July Heat
(June-July 2017)
3: Washday
On Sunday morning, while the kids were busy with other things, Stanley Pines sat in his home office at his desk, which he rarely used except when on the phone booking acts or planning an event, leaning back in his rolling chair with his big feet propped up and his head resting against the huge planning calendar hanging on the wall within easy consulting distance. Across from him sat a quiet, studious-looking fellow in a neatly trimmed gray beard and round rimless spectacles who had been listening intently to Stan's statement of his goal and his needs.
"So," said Stanley Pines that Sunday morning with a wave of his hand, "that's the skinny. Think you can take care of this for me?"
"Tricky," said the little man who sat on a stack of books in the chair opposite Stanley. Well, not man, exactly. And not little, at least for a Gnome, about average height for a male Gnome. Or, as he preferred, a Kobold. Kobolds, after all, are a somewhat different Scandinavian subspecies, and for a good portion of his life, Winziger Kobold had masqueraded as a Swiss Gnome.
Winziger tented his stubby fingers, looking rather like a bobblehead figure of the crooked landlord in It's a Wonderful Life. Behind his thick glasses, his blue eyes squinted in crafty concentration. "Let me see: currency, legitimate though unsourced. Work the deal so you don't get accused of hiding income in previous years. Process it so you can pay taxes and so forth—"
"Capital gains," Stanley said, holding up a finger. "Not straight income."
"Well, of course," said Win, who for a Gnome had an extraordinary grasp of mathematics and human—as well as monster—economics. Come to that, very few humans could compete with him in the heady world of what might be called subterranean finance. He was, after all, the head banker for the Crawl Space and its denizens. At last he pushed his specs up on his forehead, nodding thoughtfully. "Let me do some calculations."
Remarkably, he did them with an abacus and an old-fashioned crank calculator. Both of these he whipped out from beneath his jacket—unlike virtually all the other male Gnomes of Gravity Falls, Winziger wore a somewhat old-fashioned looking black and blue pin-striped business suit, very conservative. From an inner pocket he whipped out a transparent green eyeshade, donned it, and then with a face beaming with excitement and joy, got to work.
Leaning forward, Winziger set both the abacus and the adding machine on Stan's desk and made them clack and whir faster than Stan could follow. He could use computers, but preferred the older ways—faster, he said, and not so prone to error. He had earlier placed a legal pad and some sharpened pencils on Stan's desk, and without even stopping his flipping the abacus or punching the adding machine buttons, he filled up a page with notes written in Elder Futhark runes. At last he glanced up and asked, "How soon do you need it?"
"Soon as possible. Say a mil, legit."
Winziger nodded, and his short Gnomish fingers did their fiduciary gavotte on the adding machine keys. Clackety-clack, zzzt, click. "One million. Do you mean after taxes?"
"Well, yeah." Stan said. He looked on with admiration. He always loved to see things done well, especially if something was in it for him.
"Very well," Win said, tearing off the strip of adding-machine paper and pulling off the eyeshade without disturbing the glasses perched on his forehead. He studied the figures for a moment, made a few notes, and then looked up, his normally inexpressive face lit with a broad, conspiratorial smile. "I suppose you are familiar with, ah, human games of chance?"
Stan grinned. "I got a nodding acquaintance, yeah."
"Excellent. Do you also happen to have any acquaintances in, um, the unconventional revenue field?" Win asked.
"Yeah, I do, in fact." Stan said. "Good man, smart, too. Guy older'n me. He's semi-retired and mostly legit, but he survived in a racket that few guys do, and he knows his way around, if you get my drift."
"He is familiar with gaming and gaming establishments?"
"Heck, he owns half a dozen, I think," Stan said. "Not through front men, even. He's kept a clean record. Fact, he's a respected businessman."
"Trust him?"
"No," Stan said, chuckling. "But I'm used to him."
"I'll leave it up to your discretion. With an ally like that, you can do it. The trickiest time is really the first part," Win said. "You're going to need some serious cooperation and if you can swing it, a casino's your best choice. What's your starting capital?"
Stan told him. Winziger didn't even blink. "OK, so we're shooting for less than half that as an initial increment, should be easy. Here's what you do . . . ."
Though he took no notes, Stanley listened quietly and intently. He had an excellent memory for detail, if the details added up to "ka-ching."
They talked for a few minutes, and then Winziger swept the adding machine and abacus back into his jacket, where they to all appearances vanished, and he clambered down from the chair. "This is very interesting. Thanks for the opportunity, and I'll help with the tax forms and so on," the Gnome said.
"Thanks, Mr. Kobold. I owe you," Stan said.
Win chuckled. "Not yet, but I'll bill you. Oh, Mr. Pines—"
"Stan, please."
Win polished his spectacles, which he had been wearing propped high on his forehead while doing the detail work. Stan suspected they were just there to give him a chance not to look someone directly in the eye, but maybe he was far-sighted. Chasing down some speck on a lens, Winziger murmured, "Somebody's seen to it that the feral Gnomes have been adequately fed and comfortably housed ever since last winter. Most of them have decided to join the civilized Gnome community. I hear that they'd like to thank—somebody."
