Death Is Waiting: Saving Mae Carter

By A. L. Provost

Dadgummit! Why is it that every criminal who runs afoul of Baltimore chief of police Paul Marlowe scampers down south of US 1 and ends up in Lenoir County, North Carolina, where he becomes the problem of Lenoir County district attorney Newt Wildman?

It is 1933, and the South is full of wannabe John Dillingers. The cast of thieves and murderers includes two larcenous bank officers, a beautiful female bank employee, and a German immigrant stooge down on his luck and willing to commit two brazen murdersfor the right price, of course.

The chase is on in this eleventh tale of the popular Coastal Plain Mystery Series.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jan 28, 2018
• ISBN: 9781543478778

A. L. Provost

The author, an attorney and optometrist, resides outside Atlanta with his wife Evelyn, an attorney, their four talented children having gone on to careers in Optometry, real estate and teaching. In May 1961 the author received an undergraduate degree in Physics-Mathematics from Berry College, and in July of that year enlisted in the U. S. Army. He served two tours of duty in South Korea, the last with U. S. Army Intelligence as a Korean linguist and prisoner interrogator. In 1972 Dr. Provost was awarded the degree of Doctor of Optometry from the University of Houston, and in 1980 earned a Juris Doctor degree from Nova Southeastern University College of Law. Dr. Provost is the author of the best-selling memoir, Reflections in an Orphan’s Eye, The Puppeteer, a mystery novel of the wartime South, and thirteen other mystery novels.

Book preview

Copyright © 2018 by A. L. Provost.

Library of Congress Control Number:      2018900610

ISBN:                  Hardcover                     978-1-5434-7875-4

                            Softcover                       978-1-5434-7876-1

                            eBook                             978-1-5434-7877-8

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 01/25/2018

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CONTENTS

1     Our Tale Begins–The Year 1933

2     Maryland’s Eastern Shore

3     Details of the Embezzlement

4     The Nosy German Immigrant

5     A Night of Terror

6     The Girl Who Knew Too Much

7     Enter the Chief of Detectives

8     The Forensic Bank Auditor

9     The Trusted Bank Officer

10   Marlowe Searches for Answers

11   Maebelle’s Stalled Car

12   Seducing an Accomplice

13   The Telltale Banded Packets

14   The Teenage Sleuth

15   The Plot Moves South

16   The Scheme Implodes

17   William Carey: Left in the Lurch

18   Those Nagging Loose Ends

19   Marlowe Gathers the Evidence

20   The Country Cousins

21   A Visit to the Ford Place

22   Spotting the Giant June Bug

23   A Flat Tire of Convenience

24   Brad Morgan’s Costly Blunder

25   The Fortune in the Cellar

26   Brad Morgan Spots His Nemesis

27   William Carey: Lost in the Shuffle

28   Confusion on a Stormy Night

29   Waiting in a Cold Rain

30   Race to the Farmhouse

31   The Second Farmhouse

32   The Blind Man

33   A Shock to the Senses

34   Gunfight at the Farmhouse

35   The Quadriplegic and the Blind Man

Epilogue

Praise for the Mystery Novels of A. L. Provost:

The Sharecropper’s Daughter’s Secret

…fascinating…attention grabbing…morally-compelling.

Writer’s Digest

The Tangled Web

Congratulations on a great book that combines historic

detail with suspense and superb characterization.

Writer’s Digest

The Thirty-seventh Parallel

You did a good job building the suspense and drawing the

reader into the plot… I found myself reading quickly without

realizing how much time was passing.

Writer’s Digest

The Puppeteer

The murder plot that unravels in the novel is complex

and well-developed.

Writer’s Digest

Grand Deceptions

…deals with intricate plots that unfold over a relatively brief period of time.

Writer’s Digest

The Bookmark Murders

…carefully constructed narrative travels at a good pace.

Writer’s Digest

The Price of Greed

…writing is very meticulous and clear.

Writer’s Digest

The Trust of Old Men

…it’s clear that the plot of the book was well thought-out.

Writer’s Digest

The Holstein Diamonds

…intelligent thriller with a compelling premise.

Writer’s Digest

The Road to Dresden

…compelling and fascinating World War II thriller.

Writer’s Digest

Acknowledgements

Death is Waiting is my sixteenth published mystery, twelve of which are included in the popular Coastal Plain Mysteries Series. Encouragement is the vehicle that pushes writers to greater heights. Love of the craft keeps them there. But alas, once more I cannot claim all the credit. Harry Conlon, my long-time friend and literary advisor, is still keeping my stories on the straight and narrow. Thanks for everything, Harry.

