for now, except for wiping your ass on it, itâs to sell to guys like you, donât know any better, whatâs gonna start happening to them when they go out and start moving the stuff. Thatâs why the priceâs so low.
âYou know whatâs the matter with that stuff?â Amato said. âIâll tell you. Chubby took it out to fuckinâ Wonderland, is what Chubby did. He hasnât got no brains. He thinks, itâs good, heâs gonna move it all by himself. Heâs gonna go out the dog track and move the whole run, heâs so proud of that funny. So he did. He moved about ten thousand of it, all by himself, one single fuckinâ night. Five hundred of them goddamned beautiful things, and every single one of themâs got the same goddamned number on it.
âNow of course,â Amato said, âthem guys, run dog tracks, theyâre all stupid, arenât they? Betcher ass. Dumb as shit. Never occurred to them, race trackâs a good place to pass funny. No, not on your life. So they never train them tellers, look out for anything like bogus. So of course, them tellers never spot anything, the nightChubbyâs there, throwing twenties around like heâs apeshit and everything, absolutely not. So they only had about nine hundred security guys and some cops and the Secret Service all over the place when Chubby comes back, the eighth race. And you know what he says? They give him his rights and everything, he donât have to say a fuckinâ word, and if he didnât know that already, which he shouldâve, he knows now. And they tell him, heâs in the shit for counterfeit. And he looks at them and he says: âJesus Christ. I put them in coffee. They donât look