Purely by Accident

by Jim Beegle

  “Scattered all over the globe.” Mark replied

  “Where exactly, is it scattered?” Hamilton asked.

  Mark shook his head at the question. “Not so fast. We have to discuss my terms first.” Amy, who had been trying to recover her composure, came fully around when she heard Mark’s last statement. She looked at him with hard, flaming eyes. He knew what she was thinking and moved to cut her off before she could speak. “You can assume that it is all in places where security over the accounts is more than adequate and people asking questions get fewer answers than people with account numbers.” Hamilton considered this while he formed his next question.

  “You know I’ll need some proof,” Hamilton said in his best banker’s voice.

  “David Albert Cameron, born July 15, 1947. Served in the United Army from March 1969 through March of 1979. Employed at Southwest Bank of Houston from June 1979 through September 1983. On September 2nd, 1983, he stole fifteen million dollars from Southwest Bank of Houston and wired it to Al-Ahi Commercial Bank in Bahrain. From there the money made a trip to Panama. From Panama, it went to Switzerland. Up to that point, the money had moved always as one interacted unit. That is, until it got to Switzerland. There it was divided several times and scattered to the four winds. Southwest Bank, but literally Interpol and the FBI, lost track of it at that point.” Mark rattled off the facts from his memory in a flat monotone voice, as if he were reading from a script.

  “I‘m not that familiar with the details of the robbery, but I will take your word for it” Hamilton said waving his hand as if to accede to Mark’s knowledge of the facts. “All that is well and good but it’s also all public information and can be found on the Internet I suppose.” Hamilton said in a calm and even voice. “I’m going to need something more.”

  “I assumed as much.” Mark said. From his shirt pocket, he withdrew a 3 5 card that had been folded in half. He unfolded the card and slid it across the table. Hamilton picked it up and looked at it for a moment.

  “What’s this?” The older man asked.

  “That,” Mark said, indicating the card now in Hamilton’s hand, “is the account number for one of the accounts where the money is currently parked. That particular account happens to be in Panama. It’s one of the smaller ones. It contains, as of last week anyway, a little over two million dollars on deposit,” he said, pulling the balance from memory. “Let’s just call this a goodwill gesture on my part to support my claims. You can check out the balance of the account and transfer it at your discretion.”

  “OK,” Hamilton said shifting his weight in the chair, “Let’s just say that, once again, for the moment I believe you. You said something about terms. What are they?” Amy sat forward now, indicating that she was very interested in hearing this part of the discussion. Mark leaned farther back in his chair before starting to speak again.

  “I’ll start by telling you I want nothing monetary out of it. What I do want and need is something to protect Amy and me.”

  “Go on.” Hamilton nodded as he spoke.

  “First, I want a release from the bank and whatever bonding and insurance companies that will want a piece of the returned money. I want it to make clear that I had nothing to do with the theft and that I will be free of any legal actions that these companies may want to mount. I also want something legally binding from the FBI stating that I will not be prosecuted for my involvement with the money.”

  “We have no influence over the FBI or any charges that may be outstanding. The bank has no way of dismissing the charges; it’s a federal law enforcement action.”

  “I know that, Hamilton,” Mark said in a reasonable tone of voice, “but I imagine that you have influence. IBC will have over thirty million reasons to apply some gentle pressure with them on our behalf,” Mark said looking at his wife. Hamilton nodded his head in an acknowledgment that he also thought IBC had that kind of influence.

  “What else?” the banker asked.

  “That’s it,” Mark said, holding up his hands as if he were a blackjack dealer moving away from the dealer’s position at shift change. “I want it returned to its rightful owners and I don’t want to suffer any fallout for doing so. It’s that simple.” Hamilton just sat without saying anything, but Mark could see on his face that he was turning everything over in his mind. Unable to sit very long even when simply watching a baseball game on television, Mark got up from his place at the table and walked to the refrigerator. He could feel two pairs of eyes on him as he opened the door and pulled out a beer. He opened the bottle and tossed the top on to the counter, then he turned back to face Hamilton.