Chapin Nicholas-Puls is a young college student who lives with his family in an Atlanta suburb. He works part-time in his grandfather’s optical.

For the past several years this industrious young man also has served as my research assistant. In addition to his thoroughness, Chapin seems to be able to anticipate the depth of the research needed. I am very fortunate to have his help.

Finally, thanks to Cynthia Cromer, my very capable and loyal literary assistant, who has guided my books along the sometimes arduous path to the publisher. I could not have done it without her.

Prologue

Embezzlement doesn’t mix well with murder. At least not in Baltimore, Maryland in 1933. Stir in an ounce or two of greed and the criminals begin having the proverbial falling out.

What causes some criminals to stumble into the clutches of the Law often has to do with an uncanny combination of greed, conceit and arrogance. And this case would be no different but for the fact that unbeknown to one another, two officers in the large Century Bank and Trust Company of Baltimore are drawing an unknowing young female teller into their diabolical murder and embezzlement schemes.

In the end nothing is what it seems. And the crooks are running circles around the police. However…

The fatal mistake these lowlifes make is popping up on the radar screen of famed Baltimore Police Chief of Detectives Paul Marlowe. The chase is on and doesn’t end until it gets to a farmhouse down in the North Carolina Coastal Plain, near the small town of Kinston.

Chapter 1

Our Tale Begins–The Year 1933

The case was akin to purchasing the last copy of a best-selling novel only to discover after reading for six days that your copy of the 959-page thriller contained but 936 pages. Lesson: Stay away from last copies.

Or like asking directions only to be told, You can’t get there from here.

The frustration the convoluted case engendered in Newt Wildman, Lenoir County, North Carolina District Attorney, Assistant D. A. Bill Harrington and Chief Homicide Investigator Van Edmonds appeared unending, and every new avenue they explored seemed to be a one-way road leading away from a solution.

What made matters worse–if this were possible–was that the murders were not even committed, as best the lawmen could ascertain, in Kinston, the 20,000-soul population of the county seat of Lenoir County, North Carolina but in faraway Baltimore, Maryland.

The only pertinent fact of which they were somewhat certain was that the murders were committed on the same day–or same night to be more precise. But there we go again, getting ahead of ourselves.

Because sometime it is advisable to start at the beginning, that in this case was much earlier than January 1933, and work forward. This method tends to give the reader perspective. The story begins in Edgar Allen Poe’s hometown, miles from Lenoir County.

In the early 1920s Baltimore, Maryland was not exactly Sin City. However, the influx of often depressed and destitute German immigrants during the decade following the end of the Great War in 1919 impacted in a negative way the crime rate in large cities along the Eastern Seaboard.

The stock market crash of 1929 ushered in one of the bloodiest periods in the annals of American crime. The overnight loss of fortunes adversely affected not only wealthy bankers and industrialists as picture shows of that seminal era tend to portray.

The working stiff who had put in hours of overtime down at the foundry in order to purchase thirty shares of XYZ stock at five dollars per share lost his money same as did the executive who owned 30,000 shares. The wealthy man jumped out of a window fifteen stories up, the other poor slob from the fifth story. But both men hit the pavement hard and didn’t get up. The Average Joe had to get busy feeding his family. Tough times segued into even tougher.

The Enterprising Joe however soon found that one of the easiest ways to earn a living was to locate a bank in a small town, find out when the doors opened in the morning and show up carrying a gat and a sack for the cash.

History shows that John Dillinger’s gang, Ma Barker and Alvin Karpis’ gang and Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow literally kept no tally as to how many banks, from small town small ones to big city big ones, they had robbed.

Monkey see. Monkey do.

An aphorism fitting for the times. Honest, good-paying jobs were as scarce as the proverbial hen’s teeth and with each passing month conditions steadily worsened. The expression, Easy money likely was coined somewhere in America around 1930.

Bank robbers became so prolific that the government found it necessary to make bank robbery a federal crime.

And in 1930 the average bank located in a small or medium-sized town across America simply was not equipped to defend itself against a determined band of well-armed crooks often with nothing to lose. Of course it wasn’t long before bank robbers discovered it was more lucrative to rob the inadequately-armed panel trucks that carried the cash, bonds, gold and checks from one bank to another.

Furthermore, savvy crooks quickly learned that the weakest link in the chain of handling this gold, checks and cash was during the few minutes it took for the panel truck driver and guard, both armed with sawed-off shotguns, to walk from the parked vehicle to the front door of the bank carrying several bags of money in the free hand.

