Night Passage

Chapter 6

Jo Jo Genest first got into the money business through a guy named Fusco that he met at the gym in Somerville.

“Guy I know,” Fusco said, “is looking to smurf some cash.”

Jo Jo was sitting spread legged on the floor doing lat pullbacks.

“Whaddya mean smurf?” he said.

“You know, go around to banks,” Fusco said. “Deposit cash for him so he can wire transfer it later.”

“Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why the whole thing,” Jo Jo said.

His movements as he pulled the cables and raised the weight were smooth and appeared effortless. His muscles moved like huge serpents under his pale skin.

“Man, where you been,” Fusco said.

“I been around,” Jo Jo said. “Maybe I’m being smart. Tell me the deal.”

Fusco sat on a weight bench with a towel over his thighs. His stomach pushed against his tank top. His thin legs were very white and hairy in blue sport shorts.

“Guy I know makes a lotta money in ways that maybe he shouldn’t, you unnerstand? Lotta money. He needs to wash it, you unnerstand, launder it, so the government can’t find it and if they do, they can’t trace it to him.”

Jo Jo let the cable go slack on the lat pull machine and mopped his face with a hand towel, waiting for the lactic acid to drain from his muscles.

“So he needs to get the dough into banks so that he can transfer it around, maybe overseas.”

“Like to a numbered Swiss bank account,” Jo Jo said.

“Sure,” Fusco said, “like that. Anyway what you do is go around with a sack full of cash and buy cashier’s checks or money orders for amounts small enough so they don’t get reported.”

“What happens then?”

“You give them to me.”

“What do you do with them?”

“None of your business.”

“Aw, Fusco, come off it. You know I’m all right or you wouldn’t have told me this much. What happens to the checks and money orders, they get sent to a Swiss bank?”

Fusco grinned. “You really like them Switzers, don’t you?” he said. “Usually it’s the branch of some South American bank in Florida.”

“So don’t they get reported?”

“No. It’s not a cash deal. CTRs are required only for cash.”

“CTR?”

Jo Jo had begun a second set, holding his upper body till, isolating the muscles. His voice showed no sign of train.

“Cash Transaction Report.”

“So you change the cash into something else and you don’t have to report it,” Jo Jo said.

“Bada bing,” Fusco said, shooting at Jo Jo with his forefinger. “You want some?”

“How much?”

“Half a percent,” Fusco said. “Everything you smurf. Plus expenses.”

Jo Jo pulled the bar toward him and moved a huge stack of iron plates up by means of a cable-and-pulley arrangement. He held the bar tight against his stomach, then very slowly let it down. Fusco watched him with admiration.

“You gotta focus on the muscle,” Jo Jo said. “You got to be thinking about it when you work it. On this one it’s the lats, nothing else, just think about the lats, Fusco.”

“Half a percent,” Fusco said again. “You interested?”

“Sure,” Jo Jo said.