  “This may take some time,” Hamilton finally said.

  “I’m in no immediate hurry, but I do want all this done and over with by the first of the new year. The money isn’t going anywhere.”

  Hamilton spent the next forty-five minutes asking a series of questions about the money that Mark would only answer in vague generalizations. After a while, the questions slowed and finally stopped.

  After a few moments of consideration, Hamilton thumped the card with his finger. “Can I keep this?”

  “Sure,” Mark said. They then knew the formal part of the conversation was over, but no one knew how to bring the gathering to a close. Mark decided to take a stab at it. “What happens next?”

  Hamilton seemed grateful for the direction. “I have to talk to some people and we will have to see what we can do about your conditions. I am going to have to do some checking on your story, but if it is how you say it is, I imagine this can be cleared up before Christmas.”

  “You be damn careful about who you talk to and what you tell them. There is enough money here for lots of people to forget that ‘thou shalt not steal’ is one of the ten commandments,” Mark said in a very serious tone.

  Hamilton looked at him for a long minute. “I will be careful. You had better do the same. There aren’t that many religious people left out there. Thirty million dollars is a good reason not to stay one either.”

  “Well Hamilton, up until an hour or so ago, only two people knew the full story. One of them is buried in Eastland. If word gets out about the money, this deal goes south. Then I’m going to come looking for you.” Mark said pointing to the older man. Amy rose to her feet again and once more moved toward Hamilton’s side of the table.

  “Mark, that was completely uncalled for,” Amy said in a cross voice.

  “No, Amy,” Hamilton said rising to his feet as well. “Mark is right to be concerned and hold us to the task.” He turned and faced Mark. “I will call you, say, Wednesday night and let you know what’s going on.”

  Mark shook his head. “I have a business appointment that night. Just tell Amy and she can tell me.”

  “OK,” Hamilton said slowly. He turned to face Amy. “Well, I had better get going. Looks like I have a lot of work ahead of me.” Hamilton did not move to shake Mark’s hand and Mark did not make any effort on his part to indicate that he expected him to.

  “Hamilton,” Amy said, looking crossly at Mark. “I’ll show you out.” She put her hand on his elbow as if to point him in the direction of the door. Both employees of IBC walked out the kitchen door that led into the garage. As soon as the kitchen door closed Mark heard the garage door going up. As his part of the conversation was now clearly over, he made his way upstairs to his bedroom. There he changed into an old khaki shirt, jeans, and sneakers. When he came back downstairs and into the kitchen, Amy was still nowhere in sight. Mark took a beer from the refrigerator and picked up the newspaper laying on the breakfast bar. He was a good way through his third beer of the evening, as well as the local section of the paper when the kitchen door opened from the garage. A shadow passed over the paper causing him to look up from his reading.

  Amy was standing directly in front of him with her arms crossed over her chest. There was a fire in her eyes.

  “Do you have any idea how embarrassing that was?” She asked him.
As she spoke she moved to a spot very close to his side but still facing him.

  Mark folded the paper over and set the beer down on top of it. He had been expecting this and at the same time dreaded the encounter.

  “Amy,” he began, but didn’t get to the next word out before she exploded. Mark felt a sting and the heat move across his cheek before he actually heard the noise caused by her hand striking his face.

  “Don’t ‘Amy’ me, you bastard,” she yelled back at him. “Do you know how foolish I just looked? Not having any idea about what was going on here?” Mark began once again to speak, but she cut him off. “Of course not. You are clueless about so many things. Why should this be any different?” She moved her hand back and swung it at him again. There was another sound of an open palm connecting with flesh, but this time it was the noise of Amy’s wrist hitting Mark’s hand as he caught her arm on its downward stroke.

