Chapter 16 Fraud Sector Gamblers Club

The Gamblers Club had a good time, and a correspondingly short lifespan.It vanished without a trace overnight, prompting widespread speculation about the reasons for the disbandment.But the former members took terrible oaths, heavier than blood oaths, so there was no betrayer to break the silence.Since the members are businessmen—mostly self-made millionaires who have only recently retired—no one wants to admit that, in a pinch, these members of the roster can't even do simple arithmetic. One winter morning, Ellery takes over the investigation into the hallowed secrets of the Gamblers' Club.A limousine not stained by the mud of Eighty-seventh Street drove three men to his door.

That morning, Inspector Quinn happened to be at home studying a classified document sent to the Director.He raised his eyebrows at the size of the car, and went back to his study to continue with the papers—but at least he left the door ajar, so he could eavesdrop on the conversation properly. Three men introduced themselves, Charles Van Wynn, Cornelius Lewis, and Gorman Fitch.Van Wynn was a tall, lanky man with a blue face, Lewis was a big brown man, and Fitch was short and stout and pink.Van Wynn looked as fragile as a cheese displayed in a Park Avenue gourmet restaurant, Lewis as a hunk of roast that would appear on a Wall Street table, and Fitch, his puffy pink body as Ellery A snack called Grandpa Fox in childhood memories.Fitch announced that he made his money by selling women's corsets.

They explained to Ellery that the Gamblers' Club was a group of seventeen retired men who loved to gamble and had the means to indulge themselves.In addition to the usual odds games played in the clubroom, members are also able to place unusual bets on other members.Demonstrating imagination and maintaining integrity are both members' duties.Proposals to gamble are sent by anonymous letter on Gamblers' Club letterhead, which is available only to members. "Why anonymous?" Ellery was fascinated. "Well, if someone gets hurt," said little pink Mr. Fitch, "we don't want him to prejudice the member who raised the bet."

"Of course, our personalities are trustworthy," muttered Van Wynn, biting the tip of his cane. "Otherwise it wouldn't be possible, you know. That's what the club stands for." "Somebody's clearly showing signs of being unreliable." Ellery watched them. "Otherwise you gentlemen wouldn't be here." The three looked at each other. "Tell me, Van Wynn." The big Mr. Lewis whispered. "Lewis came to see me this morning," said Van Wynn suddenly, "and asked me if I had taken part in some personal game at the club which he was enjoying himself. We compared it and found it was the same thing. So We both wondered if there was someone else, and since Mr. Fitch lived near my house, we went to visit him. Of course, he was involved.

"Exactly three weeks ago, we received a long envelope in the morning mail, typewritten on club stationery, and it looked neat. It gave us a tip about a stock on the market. That The stock was volatile, going up one day and down the next. It was a gamble, so we all bought it. It went up a lot suddenly, so we sold it. "Two weeks ago today, we got a second email this morning advising us to buy another stock that was just as erratic. Two days later the stock went up and we made another profit. "And then exactly a week ago—" "Same thing happened," said Cornelius Lewis impatiently.

"You want to know how he did it?" Ellery asked. "Oh, we know how he does it," said stout Mr. Fitch grumpily. "He's obviously got inside information. It's not—" "So, you received another letter this morning." The big ex-banker yelled, "Hell, how do you know we got the letter today too?" "Let's call him Mr. X," Ellery said, getting into the situation, "Mr. X's first letter arrived three weeks ago today, the second two weeks ago, the third A week ago—Mr. Lewis, it would have been natural to place a bet on the fourth arriving today. Gentlemen, what troubles you?"

Charles Van Wynn produced a long envelope. "Read it, Mr. Quinn, and draw conclusions for us." The envelopes are of good quality and have no stamp or return address.Van Wynn's name and address were typewritten.Judging from the postmark, it was sent the night before. From it Ellery pulled out a heavy sheet of paper with the words "Gamblers' Club" stamped in gold. Not signed. Van Wynn said: "I just said to Lewis, this is gambling sportsmanship. The man has proven himself. I will follow." "I didn't say no." Cornelius Lewis growled, "but—"

"Isn't that why we came here?" Gorman Fitch sniffed as he said, "Quinn, what do you think? In your opinion, is this thing believable?" "Fitch, you're doubting the honesty of the club members," said Van Wynn coldly. "I'm just asking a question!" "It's possible, isn't it, Van Wynn?" murmured Lewis. "If somebody did something bad, you know, that would be the end of the club. What do you think, Quinn?" "Sounds like a good thing to me," muttered Ellery, "but I want to dig into it before I hand myself over. Did you two bring your letters, too?"

"Mine stayed at home," Lewis said. "They're exactly like Van Wynn's," Fitch protested. "But I'd like to see everything, including the envelope. Why don't you send a courier to bring them over. I'll call you three before noon." As soon as the front door was shut, the door to the study opened; Inspector Quinn stood there with a suspicious expression on his face. "Did I hear you right?" snapped Ellery's father. "You say it's like a 'great thing'? Is it funny?" "Your problem," said Ellery bitterly, "is that there's no gambler's blood. Why don't you wait and see how things go?"

