by Debbie Burke
Her favorite teller Margaret was on duty. The plump silver-haired woman listened to Tawny’s explanation and tapped the keyboard to access the account. She rotated the screen to show Tawny. “Here’s the deposit yesterday. Forty-one-thousand-five-hundred in cash.”
Tawny stared at the screen. “But I didn’t make that deposit. It’s wrong. Can you tell where it came from?”
Margaret shrugged. “If it was a check, we could backtrack the account number. Cash is harder to trace.”
Tawny’s checkbook always balanced to the penny, a source of pride. She might struggle with reading but she knew her numbers. “I did not make that deposit,” she repeated, as if her protest would alter the figure on the screen.
Margaret tapped again. “It wasn’t made at this branch,” she agreed. “Let’s see, it was done in Helena.”
“That’s a hundred and fifty miles away,” Tawny answered. “I haven’t been to Helena in more than a year.” An unwelcome memory flooded back of that last agonizing trip to the Fort Harrison VA when doctors finally admitted defeat and pronounced Dwight’s death sentence. She shoved the bitter memory aside. “I couldn’t have made the deposit.”
“I don’t know what to tell you.” Margaret glanced over Tawny’s shoulder at customers lining up then glared at a couple of young tellers, chatting as they ignored the growing queue. She raised her eyebrows and shook her head.
Ridiculous. In the age of computer tracking, IRS monitoring, and surveillance cameras, a bank had to be able to figure out where the cash came from and where it should rightfully go. “Is the manager in?” Tawny asked.
“Sorry, he’s out of the office.” Margaret pursed her lips and gave her a you-know-how-things-are shrug.
Yeah, the damn bank had been going downhill ever since a multi-national conglomerate bought it a year before and renamed it United Bankcorp. The former manager had taken early retirement, replaced by a man from San Francisco who’d made the front page of the newspaper when he flew into town in a Learjet emblazoned with a gaudy United Bankcorp logo. Tawny hadn’t met him yet and didn’t particularly want to. Once, she’d caught a glimpse of him glaring down from the mezzanine like an emperor. He’d averted his eyes, as if she were a peasant.
Margaret had confided that her new boss didn’t like being exiled to the backwater town of Kalispell. One by one, familiar employees left, replaced by twenty-somethings, with inflated titles like Account Management Specialist. They worried less about customer service than kissing the manager’s behind. Only Margaret remained, trying to hold out until she could collect Social Security. How much longer until she too was swept aside?
Tawny leaned forward. “I better see the operations supervisor.”
Margaret spoke into the phone then gestured at a desk on the opposite side of the lobby. “He’ll be with you in a moment.” She mouthed good luck, as if she expected Tawny would need it, and made a face that warned you won’t like him.
Tawny sat at the desk and scanned the employees, all strangers now, behind sterile glass cubicles along the wall. Back when she’d kept the books for Dwight’s diesel repair business, an error like this would never happen. Or if it did, the problem would be solved immediately with apologies and a hearty handshake.
The once-neighborly atmosphere had been wiped clean. Gone were the days when a banker’s three-piece suit meant jeans, a plaid shirt, and down vest.
A young man about twenty-five emerged from behind a wood partition, newly built since the takeover. He approached, looking as bored as if he were flipping burgers and scooping fries. A black shirt, black tie, and black horn-rims emphasized his vampire-pale complexion.
Tawny pushed the ATM receipt across the desk. “I have a problem. Someone deposited more than forty-one-thousand dollars into my account yesterday.”
“Wish somebody’d do that for me,” the kid scoffed.
Tawny forced herself to keep smiling. “It’s not my money. Obviously, someone must have keyed in the wrong number and it got put into my account by mistake.”
He stared at her through his horn-rims, blank with apparent indifference.
This nitwit was the operations supervisor? Trying to hide the irritation in her voice, Tawny said, “I’m sure whoever this money belongs to is expecting it to be in their account. Maybe they’re writing checks that are going to bounce. Don’t you think they might be a little upset?”