"I'm sure somebody would say they're welcome," Stan said, poker-faced.
Win nodded, did not offer to shake hands—most Gnomes didn't do that—but bowed as Stan saw him out. Whew, it was hot outside already, Stan thought as he stood on the porch and watched his visitor depart. Formally attired as he was, Winziger would attract attention even in Gravity Falls, where ordinary Gnomes in their red caps, pale blue shirts, and dark blue overalls had become everyday sights.
Except—well, you can take the Gnome out of the tree, but you can't take the Gnome out of the Gnome. Winziger took fewer than a dozen steps before he just couldn't be seen. Not that he turned invisible per se—Gnomes didn't have that power. They did have the power of not being noticed, however.
Stan checked his watch: a few minutes past ten in the morning. He returned to his den and, out of curiosity, opened his big floor safe and assembled some stacks of currency on his desk top.
Ten thousand dollars in hundreds made a tidy little stack, a little more than two and a half inches wide, a little more than six inches long, and a shade less than half an inch thick. Pile on enough to make it a hundred thousand, and it was no more than five inches thick. Line up ten stacks of these in two rows, and it was still only thirteen inches wide, twelve and a half inches long, and five inches thick.
Heck, if they were neatly packaged and packed, you could fit two million bucks in a roomy suitcase. It would be heavy, though still light enough to pay just the basic fee if you checked it on an airliner—forty-five pounds, to be exact. Of course, you wouldn't want any customs agents looking through your luggage. . . .
For a long time Stan sat at his desk, legal pad in front of him. He doodled—not making notes of any kind whatsoever, nothing even potentially incriminating, just idle artless sketches of trees and waterfalls and such. He did it to help him think. He was a man who sometimes acted impulsively, but who tended to think things through where money was concerned.
Finally getting up and tearing off the page full of doodles—he ripped it to pieces, though it was entirely innocent, and then dropped the shreds into his trash can—Stan locked the currency in the safe again and once more checked the time. It was past eleven. His old friend Edward Pinter had always been an early riser. He was older now, but—heck, if Pinky was still asleep, he could just call back later. Pinky would have people to answer the phone for him. He dialed the number.
Somewhat to his surprise, he heard a gravelly voice that he had first heard, my God, when Stan was only twelve and Pinter was like twenty? It still sounded exactly the same as it always had: "Yah?"
"Pinky!" he said. "You old rascal, you doin' OK?"
"Stanny!" rasped the voice on the other end. "Eh, for an old fart in shootin' distance of ninety, I can't complain. I'll be a son of a gun, Stanny Pines. Long time since we talked, kid. What can I do for ya?"
"Funny you should ask that," Stan said with a grin. "Listen, you by any chance ever heard of the Medicine Lodge Casino in British Columbia?"
The old man's voice instantly became wary. "Nah, sorry, never heard of it. Uh, hang on, I gotta take another call, Stanny. I'll call ya back when I can."
Stan hung up, drummed his fingers for not more than three minutes, and then answered the ring. "OK now?" he asked.
"Yah," Mr. Edward "Fast Eddie" Pinter of Philadelphia said. "I got this line secured six ways to Sunday, and my AT guy says nobody's listenin' on your end, either."
"He works on Sundays?" Stan asked.
"He works when I need him to work. Right now he says we got twenty-four minutes for sure to talk private. I set the timer already. Now, you mentioned a legitimate business up in Canada. The institution which you mentioned, yah, in fact I do know about it. In further fact, I got an investment in it—not a majority share, but tidy, and not in my right name 'cause of international complications. Why?"
"Yeah, I'd already checked some records this past week and I figured you had a connection."
"Interesting," Pinky said. "Tell me how."
"No time right now, but arrange for a longer call and I'll tell you what holes you gotta plug to stay off the books."
"I'll arrange the call. But why were you lookin' into it, Stanny?"
"Point is, I want to move some cash around," Stanley said. "I need it to be all fresh and sparkly when it comes back to me, if you understand me. Of course, you're welcome to take a reasonable bite of it."
After a twenty-second pause, Pinky asked, "You get this money legit?"
"Pink, hand to God, it is in no way stolen. Or hot. No serial numbers on watch lists or anything like that. But a lot of moolah poppin' up at once from nowhere, you know—people ask awkward questions. I want to turn it around quick and clean, pay capital gains, the whole shmear. I know it'll cost me."
"How much we talkin'?" Pinky asked.
Stanley told him, and he heard the old man sigh with relief. "Ah, Stanny, that's peanuts, easy-peasy! Gets a little bit complicated, and like you say, you'll lose some along the way, but the casino has no obligation to report to the IRS, and the rest of it, you won't take a big hit."
"I'll gladly pay for the help, though," Stan said.
They talked terms, which proved to be reasonable—even after taxes, Stan figured, he would have a heck of a lot of money left at the clean end, a lot more than if he paid straight income tax on the amount.
"Give me until tomorrah mornin'," Pinky said. "I'll get it all set up for you."
"I appreciate the help. Pinky, what's your cut?"
