Purely by Accident

by Jim Beegle

  “You didn’t. No harm done,” he replied. Marin started to walk away still embarrassed.

  “I’m sorry. I’ll leave you alone.”

  “Hey,” he called to her. She stopped and turn back to face him. “You don’t have to go. What are you doing out here anyway? Aren’t they wheelin’ and dealin’ in there yet?” Marin walked back to the corral and spoke in a somewhat lower voice.

  “Oh, Mrs. Vogel and Mr. Hunte are into the full court press. As for me, I am just a worker drone,” she said with a half-smile. Mark could detect some bitterness in her voice. “After I’ve done my part they don’t want me around to hear too many of the details and, more to the point, just how much money the bank will be making. So I get to take a walk for several hours and entertain myself. They told me that if I wanted to I could take one of the cars back to town. I thought I would have a look around some first. You have a nice place. I have always liked the country.”

  “I like it out here too.” Mark said, walking to the gate and letting himself out to the same side Marin was on. “Nice to have the company of a fellow non-essential to the operation.” She smiled at him and at his effort to make her feel like all really was forgiven. “What would you like to know about the place?”

  “Everything,” she said still smiling. “How much do you own?”

  “Oh, it’s just at two hundred fifty acres.” Mark pointed with his hand, indicating where his property boundaries were located. “A good size place to try to take care of yourself.”

  “Do you have help?”

  “Yes and no. I don’t do too much here in the way of real ranchin’. When I am not cooking for wealthy Germans that is.” She smiled at his joke. Mark wasn’t sure if she really thought it funny or was just trying to be polite. Either way, he was flattered. “I hire the kids from the place next door when I need some help. They look after the horses when I’m not here. Horses have to be taken care of every day.” He pointed this time in the direction of the Willies’ place. “Outside of the two horses I don’t keep any livestock here. I don’t grow anything either. Some of the local guys mow the fields for me, in exchange I let them keep the hay they bail from it when they mow. Works out pretty good. If they didn’t do that and it grew for a year or so the fire hazard would be unthinkable.”

  “Do you ride much?” she asked looking at the two horses milling around in the corral.

  “Nope. Don’t have much time. We got them ’cause Amy thought she might like to ride, but they don’t have much of a portfolio so they don’t command much of her attention these days.” He wanted to say “like me,” but stopped himself. “Besides, it makes my ass sore.” She laughed in earnest this time.

  “I used to love to ride,” she said to him still looking at the horses.

  “Used too? I take it you don’t now?”

  “Oh. I still love to ride but don’t get much chance to and there’s no place to keep one in my small house in urban Dallas”.” She was still not looking directly at him when she spoke, smiling. Mark looked at her and returned the smile.

  “How much longer will that thing be going on?” he asked, yanking a thumb back toward the main house. Now she turned back to him confused at the change in the topic of conversation.

  “Oh, Lord, hours still. They haven’t even gotten to the negotiations yet. Why?” she asked. In reply just Mark rubbed his chin with his hand, thinking.

  “Good,” he finally said after a moment’s thought. He turned to look at her full in the face. “Want to go for a ride then?” Instantly her face lit up.

  “Oh I don’t know,” she said, startled at his offer. “I don’t want to put you to any trouble.” But while she hesitated, Mark could see in her eyes that she was already on the horse and galloping across the fields.

  “It’s no bother. They need to be exercised anyway. Come on help me get ’em saddled.” They went to the barn and Mark saddled his horse while Marin watched. Then he lifted the saddle Amy used up onto the other animal and let Marin take it from there. She was a little rusty but for the most part remembered, either from her past experience or the lesson she had just gotten from Mark. The only thing he really did to help her saddle the horse was to check and make sure the straps that ran under the horse securing the saddle were tight. Satisfied that they were, he helped her up into the saddle.

  “Does she have a name?” Marin asked stroking the horse’s mane.

  “Marin Yates, meet Old Pro.” He said indicating the name of the horse Marin was sitting on. “And” he pointed to his mount “Search Light.”

  “Old Pro and Search Light? Those are unusual names.”

  “Well,” Mark said over his shoulder as he guided Search Light out of the barn, “they were characters from some really old beer commercials I used to watch when I was a kid.” He turned to make sure Marin was following him out. She was frowning when he finished his explanation. “Yea, Amy liked the names about as much as you do, but I feed ’em so I get to name ’em,” he told her with a laugh.

  They rode to the western side of the corral. Mark dismounted and opened the gate, leading his horse through by the reins. Marin followed and Mark closed and latched the gate before getting back on his horse. They rode off still heading west. Mark kept the pace slow out of consideration for Marin as well as for his own stomach, still full of steak, potatoes, and beer. They rode side by side out to his fence line. They talked the whole way, mostly about the ranch and how Mark had come to buy it.