“The manager’s out,” he answered blandly.
“So I hear. Meanwhile, how do we straighten this out?”
With a put-upon sigh, he asked, “Are you sure it’s a mistake?”
She wanted to reach across the desk and swat him. “Look, a forty-one dollar error, maybe I could’ve screwed up. But I guarantee you I didn’t screw up forty-one-thousand dollars worth.” She sucked in a deep, nerve-settling breath. “Why don’t you call the Helena branch and talk to them?”
He peered over the top of his glasses, plucked a bank business card from a holder, circled a phone number, and handed it to her. “Here’s the eight-hundred number. You can explain directly to them.”
She took it. “Is this the branch number?”
He heaved another sigh. “It’s the central number for the whole bank. They’ll help you.”
Useless talking to this clown. Tawny grabbed a pen and scrawled her name and phone number on a slip of paper. “When the manager gets back, please have him call me right away.” She rose and stalked toward the door.
“Have a wonderful day,” he called. How politely and professionally he had told her to go screw herself.
* * *
Tawny couldn’t wait to get home. When Dwight heard about this ridiculous mess, he’d blow a gasket and they’d be out looking for a new bank tomorrow.
Realization hit her like an ice cube down the back.
Dwight was gone. Forever.
Tears burning, she pulled over and parked. “Dammit, Dwight!” She pounded the steering wheel. “Why aren’t you here to help me?”
Most of the time, she held grief at bay, until the smallest trigger set off the horrible replay of his death. She felt as if she’d been hanging on a sheer cliff with one hand, desperately clinging to her husband with the other, until her strength ran out and she could no longer hold him. When he fell into the abyss, she’d been torn apart and half of her had fallen with him.
She knew it wasn’t the bank and its corporate indifference that troubled her—it was the silent emptiness she faced at home, no one to talk to or share her frustration with. Guilt filled the hollowness inside her, multiplying and swelling, like Dwight’s cancer, seeping into the ragged edges of her soul.
It was her fault. She had wished for an end to the relentless pain, the vomiting, the sleepless nights. Now she regretted the wish with all her heart. Their bed was silent and empty with only his childhood teddy bear to hold, a pitiful substitute.
Still sniffling, she pulled herself together and blew her nose.
No matter how much she screamed and pounded, Dwight would still be dead and she still had $41,500 of someone else’s money. She needed to fix that.
* * *
At home, she steeled herself and called United Bankcorp’s 800 number. The automated response runaround offered to make a loan, open a credit card, consolidate her debts, and rattled off locations of branches in fourteen states. She heard a prompt for every possibility except what to do when someone else’s money winds up in your account.
After twenty minutes of merry-go-round trips back to the main menu, she repeatedly pressed zero, hoping to connect with a human being. The recorded voice sincerely apologized but did not recognize that command. When she heard for the eighteenth time how important her call was to them and how valued she was as a customer, she disconnected. She wished she’d used the land line phone and at least could feel the satisfaction of slamming the receiver down. Damn smartphone deprived her of even that.
“Valued, my ass,” she muttered. “If I’m so important, why can’t I talk to anyone but a mach
ine?”
Then she thought of the Slocums, neighbors who had retired from banking, Sheryl as a loan collector, Phil as a vice president. Maybe they could give her advice.
Tawny walked down the avenue under red maple and linden trees past well-kept old bungalows like hers. On double corner lots sat the landmark mansions built by Kalispell’s movers and shakers in the early 1900s. The Slocums’ was a two-story pillared Colonial with a carriage house converted to a double garage.
She rang the bell and heard Sheryl lumber across the hardwood floor with heavy dinosaur steps.
“Hi, Tawny, what’s up?” Sheryl always looked vaguely annoyed, as if her bunions hurt or her bra chafed.
“Hi, I wondered if I could talk to you and Phil about a banking problem I’m having.”
Sheryl looked her up and down, eyes gone flinty. Heaven help anyone who might fall behind on their payments to Sheryl. “You know we’re retired. We really don’t care to talk business anymore.”
