The Moneychangers (17 page)

Miles Eastin stared, his expression frozen, stupefied. A convulsive shudder went through him. In fresh shock his head came down, his hands went to his face.

"Cut that outl" Wainwright reached over, pulled Eastin's hands free and pushed his head up, though not roughly, remembering his promise to the FBI man. No bruised potato.

He added, "You've got some talking to do, so let's start."

"Hey, time out, huh?" Eastin pleaded. "Give me a minute to think."

"Forget it!
" The last thing Wainwright wanted was to give Eastin time to reflect. He was a bright young maw who might reason, correctly, that his wisest course was silence. The security chief knew that at this: moment he had two advantages. One was having Miles Eastin off balance, the other being unrestricted by rules.

If the FBI agents were here they would have to inform Eastin of his legal rights the right not to answer questions, and
to have a lawyer present. Wainwri
ght, not a policeman any more, had no such obligation.

What the security chief wanted was hard evidence pinning the six-thousand-dollar cash theft on Miles East
in
. A signed confession would do it.

He sat down facing Eastin, his eyes impaling
the younger man. "We can do thi
s the long, hard way or we can move fast."

When there was no response, Wainwright picked up the small black ledger and opened it. "Let's start with this." He put his finger on the
list of sums and dates; besides
each entry were other figures
in a code. "These are: bets. Righ
t?"

Through a muddled dullness Eastin nodded. "Explain this one."

It was a two-hundred-and-fifty-dollar bet, Miles Eastin mumbled, on the outcome of a football game between Texas and Notre D
ame. He explained the odds. The bet had been on Notre Dame,
Texas had won. "And this?"

Another mumbled answer: Another football game. Another loss.

"Go on;" Wainwright persisted, keeping his finger on the page, maintaining pressure.

Responses came slowly. Some of the entries covered basketball games. A few bets were on the winning side, though losses outnumbered them. The minimum bet was one hundred dollars, the highest three hundred. "Did you bet alone or with a group?" "A group." "Who was in it?" "Four other guys. Working. Like me." "Working at the bank?" - Eastin shook his head. "other places." "Did they lose, too?" "Some. But their batting average was better than mine.. "What are the names of the other four?" No answer. Wainwright let it go. "You made no bets on horses. Why?"

"We got together. Everybody knows horse racing is crooked, races fixed. Football and basketball are on the level. We worked out a system. With honest games, we figured we could beat the odds."

The total of losses
showed how wrong that figuring h
ad been. "Did y
ou bet with one bookie, or more
' "One." "His name?" Eastin stayed mute.

"The rest of the money you've been stealing from the bank where is it?"

The young man's mouth turned down. He answe
red miserably, "Gone."
"And more besides?" An affirmative, dismal nod.

"We'll get to that later. Right now let's talk about this money." Wainwright touched the six thousand dollars which lay between them. "We know you took it on Wednesday. How?"

Eastin hesitated, then shrugged. "I guess you may as well know."

Wainwright said sharply, "You're guessing right but wasting time."

"Last Wednesday," Eastin said, "we had people away with flu. That day I filled in as a teller." "I know that. Get to what happened."

"Before the bank opened for business I went to the vault to get a cash truck one of the spares. Juanita Nunez was there. She unlocked her regular cash truck. I was right alongside. Without Juanita knowing, I watched to see her combination." "And?" "I memorized it. As soon as I could, I wrote it down..

With Wainwright prompting, the
damning facts multiplied.

The main downtown branch vault was large. During daytime a vault teller worked in a cage-like enclosure just inside, near the heavy, timelock controlled door. The vault teller was invariably busy, counting currency, handing out packages of bills or receiving them, checking tellers and cash trucks in or out. While no one could pass the vault teller without being seen, once they were inside he took little notice of them.

That morning, while outwardly cheerful, Miles Eastin was desperate for cash. There had been betting losses the week before and he was being pressed for payment of accumulated debts.

Wainwright interrupted, "You already had an employee bank loan. You owed finance companies. Also the bookie. Right?" "Right." "Did you owe anyone else?" Eastin nodded affirmatively. .

"A loan shark?" The younger man hesitated, then admitted, "Yes." "Was the loan shark threatening you?"

Miles Eastin moistened his lips. "Yes; so was the bookie. They both are, still." His eyes went to the six thousand dollars.

The jigsaw was fitting together. Wainwright motioned to the money. "You promised to pay the shark and the bookie that?" "Yes." "How much to each?" "Three thousand." "When?"

"Tomorrow." Eastin looked nervously at a wall clock and-corrected himself. "Today."

Wainwright prompted, "Go back to Wednesday. So you knew the combination of the Nunez girl's cash box. How did you use it?"

As Miles Eastin revealed the details now, it was all incredibly simple. After working through the morning, he took his lunch break at the same time as Juanita Nunez. Before going to lunch they wheeled their cash trucks into the vault. The two cash units were left side by side, both locked.

Eastin returned from lunch early and went into the vault. The vault teller checked Eastin in, then went on working. No one else was in the vault.

Miles Eastin went directly to Juanita Nunez's cash truck and opened it, using the combination he had written down. It took seconds only to remove three packages of bills totaling six thousand dollars, then close and retook the box. He slipped the currency packages into inside pockets; the bulges scarcely showed. He then ch
ecked out his own cash truck fro
m the vault and returned to work.

There was a silence, then Wainwright said, "So while questioning was going on Wednesday afternoon some of it by you, and while you and I were talking later that same day an that time you had the money on you?"

