Then the money guys came to look over their purchase. They couldn't make head or tail of it, and you can hardly blame them, because inside the great structure they found a huge contraption that looked like a cigar (Havana Perfecto) standing on end. "What the hell is this," they asked the character in the opera hat, in what is known as a menacing attitude. * * * * * The old pappy guy offered to show them. He escorted them into the cigar, pressed a button here and there, and before you could say "Al Capone" the roof of the shed slid back and they began to move upward at a terrific rate of speed. Three or four of the Mafia chieftains were old hop-heads and felt at home. In fact, one of them remarked, "Boy, are we gone." And he was right. The soberer Mafistas, after recovering from their first shock, laid ungentle fists on their conductor. "What goes on?" he was asked. "This is a space ship and we are headed for Mars." "What's Mars?" "A planet up in space, loaded with gold and diamonds." "Any bims there?" "I beg your pardon, sir. What are bims?" "Get a load of this dope. He never heard of bims. Babes, broads, frails, pigeons, ribs--catch on?" "Oh, I assume you mean girls. There must be, otherwise what are the diamonds for?" The outward trip took a week, but it was spent pleasantly. During that time, the Miami delegation cleaned out Chicago, New York and Pittsburgh in a klabiash game. The hop back, for various reasons, took a little longer. One reason may have been the condition of the crew. On the return the boys from Brooklyn were primed to the ears with _zorkle_. _Zorkle_ is a Martian medicinal distillation, made from the milk of the _schznoogle_--a six-legged cow, seldom milked because few Martians can run fast enough to catch one. _Zorkle_ is strong enough to rip steel plates out of battleships, but to stomachs accustomed to the stuff sold in Flatbush, it acted like a gentle stimulant. Upon their safe landing in Nevada, the Columbuses of this first flight to Mars put in long-distance calls to all the other important hoods in the country. The Crime Cartel met in Cleveland--in the third floor front of a tenement on Mayfield Road. The purpose of the meeting was to "cut up" Mars. Considerable dissension arose over the bookmaking facilities, when it was learned that the radioactive surface of the planet made it unnecessary to send scratches and results by wire. On the contrary, the steel-shod hooves of the animals set up a current which carried into every pool room, without a pay-off to the wire service. The final division found the apportionment as follows: _New York mob_: Real estate and investments (if any) _Chicago mob_: Bookmaking and liquor (if any) _Brooklyn mob_: Protection and assassinations _Jersey mob_: Numbers (if any) and craps (if any) _Los Angeles mob_: Girls (if any) _Galveston and New Orleans mobs_: Dope (if any)