Phil approached behind Sheryl with a leering smile, the kind Tawny dreaded from husbands because it made wives hate her. “Howdy, neighbor!”
Tawny took a step back. “I don’t want to bother you.”
“So what’s the problem?” Phil all but pushed Sheryl aside. “I heard something about banking?” He motioned Tawny into the house. “Come on in, sit down. Want some coffee?”
“No, thank you. I won’t take up much of your time.” She grimaced an apology to Sheryl, who narrowed her eyes and closed the door.
In their lavish great room, Tawny sat on an uncomfortable but no doubt expensive antique chair. Sheryl took the matching chair, while her husband filled a tapestry love seat.
“Now, what’s this about?” Phil asked.
Tawny released a breath. “This is going to sound weird but United Bankcorp put money in my account, a lot of money, and I don’t know where it came from. I think it must be a computer mistake and it should have gone into someone else’s account. But I can’t get the bank to look into it. They insist I made the deposit yesterday in Helena. I haven’t been to Helena lately so it can’t have been me.”
Phil hunched forward, elbows on knees, belly hanging. “How much are you talking about?”
“Forty-one thousand-five-hundred dollars.”
He whistled softly. “You sure it couldn’t have been a direct deposit, like from a life insurance payoff, or a tax refund you forgot about, or a settlement in Dwight’s estate?”
Tawny shook her head. “None of those. I think I’ve got the finances pretty well squared away. No, this is completely out of the blue. And it was cash. The trouble is, I can’t get anyone at the bank to pay attention. I’ve told them it’s an error but they blow me off.”
Phil rubbed his chin. “This could be more of a problem than you think. Even before 9/11, regulators tightened restrictions and increased reporting requirements to track money laundering that finances terrorism. Any time someone makes a cash deposit of more than ten-thousand dollars to an account outside the normal ordinary course of business, banks have to file a CTR within fifteen days of the transaction.”
“What’s a CTR?” Tawny asked.
“Currency transaction report. That goes to the feds so they can monitor unexplained movements of large amounts of cash—you know, like from drugs or weapons smuggling. If something alerts the teller to unusual behavior, he or she fills out an SAR, suspicious activity report.”
Tawny’s stomach clenched. “What the hell? I’m no drug smuggler or terrorist. I just want the mistake fixed.”
“That’s all well and good but the bank has probably already filed the CTR, so you may still come under scrutiny unless you can explain the source of funds.”
“What’s to explain? I don’t know where it came from. It isn’t my money.”
“You need to talk to the manager and ask about putting the money in a suspense account until they find out the source.”
“What’s a suspense account?”
Phil lifted his double chin and smiled while looking down his nose. “To put it in basic terms that you could understand, it’s an internal account where banks stick money they’re not sure what to do with until they figure it out.”
Tawny tightened at his condescending tone but said nothing. She needed the ex-banker’s information.
Sheryl cleared her throat. Tawny recognized the wifely signal—wrap this up and get her out of our house.
Phil leaned forward. “You’re absolutely sure you don’t know about this cash? You’ve had a lot to keep track of with Dwight’s illness and passing. Maybe something slipped your mind.”
Tawny read doubt in his eyes and pulled herself straight. “More than forty-thousand dollars didn’t slip my mind.” She rose. “Thanks for your time. I’ll see the manager tomorrow.” As she went toward the front door, she felt Sheryl’s glare on her back and heard Phil mutter something to his wife.
They think I’m crazy. If my own neighbors don’t believe me, how can I convince the feds I haven’t done anything wrong
?
Chapter 2 - Windfall
The next morning, Tawny dressed in cocoa-brown slacks, a cream silk blouse, and a copper-colored scarf that matched her hair, determined to talk to the bank manager. She stood at the entrance when the bank opened, watching the operations supervisor unlock the door. He held it wide for her but otherwise gave no sign he recognized her from the previous day.
“Is the manager in?” she asked.
“No, he’s at a meeting.”
“Who’s in charge while he’s gone?”