  When they reached the fence, they turned north and followed it around the whole circumference of his property. Now, while they rode, she told him about being the youngest child of eight and about her early life on a ranch in South Texas. Born to a woman who loved them all and a father who worked long hours on the offshore oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico. They had lived in the country, not for the same reasons Mark did. The place had been in the family, on her mother’s side, and it had been willed to her mother years before she was born. It was there she had learned to ride. High school gave her a taste of life beyond the farm and she decided, like many teenagers, that she would strike out on her own just as soon as she could. The difference between Marin, and her girlfriends at school, who also longed to run away to the big city, was that she did it. After getting out of school she moved to Houston and went to community college during the day while working at various convenience stores at night. When she finally graduated she went to work for the bank.

  The farther they rode, the more she told him. Mark had a gift that he had just recently become aware of. He could get just about anyone to tell him just about anything with one simple but effective technique: he listened and did not try to interrupt. It was as if the speaker felt compelled to tell Mark everything she could, whether he wanted to hear it or not. But, of course, he would listen either way. She told him about her two children and their father. She told him about her second marriage and the destruction of it as well. Mark just listened and rode. They had ridden about three-quarters of the way around the ranch when she finally took a break.

  “You must think me a blabbering idiot for all the talking I’ve been doing,” she said when it dawned on her that the last time she had heard Mark’s voice was when they had turned to go north.

  “Not at all,” he told her. “I just think you needed to talk. Ranch hands are good listeners too you know.” She blushed at his joke about her mistaking his identify earlier. He saw it and just laughed.

  “You’re not going to let me forget that are you?” she asked in a good-natured way.

  “Nope, never.” he answered with a smile. They rode the rest of the way back with Mark telling her what he hoped to do with the place as he got time and money. When they got back to the corral the meeting had broken up and the Germans, as well as Mr. Hunte, were beginning to get into their cars for the trip back to Dallas. Mark took Marin’s horse and told her he would take care of it. She thanked him quickly, but with real feelings and then sprinted for the waiting car. Mark to
ok both animals into the barn and unsaddled them. He brushed them lightly and gave them oats to eat. He had just put the bridles away and was about to close the barn door when he turned to find his wife watching him.

  “Oh, hello,” he said slightly surprised. “How did your meeting go?”

  “Great, we got the deal.” She said in a voice that was not altogether as happy as Mark thought it might have been.

  “Good, glad to hear it,” he told her, not knowing exactly how to read her body language at the moment. He walked to hang the trap up on the barn wall.

  “Enjoy your ride?” There was something in the tone of her voice that caused Mark to pause and turn around. Now he knew what was bothering her.

  “And just what does that mean?” he asked, feeling his anger rising with his understanding.

  “You don’t think I was too busy to see you riding off into the sunset with one of my office girls?” his wife demanded, crossing her arms in front of her chest.

  “Well, Amy, the horses needed the exercise,” he told her in a voice now more under control. “You banished me from the house and sent Ms. Yates packing as soon as you were through with her too. In the course of sharing our status as hired hands here on your spread, I invited her to ride. I think she enjoyed it,” he told her, more sure of his footing in the conversation. “We rode, we talked, and that’s it.” Amy glared at Mark but he continued to move and did not give her a chance to attack again.

  Mark had noticed Marin at other bank functions over the following years, but she was never back at the ranch. He always made it a point to say hello to her. She always seemed to appreciate the effort. She was always unescorted. Even after getting to know her better and counting her as a friend, she still seemed to have a shyness about her that kept her from mixing well with the crowd.

  The next time Mark actually talked at any length with Marin it was over the phone. She had called the house early one morning asking to speak with Amy.

  “Mr. Vogel, this is Marin Yates,” she said when Mark answered the phone. “Is Mrs. Vogel there?” Mark could tell by the tone of her voice that she was in some kind of distress.

  “Marin, it’s Mark and not Mr. Vogel,” he corrected her. “I ‘m sorry but Amy’s already gone to the office.” He heard her let out a big sigh. “Is everything alright?” he asked. She told him that, as a matter of fact, everything was not alright. She was supposed to meet Amy at the bank early that morning, but on the way, not only in the middle of one of Dallas’s cold winter rain storms but in the middle of a busy intersection as well, her car had died.

  “I called to tell her I was going to be late. I called her cell phone but she isn’t answering.” Marin told him, her voice wavering as she spoke.

  “Where are you?” he asked.

  “What?” she stammered back over the line.

  “Where, did you break down?” he asked her, saying the words slowly. She told him. “Look, you find someplace warm and dry and I’ll come get you.”

  “Oh no,” she began. But it was too late. Mark was already in the process of hanging up the phone and heading out the door to the garage. He found her in a café about twenty minutes later—soaking wet and sipping coffee. He had already called for a tow truck and went with her to the garage and then drove her to the bank and visited with Amy while Marin explained what had happened.

  Marin knew, just as Mark knew, he had accompanied her to the office to act as a buffer between Amy and Marin. He knew, from firsthand experience, how angry his wife could become when she was inconvenienced. After he was sure Amy had time to calm down, he started to leave the building. Marin caught up with him in the outer office and offered him her thanks.

  “I don’t know what I would have done, without your help this morning,” she told him with gratitude in her voice. “Thank you.”

  “Oh I’m sure you would have figured something out, but I’m glad I was able to help.” He said.

  “How can I ever thank you?”

  “Oh, there is no need to, but I am sure that I may need a favor someday. Maybe I can call on you for some help.” He said smiling at her.

