They say a million dollars passed into the hands of the Huey Long inner group--and not a bad investment, for the first year's profits, reported for Federal taxes, exceeded $1,200,000. Anyway, the Louisiana legislature voted a bill legalizing slot machines, and Costello and Kastel organized several inter-involved corporations with innocent names to run them. There was practically no competition--and very little shooting; Long simply passed the word around that the concession belonged to these two gentlemen from New York. As a concrete example of how the tax situation is manipulated by intricate items of overlaying accounts, it was shown when Costello was hauled up for taxes apparently due, that the slot machines belonged to one corporation, that they were operated by a second, which rented the locations from a third. Costello eventually settled for $600,000 cash. Among other little entries about which the government inquired were payments of $200,000 a year to each of his wife's two brothers, as salaries in different slot-machine corporations. This transparent cover-up was laughable--but it was judged not criminal. Costello pleaded that he had been misadvised--excuse it, please--and he wrote a check. This is only a ripple on the ocean of hundreds, probably thousands, of holding companies organized in various states and under various directorships and local laws, through which flow the vast garnerings of the syndicate from coast to coast, with an accounting system which in any emergency can explain and make good any entry, and thus avoid the peril of the penitentiary. There is an intercommunicating liaison among the lawyers, many of whom are engaged for their exclusive services by the year, and all supervising the main channels and watching hawklike to guard against letting their employers become involved in actionable tax delinquencies. As for all other matters, they can be handled locally. The syndicate owns plenty of judges, strong men in both parties and great fluid assets. It is no secret that money can square anything in the United States. Luciano was no peanut when Dewey ruined him. But there are few Deweys. And Luciano had not yet learned to cover his tracks. The money came in so fast and his drag was so good, he felt immune, but Tom Dewey wanted to be President of the United States, and Lucky hadn't thought of that. Luciano had been taken for a ride in the orthodox manner, between two executioners, and had come out alive. They left him for dead in a lonely spot, but he beat it. After that he felt that nothing could break him. Like Samson, he was betrayed by infatuation for a doll. She was Gay Orlova, a fabulously beautiful, but plump, blonde White Russian refugee, who had come to Broadway and Earl Carroll's choruses by way of Turkey.