In 1929 so-called armored trucks were unheard of outside the largest cities, located mainly in the northeast. However as of January 1931 banks of any size sought protection because losses due to robbery were not covered by insurance. Gone money was just that–gone. With the bank usually left holding the (empty) bag.

Within a span of two years armored security trucks were everywhere. There were so many ways to rob an armored truck that lawmen seemed to be outwitted at every turn by enterprising gangs of thieves, and the hijacking of armored trucks became the plot of several dozen movies over the years. It is against this social and economically-depressed backdrop that our tale unfolds.

The Armored Security Venture

Collusion has always been the name of the bank fraud game. Without the efforts of two, sometimes three, well-placed employees acting in concert most of the nation’s bank fraud could not occur.

One rainy morning in the fall of 1930 Brian Davenport stopped by the second-floor office of Brad Morgan. Poking his head through the open portal, Davenport greeted his friend cheerfully.

Not much is happening down in the lobby, Brad. Let’s walk over to the coffee shop on the corner and discuss the new venture I mentioned to you last week. The walls have ears even on the second floor of a bank.

The amiable Davenport had been the vice-President for Investments at Century Bank and Trust Company for five years when Morgan joined the staff, in charge of New Accounts. The two hit it off immediately.

What I’m going to discuss with you is my own idea, began Brian as the waitress served coffee and generous slices of Southern pecan pie, then departed.

I have not told anyone else my plan, so it’s ours if you wish to join me.

I’m eager to hear your thoughts, said Brad. But whether I go along or don’t I’ll still never mention anything to anyone about what we discuss here this morning. So what gives?

You, of course, have seen those armored security trucks about town, and it appears there are more of them on the streets than there were even a year ago, began Brian.

I would suppose so now that the idea has proved to be a sound one, added his friend. I take it that you’ve looked into it as a business venture?

Actually it’s two business ventures in one, said Davenport.

Please explain, said Morgan.

"I’ve planned a route south of here, and I know my banks quite well–or rather my bank managers I should say, said his friend. And I’ve received commitments from twelve banks from Richmond south to Columbia, South Carolina, to pick up and deliver their cash and bonds daily."

How many armored trucks do you think we’ll need and how much will each truck cost? asked a suddenly quite interested General Accounting vice-President.

We’ll start with two trucks and at first we’ll lease them. Damage to or theft of the trucks will be taken care of by the owner of the trucks and his insurance. And the lease payments are quite reasonable.

Have you determined the routes of the two armored trucks? asked Brad Morgan.

Yes, said Davenport. Along the north-south route from Richmond to Columbia, South Carolina the small tobacco town of Kinston is situated at about the midway point. But don’t let the size of the town fool you.

Why so? asked a puzzled Brad Morgan. Puzzled, but more impressed than puzzled.

Some of the largest and most productive tobacco farms are located in Lenoir County, of which Kinston is the county seat. And even during hard economic times people still love their cigarettes.

So what is the significance of the midway point? asked Brad curiously.

We’ll have two armored trucks, each of which will carry a driver and a guard armed with a sidearm and a sawed-off shotgun, riding in the passenger seat, began Davenport.

He explained that the southbound vehicle and the northbound vehicle would start out early in the morning from Richmond and Columbia respectively.

Each vehicle would stop at banks along the way, picking up and dropping off stocks, bonds and cash from the other client banks.

At somewhere around noon the two armored trucks would meet on the street in front of Commerce Bank in Kinston, on the corner of North Avenue and Queen Street.

At this time the two vehicles would exchange cargoes; the Richmond truck would return north to Richmond while the Columbia truck headed back home to South Carolina, again stopping at each bank along the way.

Sounds simple enough, said Brad. So what you’re saying is that at the end of the day neither armored vehicle would be carrying any stocks, bonds or cash.

Exactly, responded Brian Davenport. The beauty of my plan is that we would not need a storage warehouse nor additional armed personnel. We’ll be able to earn more while at the same time not being worried about storing all those valuables overnight.

I’m assuming that once we get started and have worked out any kinks, we’ll want to expand? said Morgan.

You’re exactly right. We’d be foolish not to try for more banks along the way, said Brian. But you’ll agree we can handle any changes when the time comes to expand. And this will get us started in business with a minimum of working capital required.

Would this southern route require one of us to move farther south, such as to Raleigh for example? asked Brad.

