The Con Man Read Online Free Page A

and left chambers, you see. Blood passes through, gets pumped around the body...Oh hell, I can’t give a layman an anatomy lesson.”
    “I didn’t ask for one,” Carella said.
    “Anyway, I did the Gettler test. Idea is that if someone drowns, water passes from the lungs into the blood. We can tell pretty well this way whether a person drowned in fresh water or salt water.”
    “How so?”
    “If it was fresh water, the blood in the left side of the heart will have a lower-than-normal chloride content. Salt water, the blood in the left side of the heart will have a higher-than-normal amount of chloride.”
    “This girl was found in the River Harb,” Carella said. “That’s fresh water, isn’t it?”
    “Sure. But according to Smith—you know, Smith, Glaister, and Von Neureiter…”
    “Go ahead,” Carella said.
    “According to Smith, if a person is already dead when he’s thrown into the water, it’s impossible for any water to get into that person’s left heart.” Blaney paused. “In other words, if we find no water in the left heart during autopsy, we can safely assume that person didn’t drown. That person was dead before he hit the water.”
    “Yes?” Carella said, interested now.
    “This little girl didn’t have a drop of water there, Carella. This little girl didn’t drown.”
    Carella stared deep into Blaney’s violet eyes. “How’d she die?” he asked.
    “Acute arsenic poisoning,” Blaney said. “Greatest amount of it was found in the stomach and intestines. Indicates oral ingestion. The whole system was not impregnated, so we can chalk off chronic poisoning. This was acute. She may, in fact, have died just a few hours after she swallowed the stuff.”
    Blaney scratched the top of his balding head.
    “In fact,” he added, “you may even have yourself a homicide here.”

Life, if you take a somewhat dim and cynical view of it, is something like a big con game.
    Look around you, friends, and see the confidence men.
    “I have in my hand right here, ladies and gentlemen, a bar of So-Soap. This is the only soap on the market that contains neocenephrotaneticin, which we call Neo No. 7. Neo No. 7 puts an invisible film of visible filmy acentodoids on the epidermal glottifram…”
    “If I am elected, friends, I can promise you good clean government. And why can I promise you good abusive government? Because I am sincere and untrustworthy. I am honest and selfishly domineering. I am the biggest, the most attentive, the most fastidious violator of the Mann Act, and I can promise…”
    “Look, George, where else can you get a deal like this one? We are willing to construct the whole damned thing, take full responsibility for the job, and all it’ll cost you is around two million dollars. And, with that, you get my own personal guarantee. My own personal guarantee.”
    “Baby, what I’m trying to tell you is I never felt like this before. I mean, when you walk into a room, Jesus, the room lights up. Do you know what I mean? My heart begins to go up and down like a yo-yo. There’s a light that comes from you, baby, a light that fills up the sky. If that ain’t love, I don’t know what love is. Believe me, baby, I never felt like this. Like walking on air with my head in the clouds, like wanting to sing all the time. I love you, sweetheart. I love you like crazy. So why don’t you be a good girl and take off that dress, huh?”
    “I’ll be honest with you. That car had seventy-five thousand miles on it before we turned back the speedometer. Also, that’s a new paint job. We don’t trust new paint jobs. Who knows what’s under that paint, friend. I wouldn’t sell you that dog if you begged me. But step over here a minute and take a look at this lavender-andred convertible that was owned by the maiden aunt of a Protestant minister who used it only once a week to do her marketing around the corner. Now, this car… ”
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