Funny Money

by Traci DePree

  The image of Millie stuffing the bag of money into her vest flashed into Kate’s mind.

  “You’ve been back at the SuperMart for a few days?” Kate probed.

  Millie gave her a puzzled look. “Uh-huh.”

  “Has there been anything”—she searched for the right word—“unusual there?” She hoped it would be enough for Millie to pick up on.

  Millie gave her a blank look. “Unusual?” Millie paused for a moment as if in thought. “There was a robbery at the SuperMart the day before I got back, if that’s what you’re talking about.”

  “A robbery?” Why hadn’t anyone else mentioned it?

  “It really rattled me,” she added with a shrug and a humorless chuckle.

  “That would scare me too,” Kate said. “Did they catch the perpetrator?”

  “Yeah, some kid from out of town. They arrested him Saturday.”

  Relief filled Kate. A robbery. That could explain why Millie had acted so nervous with the cash. Maybe she was simply paranoid that the robber was still around.

  When Kate left for home, she called Randall Randolph, who confirmed that there had been a robbery while Millie had been away. As it turned out, there hadn’t been any money missing from the jewelry counter the Friday in question, nor had any counterfeit bills made an appearance.

  Chapter Eleven

  Renee Lambert called Kate on Thursday afternoon with news that more counterfeits had surfaced—some at the Mercantile and others at Emma’s Ice Cream Shop. She told Kate that the authorities suspected the bills were passed the previous evening.

  Passing the counterfeits with the town on full alert was pretty nervy, Kate thought.

  Getting out a bread pan, she began what she often did when she had much to consider: she baked. This time it was her mother’s special banana-bread recipe—no nuts, but so rich and moist it never lasted more than an hour or two after baking. At least not when Paul was in the house.

  As she mashed the overripe bananas, several thoughts came. Who was the dark-haired woman who’d brought the envelope to Millie? Had the counterfeit bills come from that envelope or from the offering plates? What did the locations where the bills were passed have in common? Then it came to her—besides the bills passed at the church, both the Mercantile and Emma’s employed young clerks.

  It was much easier to get a counterfeit bill past inexperienced eyes.

  Except the bank—everyone there was more than experienced, especially when it came to spotting phony money.

  AN HOUR LATER, as the delicious-smelling bread came out of the oven, Kate decided to pay a visit to the library and then to Amy afterward. She wrapped the still-warm bread in foil to take to the Lourdes’, then hopped into her black Honda to head to town.

  Livvy stood at her post behind the horseshoe-shaped counter near the library entrance. “What’s up?” she said.

  “Hey, Liv. I’m just here to enjoy some of your high-speed Internet.” With only a dial-up connection at home, Kate often found it faster to use the library’s computers.

  “Of course,” Livvy said. “How are the Lourdeses doing?” she asked. “I keep thinking about that poor little boy...”

  “I know. You should’ve seen the look on Tim’s face when Paul and I went to see him. He’s devastated and frantic to get back to his family. He’s so worried about Jake.”

  “I’m glad you’re looking into who did this,” Livvy said with a knowing gleam in her eyes. Kate had felt a connection with Livvy practically from the first time they’d met, as if she were a long-lost sister.

  Kate nodded and made her way to the upstairs computer bank. She began her search, punching into Google the words counterfeiting and how to.

  She clicked on a site and learned that rag paper was the cotton-linen mix upon which genuine money was printed. It had a high fabric content, which explained why you could wash money in the laundry and not have it disintegrate as a sheet of printer paper would.

  Kate paused in thought. The bills in the offering had that feel of true money. How had the counterfeiter duplicated it? She typed “papermaking” and read about what it took to create the thin fabric-paper. It wasn’t an easy feat, that was for sure. It required special rollers to press it thin, not to mention the watermark that bills had as part of their security feature.

  Getting out the magnifying glass she’d put in her handbag, Kate pulled out several real dollar bills, examining them closely and noting the fine lines and various inks used.

