"Destroyer - 018 - Funny Money" - читать интересную книгу автора (Murphy Warren)

"I know it's the office. I didn't think you were about to hold up the Bank of America. Have you been demoted to agent or something?"

"No. It's something special tonight."

"I know it's something special. You wouldn't be taking your gun out if it weren't something special. I know I'm wasting my time even asking."

"Uh huh," said Castellano and kissed his wife on the cheek. He felt her hug him more strongly than usual and he returned the hard embrace just to let her know that the comfort of their relationship had not smothered his love.

"Bring home some samples, dear. I hear they're getting better every day."

"What?" asked Castellano.

"Oh, don't look so worried. I read it in the paper. You didn't tell me anything. You never tell me anything. I read that there's a lot of counterfeit twenties around. High-quality ones."

"Good, dear," said Castellano and kissed Beth Marie warmly on the lips. When she turned to go back into the kitchen, he patted her on her ample backside and she shrieked, just as shocked as she had been when they were first married and she had threatened if he ever did that again, she would leave him. More than twenty-five years and 70,000 pats ago.

At the federal building in downtown San Diego, Castellano entered the blessed air-conditioned coolness of his office that made staying in a requirement for this hot summer day. In the afternoon, a messenger from Supplies brought him a shoulder holster and showed him how to put it on.

At 4:45 P.M., the district supervisor called to ask him if he had his weapon. Castellano said "yes," and the supervisor said, "Good, I'll be back to you."

At 7 P.M., two and a half hours after Castellano normally left to go home, the supervisor phoned again and asked whether Castellano had gotten it.

"Got what?" asked Castellano.

"It should have been there by now."

There was a knock on his door and Castellano told his supervisor about it.

"That must be it," the supervisor said. "Phone back after you have looked at it."

Two men entered his office with a sealed manila envelope. The envelope was stamped in black ink: "For your eyes only." The two men asked him to sign for it, and when Castellano signed the receipt, he saw that his supervisor had signed it, and strangely enough so had the Undersecretary of the Treasury and the Undersecretary of State also. This envelope had been around. Following proper form, Castellano waited until the two men were out of his office before opening the seal of the envelope. Inside were two small envelopes and a note. The first small envelope was marked: "Open this first." The second warned: "Do not open without specific telephone authorization." The note from his supervisor said: "Jim, tell me what you think."

Castellano opened the first envelope at the corner and shook out a mint-fresh fifty-dollar bill. He held it in his hands. The paper felt real. The most common mistake in counterfeiting was the paper. An experienced bank teller, ruffling through stacks of bills, could spot funny money easily, sometimes even with his eyes closed. There was a feel to counterfeit, a cheap paper kind of feel because the rag content was usually deficient.

This bill felt real. He rubbed the corners of the bill against a piece of plain white paper, very hard. The green ink smeared off. This was a test not so much of the ink but of the paper. The special money paper of the United States government was not porous enough for the proper ink to dry. So far this bill looked good. In the corner of his office, underneath blowups of now-famous counterfeitsЧlike the Hitler fifties that were so good they just let them stay in circulationЧwas the ultraviolet light. Many counterfeiters, in an effort to get the right feel, which would fool a bank teller, would use commercial high rag content paper.

The flaw was that commercial rag paper was made of used cloth and used cloth had been washed at least once and all detergents left traces that would show up under ultraviolet light. United States money was made with unwashed rags. New rag content.

Castellano examined this bill under the eerie purplish light which made his white shirt cuffs seem to glow. There was no shineback from the bill and Castellano knew how this group must have done it. They had bleached fresh one-dollar bills. This paper was real.

Doing that, though, posed a different problem for a counterfeiter. They had real paper with proper rag content but also a printing headache. Government money was printed on big sheets and cut down. But if a counterfeiter bleached individual dollar bills and then reprinted the paper in a higher denomination, the printing register would not be perfect. The printing might not be centered exactly. The back of the bill might differ in placement from the front. On this bill, the borders were perfect.

Under a magnifying glass, Castellano looked at the lines in the face of Ulysses S. Grant. The engraving lines were clean and uninterrupted, the skillful work of a master engraver, the sort of lines on valid bills. A photo plate made for an offset printing press could sometimes achieved this sort of lines, but could not print them on the slick high rag content paper he was holding. On this sort of paper, offset ink would run and smudge and blot. Obviously the counterfeiter had hand-engraved plates and as Castellano examined the bowl of the five that made up the fifty in the corners of the bill, he softly whistled his admiration. A craftsman had made this bill.

The last item he checked was the serial number. On rare occasions, a counterfeiter who had an excellent plate, correct paper, perfect register, and proper ink, would make the last common mistake. The serial numbers would be fuzzy. Those large crisp numbers on a bill somehow always got short shrift from a counterfeiter, who might even spend years engraving the rest of the plate. Castellano examined each number.

"Sonuvabitch," he said and dialed his supervisor on his office phone. "Are you happy now? It's nine thirty and I've worked five hours overtime. I've been toting around an old pistol since morning wondering what I'm going to have to use it for and now I find it's an old, old trick that doesn't work on the greenest recruit. I don't need any more identification training. I'm the chief of that branch."

"So you say the bill I sent you is genuine?"