  “You can count on it,” Marin said, offering him her hand. He shook it and waved to her as he went through the doorway. A few months later he had a chance to test her promise.

  He arrived back in Dallas late one night from a business trip to find he had left his wallet, containing all his money and credit cards in a bar in the airport when he changed planes in St. Louis. With no money, he could not get his car out of the parking garage. With no credit cards, he couldn’t rent a replacement. Amy was off in Europe on yet another extended business trip. Having nowhere else to turn, he called Marin, who showed up an hour later with money to liberate his car from the parking garage.

  It had continued in a similar vein for years; calling on each other when they needed help with something or needed some advice. A friendship of mutual respect and appreciation slowly took form and grew. From time to time she would call Mark just to see how he was doing and to talk. When he knew Amy was out of town he would occasionally call Marin at her office and have her meet him for a quick lunch just to catch up. During the lunches and phone conversations, the unspoken rule was Amy, either in her role as boss or wife, was not allowed as a topic of conversation. After a while, he got to know more about Marin and more about what she did for Amy and IBC.

  What she did, and did very well, was understand how to move funds from one international bank to the other as easily as everyone else takes money from an ATM. She knew all the laws and rules to make the currency skip across oceans and dance in and out of bank accounts from Hong Kong to New York. Several times he had overheard others speak of her in glow terms as the woman who could make millions swim from on bank in the Pacific to IBC right here in Dallas. It was for these talents that Hamilton Hunte had pulled her out of Houston. It was those same talents that had attached Hamilton to Marin, that caused her name to pop up as he drifted off to sleep the night before on the plane. If anyone could tell him how Cecil had done what he had done, Marin Yates was one to do it. It was the reason he was leaning against the door jamb of her office, once again reminding her of how they met.

  “Oh, Mr. Vogel.” she said with a start.

  “It’s Mark,” he said. “Just like all the other times, I’ve told you that.” He smiled in a manner he hoped would let her know he was joking.

  “Oh. I hope you’re not looking for Mrs. Vogel, I still think she’s in Europe.” She blushed. “I mean, I hope you aren’t thinking she is here … oh, I’m not sure what I mean now.”

  “It’s OK.” he said. “I knew what you meant the first time. Yes, I know Amy is still gone. Besides I’m not looking for her. I’m looking for you.”

  “Me?” Marin asked, pointing to her chest.

  “Uh huh. I am working on some software for a new client that will involve making wire transfers overseas. I was hoping you would let me buy you lunch and pick your brain for a little bit?” He had delivered this elaborate lie with one long breath so that his voice would not give him away. Not that Marin would or could catch him in a lie. He just hated doing it for no reason other than he was not very good at it in the first place. She looked at a brown paper bag on the only corner of her desk not piled high with files and computer reports. Mark lowered his voice. “I would really appreciate the help.” he said with a little pleading in his tone. She smiled at him.

  “I would be glad to.” With that, she grabbed her purse and walked toward the doorway Mark had been standing in.

  They walked out of the building and onto the sidewalk. The day had started out clear but had grown cloudier as the morning waned. Now it was totally overcast, with a wind blowing strong and cold out of the northwest. They walked quickly to stay warm and to cover the ground to the deli as quickly as possible to get out of the cold. They managed to find a table out of the main traffic passage. For a few minutes, they both studied a menu that resided on the table before a
waitress showed up to take their orders. Mark order a ham and Swiss on rye. Marin ordered a salad and iced tea. Mark ordered coffee. When the waitress left Mark pulled out a yellow legal pad and took out a pen. He uncapped it and prepared to write.

  “So tell me the Reader’s Digest version of how money moves all over the world.” She laughed and began to tell him about the different ways money could be moved from one bank in the United States to a bank in another country. Most of it involved wire transfers of one kind or another. Mark discovered that it was not that hard to wire money on deposit in a bank where you were physically located into an account at another bank on the other side of the world. Things got more complicated when you wanted to move it from that bank to another without physically being on sight. Usually, it had to be arranged beforehand and involved affidavits and agreements to get it moved yet again.

  “It’s always much easier,” Marin told him in between bites of salad, “if you are there to initiate the transaction. If not you have to get another bank to contact the bank holding the funds to enable the transaction. It involves more paperwork, lots of identification and fees to the bank as well as taxes to the country where the money is and, in some cases, taxes to the bank to where the money is going to be.”

  “Are all the banks that expensive to deal with?” he asked washing down a bite of sandwich with a mouth full of tea.

  “Most, but not all. The banks in Hong Kong, Switzerland, the Bahamas, the Grand Cayman Islands, Bahrain, and Panama are pretty liberal and pose fewer roadblocks and lower fees and taxes on the transfers. That’s the important thing to remember. Every time the money moves someone wants to take a percentage for their troubles.” Mark listened attentively while he ate, making notes on his yellow legal. “We refer to those banks as offshore banks. Those countries have lower or, in lots of cases, no taxes on deposit in their countries banks. They also do a great deal to protect the identity of the depositor. You don’t earn as much interest that way but you get to keep more of what you earn private.”