The Five

Like a giant magnet at the end of the expressway, those glittering casino towers lining the boardwalk pull in the day trippers, pensioners, and everyday suckers. But they aren’t the only games in town.

There are no neon signs, flashing lights or much of anything particularly noticeable about The Five. The old colonial mansion, majestic in its heyday, long since passed, sits just a few hundred yards from Tropicana Casino Hotel, less than that from the beach.

It stands three stories, and is surrounded by abandoned properties and vacant lots. The house is situated between Pacific Avenue and the boardwalk, on a forgettable dead-end stretch of the city you won’t find on any Monopoly board. But if you live a certain kind of life, outside the margins so to speak, you might find your way there on a Saturday night looking to make a score.

The upper floors front a restaurant, though there’s no sign designating it as such. The place doesn’t even have a listed phone number. Notwithstanding the lack of fanciness, it’s still the most sought-after restaurant in the city. People come far and wide for the speakeasy-like feel and the chance to rub shoulders with celebrities. Sinatra’s a regular diner when he’s in town. It’s a bit of a coup, smalltime bragging rights if you can score a reservation at the infamous Voila’s.

If you look closely at the tattered green awning covering the red brick steps leading to the basement you can just make out the words ‘private club’ in small cracked white letters. Take a wrong step down, a voice from the dark recesses of the landing will bark, “Restaurant’s upstairs!” The bright orange ember of a cigarette the only visible sign of life.

That raspy voice belongs to a guy called ‘The Schnoz.’ His pockmarked face, anchored by his colossal nose was nothing compared to his coal black narrowly set eyes. Mean eyes. Killer eyes. There wasn’t much, if any love in his life. When he was a kid, his own mother used to mock him, a bastard she called him. And ugly. That’s why he killed her first chance he got. He was the perfect guy to protect the club. He was available seven days a week. It might be the club was the only thing he cared about. Or maybe it was just the green it put in his pocket.

If you have the right answers, you might make it down those basement steps and past The Schnoz. Then, you’ll find yourself in a mini casino that could rival anything you’d see on the boardwalk. The big difference, this casino was off the books as they say. No gaming enforcement or state police lurking in the surveillance rooms. But that’s not to say it was crooked, oh no, if you ask anybody, The Five is the fairest game in the city, the whole east coast if you really wanted to take it that far. It’s where the sharps play. For the highest stakes.

There were slots, table games, even had sports betting, especially the ponies. The only tax was a ten-percent house cut of every pot and bet. The vigorish. Factoring in the taxman or lack thereof, it was a much better deal than the legal casinos offered. And nobody cared how you came to hold thousands of dollars in cash, in some cases hundreds of thousands.

Like an old wiseman, Skinny was the guy who called the shots at The Five. Since he was a young kid hustling three card monte on the boardwalk, taking the suckers for twenty-five cents a clip, he had a knack for numbers. Most important, he was a straight shooter. When he was in his early twenties, he started holding card games for the knockaround guys in Ducktown.

Neighborhoods have a way of talking all on their own, and eventually Skinny’s name and word of his card games sailed through the streets and into the ear of the real wiseguys. Godfather types. Eventually, Skinny was sent for by the Philadelphia boss.

Because A.C. was strategically located, many different mob families have their hands in the rackets of the small city by the sea. Seeing a golden opportunity, with the approval from the commission, the Philly boss proposed opening a much bigger operation. He would back all the action, provide markers, security and collections. The only thing Skinny had to do was find a place to run the casino, and straight.

On one of his morning walks shortly after the meeting Skinny stopped in front of an old abandoned Colonial, practically dead center in the town and just a few steps from the boardwalk. It had potential he thought. He made a discreet inquiry at city hall, paid the delinquent tax bill through a shell company and after six months of renovations, The Five was born. The word reached up and down the eastern seaboard. Players of all stripes soon came to throwdown fat stacks of cash on the green felt tables.

Every morning after, in the predawn quiet, a black Lincoln town car eases up to the curb. The car’s windows are custom tinted, shielding the occupants from inspection. Bulletproof too. Once the car comes to a stop, the driver hits the trunk release. Seconds later, gun in one hand, suitcase in the other, The Schnoz steps out of the darkness and places the nights take into the trunk. As soon as he shuts the lid, the brake lights go dark as the car eases off into the distance. The only audible sounds are the crashing surf and seagulls squawking for breakfast. The crash car following close behind.