My Uncle Fuzzy was a dreamer and a schemer. His name was Lee, but he had always been Uncle Fuzzy to practically everybody who knew him. The problem with his schemes was that they weren’t good ones, and he wasn’t very good at them, but still he tried, and when one failed he just went on to the next. If nothing else, he was persistent. Uncle Fuzzy worked full time in a foundry. I never knew what he did there, I just know he always came home covered from head to toe in filth. After work in the evenings and on weekends he would be hard at work on one get rich quick scheme or another.

He worked quite a while making plastic resin grapes at home and building lamps out of them. He didn’t make enough money to even cover his expenses, and that failed completely when the fad died out. He worked for a while on making an electric device that would make worms come up out of the ground so fishermen wouldn't have to dig for them. Surprisingly, that failed as well. He then worked for a while re-filling table candles for restaurants. That failed. The list went on and on and on, and that was just the ones I knew about.

Uncle Fuzzy’s most prized possession was a 1950 Mercury coupe. It was restorable, but not restored. It stayed in an old shed near the back of his lot, and he kept it covered with a tarp. I had never heard it run, and I wasn’t too sure it even would. Fact of the matter, I had never even seen it completely uncovered or out of the shed. It was one of Uncle Fuzzy’s many “one of these days” projects. The thing was that he could have probably had it in pristine condition if he didn’t spend all his time and money on get-rich-quick schemes.

When I got out of high school, I moved out of the area. The next time I heard anything about Uncle Fuzzy was several years later, when I was contacted to come to the reading of his will. I knew Uncle Fuzzy had never had much, and that there would probably be nothing of value come out of it, but since I was in the will, I went to the reading.

I thought about it a lot on the drive to the reading of the will. Fact is, I almost turned back at one point, thinking that there would probably be nothing of value, and even if there was, it would probably go to one of my cousins. Still, I was curious, so I kept driving. Besides, I figured that if Uncle Fuzzy thought enough of me to put me in his will, the least I could do was show up. I arrived at the lawyer’s office a little early, and spent some time reminiscing with my cousins. Eventually, the lawyer called us in.

As I had figured, Uncle Fuzzy didn’t leave much. His schemes had taken their toll, and he was almost a pauper. Still, there was enough small stuff that the reading of the will took quite a while. Eventually, the lawyer got around to me. I figured by that time that there would certainly be nothing of value left, but I had forgotten about one item. His last remaining possession was the Mercury, and he had willed it to me.

A few days later, I borrowed a friend’s pick up truck and trailer and went to get the car. I used the pickup to pull the car out of the shed, and once I had it in daylight, I removed the tarp. It was the first time the car had been uncovered and in daylight that I knew of. It really wasn’t in too bad a shape, despite the years of storage, and looked like it could still be restored fairly easily. I winched it on to the trailer and took it home, where I put it in my garage. It was the next day before I started looking at it closer.

The first thing I did was pop the hood. The engine looked original, and was surprisingly clean. It had dirt and cobwebs on it, but it had no traces of oil leaks. Just for grins, I checked the oil, and found it clean with no trace of moisture in it. All the tires were weather checked and flat. The body was in pretty good shape. No major dents or anything. The paint was pretty bad. The interior appeared to be original, and was not in the best of shape. The interior had the musty old “stored under a tarp in a shed for years” aroma.

From my examination so far, it appeared that there were no major parts missing. It would be a fairly easy restoration, but it would still take a lot of work. I opened the trunk next, and to my surprise found it almost full of old suitcases. I grabbed the first one and started to lift it out of the car. It was surprisingly heavy, but I managed to get it out and lay it on the garage floor. I started to open it, and found it was locked with one of those miniature suitcase padlocks. I busted the lock off easily with a screwdriver and unzipped the case.