Not necessarily, replied his new partner. However I suggest we purchase a modest two-bedroom house in Kinston, as like I said is about the halfway point. Houses are not very expensive and we can use it as an office. If either of us needs to come south to meet with our bank clients, we’ll have a place to stay without being required to spend money on hotel rooms.

I like your idea, Brian, said Brad. I’d say having a dozen banks already signed up is a great start.

So you’re in? asked Brian excitedly.

I’m in–partner, replied Brad smiling broadly. The men stood and shook hands across the table.

We need a name for our new venture, said Brad. I’m certain that because this was your brainchild you must have a name or three already picked out.

"What about Seaboard Armored Security? asked Brian. It is an armored security business and our route will run along the Eastern Seaboard."

I like it already, said Brad. It says what it is. I’m sure we’ll be a raving success in no time at all.

Well as soon as we finish our coffee and pecan pie I’ll get back to the office and begin setting up the company and contacting the twelve bank managers to make up a schedule, said Brian.

And I’m going to get back to the bank and begin figuring out a foolproof scheme to become the wealthiest man along the Eastern Seaboard, thought Brad Morgan. Thank you for the opportunity my friend, he chuckled.

To couch the situation in succinct terms Brad Morgan, for as long as he could recall, had viewed life through a narcissistic lens. And anything that smacked of money also smacked of opportunity. Forty-year-old Brad Morgan was a con artist. With a mean streak a mile long.

No sooner had his friend Brian Davenport mentioned that each day around noon the northbound armored truck and the southbound armored truck would meet on the street in front of Commerce Bank on the corner of North Avenue and Queen Street in Kinston for the purpose of exchanging cargoes, than Brad picked up on the fact that this was the only time all the money would be located in one place.

Therefore Brad Morgan had only to determine on which day of the week (or month) would there by the greatest amount of money being transferred between the two armored trucks on a quiet street in a sleepy Southern small town.

Now any banker will tell you that the banks would have no reason to inform the drivers of an armored truck as to the amount of money inside the money sacks. Not to worry however. Just by hefting the money sacks enough times, the drivers would be able to determine that one sack was heavier than another. Brad Morgan was a smart man. He’d figure it out.

Because the Board of Directors of Century Bank would object to two of the bank’s officers having an outside business interest, the partners agreed to locate and hire a dependable person with experience in the armored car industry to manage the fledging Seaboard Armored Security Company.

In order to engender a sense of mutual trust in his partner, Brad Morgan asked Brian if he, Brian, would take the responsibility of locating and hiring the manager.

Once I locate the prospective manager, should the three of us meet so that you can sign off on hiring him? asked Brian.

That won’t be necessary, replied Brad. In fact come to think of it, it’s not even necessary that the man know my identity. This way if we ever need to check up on whether he’s doing a good job, I can do this without his knowledge, as he wouldn’t know me from Adam’s house cat.

Sounds like a good idea to me, agreed Davenport. I’ll get started right away, and let you know when I’ve hired someone.

Now here was a fortuitous turn of events, mused Brad Morgan. He knew that the armored security business was quite profitable and would afford him a comfortable supplemental income with a minimum investment.

More important was if for some unforeseen reason his Grand Scam didn’t work out, he could continue receiving a secret income. All in all, he felt good about his venture with his fellow bank officer. And in his own cockamamie way his mind immediately dropped into fourth gear on its way to figuring out a way to end up with all the money.

The Manipulator’s Agenda

Bradley Morgan, Brad to his friends–of which there were many–was an avowed narcissist, and as an extension of this sociopathic quality, was a manipulator par excellence. Of situations in life. And of persons. What some would call a user.

Yet Brad Morgan also possessed a quality that if nurtured would carry him far in life. At the same time his classmates in grade school boasted of having I.Q.s of 100, 125 and an occasional 140, when he started fifth grade his mother showed him a report from the school psychologist that scored his I.Q. at a phenomenal 186.

The reason you score high marks in all your school subjects even though you rarely put forth much effort is because, as your intelligence test scores indicate, you are more intelligent than ninety-nine percent of the population, said his mother, smiling down at her favorite child proudly.

However, Brad’s mother hardly hid her favoritism of Brad over her other two sons, both several years older than Brad. As a result, the brothers resented Brad and their mother to the extent that the boy’s de facto position in the family was akin to that of an only child. And this suited the young narcissist just fine. He craved the attention anyway.

As high school graduation approached, Brad’s mother naturally assumed that her favorite son would pursue a profession in medicine or law. However, he opted to enroll in the University of Maryland and work toward a career in banking and finance.

