Paradise By Frank Cotolo
By my sixth delivery I became very confident, and that is when I learned a huge lesson of life: never become very confident. My destination was Coxsackie, New York, a small town named after the Coxsackie virus, which is among the leading causes of aseptic meningitis. Dr. Gilbert Dalldorf, a scientist working at the New York State Department of Health, discovered the virus around 1948 while finding an antidote to a poison affecting Badminton players. My contact was a man named Pierre LaFondue. It was an obvious pseudonym, since no surname in history has ever been translated as a French dish of melted cheese served in a communal pot. I was to meet him where Route 385 crossed Sunset Boulevard. As I was waiting, a Hearst pulled over and stopped. Three men in ski masks jumped out, grabbed my duffle bag and me and dragged me into the vehicle. “Which one of you is LaFondue?” I said. No one responded as two of the three men pulled the mouth open on the duffle bag and looked inside. Then they froze and looked at one another and said in unison, “Chinese black!” “What?” I said. They were right. Even I could tell that the truffles in the duffle bag were not the Italian white. Someone had filled the bag with Chinese Black Truffles — counterfeits. These were white truffles cut with black truffles and sold as the rare Italian type to unknowing customers. It was amazing, I remember thinking that even among criminals there were criminals. The competition for the illegal dollar was more intense than in legitimate business, which was, in itself, as crooked as any criminal business. It boggled the mind. “Where are the genuine truffles?” said one of the men with a growl. Then a slam, a pound and everything went black. The next thing I knew, I was tied to a chair in a damp room with brick walls. The man with the growling voice stood before me holding a syringe. He said if I did not tell him where to find the authentic truffles he was going to inject me with the namesake
virus of the New York town. “If that does not kill you,” the growling man said, “then I will use the only other disease a town is named after. Yes, I mean the Muerto Canyon etiologic agent, the virus that caused the outbreak of pulmonary illness in four corners of the southwestern United States, those corners being Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado and Utah. Yes,” he continued while growling deeper, “the Sin Nombre virus.” I was frightened, but still impressed that a thug was so well versed on viruses. “Call my Uncle Hercules,” I said pleadingly. “He gave me the duffle bag to deliver to LaFondue.” “I am LaFondue,” the growling man said. “But that is not my real name because no surname in history has ever been translated as a French dish of melted cheese served in a communal pot.” He jerked his ski mask from his head and smiled. The growl in his voice disappeared. “I am a government agent but I cannot reveal for which government. My other fake name is Ben Dustwarren. You can call me Dusty even though that is not my real nickname, either.” He untied me. “We have been tracking shipments of Chinese counterfeit truffles and traced the latest batch to the Medicina family in Brooklyn.” He described the true villains. The Truffle Mafia, as Dusty called it, was a deadly group that haunted the families of billionaires and millionaires that had anything to do with the search, distribution or use of truffles. This scurrilous mob kidnapped people and demanded truffles as ransom, placed suicide-hunting dogs (dogs wearing explosive collars) into packs of truffle-hunting canines, and traded arms for truffles to rebel armies. Convinced that I was a stooge in the operation, Dusty let me go but gave me my duffle bag back. He said, “This looks like it’s worth more than you.” When I returned to Brooklyn, I told Uncle Hercules what happened. “I thought there could be trouble,” he said, “but I couldn’t tell you what I thought.
One thing you learn in this business, aside from not being overconfident, is never tell anyone anything you think or thought or may think in the future. Thinking can get you killed.” “So the Medicina family is in the truffles counterfeiting business with the Chinese?” I said. “Is that what you think?” “Yes.” “What did I just tell you about telling people what you think?” “I don’t know what to think, Uncle Hercules.” “I am only going to say this to you once, and you didn’t hear it from me. The Truffle Mafia could be the force behind many hideous crimes. Perhaps it assassinated a president or two. Maybe it started the My Lai Massacre. Could even be responsible for your grandfather’s award-winning sizeof-a-basketball tomato.” That was the last delivery I made. I quit the job. That September, Bruno, the head of the Medicina family, was killed after being served a poison truffle at dinner in The Brown Derby in Los Angeles. It was actually the hundreds of machine-gun rounds that were fired at him as he ate that caused his death but there was no doubt in my mind that the Truffle Mafia was behind it. I experienced only one more trufflesrelated incident. Weng Fu, who ran the Chinese laundry in my neighborhood, asked me if I would consider taking a job in Oregon, where a business having to do with Douglas fir trees and fungi delicacies was beginning to flourish. “You like dogs?” Weng Fu said. Today, the Italian White Truffle is worth about $3,600 a pound. Fake Chinese truffles are still being smuggled by the hundreds of thousands and go on the black market for $20 a pound. No other towns in America have been named after a virus and Uncle Hercules died at the ripe old age of 99 trying to give himself the Heimlich maneuver while choking on a fish bone. His death actually occurred when a bullet was shot through his skull just as he was about to regain his breath. ISSUE TWO
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