When I lifted the lid, I found the suitcase was full to the brim with money. There was bundle after bundle of 20s, 50s, and 100s. I picked up a bundle and leafed through it, amazed at my fortune and confused about its source. All sorts of visions danced through my head, thinking of all the ways I could spend this. My senses came back, though, as I remembered that Uncle Fuzzy had been a poor man. Even an eccentric would have spent enough money to live a reasonably good life, and I knew that Uncle Fuzzy had been living like a pauper for most of his life. As I looked at the money a bit closer, though, the answer became obvious. It was counterfeit, and not very good counterfeit at that. Certainly not good enough to pass more than a glancing examination. Anything more than a quick look would instantly reveal that it was phony. The “feel” was pretty good, but the “snap” was not there. The printing was not as sharp as it should be, and the color was a bit off. I had been too caught up in the moment to notice it at first, but now that I looked at it was pretty obvious.

In all, there were nine cases of varying sizes, each full. The quality of the counterfeit in each varied greatly, from extremely poor to probably passable. I guess they were the result of several attempts to get it right. Three large cases of counterfeit would pass most cursory examinations, but would be detectable with a detailed examination. Four cases were marginal, and might pass a quick examination under the right circumstances. Two cases were a joke, with the quality so bad that there was no way it would ever pass. I didn't count any of it, but there was a huge amount. Obviously, Uncle Fuzzy had been working on this one for a long time. The question now was what to do next.

For lack of a better idea, I put it all back in the cases except for one bundle of reasonably good looking 50s, which I kept out. I put all the cases back in the trunk of the car and locked it. This would require some thought. A lot of thought. I stuck the bundle of 50s in my jacket pocket and went in the house. I had a rather restless night, and ended up not sleeping much at all.

It was four days later and I still had not decided what to do. I was driving around town that evening thinking it over, thinking about all the things I wanted and needed and about all the money I had. Hell, it wasn’t money. Who was I kidding? There was no way I could use it without getting caught. Even the best of it wasn’t good enough to pass a close examination. It could never be passed in a store or a bank, and anything more than a quick glance would detect it as fake.

The better bills might be passable at night under low light conditions in situations where it wouldn’t be examined too closely. It couldn’t be passed at a restaurant, bar, or a club, because they were always on the lookout for phony money and were trained on what to look for. On top of that, most of them had detectors of one sort or another. I couldn’t make any purchase that required any kind of ID or registration, because that would be easily traceable. I came up with the idea that I could read the classifieds and arrange evening appointments to buy items of value from individuals, then I could pawn them for the cash or re-sell them. The problems with that were that I would be very limited on how many times I could do that in any particular town. I would also have to use an ID to pawn anything, and I wouldn’t be able to advertise for sale the things I bought. Then there was the registration issue. I couldn’t buy any big ticket items like cars because I would have to register them, and it would take too many small items to make any money. All in all, not a good idea. I couldn’t buy things with it, I couldn’t just throw it away, I couldn’t turn it in, and I couldn’t get caught with it. I began to understand why Uncle Fuzzy had just stuck it in the car and left it. I kept driving, hoping for a revelation.

As I drove around, I noticed a whore on the street corner. She was ugly, and certainly not worth the risk, but the idea did intrigue me. This had possibilities. Darkness, no ID involved, and very little risk of the money being closely examined. On the other hand, they did handle a lot of money, and might notice the different feel and look, even in the dark. Still, it was an idea. I drove around a bit longer, hoping to run across a likely candidate. I saw several, but not one that was worthy of my time. Even so, there was still the nagging thought that they might be able to detect a counterfeit (even a pretty good counterfeit). On top of that, there was the very real possibility that I might hit on an undercover policewoman. Hell, that would be all I needed. Not only busted for soliciting, but also getting caught with a pocket full of counterfeit 50s. They would put me so far back in the hole they would have to send me sunshine through a pipe. As I drove, my mind was in overdrive. Thoughts kept coming into my head. Things I had heard all my life, like “All women are basically whores. You always pay for it, one way or the other.” Then it came to me. I had a plan.

Written by: J. Robert Dark
jrobertdark@yahoo.com