When it was almost noon, Inspector Quinn came out of the study again.He saw his rather prestigious son examining the two envelopes and their contents.Cornelius Lewis' envelope was postmarked the night before, as Charles van Wyen had received it, and the wording on club letterhead was the same.It's just that the letter told Van Wynn to leave the money at Trinity Cemetery at three thirty in the morning, and Lewis at three forty-five.What Gorman Fitch received was a small envelope, also postmarked the night before, with the same information on the club stationery, but the time to ask Fitch to put down the money was four o'clock in the morning.

"I suppose," said the Inspector, "that you are going to recommend these three clients, who are making fun of the matter, to follow the brilliant proposal contained in this letter?" "Of course," Ellery said cheerfully.He called Van Wynn, Lewis, and Fitch in turn, and the gamble, in his professional opinion, was as safe as a government coffer; Take a gamble.The detective was stunned. "Are you crazy, Ellery?" Inspector Quinn yelled when Ellery hung up for the third time. "The only sure thing about this scam is that these three fools are sold!" "Scam?" his son muttered. The old man controlled his emotions. "Look. This honey-bellied guy tricked a bunch of—" "You mean Mr. X? What do you mean by 'group'? Please be more specific." "Seventeen! One of the club of seventeen has evil intentions. Perhaps he's bankrupt. He's devised a scam based on giving the other sixteen people news about the stock market. A stock that goes up and down like stilts tells half the members it will go up and the other half it goes down. No matter which way the stock goes, half of them will lose but the other half will win. To the winner, he is a genius. "Second step: He ignores those who lost in the first operation, finds another extremely unstable stock, and sends the news only to those winners-one" "Numbers," Ellery asked. "How many people got the second message?" "Half of the original sixteen! Eight people, eight people who won in the first round. Now he gives news to these eight people, half say the stock will go up, and the other half say it will go down. Again, Half the men must win—" "Give me the numbers," Ellery said. "You can't even do kindergarten arithmetic? Half of eight is four! Now he has four people who have won twice. He chose another stock that has fluctuated wildly, and sent the third letter. This time, half of the four people said that the stock would go up, and the other half said it would go down. "And so he got the three-time winner, and they all trusted his market sense. He was ready to make a fortune, so he sent the fourth letter to those two fools—" "How many fools?" Ellery asked. "The remaining two winners!" "If you start with sixteen, of course that's the answer," Ellery said regretfully. "The thing is, that's not the answer. We have three winners." The Inspector sat down slowly. "One more person," Ellery said. "The question is: Who is he? Why can he defy the laws of mathematics? The answer is: He can't, so he is the one who planned the hoax. Our friend, Mr. X, is not One of those who took the bait." "Van Wynn, Lewis, or Fitch. One of them's a liar..." "I'm afraid so. Whichever it was, he noticed with distaste this morning that two victims had come to him to confer. The letter ordering payment at the graveyard had been posted the night before and could not be withdrawn. So he had to pretend I am also the one who has won three times! If I recognized this trick when they came to me for consultation, or if I posed a threat to his safety, Mr. X would not appear in the Holy Trinity Cemetery tonight. But If I look unsuspecting and non-threatening, he'll follow through with the plan. Does that even make sense?" "More reasonable than Einstein." The inspector laughed. He immediately went to the police headquarters and arranged for people to monitor the cemetery and the tombstone of a certain man named Dominique Pike. That night, ghosts wandered around Broadway and Wall Street.But by one o'clock in the morning, they all retreated behind the tombstones of different celebrities in the cemetery.A silence fell over the area.Ellery insisted that his father sit with him in the same chair that George Washington had sat in the chapel, muttering about waiting so long on a winter night like this, that time is the father of truth, and so on. But by 3:15, the Quinns were hiding behind a tombstone in Trinity Cemetery, shivering like the other zombies. At three-thirty in the morning the lanky, eager figure of Charles Van Wynn was cast over Dominique Pike's tombstone.He put something on the cold ground and disappeared. At three forty-five in the morning, the huge dark figure of Cornelius Lewis appeared, dropped something, and disappeared. Finally, at exactly four o'clock in the morning, the bloated, blurred shadow of Gorman Fitch repeated the process, also disappearing. "No matter who it is, he will not take risks." Inspector Quinn said with trembling teeth. "If something goes wrong, he will definitely put down twenty-five thousand dollars and run like other fools. Now he will Wait a while, then sneak back and take all three bags. I wonder which of them it will be." "Papa," Ellery whispered in surprise, "are you trying to say you don't know?" "No, I don't know," said the Inspector viciously, "don't tell me you know!" Ellery sighed. "X certainly didn't write to himself—it didn't occur to him to play the role of 'victim. Lied that he got the fourth letter too, but I asked him to hand it over - along with the envelope. To make it seem genuine, the envelope he gave me had to have the same postmark as the other two —Last night's postmark! But that was impossible—it was already the next morning. "So X did what he could. He rummaged through his mail this morning and found an unaddressed envelope addressed to him in his name with the correct postmark from last night. He mailed the envelope to He sent me an improvised letter to top up. The only problem was that the envelope wasn't the same size as the one he sent the victim. I think maybe he hoped I wouldn't notice the difference." "Van Wynn's envelope is long..." "Lewis' envelope is the same as Van Wynn's. But the third envelope," said Ellery, "is a small envelope, and the one who gave me that envelope was..." A howl desecrated the tranquility of the cemetery.The lights were bright, and in the beams of light crouched next to the three bags of money on the cemetery, caught like a little boy in a watermelon patch—it was the chubby little figure of Gorman Fitch.