But this is the field your favorite uncle, my brother Thomas, chose. However he has been an officer in a large bank in Richmond, Virginia for fifteen years and still draws a small salary. So why would you want to work in a bank? scoffed Mrs. Morgan.

Because Mother, said the boy smiling, that’s where the money is. This trite comment whizzed by his mother’s auditory canal at the speed of light while failing to even register on the well-meaning lady’s consciousness.

However, to offer another trite paternoster, one apropos to the instant case, truer words were never spoken. And as intelligent as was the young man, which could be described as very, quite, and immensely, he knew for a fact that if he were legally allowed near all that money, it wouldn’t take him very long to manipulate the books and make off with his share–and more, without anyone being the wiser.

This mindset is especially important in persons of the caliber of Brad Morgan, because the hallmark of any narcissist is absolute confidence in his ability to accomplish any difficult (unlawful) task and the nerve to pull it off.

As Brad entered his junior year at the University of Maryland he applied to, and because of his superior grades during his freshman and sophomore years, was accepted in the Banking Trainee Program at Century Bank and Trust Company, the fourth largest banking group in the state with its main office in Baltimore.

Among the six students accepted into the program, young Brad Morgan set out to prove himself to be the most intelligent, most helpful and most professional of the group. He associated not with the other five students but with the bank tellers and other mid-level associates.

Setting himself off from the other students paid the desired dividends and upon graduation two years later Brad Morgan was offered the position of Chief Teller in the main office of Century Bank located in downtown Baltimore. He coasted uphill from there.

The Education of William Carey

William Carey was industrious and intelligent. Following graduation from Baltimore High School he tried his hand at several different jobs including retail sales and home repair, but none of these held his interest for long. He realized he needed a job that was more mentally-challenging, one in which he could feel a sense of accomplishment on a daily basis. What William really sought was a responsible profession and not just a trade.

One day William was shopping for groceries down at the corner market, when he overheard a conversation between a young woman and her boyfriend, who had just begun his job as a teller at a small bank in South Baltimore.

Although William had never given it any conscious thought, he recalled that he maintained a small checking account at a local bank and the tellers always seemed helpful and appeared to like their work. William also observed that the young man in the grocery store and the tellers at his bank were about his age, which at the time was twenty-five.

So after giving his plan much thought he applied for the advertised position of junior teller in a large bank in downtown Baltimore, halfway expecting to be turned down because he had no formal education past high school.

Following a thirty-minute interview with a pleasant bank officer however, William received the shock of his life when the officer asked him when he could begin work.

So taken aback was the young man that he questioned the bank officer’s decision to hire him.

You’ll learn, William, that very few bank tellers have college degrees. The teller’s job is a limited one, he said.

It will take you about six months to learn the job. Bear in mind that even the most experienced tellers still need the advice of bank officers from time to time. Remember that we’re always here to help.

And the helpful bank officer’s assurances proved portentous indeed. The teller’s job after three months became quite routine and on the few times William wasn’t certain how to handle a transaction his mentor bailed him out.

The bank employed seven tellers, and over coffee in the rear break room the newest employee learned that none of the seven tellers possessed more than a high school education.

However, William Carey was nothing if not ambitious. He did not come to the bank solely for a job. No, he came for a career.

So looking around the bank lobby at the other tellers he tried to figure a way to move up in the bank, because just being a lowly teller was not getting him where he needed to be. Spinning his wheels, he was.

So he decided to ask the advice of his knowledgeable mentor, which he did the following day.

Passing by Mr. Bradley Morgan’s open doorway shortly before lunch time he paused and rapped lightly on the door frame.

Yes William? said the friendly bank officer looking up from a report he was writing.

Mr. Morgan, I need some advice concerning how I can move up in the bank.

Boring job after a few months, isn’t it? Mr. Morgan said smiling. Come on, I’ll treat you to lunch at the small café around the corner.

Once they were seated at a rear corner table out of the din of the noontime crowd, William came to the point.

You were correct, Mr. Morgan. After several months, being a bank teller is a monotonous job. There is absolutely no challenge at all, he lamented. How can I move up at the bank into something more challenging?

It would take some more schooling–the standard course is two years–to have you qualified to eventually take over one of the five departments in the bank. Or in just about any bank for that matter.

And what are those departments? asked William.

Well, there are New Accounts, Investments, Loans, Stocks and Bonds, and General Accounting, said Mr. Morgan.

At this point William was aching to ask which one of those departments would put him closer to earning more money, but he would figure that out as he went along. This certainly was not the time to discuss money matters.

