Chapter 6 - The Notary Who Remembered Everything|
Janice Bell lived in a small brick house about forty minutes outside Briar County.
There were yellow flowers along her walkway and a faded American flag beside the front porch.
She answered the door wearing gardening gloves.
"Mara Pierce?"
I smiled.
"Hello, Janice."
Her expression softened.
"Goodness gracious."
She pulled me into a hug.
"I haven't seen you since that veterans' fundraiser."
Janice had worked as a part-time administrator and notary for several local charities.
Years earlier, she'd notarized documents for the Ellison Veterans Relief Fund.
She had retired the previous summer.
Her notary commission had expired around the same time.
I explained why I'd come.
She listened without interrupting.
When I finished, she removed her glasses.
"You're telling me somebody used my name on a divorce agreement?"
"That's what the copy indicates."
She shook her head.
"That's impossible."
I placed the disputed acknowledgment on her kitchen table.
Janice stared at it.
Then she reached for her glasses again.
"Oh, my goodness."
"Do you recognize it?"
"I recognize parts of it."
She pointed at the notarial seal.
"See that little crooked border?"
I leaned closer.
"The mark beside the commission number?"
"Yes."
"My old rubber stamp developed that flaw after I dropped it."
She looked up.
"But I destroyed the stamp when I retired."
I remained silent.
Janice examined the page.
"The impression looks exactly like an old scanned document."
"Have you retained your notarial journal?"
"Of course."
She stood.
"I never threw those records away."
Ten minutes later, she returned carrying a thick ledger.
She opened it carefully.
Every notarization had an entry.
Names.
Dates.
Types of documents.
Identification details.
Her handwriting was neat and deliberate.
"I never notarized a marital settlement for you," she said.
"I'd remember."
"Can you verify that from your records?"
She nodded.
"There is no such entry."
She turned several pages.
"But I did notarize something for you three years ago."
I leaned forward.
It was a volunteer reimbursement authorization associated with a veterans' outreach event.
I remembered signing it.
Ruth had insisted on having the form formally witnessed because she said the foundation's accountant required additional controls.
At the time, I had found that excessive.
Now I wondered whether the paperwork had been collected for another reason.
Janice showed me a retained reference copy.
The seal carried the same crooked border.
The signature on the form was unmistakably mine.
I compared it with the image on the disputed divorce agreement.
The similarities were alarming.
"I think somebody may have copied this signature," I said.
Janice looked devastated.
"Do you think Ruth did it?"
"I don't know who created the documents."
That distinction mattered.
Suspicion wasn't evidence.
Even when every instinct told me where to look, I needed reliable proof.
I asked Janice whether she would be willing to provide a sworn statement and testify if subpoenaed.
She agreed immediately.
"I spent twenty years making sure people's signatures were handled properly," she said.
"I won't have someone using my name to cheat anybody."
Before I left, she stopped me at the door.
"There's something I should tell you."
I turned.
"What is it?"
"Ruth contacted me in January."
My pulse quickened.
"About what?"
"She asked whether I had kept electronic copies of old notarized foundation documents."
"Did she explain why?"
"She said the accountant was performing an audit."
"What did you tell her?"
"That the foundation should already have its own records."
Janice hesitated.
"Then she asked whether a scanned copy was as good as an original."
I felt a cold sensation crawl down my spine.
"What did you say?"
"I told her that depended on the purpose, and that she couldn't treat a scan as proof somebody had signed a new document."
She shook her head.
"She didn't like that answer."
As I drove away, I called Nora.
"Janice never notarized the agreement."
"Will she testify?"
"Yes."
"That's excellent."
"There's more."
I explained the old volunteer authorization.
Nora became quiet.
"So they may have lifted your signature from a real document."
"Possibly."
"And used the same copied seal?"
"That's what a document examiner will need to determine."
I could hear Nora typing.
"Then we need the originals and the digital files."
"Exactly."
We spent the next two days preparing requests for the relevant electronic records.
I contacted an independent forensic document specialist to understand the scope of an examination.
I didn't ask the specialist to confirm my theory.
I asked what would be needed to test it.
That was a difference I'd learned in the Army.
A weak attorney went looking for facts that supported a preferred conclusion.
A good attorney followed reliable evidence wherever it led.
On Thursday afternoon, Stephen Calder filed a notice in the divorce proceedings.
His office had been unable to locate an original wet-ink signed copy of the settlement agreement.
The client had supplied only a scanned document.
He also acknowledged that his office had received information calling the notarization into question.
I read the notice twice.
Then I reached the final paragraph.
Counsel requested additional time to investigate the authenticity of materials provided by the Ellison family.
I knew what that meant.
Stephen Calder was no longer willing to defend the agreement without verification.
The expensive legal machine Andrew had assembled was beginning to malfunction.
But that evening, my phone received a message from an unfamiliar number.
It contained a photograph of my old Army identification card.
Below the picture were nine words.
"Your military record won't save you from what comes next."
I stared at the screen.
For the first time, I understood that somebody wasn't merely trying to take my money.
May you like
They were trying to frighten me into abandoning the investigation.
And they knew exactly which part of my past I valued most.
