The Long End

The con man Jebidiah Skint has been scheming to get his hands on some hidden papers, and now he thinks he knows where they are. His young accomplice, Two-Bits, wants details, but Skint keeps his plans to himself. Instead he sends Two-Bits back to the antique shop with a wad of cash and instructions to buy the old hope chest outright. At the shop, Jason Whittaker and his nephew Monty, a federal agent, realize the visit is a ruse: Skint knows he is being watched and is baiting them. Jason plays along, sells Two-Bits the chest, and then tells Monty's team to chase him loudly and make a show of it, since a chase is exactly what Skint wants. Meanwhile, Monty calls Eugene Meltsner, because he has figured out what Skint is really after.

At the Meltsner home, Buck nervously explains to Eugene that everything now underway is like the final scene of a "long end," a con artist's term for a long, patient scheme with a big payoff. Skint soon arrives at the door and forces his way in. He has Eugene and Katrina taped to chairs and orders Buck to gather his things, announcing that he is kidnapping the boy who, in his view, never belonged there anyway. Before leaving, Skint marvels at how cleverly Buck's late mother hid things: her son's birth certificate behind a mirror and her will, with its trust fund for Buck, inside a painting, while Skint wasted years assuming everything was in the hope chest. Buck packs the documents, promises the frightened Meltsners it will be all right, and goes with Skint.

On the long drive to the bank in Harlanville, Skint reveals the rest of his plan. Two-Bits will lead the police back to the Meltsner house and hold Eugene and Katrina hostage, creating a standoff that keeps the police too busy to stop the bank withdrawal. Skint must check in by phone every quarter hour, or Two-Bits will assume the worst. Buck presses Skint with hard questions: how does anyone in his world of fake names and schemes know where one lie ends and another begins? Skint insists his affection for Buck has always been real, but he admits he needs Buck's trust money as seed for the biggest con of his life. He also finally tells Buck about his parents: his father died in a car accident, and his mother, dying of cancer, gave Buck to Skint so her son would never watch her suffer, then hid away with Felicia Larson until she passed. Buck, in turn, seems to waver. He claims he is confused about staying in Odyssey and hints that he has been quietly collecting account numbers and PIN codes around town, just as Skint taught him. Skint suspects a con, but he wants to believe his boy is coming back.

At the Harlanville National Bank, a phone call from Two-Bits describes a dramatic standoff with helicopters and a SWAT truck, and Skint cheerfully admits to Buck that he has no intention of rescuing Two-Bits at all. Inside, the banker Mr. Burton checks Buck's birth certificate, will, and ID, then leads them downstairs to the safe deposit vault, a barred room guarded by a gate. Buck hangs back, claiming the vault makes him claustrophobic, and lets Skint step inside alone. Then Buck calmly gives the order: "Close the gate, Hank." The trap snaps shut. Monty Whittaker steps forward, identifies himself as a Secret Service agent from the fraud division, and arrests Skint. When Skint protests, Buck admits he may feel bad about this someday, but only for a moment.

Outside, the whole scheme unravels for Skint. Once Buck learned what Skint was truly after, he helped the authorities anticipate every move. Two-Bits was arrested early and made a deal at once; his phone calls came from the Odyssey police station, and the hostage standoff was pure theater, with Eugene and Katrina in on the plan. Skint can only mutter, half in pride and half in disappointment, at how his student outplayed him, and Buck answers, "I only did what you would have done."

Monty then brings Buck to meet a surprise witness: Felicia Larson, alive and well and headed into witness protection. She drops her feeble, hard-of-hearing act, insists Buck call her Mama, and finally tells him the truth. His mother hid the documents from Skint, not from Buck, and Felicia was meant to deliver them when he came of age; when federal agents appeared, she scrambled to protect everything, because the trust money was stolen. She urges Buck not to judge his mother harshly, for the woman made bad decisions, but having Buck was never one of them, and she promises him a photograph of her.

Back home with the Meltsners, Buck sets up a small rocket found in his safe deposit box, which his mother's note told him to launch when he claimed the money. He declares, "I know who I am, and I know who I'm not." He decides the stolen trust money must be returned to its rightful owners, keeping only two treasures from his childhood: a baby blanket from the hope chest, just like the one in the painting, and his father's high school ring, the one thing his father never got from a con. Reflecting that people who cling to lies eventually stop recognizing the truth, Buck lights the rocket, and together they cheer, "To the long end!"