He jerked a thumb at a glassed-in cubicle across the lobby. “She’ll help you.” He made his escape, disappearing behind the wood partition.
Margaret stood at her window. She caught Tawny’s eye and offered another helpless shrug.
Tawny crossed the lobby to a door with a nameplate that read Guadalupe Garza, Consumer Lending Facilitator. Dwight always said big corporations gave inflated titles to employees instead of decent pay. Tawny knocked. A round-shouldered woman in her mid-fifties looked up from her monitor and gestured to come in. Gray-brown hair fell in lank curtains on either side of her face, reminding Tawny of a lop-eared rabbit.
This time, Tawny felt more confident, having learned banker’s jargon from her neighbor. “Good morning, Ms. Garza. I’m Tawny Lindholm. My husband and I have banked here for fifteen years. I have a big problem and I need your help. Someone deposited forty-one-thousand-five-hundred dollars in cash into my account a couple of days ago in Helena. It’s not mine. The manager is out and hasn’t answered my messages. Your automated phone system makes it impossible to talk to a human being.”
Tawny paused to refresh the banking code words in her mind. “I need to get this straightened out because I don’t want you filing a CRT or an SAR that will make the feds look at me suspiciously. You need to put that money in a suspense account. And you should look at the surveillance video from Helena to find out who the money really belongs to and get it in their account.” She finished the rehearsed speech without a glitch. Wow, I did it.
Guadalupe Garza spread her hands in a helpless gesture. “Mrs. Lindholm, first of all, I’m very sorry you’re having this problem. But I’m sure you can understand why federal auditors would frown on us allowing a customer to determine what reports we do or do not file, as well as what funds should be put in suspense. To act simply on a customer’s say-so would violate more regulations than you can imagine.”
Tawny’s short-lived confidence disappeared. Garza had shot down ex-banker Phil Slocum’s suggestions in seconds.
“Besides,” she continued, “I’m a loan officer, not operations. That really is an operations matter.”
“I will not be put off again.” Tawny’s jaw tightened. “I’m a bank customer and there has been a serious error and you need to take care of it. I don’t care what your internal…” What was that big word Dwight used to say? “…hierarchy is. You need to correct this.”
Garza reached for the
ATM receipt. “I’ll see what I can find out.” She tapped her keyboard then studied the screen. “OK, what you were told is correct, forty-one-thousand-five-hundred in cash was deposited at the Helena branch.” She typed for a minute. “I’ve sent an email to branch operations and the manager, asking them to look into this. Now, is there anything else I can do for you?”
“Can you tell if one of those SARs or CRTs has been filed?”
Garza gave an apologetic shrug. “Again, that’s an operations matter, not my department.”
At least Garza had been more helpful than the guy in horn-rims but Tawny still felt the brush-off. “Would you please write down the manager’s name, email address, and a direct phone number so I can follow up?”
“Of course, I’d be happy to.” Garza penned the information on a bank business card and handed it to Tawny. “Again, I’m very sorry you’re having this problem but I’m sure they’ll get to the bottom of it.” She rose and offered her hand.
Tawny shook it. “Thank you.” But she sensed she’d been shuffled down the line.
Her suspicion was confirmed when, back at home, she sent an email to the address Guadalupe Garza had given her. An unsigned reply appeared instantly: Thank you for contacting United Bankcorp. Your business is very important to us. Your message has been forwarded to the appropriate department. You’ll receive an answer shortly. A stock acknowledgement intended to fend her off while her question dropped into the black hole of corporate indifference.
The so-called direct phone number snared her in the same automated phone tree as before.
Short of driving to Helena, what else could she do?
* * *
After Zumba at the gym the next day, Tawny ran into her friend, Virgie Belmonte, a petite woman in her late thirties with mahogany-colored hair cut in an asymmetrical bob. Her long plaid skirt brushed the floor and a gray turtleneck molded her sprung-steel figure. When they hugged, Tawny apologized, “Sorry I’m sweaty but am I glad to see a friendly face.”