Now if you enroll in the banking course at the college, after six months we can allow you to start working in the department of your choice, continued Mr. Morgan. All five departments are open.

How would I know which department in which to choose to work? asked William.

This can always be decided later. The main thing is to get you enrolled in college. That is if you’re really interested in moving up at the bank.

You bet I am, said William eagerly. Six weeks later he started classes at the Maryland College of Banking and Finance.

The New New Accounts Head

At this time William realized the wonderful opportunity opened to him by the benevolence of Mr. Morgan, who held the position of vice-President in charge of the General Accounting Department of the bank.

William could think of no reason why Mr. Morgan, who at age forty had been an employee at Century Bank and Trust for nine years and for the past four of these years had been in charge of General Accounting, would decide to go out of his way to help the neophyte bank employee. So one day after William had been attending college for six months or so he stopped by Mr. Morgan’s office and invited him to lunch at the corner café.

After ordering two meals of chipped beef and gravy on Sunbeam white toast and large mugs of Maxwell House coffee, William broached the subject.

Mr. Morgan, I really appreciate all the help and advice you have given me since I started working at the bank, said the young bank teller-college student. Of all the bank tellers you seem to have chosen to help me, and I’m grateful.

It’s because I see in you an intelligent young man who wants to better himself, and I am happy to assist you in attaining your goals, said the bank officer sincerely.

"And by the way young man, I believe it’s time you started calling me Brad or Bradley when we are not inside the bank. Just keep it formal when we’re around other people."

"Okay Mr. Morgan, Bradley it is," said William Carey, happy to be accepted (nearly) as an equal by someone he admired and respected. The Plan was progressing well on schedule. William Carey’s plan, that is.

But what about Brad Morgan’s plan?

Eighteen months later, just two weeks before William Carey’s graduation from the Maryland College of Banking and Finance, Robert Morrison, head of Century Bank’s New Accounts Department, announced that he was leaving the bank after six years to become the New Accounts Department head at a large bank in Raleigh.

Mr. Morrison’s decision to leave could not have come at a better time for young William Carey because Carey’s mentor had let Carey know that the new college graduate would fit in well in the New Accounts Department.

At the weekly meeting of the five department managers Bradley Morgan stood up for his protégé.

Young Carey is graduating at the top of his class in the banking and finance college, said Morgan. He would fit in quite well in New Accounts, and as we other four department heads are now in our forties we would certainly welcome an infusion of young blood in the bank.

The other four department heads agreed, and the day following his college graduation William Carey became the New Accounts Department head. At the young age of twenty-seven William Carey was just where he wanted to be.

An Accomplice of Beauty

Among the five women who were employed by Century Bank and Trust Company on the day William Carey became vice-President in charge of the New Accounts Department, the only one who caught his eye immediately was a twenty-six-year-old, five-foot-five-inch tall blonde-haired beauty named Mae Belle Carter.

William Carey was an exceptionally handsome man. Trouble was he never had possessed much of a libido, so he could either take women or leave them. However, at the same time still he could appreciate beauty, and one of the things that struck William was that the teller was without doubt a strikingly beautiful woman.

However, the beautiful woman appeared to have no deficiencies in the biological urge department and furthermore she took a liking to the new New Accounts vice-President the moment he introduced himself.

Within a fortnight Maebelle (spoken quickly, Mae Belle became Maebelle) let it be known that despite the strict rule against intimate goings-on between male and female bank employees, she would invite the tall, good-looking bank officer to park his expensive brown calfskin ankle-high boots under her bed any time he pleased.

The Dark Secret

On the morning of his first day on the job the young man carried a dark secret into the Century Bank and Trust building. A secret that would surely torpedo his chances of getting any job at the prestigious financial institution should he disclose his personal shortcomings.

The simple truth was that William Carey was a gambler, which in itself surely was not a crime. However, William Carey was not very good at it and it wasn’t very long before big-time gamblers learned that young Carey worked in a bank, and therefore had access to large amounts of cash. So before he knew it William was into the gamblers for $60,000.

Thus on a pleasant morning a week later, in the brief span of time it took Maebelle Carter and William Carey to walk the few short blocks from the coffee shop to the bank the name Maebelle became synonymous with the word accomplice.

And at the same time, Carey’s new partner became the mark, defined not as a visible line or trace, but rather as an intended victim. Only in the English language could a single word have so many different meanings.

