Diane Davidson - The Main Corpse

“Well, let’s hear all about it,” I said as we headed into the empty conference room. I uncovered the first tray and offered it to her. “Have something to eat. Food heals all messes.”

Eileen plucked a banana muffin from the platter. “Lowfat?”

I nodded. “Even lower if you don’t count the pecans”

She shrugged and bit greedily into the muffin. “Mm-mm, rum. First thing I’ve had to eat today.”

“What’s the problem with Prospect Financial Partners?” I asked casually. “They don’t use Bank of Aspen Meadow, do they?”

“No, but our merger with First of the Rockies becomes final today. A whole bunch of our account numbers are being changed to avoid duplication. Customers who didn’t order checks are coming in totally irate. Not to mention the confusion with the doggone ATM cards. And of course I’m on the phone every other minute about this Lipscomb disappearance.” She put the muffin down and looked wistfully out the window. “I knew Dottie Quentin, the teller Albert Lipscomb ran off with. She’s probably on her way to Cozumel right now.” She sighed and nibbled more muffin. “Dottie was looking for a guy like Albert. She even had a copy of that infernal book, How to Meet and, Marry a Millionaire. In this case, he’s worth a tad more than a million,” she concluded darkly.

“I know, I heard,” I said sympathetically. “A three-and-a-half millionaire. Does the bank stand to lose money?”

“Oh, you heard about the amount. It’s supposed to be so hush-hush. No, the bank didn’t do anything wrong. We followed standard procedures. How were we to know the guy was stealing money? Besides, Prospect had the cash in the account, for a change. But I am worried about Dottie.” To console herself she sliced a thick wedge of coffee cake.

Prospect had the money, for a change? Hmm. Two employees came in and started to moan to Eileen about the new ATM cards; I busied myself slicing the rest of the cherry cake.

When the employees left and Eileen again assumed a morose expression, I ventured over with the muffin tray. “How old was that bank teller-did you say her name was Dottie Quentin?”

“Twenty-four. Dottie was my protégé during an exchange program between the branches. That dumb girl, I swear. I just wish I could talk to her.”

I nodded sympathetically. “Albert wasn’t that attractive, and he certainly didn’t impress me as the kind of guy who could make love to you with words. Did he impress you that way?”

“Oh, no.” She may have been in the middle of a bank merger crisis, and her protégé may have run off with a rich embezzler, but Eileen’s dark-lashed blue eyes, which she tried to keep downcast, gleamed with triumph. Maybe she wasn’t such a good actress after all.

“There’s nobody here,” I ventured, always one to take advantage of an opportunity for further sleuthing. “Want to sit down and visit for a little bit?” She nodded, and I poured two cups of coffee. “What I wonder,” I said carefully, “is why he did it. Lipscomb, I mean. Three and a half million shouldn’t be that much to a big money guy, should it?”

“It is if it’s all you’ve got in the account,” Eileen replied slyly. “Besides, maybe Albert wasn’t motivated so much by money. Maybe what he really wanted was to get back at Tony Royce for something.”

“Revenge? But get back at him for what?” I asked innocently.

She shrugged. “What few people know is that that mine was Tony’s baby as much as it was Albert’s. Albert usually analyzed their investments, while Tony brought in the clients. That’s how they cleaned up on Medigen. But Albert inherited the mine, so he was the official promoter looking for cash investors. Tony was desperate to analyze his own project. He told me so himself First he was going to score with Albert’s mine, then he’d move on to regional restaurants.” She waved her hand dismissively. “But first, Prospect would have to prove Eurydice still had gold; second, go public with their little enterprise; and third, make a bundle. Maybe things went sour. Maybe Albert decided to clean out their partnership account and leave Tony…” – she smiled – “high and dry.”

“But… what could possibly have gone sour, Eileen? I mean, Marla just lost her temper over something she didn’t understand in the assay report. My understanding is that you do lots and lots of assays to be sure a mine has gold or silver or whatever it is you’re looking for. Surely one bad assay wouldn’t be enough to ruin the whole project?”

She shrugged again. “Who knows? Because they’re not going to be doing any more exploration up there for a while. Not without money. Albert Lipscomb certainly saw to that,” she added maliciously.

I smiled at her and sipped coffee. “Clearly that doesn’t cause you any pain. You must not be a Prospect client.”

“I would never invest in one of their ventures.” Her voice had turned back to vinegar. “God forbid.”

“How come?”

Three employees appeared at the door. “It’s not something I can talk about,” Eileen replied curtly, and moved off to greet her workers. I got to my feet and offered fruit, coffee, and baked goods to the new arrivals. They dug in happily. When they left twenty minutes later, fed and content, Eileen lingered to pour herself some more coffee. She still looked hungry for conversation, so this time I decided to try a new tack.

“You know what I wonder about,” I said conspiratorially, “is how, in this day and age of bank security, a guy like Albert Lipscomb could talk his way into a big wad of cash and a compliant teller.”

Eileen glanced nervously at the conference door, blew on her coffee, and gestured with the muffin she held in her hand. “Oh, we know that part. Lipscomb went into the downtown branch of First of the Rockies Monday morning, June the seventh. He had a big check written out to himself, three and a half mil. He wanted cash. What did they teach him about banking in business school, I’d like to know? You can’t expect to get same-day service with that size transaction. So the teller – my idiot friend Dottie – said, ‘You have to order that kind of cash, we can’t get it for you right away.’ She alerted the officer, but the officer was drowning in this merger. So the officer told her, ‘Order the cash, and convince the guy to come back tomorrow for it.’ The officer told Dottie he’d join her in a minute to do the Large Currency Transaction Report. Required by the federal government, thank you very much, because of all the drug traffic,” she said to forestall my question. She took a big bite of muffin, spilling crumbs over the conference table. She didn’t seem to notice them. “Anytime you’re doing cash over ten thousand deposited or withdrawn, you have to fill out a Large Currency Transaction Report.”

I dumped my cold coffee and poured myself a new cup. “And what did Albert say to all this? I mean, it sounds as if he expected to leave that day with a couple of briefcases full of cash.”

“Apparently he had all the right identification for the Transaction Report.” Eileen sighed. “Albert left, then came back the next morning all smiles and charm, with a glitter in his eyes and a shine on his bald head. He loaded that three and a half mil into a large backpack, said thank you very much, and walked out. After the transaction, Dottie bubbled over telling all her co-workers how cute her rich customer was, and how nifty it was that he seemed so interested in her! She gushed about how she was going out to lunch with him. Which she did. And didn’t come back. Wednesday morning, Tony Royce called the bank about overdraft protection for some large checks to his mine exploration people. You’d better believe the salami hit the fan. There wasn’t enough money in the account to pay the exploration people, forget overdraft. Royce screamed and yelled and had a fit. He would never cosign on a withdrawal of that amount! Albert Lipscomb must have forged his signature on that check! Tony swore to decapitate the bank manager! And if one word of this got out, he said, he’d firebomb the damn bank!”