"For a friend? Say two and a half per cent off the top. That's the low, low family rate, quarter of the usual minimum."
Stan nodded, grinning. "Very reasonable. Ya ever want a favor out here on the Coast, you know who to call," Stan said. "No charge so long as I don't have to put on the brass knucks."
"Brass knuckles! Ah, get out of here, ya sentimental shmuck, before you make me tear up. The bad old days are gone, ya know. Oh, Stanny, don't hang up yet—I heard your smart brother turned out not dead after all. True?"
"True," Stanley said. "Seems he did some government work, then kind of went undercover for a long, long time. But he's back, living not far from me, and doin' OK for himself."
"Government work," the old man's voice said. He sighed regretfully. "Well, what can I say? Every family has a black sheep, right? I remember him as a real smart kid. Not fun, like you, but real smart. Well, just a couple-three minutes left. Let me take some time to think, make some calls, set the deal up. I'll call ya tomorrah mornin', between—let's see, you three hours ahead or three hours behind us?"
"Three behind," Stan said. "When it's noon there, it's nine A.M. here."
"I never can remember. OK, so listen for the call between eleven and noon, your time. Hey, you got a passport?"
"Yeah, and I'm used to flying. Don't like it, but I can take it."
"So if you want to take a two, maybe four day vacation at the Medicine Lodge, do a little gambling, nothing's to stop you?"
"Nope, not a thing."
"OK, the little presidents may have to take a different route and meet you there, but I'll let you know the drill. Now, to do a good job, there's gonna be an assload of electronic transfers—like Canada to China, China to Brazil, Brazil to Luxembourg, yada yada, maybe ten, even twenty moves, but all zapped electronic, get it? And in a week, ten days at the outside, you start seein' bank transfers comin' in to your account. We'll decide on amounts when we talk. Main thing, gotta look like revenue."
"I got a business out here, licensed and everything, and we can use its accounts," Stan said. "Pines Phenomenal Promotions. I stage music concerts, festivals, that kinda thing."
"Perfect. OK, time's up, talk to you between eleven and noon. Keep well!"
"You, too," Stan said. He hung up, chuckling.
If Winziger the Gnome was right, and he was very seldom wrong, then of Stan's $2,267,800.00 in genie money—it wasn't genie bucks, either, not some phony-baloney currency but hundreds and fifties in real USA greenbacks—he could expect to net right around a million and a half after taking care of Pinky and others. And Winziger, too, of course, who wouldn't take much for his services—mostly, he just enjoyed using his talents. But the Gnome was due a reward, and though Stan could be greedy, he always took care of people who helped him.
"Shoulda been more specific about my magic money pants," Stan told himself. Yeah, the genie had produced real money for him—but where did it come from? Ford's theory was that the genie somehow vanished the bills from stashes that otherwise would never ever be found, big bales of American money moldering away in the warehouses of deceased criminal overlords and such, but whatever its origin, it was all real, none counterfeit.
Stan's immediate dilemma had been that although the dough itself was genuine, it lacked provenance. What could you do, tell the nice man from the IRS, "Yeah, this money was in a cave in the woods and I just stumbled across it?"
Oh, sure, like that would fly. "A genie conjured it up" wouldn't be any better. Not only wouldn't he be believed, he'd find it hard to access his fortune from inside a loony bin.
So because the government got nervous about magic—heck, for all Stan knew, if he claimed "genie profit," the IRS might even call in Stanford's group of playmates to check on him, and wouldn't that be nice?
Anyhow, because the IRS probably would not buy a genie's generosity as a source for so much money, Stan had realized he had to treat it as if it were dirty. So washday had arrived. With Win's and Pinky's advice, Stan was reasonably sure he could get away with legitimizing it.
Not, strictly speaking all, because sure, he'd lose a little—the tub always leaks when you're washing money. But who cared? The beauty part was that in the long run, the money truly would be completely legit. And he estimated the payout to his business account in the next month or so would be far more than he actually needed to pull off his little pet project.
And then—oh, man, this was the best of all—when the thing had been done and was over with, say in four, five years he'd be able to sell off some stuff and more than recoup his—call it an investment.
Very nice nest egg for retirement, that, together with the loot—um, no, call the stuff the objects of art and collector's items—that he'd garnered during his and Ford's trip up to the Arctic. It had been nearly five years, and supposedly Ford had pulled strings to waive the statute of limitations, but why tempt the fates, as Dipper said? Another two years, meh, it wouldn't hurt anything.
Stan left his den in his and Sheila's house. As he closed the door, he paused to pat the engraved bronze plaque that he had screwed to the wall first thing that morning:
STANLEY F. PINES
JUSTICE OF THE PEACE
ROADKILL COUNTY
As the legal regulations required, he now had his official premises as a J.P. Heck, he could even conduct court there if he wanted. Adjudicate minor traffic violations, hunting and fishing cases, piddling stuff not requiring a jury, misdemeanors. And other stuff that justices did.
"Man," he told his golden reflection in the metal, "money in the bank and sorta a judge, If only Dad could see me now, huh?"
He went upstairs to lunch with a good appetite.
Things were looking pretty good for Stanley Pines.