  Every site Kate looked at said that to spot fake money, you had to know what real money looked like. Real money was intricate in its design. It had multiple colors of inks, as well as magnetic inks and strips that allowed vending machines to read its value and thus dispense correct change. The level of detail in the bills was astounding.

  As Kate read, she thought of how that principle was true of people too. The contrast between someone whose life was genuine and connected to God in a meaningful way was a stark contrast to those who only acted like people of faith when it suited their fancy. And while many looked like the real deal, it was at the heart level—that watermark placed by God—where the truth of their identity lay. It was what pushed her toward her belief that Tim Lourdes was innocent.

  Then Kate clicked onto another page that recounted cases of counterfeiters caught in the act. As the printing industry became more high-tech, she discovered, it took more and more expertise to pull off the feat of creating fakes. Whoever had made the bills knew what they were doing. Enough of the bills had been passed in town to attest to the quality of the counterfeit bills.

  Kate clicked on a short video clip on the Secret Service’s Web site and watched. When it finished, she noted an elderly woman peering over her shoulder at the screen.

  “It’s a crying shame, isn’t it?” the woman said. “I had some of that funny money show up at my garage sale last week!”

  Kate spun around in her chair. “Do you know who it came from?”

  The woman shook her head. “It was a busy day—hard to know who did what. But I guarantee it was that new banker in town.” The woman crossed her arms over her chest.

  “Oh? Did you tell the Secret Service that?”

  “Well, of course I did. I’m not un-American.”

  “What makes you certain it was him?”

  “It just makes sense, doesn’t it? It’s always easier for an insider to get away with things like that.”

  It seemed the town had already tried and convicted Tim Lourdes. Yet doubt niggled at Kate. Yes, there were clues that pointed to him, but her instinct was that his character pointed in the opposite direction.

  ONCE SHE’D FINISHED at the library, Kate made her way to the Lourdes’ home. Amy was in the midst of preparing supper when Kate got there.

  “Come in,” Amy said, ushering her inside the neat home.

  “You look busy,” Kate began. She handed Amy the banana bread as she came inside.

  “What’s this?”

  “My mother’s banana-bread recipe. I thought you’d enjoy it.”

  Amy looked better, though the dark circles under her eyes remained. Her hair was tied neatly into a ponytail. She even wore a touch of makeup.

  “It smells delicious. Thank you.”

  Amy led Kate to the kitchen just off the dining area in the small house. Jake was immersed in an episode of Bugs Bunny in the living room on the other side of the dining area. Kate recalled her own children, now grown, watching the same episode, a musical spoof of the Barber of Seville, and laughing as heartily as Jake did now, though his laughter was interspersed with that deep cough.

  “We just got back from seeing Tim,” Amy said, her voice low. “The public defender was there too; he didn’t seem too optimistic about the case.” She shook her head and let out a long breath. “They found files...”

  “What kind of files?”

  “I can’t imagine. That computer had our basic family stuff on it—nothing illegal.” Her face filled with horror.

 
“Amy,” Kate reached for her hand and waited for her to compose herself. The young woman inhaled deeply. “Did anyone have access to Tim’s computer?”

  Amy shook her head. “Other than me? No one.” She paused for a long moment. “I can’t imagine what they found. Someone is doing this, Kate. Someone is setting Tim up.”

  Kate said a quick prayer for the distraught woman.

  “Tell me about you and Tim,” Kate said. “Has he ever been in any kind of trouble before?”

  “No.” Amy shook her head. “Except... well, we had some financial issues a while back.” She took a deep breath. “Our last house was foreclosed on. With all of Jake’s medical bills ...it’s been hard to make ends meet. The lawyer said that would hurt our case if the jury finds that out. ”

  It wasn’t a secret that they’d had financial struggles, though the revelation of their foreclosure surely wouldn’t help.

  “So the lawyer thinks the jury will see a motive?”

  Amy nodded.