In his quest for gambling-debt money William Carey realized the importance of discretion. For this reason, he and his eager lover Maebelle Carter avoided speaking in low tones when at work. If they ever walked down to the corner café for lunch William would invite his mentor Brad Morgan or one of the other department heads along to avoid suspicion.

Similar precautions controlled their away-from-work relationship. The two had a standing date every Tuesday and Thursday night, mainly for dinner and love-making that followed. William never spent the night at Maebelle’s apartment.

It took less than thirty days for the gambler, the recently-hired New Accounts vice-President, to put to good use his relationship with the unknowing young woman.

William Carey’s first order of business was to review all the accounts. He was searching the bank ledgers for two categories–the accounts with the largest deposits, and within this class the accounts whose balance had not changed during the previous six months.

But why six months specifically? Mainly because the gambler’s loan sharks were calling the shots. William Carey was nothing more than a pipeline for embezzlement of bank funds. Truth be told the gambling syndicate owned William Carey. Under threat of grievous bodily harm William Carey would go along with the gambler’s accountant’s embezzlement (against the bank), and extortion (against young William Carey), or else.

And just to drive home their point the syndicate’s accountant made it clear to William that the gamblers were not the least bit obligated to even offer him a monthly repayment schedule because the $60,000 was a legal gambling debt.

In order for the gambler’s scheme to work and not create suspicion they needed one–but certainly no more than one–absolutely loyal teller to perform the account manipulations that especially in a bank as large and prestigious as Century Bank and Trust Company of Baltimore, Maryland, could not be seen as being handled by a senior officer of the bank. This would only draw scrutiny.

Thus Maebelle Carter’s obvious attraction to the handsome bank officer was met in kind. Soon Carey had arranged for Maebelle to become his New Accounts assistant. The move was a promotion for the smitten bank clerk, and she looked forward to expressing her appreciation.

Which she did the following Saturday night in the bedroom of her small apartment following a dinner at an expensive downtown restaurant. Thanked him properly she did. Twice.

Early the following Monday morning the two met in Carey’s office, where over coffee and sweet rolls, he gave Maebelle her first assignment. The ten largest depositors whose account balances had not changed during the past six months.

The mechanics of this sleight-of-hand were really quite simple. The trick was in moving money among accounts in the bank without leaving a trail of (paper) transfer slips.

It is axiomatic in the field of bank fraud that the death knell of any scam is the use of paper in making transactions. Paper trails were not only dangerous. They could be deadly caper-enders.

William Carey was well aware of this proscription against using written bank transfer slips in his scheme, the logic of which went something like this.

If a wealthy depositor failed to move funds from his account during a six-month period, the likelihood was great that he did not need the funds for household living expenses. He naturally assumed that his money was in a secure place and paid little or no attention to his monthly bank statements.

Chapter 2

Maryland’s Eastern Shore

For Carey’s purposes as few as five accounts would be sufficient. He began by setting up an account under the name Apex Machinery Company. But not in the main Baltimore office.

The wide and deep Chesapeake Bay splits the state of Maryland roughly into east and west halves, with Baltimore located on the western shore of the bay. During the thirties there were only a few bridges spanning the wide bay. So if a person lived in the eastern half of the state he generally did his shopping–and banking–in stores and banks on the eastern side of the bay, the eastern shore.

Century Bank and Trust Company took its name from the fact it was founded at the beginning of the century, in 1900 to be precise.

Two decades later in 1920 the bank’s forward-thinking Board of Trustees, fearful of losing wealthy eastern Maryland customers, opened something almost unheard of in that era, a so-called branch bank in the town of Easton, located on the eastern shore.

Employees of the branch bank were drawn from the eastern half of the state and rarely did these employees have reason to visit the main Baltimore bank. A Marylander’s sense of regional pride perhaps having something to do with this way of thinking.

The Well-disguised(?) Bank Customer

Thus when it came time for William Carey to open a bank account under the fictitious name Apex Machinery Company, he purchased a paste-on mustache and a pair of thick horn-rimmed eyeglasses from a novelty shop and showed up at the branch bank at opening time, speaking softly and complaining of hoarseness occasioned by a pesky summer cold.

Within thirty minutes Carey had opened an account under the name Apex Machinery Company, located at the address of a vacant two-story dilapidated red brick building down in the Inner Harbor. No one would ever recall the man who opened the account. Or so he assumed.

For several reasons, the first of course being the fake paste-on mustache and the gaudy horn-rimmed eyeglasses.

Second, when Carey opened the account of Apex Machinery Company he brought with him the company’s Articles of Incorporation which showed that he, William Carey, was actually Albert N. Stine, the company’s Chief Financial Officer.