  “You may think you were entitled to the first one, and I’m willing to let it go at that.” He shifted his weight in the chair so he could look her in the face, “but if you hit me again, then its considered assault.” Mark continued to hold her arm suspended in the air until he felt her muscles relax as she was trying to withdraw her hand. “Why don’t you sit down and let’s talk about this instead of going another round of bare knuckles.” Amy continued to stand as if she had not heard him.

  “SIT DOWN!” Mark yelled at her. Either because he rarely yelled at her, or she knew that when he yelled she had crossed the line, or simply because his voice startled her, Mark did not know. The result, for whatever reason, was that Amy sat.

  “Amy,” he began again. “I didn’t try to broadside you. I thought about telling you about the money beforehand.” He said that and was almost amazed that he believed the lie. “I didn’t do this to embarrass you or to try to cause you trouble at the bank.” At least he thought to himself, that much was true. “Amy, if you knew about all this and something happened, then it would look like you and I had plotted to try to keep the money. One mistake, one misstep, and there is going to be all kinds of trouble here. With Hamilton involved in it now, hopefully, none of that can happen. Listen to me. You can honestly say, when someone asks you, that you had no idea of any of this until you were notified along with another officer of the bank. If the truth be known, I chose to handle it this way to insulate you from the process.”

  He watched her eyes as she considered what he had just said. He was sure that she did not completely buy into everything he had said, but Mark could see the fire in her eyes damping down and the muscles in the upper part of her body relax. He decided it was time to play his trump card. “Besides, Amy,” he told her, “you’re going to get all the credit for this. All the fortune and glory is going to be yours.” She cocked her head toward him as he spoke. “Amy Vogel recovers fifteen million dollars of the bank’s stolen money with an equal amount of interest. That is promotion stuff any way you slice it.” He could tell by her eyes that the idea was already beginning to take form in her brain.

  “Do you think IBC isn’t going to know that we are married? Do you think anyone is going to ignore the fact that it was you and your husband who returned millions of dollars stolen from the bank years ago? How many more things like this do you need to make it to the top of this mountain you have been trying to climb all these years? This way, if anyone questions what you knew and when you knew it, there’s Hamilton to back up your side of the story.” He could tell that the idea had indeed found a home in her imagination, and for all he knew she was already picking colors for her office after she became a director. They remained silent for a few more moments basking in Amy’s imagined glory. After a few minutes, he saw her eyes flare again as she returned to the kitchen and remembered who she was angry with.

  “Hamilton knows that you told both of us at the same time.” Her voice was angry again. Mark sighed deeply, knowing that he had lost the momentum of the battle.

  “Who would believe him?” Mark asked her.

  “All the other directors, you ass,” she said, her full rage now refocused through her eyes and directly onto him. There was something in the way she looked at him, as if he were a sharecropper having to come to town to tell the bank that he was going to miss the next loan payment. When they argued she always made him feel small. She would be tough, swearing and gutting it out like any of the good ole’ boys, until Mark, usually through logic and reason, would begin to gain an upper hand. She would then switch on the tears and claim foul, attempting to reestablish her womanhood as a shield from the spears being thrown at her. More times than not Mark was trying to dodge the ones she had already tossed at him, like chickens coming home to roost.

  “Amy,” Mark said before getting up, “it’s over. Live with it.” She began to move from her chair and toward him again as he drained the remains of the beer bottle. Mark didn’t have any idea whether she wanted to move the fight closer or only wanted to get back in striking range.

  As he got up he realized he was weary. Not just of this fight with Amy, but with all of it: Micronix, Cecil, Hamilton, Art Ness, DECCO, and Amy, the whole great lot of them. He moved toward the trashcan and cut off her advance toward him. “I am sure you will figure a way out of this perceived situation you find yourself in. In the meantime, I have some work I need to get done, and I am going to get started on it.” Leaving the kitchen he gathered the other bottles and newspaper up from the table, throwing them away as he left.