"Yes," Miles Eastin said. As he remembered how easy it had been, a faint smile creased his face.

Wainwright saw the smile. Without hesitating, and in a single movement, he leaned forward and hit Eastin hard on both sides of the face. He used his open palm for the first blow, the back of his hand for the second. The double blow was so forceful that Wainwright's hand stung. Miles Eastin's face showed two bright weals. He shrunk backward on the sofa and blinked as tears formed in his eyes.

The security chief said grimly, "That's to let you know I see nothing funny in what you did to the bank or to Mrs. Nunez. Nothing at all." Something else he had just learned was that Miles Eastin was afraid of physical violence. He observed that it was 1 A.M.

"The next order of business," Nolan Wainwright announced, "is a written statement. In your own handwriting and with everything in it that you've told me." "Nol I won't do thatl" Eastin was wary now.

Wainwright shrugged. "In that case there's no point in my staying longer." He reached for the six thousand dollars and began stowing it in his pockets. "You can't do thatl"

"Can't I? Try stopping me. I'm taking it back to the bank the night depository."

"Listen! you can't prove…" The younger man hesitated. He was thinking now, remembering too late that the serial numbers of the bins had never been recorded.

"Maybe I can prove it's the same money that was taken Wednesday; maybe not. If not, you can always try suing the bank to get it back." Eastin pleaded, "I need it nowl Todayl"

"Oh, sure, some for the bookie and some for the loan shark. Or the strong-arm guys they'll send. Well, you can try explaining how you lost it, though I doubt if they'll listen." The security chief eyed Eastin for the first time with sardonic amusement. "You really are in' trouble. Maybe they'll both come together, then they'll break one of your arms and one leg each. They're apt to do that so
rt of thing. Or didn't you know
"

Fear, real fear, showed in Eastin's eyes. "Yes, I do know
. You've got to help met Please!
"

F
rom the apartment door
way Wainwright said coldly, "I’ll
consider it. After you've written that statement."

The ban
k
security chief dictated while Eastin
wrote the words down obediently.

1, Miles Broderick Ea
stin, make this statement voluntarily. I have
been offered no inducement to m
ake it. No violence or threat of violence has been used…

I confess to stealing from First Mercantile American Bank the sum of six thousand dollars in cash at approximately 1:30 P.M. on Wednesday, October…

I obtained and concealed this money by the following means…

A quarter of an hour ago, after Wainwright's threat to walk out, Miles Eastin had collapsed entirely, co-operative and cowed.

Now, while Eastin
continued writing his confession
Wainwright telephoned Innes, the FBI man, at his
home
.

15

During the first week of November, Ben RossellPs physical condition worsened. Since the bank president's disclosure of his terminal illness four weeks earlier, his strength had ebbed, his body wasted as proliferating and invading cancerous cells tightened their stran
glehold on his remaining life.

Those who visited old Ben at home including Roscoe Heyward, Alex Vandervoort, Edwina D'Orsey, Nolan Wainwright, and various directors of the bank were shocked at the extent and speed of his deterioration. It was obvious he had very little time to live.

Then, in mid-November, while a savage storm with gale force winds beset the city, Ben Rosselli was moved by ambulance to the private pavilion of Mount Adams Hospital, a short jou
rney which was to be his last ab
o
d
e. By then he was under almost continuous sedation, so that his moments of awareness and coherence became fewer day by day.

The last vestiges of any control of First Mercantile American Bank had now slipped from him, and a group of the bank's senior directors, meeting privately, agreed the full board must be summoned, a successor to the presidency named. The decisive board meeting was set for December 4
th
.

Directors began arriving shortly before 1O A.M. They greeted one another cordially, each with an easy confidence the patina of a successful businessman in the company of his peers.

The cordiality was slightly more restrained than usual in deference to the dying Ben Rosselli, still clutching feebly to life a mile or so away. Yet the directors now assembling were admirals and field marshals of commerce, as Ben had been himself, who knew that whatever else on traded, business, which kept civilization lubricated, must go on. Their mood appeared to say: The reason behind decisions we must make today is regrettable, but our solemn duty to the system shall be done.

Thus they moved resolutely into the walnut paneled boardroom, hung with paintings and photographs of selected predecessors, once important th
emselves, now long departed.

A board of directors of any major corporation resembles an exclusive club. Apart from three or four top management executives who are employed full time, the board comprises a score or so of outstanding businessmen often board chairmen or p
residents themselves from other
diverse fields.

Usually such outside directors are invited to
join the board for one or more
of several reasons their own

achievements elsewhere, the prestige of the institution they represent, or a strong connection usually financial with the company on whose board they sit.

Among businessmen it is considered a high honor to be a company director, and the more prestigious the company the greater the glory. This is why some individuals collect directorships the way some Indians once collected scalps Another reason is that directors are treated with ego
satisfying reverence and also generously major companies pay each director between one and two thousand dollars for every meeting attended, normally ten a year.

Particularly high in prestige is a directorship of any major bank. For a businessman to be invited to serve on a top
-
flight bank board is roughly equivalent to being knighted by the British Queen; therefore the accolade is widely sought. First Mercantile American, as befitting a bank among the nation's top twenty, possessed a board of directors appropriately impressive. Or so they thought.

Alex Vandervoort, surveying the other directors as they took seats around the long, elliptical boardroom table, decided there was a high percentage of deadwood. There were also conflicts of interest since some directors, or their companies, were major borrowers of bank money. Among his long-term objective if he became president would be to make the FMA board more representative and less like a cozy club. But would he be president? Or would Heyward?