  So there were fingerprints, computer evidence—whatever that was—and motive. She wondered if she were on the jury whether she’d be able to overlook that evidence. So many questions remained.

  “I guess we’re at God’s mercy.” Amy smiled. “And I can think of worse places to be.”

  The young woman’s faith through her adversity touched Kate. Many would turn their backs, or even blame God at a time like this, but Amy chose to trust him. Kate sent up a quick prayer for her.

  Then she glanced at Amy as she returned to chopping tomatoes for tacos. She slipped the cut pieces into a multicolored glass bowl before moving on to the onions and black olives.

  “Amy, do you know what kind of printer and scanner Tim had?”

  “The Secret Service confiscated them, but I have the paperwork on them.”

  “Could I take a look?”

  “Of course.” Amy wiped her hands on a towel and disappeared into the den at the front of the house while Kate waited at the kitchen counter. Jake began to cough so furiously that Kate came around the corner to check on him. His thin body convulsed with each burst. She patted his back, hoping to help him through the bout. When it finally ended, Jake stared up at her.

  “You can pound on my back when that happens,” he informed her. She patted a bit harder. “No, really hit me.” But Kate was hesitant.

  “He’s right,” Amy said, coming alongside them with the promised file folders in hand. She gave them to Kate, then leaned Jake forward and pounded what seemed to Kate to be too hard between his shoulder blades, starting low on his back and working upward with repeated, even blows.

  “It’s part of his physical therapy, to loosen that thick mucus that builds up in his lungs,” she explained.

  The boy coughed again, and Amy handed him several tissues. When it seemed he was finally freed from the hacking torture, he looked back at the TV show as if nothing had happened at all.

  “Of course, with the asthma he has the nebulizer to help him breathe easier too,” Amy said. “Something is bound to help, right? At least that’s the hope.”

  She went back to supper preparations, and Kate laid the folders on the counter and paged through the contents of the first one. The documents were basic users’ manuals, nothing exciting about them.

  “Can I borrow these?” Kate asked.

  Amy nodded as she kept chopping black olives on the cutting board between them. “I don’t exactly need them right now.”

  “And...,” Kate paused, causing Amy to glance up, “would it be okay if I took a look at your basement and maybe your garage?”

  “Look to your heart’s content,” she said with a smile.

  Amy showed Kate the stairs to the basement and left her to explore on her own. The basement was mostly storage, with a laundry room and small weight room set up with a bench and dumbbells. But there was nothing of particular interest to Kate. No counterfeiting lab designed to reproduce bills, no papermaking equipment, not even a ream of paper for printing.

  She searched the garage, which was mostly empty save for a lawn mower and a few gardening tools, then came back to the kitchen. Amy was setting the table.

  Kate said, “Did the Secret Service confiscate anything else, other than Tim’s computer, printer and scanner?”

  “No,” Amy said. “Except they took our bank statements and some other paperwork.”

  “But there wasn’t anything else—no hardware, nothing from the basement or garage?”

  “No, nothing else,” Amy said.

  Kate tapped a finger to her chin as she considered the implications of that information. It meant that if Tim was guilty, the bills had been made exclusively with the computer equipment. Unless he’d created them at another location. Either way, was it possible to create realistic money with those tools? Kate wasn’t sure.

  Chapter Twelve

  Kate and Paul were the first to arrive for their second ballroom dance lesson on Thursday evening. Hal and Audrey greeted them at the door.

  “So,” Kate said, “how’s life in Copper Mill so far? Are you beginning to feel at home?”

  “Oh yes. Everyone has been so nice,” Audrey said. “And I finally feel as if the house is getting settled. I don’t ever want to see another box!”

  “Where did you move from?” Paul asked.

  “New York,” Hal answered. “Lived there for a long time.”

  Audrey added, “So now he’s retired, and we’re living our dream.”

  “Do you have family in the area?” Kate asked.

  Hal shook his head, while Audrey said, “We don’t have much family to speak of, actually. Never had children, so it’s just us.”