  He worked for about five hours. At first, the sting on his cheek and the things running through his head that he wished he had said to Amy occupied most of his attention. After about an hour he was finally able to lose himself in the project and focus his attention on something that would neither cause him to sulk nor hit him again. When his eyes began to burn from the strain of working into the early morning hours, Mark saved his work, powered down his computer, and retired to the leather couch in his office/den. The leather felt cold against his skin as he started to fall off to sleep. But not as cold as it would be sleeping with Amy tonight he told himself as he drifted into unconsciousness.

  He was only able to sleep for a few hours before habit woke him. He made coffee and let himself quietly into the bedroom upstairs. Amy slept on; unaware he had entered the room. He went into the bathroom area, closing the door behind himself before beginning the task of getting ready for work. Amy was still sleeping forty-five minutes later when he let himself out of the house and into the new day.

  After he made his way to his office he spent most of the day in the software lab, going over the latest set of code changes to be shipped over from Phoenix. The few that actually worked were painfully slow when they finally decided to run. Mark also spent part of the day in the very awkward position of defending DECCO to people he knew trusted him and his judgment. They were all frustrated and tired of the mess that had become their software. Some of the code writers had worked on Micronix’s first product years ago. These were the people most disgusted with the whole process. By noon Mark had coerced them all into agreeing to see what they could do to make the software work. They continued for no other reason than that Mark had asked them to.

  At lunchtime, he had ventured back up to his office to find a FedEx package on his desk. He opened it as he drank more coffee. True to his word, Pat had sent him what appeared to be a very detailed business plan. Mark could see Pat had been his usual upbeat self in making his forecast. He was not at all displeased to recognize a little of his own influence on Pat in the way the explanation of the business plan was crafted. He sat at his desk and read for almost two hours. When he was finished he sat back and had to admit that Pat might very well have crafted a very saleable product.

  Like the first products introduced by Micronix, Pat had seen a need in the market, made some key decisions about how best to approach the need, and figured that he could make a profit off the resulting solution. It was all based on the premise that the geeks got finished with the software in time.
For the moment he did not have time to give Pat’s project the type of consideration it needed. He decided to take the documents home with him and reread them there. Maybe give Pat a call and ask him a few questions after dinner.

  He swiveled around in his desk chair to deposit the papers in his briefcase. Just before dropping the documents into it his attention was caught by something odd. The inside of the briefcase looked surprisingly large. It took him a moment to realize that the laptop computer that usually took up more than eighty percent of the space was missing. There was a momentary panic when Mark could not remember where the computer could be. The mood passed quickly. He mentally retraced his actions and finally recalled the last place he had used it was in the living room at the ranch. Amy’s phone call had disrupted him in the process of repacking the thing. He knew this because the power cord lay curled and wrapped in its place in the briefcase. Nothing to really worry about he decided. He did not think he would need it and even if he did there were lots of other computers around that he could use. He would just collect it on his next trip to the ranch. He was sure he would be there this weekend. He was equally sure he did not want to stay in Dallas any more than he had too.

  Around five o’clock he called an end to his day soon after the lab had emptied out. They did not have much real progress to show for their efforts, but everyone agreed that they were moving in the right direction. Mark knew that they didn’t have much time to decide. Pretty soon DECCO would start making advance announcements regarding the release of the new upgraded version of the Gamma software. That upgrade, Mark realized, which currently sat in a million electronic bits of code in various computers scattered all over the lab. He would soon have to start shielding his engineers from the DECCO managers who, in an effort to see how fast everyone was working, would slow the whole process down by demanding continuous progress reports on why they weren’t making any progress. Mark likened this to pulling up the flowers to see how well the roots were developing. He sighed to himself as he turned the light off in the cavernous room. He figured that the process of the “art of the squeeze,” as he called the mounting pressure to finish the software, would begin tomorrow night when he met Art Ness for dinner.