In the midst of this crisis, a man named Lord John Gordon-Gordon offered to help. Gordon-Gordon, a Scottish lord, had apparently made a small fortune investing in railroads.
Jay Gould, like A1 Capone, was a man who distrusted everyone. By the time he was thirty-three he was already a multimillionaire, mostly through deception and strong-arming. In the late 1860s, Gould invested heavily in the Erie Railroad, then discovered that the market had been flooded with a vast amount of phony stock certificates for the company. He stood to lose a fortune and to suffer a lot of embarrassment.
Selective honesty is best employed on your first encounter with someone. We are all creatures of habit, and our first impressions last a long time. If someone believes you are honest at the start of your relationship it takes a lot to convince them otherwise. This gives you room to maneuver.
In ancient China this was called "giving before you take" the giving makes it hard for the other person to notice the taking. It is a device with infinite practical uses. Brazenly taking something from someone is dangerous, even for the powerful. The victim will pot revenge. It is also dangerous simply to ask for what you need, no matter how politely: Unless the other person sees some gain for themselves, they may come to resent your neediness. Learn to give before you take. It softens the ground, takes the bite out of a future request, or simply creates a distraction. And the giving can take many forms: an actual gift, a generous act, a kind favor, an "honest" admission whatever it takes.
Keys To Power
The essence of deception is distraction. Distracting the people you want to deceive gives you the time and space to do something they won't notice. An act of kindness, generosity, or honesty is often the most powerful form of distraction because it disarms other people's suspicions. It turns them into children, eagerly lapping up any kind of affectionate gesture.
Everything turns gray when I don't have at least one mark on the horizon. Life then seems empty and depressing. I cannot understand honest men. They lead desperate lives, full of boredom.
Count Victor Lustig, 1890-1947
Do not shy away from practicing this law on the Capones of the world. With a well-timed gesture of honesty or generosity, you will have the most brutal and cynical beast in the kingdom eating out of your hand.
Lustig's act of selective honesty disarmed Capone because it was so unexpected. A con artist loves conflicting emotions like these, since the person caught up in them is so easily distracted and deceived.
One sure way to do this is through an act of apparent sincerity and honesty. Who will distrust a person literally caught in the act of being honest? Lustig used selective honesty many times, but with Capone he went a step further. No normal con man would have dared such a con; he would have chosen his suckers for their meekness, for that look about them that says they will take their medicine without complaint. Con Capone and you would spend the rest of your life (whatever remained of it) afraid. But Lustig understood that a man like Capone spends his life mistrusting others. No one around him is honest or generous, and beings so much in the company of wolves is exhausting, even depressing. A man like Capone yearns to be the recipient of an honest or generous gesture, to feel that not everyone has an angle or is out to rob him.
Interpretation
Count Victor Lustig, a man who spoke several languages and prided himself on his refinement and culture, was one of the great con artists of modern times. He was know for his audacity, his fearlessness, and, most important, his knowledge of human psychology. He could size up a man in minutes, discovering his weaknesses, and he had radar for suckers. Lustig knew that most men build up defenses against crooks and other trouble-makers. The con artist's job is to bring those defenses down.
The $5,000 was what Lustig had been after all along.
Capone sagged back into his chair, confused. "I know you're a conman, Count," said Capone. "I knew it the moment you walked in here. I expected either one hundred thousand dollars or nothing. But this... getting my money back... well." "Again my apologies, Mr. Capone," said Lustig, as he picked up his hat and began to leave. "My God! You're honest!" yelled Capone. "If you're on the spot, here's five to help you along." He counted out five one-thousand bills out of the $50,000. The count seemed stunned, bowed deeply, mumbled his thanks, and left, taking the money.
Capone slowly stood up. He glowered at Lustig, debating which part of the river to throw him in. But the count reached into his coat pocket, withdrew the $50,000 and placed it on the desk. "Here, sir, is your money, to the penny. Again, my sincere apologies. This is most embarrassing. Things didn't work out the way I thought they would. I would have loved to have doubled your money for you and for myself Lord knows I need it but the plan just didn't materialize."
The $50,000 remained in the bank box untouched. Lustig made no effort to double it. Two months later he returned to Chicago, took the money from the box, and paid Capone another visit. He looked at the gangster's stony-faced bodyguards, smiled apologetically, and said, "Please accept my profound regrets, Mr. Capone. I'm sorry to report that the plan failed... I failed."
Use Selective Honesty And Generosity To Disarm Your Victim
Observance Of The Law
Sometime in 1926, a tall, dapperly dressed man paid a visit to A1 Capone, the most feared gangster of his time. Speaking with an elegant Continental accent, the man introduced himself as Count Victor Lustig. He promised that if Capone gave him $50,000 he could double it. Capone had more than enough funds to cover the "investment," but he wasn't in the habit of entrusting large sums to total strangers. He looked the count over: Something about the man was different his classy style, his manner and so Capone decided to play along. He counted out the bills personally and handed them to Lustig. "Okay, Count," said Capone. "Double it in sixty days like you said." Lustig left with the money, put it in a safe-deposit box in Chicago, then headed to New York, where he had several other money-making schemes in progress.
No such independence comes without a price. You are forced to isolate yourself. Monopolies often turn inward and destroy themselves from the internal pressure. They also stir up powerful resentment, making their enemies bond together to fight them. The drive for complete control is often ruinous and fruitless. Interdependence remains the law, independence a rare and often fatal exception. Better to place yourself in a position of mutual dependence, then, and to follow this critical law rather than look for its reversal. You will not have the unbearable pressure of being on top, and the master above you will in essence be your slave, for he will depend on you.
Reversal
The weakness of making others depend on you is that you are in some measure dependent on them. But trying to move beyond that point means getting rid of those above you it means standing alone, depending on no one. Such is the monopolistic drive of a J. P. Morgan or a John D. Rockefeller to drive out all competition, to be in complete control. If you can corner the market, so much the better.
Authority: Make people depend on you. More is to be gained from such dependence than courtesy. He who has slaked his thirst, immediately turns his back on the well, no longer needing it. When dependence disappears, so does civility and decency, and then respect. The first lesson which experience should teach you is to keep hope alive but never satisfied, keeping even a royal patron ever in need of you. (Baltasar Gracian, 1601-1658)
Image: Vines with Many Thorns. Below, the roots grow deep and wide. Above, the vines push through bushes, entwine themselves around trees and poles and window ledges. To get rid of them would cost such toil and blood, it is easier to let them climb.
One last warning: Do not imagine that your master's dependence on you will make him love you. In fact, he may resent and fear you. But, as Machiavelli said, it is better to be feared than loved. Fear you can control; love, never. Depending on an emotion as subtle and changeable as love or friendship will only make you insecure. Better to have others depend on you out of fear of the consequences of losing you than out of love of your company.