The goal of the gambler’s scheme was to siphon off a certain amount of money each month in the form of a cashier’s check made payable to Apex Machinery Company.

It would be the duty of William Carey’s accomplice to intercept the monthly bank statements that naturally would show a recent decrease in the clients’ bank balance, and replace this statement with one indicating that the bank balance had not changed.

There was only one tiny caveat to this ruse. It could not be accomplished without the accomplice being conscious of the con because the success of the entire scheme depended upon the timely actions of the accomplice.

Maebelle Carter Becomes Involved

Two weeks after William Carey (Albert N. Stine) established the Apex Machinery account he invited Maebelle to dinner at a nice restaurant. He purposely parked his car a block from the restaurant, and as they walked together along the sidewalk he casually slipped his arm around her waist pulling her close.

You know Maebelle, I could get used to having you around, he said smiling.

And I could get used to being around, she responded pulling herself closer.

Without further comment the couple turned and walked back to the car. They did not speak again until they were lying together naked in bed inside the bedroom of her apartment.

The following Tuesday morning Maebelle was seated at her desk in the bank, reviewing seven accounts that met her lover’s criteria. She looked up as Carey walked by and paused at her desk.

Come on back and we’ll go over what you have thus far, he said quietly. She followed him.

Maebelle Carter was in love with the handsome bank officer. Supposedly. If not, she certainly was putting on a convincing show.

At the same time however, and although not the sharpest knife in the kitchen drawer, Maebelle sensed that there might be some hidden reason for her lover requesting the accounts of the bank’s wealthiest clients. Try as she might there just didn’t appear to be any reason for such an unusual request. At least not to her way of thinking.

Therefore, contrary to William Carey’s faulty assumption, his lover was still teetering on the cusp of caution. So when his request came it was of no great surprise. In point of fact the request was hoped-for.

Maebelle, you must know how I feel about you, said William after he had closed the door and they were seated on two client chairs he had already pulled close together in preparation for this meeting.

It was at this point that Maebelle put together the obvious close proximity of the two client chairs with her boss’ request for the wealthiest bank clients’ records and reached the obvious conclusion that her lover was about to ask her to assist him in some sort of illegal scheme involving a lot more than a little bit of money.

And William Carey was not one to disappoint.

I’ll come directly to the point Maebelle, he began in a hushed tone the lie intended to stress the seriousness of his problem.

I moved from Philadelphia to Baltimore hoping to put some distance between myself and some people who were into me for a lot of money, he continued, donning a cloak of despondency befitting his dilemma.

How much money are we talking about? Maebelle said with obvious concern.

Sixty thousand dollars, said Carey hesitantly, fearful of what her reaction might be to such an exorbitant figure.

At this moment Maebelle Carter thought what William Carey hoped she would think.

Well this doesn’t appear to be an insurmountable sum of money to owe, she said encouragingly. You should be able to work out a payment schedule with your creditors over the next few years. I’ll be glad to help you with the payments.

I’m touched by your offer to help, Maebelle, said Carey. However these are dangerous men and the amounts I owe are losses from gambling. I’m afraid of what they will do to me unless I pay up soon.

How long have they given you William? she said, concern for her lover’s safety evident in her voice.

The best they will do is ten thousand a month for the next six months, came the sobering response. The first payment is due within thirty days. He paused to allow this to register.

Today is June 18. The bank statements are due to be mailed out on July 2. And I’ve discovered seven accounts thus far that meet your requirements. I’ll do anything to prevent harm to you, William. We can always put the money back into these accounts later and no bank customer will have been harmed.

Can we have dinner tonight? said Carey. We can go over the details at that time.

A woman deeply smitten, upon learning that her lover does not possess the stellar character she had expected or at the very least had dreamed of, often begins to subconsciously rationalize her way into believing her love and patience will somehow change him.

Thus at that moment, based on William Carey’s words Maebelle appeared to be convinced that they intended to embezzle sixty thousand dollars from Century Bank over the following six months, then begin repaying the money slowly over a period of a year or so. No one would be harmed. Logical if only in a dishonest sort of way.

Chapter 3

Details of the Embezzlement

At the time Maebelle Carter agreed to assist William Carey in his $60,000 scam, he realized the importance of keeping his co-conspirator happy.

One way he accomplished this was to arrange for Maebelle to be granted a small raise in salary without the knowledge of the other tellers.

For this increase in salary he consulted his mentor Brad Morgan, who as head of General Accounting