  “So why Copper Mill?” Paul asked.

  Audrey shrugged, glancing at her husband. “We’d come through on vacation several years back and thought it was a nice place.”

  “That’s courageous,” Kate said. “To pick a spot on the map and move there without even a job waiting for you there.”

  “I’m pretty outgoing,” Audrey said, “and we’ve moved around a bit in our married life, so it’s not anything new for us. Now Hal”—she looked at her husband—“he’s the shy one. But we’re working on that.” She winked.

  Kate liked this couple. Audrey was a natural with people, and while Hal tended to be quieter than his vivacious wife, he seemed like a genteel man, offering smiles and agreeable nods.

  Audrey and Hal went to greet the rest of the students as they came in—the Jenners, Renee Lambert, and Sam Gorman.

  The Cline sisters came in last. Georgia, the older of the identical twins by five minutes, seemed perturbed about something. “I can’t believe you could think that,” she was saying to Evelyn. “He’s been acting odd, if you ask me. Always leaving work to run off to this or that appointment. I’d think the mother could do that and not make Tim have to skip his responsibilities for it.”

  Defensiveness rose up in Kate when she realized they were talking about Tim Lourdes, though she decided it was best not to say anything.

  Evelyn retorted, “Maybe Tim is simply a good father who wants to be around for his kid’s doctor’s appointments. That doesn’t make him a criminal, does it?” Her head turned toward Kate as she spoke.

  “Are you talking about that Lourdes family?” Audrey said instead.

  Evelyn nodded. “We work with him at the bank; he’s a nice kid.”

  “He’s a crook,” Georgia said under her breath. “His fingerprints had no business being on those bills—”

  “I’ve been hearing about their situation around town,” Audrey interrupted. “It must be impossibly difficult for his family, don’t you agree? With that sick child and all.”

  Sam moved next to Paul and Kate to say hello.

  “By the way, you never told me how Renee talked you into this,” Kate heard Paul whisper to his friend.

  “Beats me.” Sam’s eyes crinkled in a wizened way, and his skin had a tanned, ruddy appearance. “One minute we’re talking about not much special—the p
rice of gasoline and whatnot—the next she has me wrangled into taking dance lessons with her. It’s like dancing with my Aunt Inez. She pinches my arm if I get it wrong!” He rubbed his upper arm where the offenses had occurred.

  The three of them laughed.

  Audrey moved to her spot to begin the class. “Everyone.” She gave three short claps in front of her face, and the class quieted down. “Let’s form two lines.”

  The men ambled to one side of the room while the women formed a line along the other. They went through the steps and were soon paired up again, the Cline sisters dancing with each other. They kept arguing as they danced, and Kate wondered why they continued to dance together when it was clear they weren’t getting along.

  Finally Hal came over. He smiled at each of the sisters in turn, then said, “Can I show you?” He lifted his hands into waltz position and spun Evelyn around the room. The younger of the two was a natural on the floor. Her body lifted and lowered along with Hal’s as they moved in a spiraling pattern. Kate and Paul had stopped to watch them, unaware at first that Georgia was glowering at their admiration.

  “She’s good,” Kate offered, but judging from the expression on Georgia’s face, the comment didn’t go over well.

  “We’re looking for male partners,” Georgia informed. “Some of us aren’t blessed with husbands who’ll do whatever we wish.”

  Paul was smirking. Sam Gorman must’ve overheard too, because he shot a look at them that clearly said, I am not Renee Lambert’s puppet! Renee danced blissfully on, though Kate did note that she gave Sam a pinch on the arm.

  Hal brought Evelyn back to her sister so he could take a spin with the elder sister. Georgia didn’t have the same ease Evelyn had shown, though she was still a fair dancer.

  Paul tapped Kate on the shoulder and said, “Shall we?”

  Kate laughed. She hadn’t realized what a voyeur she’d become.

  When Hal brought Georgia to her sister, he said, “You’re both very natural dancers.”