take the money from him, she beat him soundly with her riding crop, and left him bloody and half mad on the cabin floor where the ship’s steward later found him. His full confession followed at once. But Mary Beth was not found on board the ship, and neither was the money. This story was recounted in the local papers, though Mary Beth herself refused to confirm or deny that anything was ever stolen.
Another story, told by two different elderly men in the year 1955, recounts how a meeting was held by one of Mary Beth’s companies which sought to dissociate itself from her and cheat her by a series of entirely legal maneuvers. The meeting was half over perhaps when all at the table realized Mary Beth was sitting there with them. Mary Beth told them simply what she thought of them, severed her tie with the company, and it soon met with financial ruin. Descendants of those involved despise the Mayfairs to this day for this tragedy.
One branch of the Mayfair family-descendants of Clay Mayfair who now live in New York-will have nothing to do with the New Orleans Mayfairs on account of such an entanglement with Mary Beth which took place in 1919.
It seems Mary Beth was investing heavily in New York banking at this time. But an altercation had occurred between her and a cousin. In sum, he did not believe Mary Beth’s plan of action would work. She thought it would. He sought to undercut her plan without her knowledge. She appeared in New York, in his office, and tore the pertinent papers from his hands and threw them into the air, where they caught fire and burnt without ever touching the ground. She then warned him if he ever tried to cheat his own blood again, she’d kill him. He then told this story over and over again compulsively to anyone and everyone who would listen, effectively ruining his reputation and destroying his professional life. People thought he was crazy. He committed suicide by jumping out of the office window three months after Mary Beth’s appearance. To this day the family blames Mary Beth for the death, and speaks of her and her descendants with hatred.
It should be noted that these New York Mayfairs are very well off. And Stella made friendly overtures to them on numerous occasions. They insist that Mary Beth used Black Magic in all her dealings, but the more they talk to our representatives, the more we come to understand that they really know very little of the New Orleans family from which they came, and they have a very small concept of Mary Beth’s dealings.
Of course it is common to have a very small idea of Mary Beth’s dealings. As mentioned before, she was very good at keeping her immense power and influence a secret.
But to the Talamasca, stories of Mary Beth putting a curse on a farmer who wouldn’t sell her a horse sound perfectly absurd when we know that Mary Beth was buying up railroads in South America and investing in Indian tea and purchasing enormous amounts of land surrounding the city of Los Angeles, California.
Some day perhaps someone will write a book about Mary Beth Mayfair. It is all there in the records. But as it stands now, it seems that the Talamasca alone is the only group of persons outside the family who knows that Mary Beth Mayfair expanded her financial influence and power globally-that she built a financial empire so immense, so strong, and so diversified that its gradual dismantling is still going on to this day.
But the entire subject of Mayfair finances deserves more attention than we can give it. If those with the knowledge of such matters were to make a thorough study of the entire Mayfair history-and we refer here to public documents available to anyone diligent enough to search for them-it is possible that we would perceive a very strong case for occult power being used throughout the centuries for the acquisition and expansion of wealth. The jewels and the gold coins might represent the smallest part of it.
Alas, we have no such expertise for that kind of study. And given what we do know, Mary Beth rises head and shoulders above Julien as an entrepreneur, and it is almost certain that no one human being could have accomplished, without supernatural aid, what she accomplished.
To conclude, Mary Beth left her family far richer than most of them ever knew, apparently, or ever appreciated. And the wealth exists to this day.
Mary Beth’s second passion was the family. And from the beginning of her active business life, she involved her cousins (or brothers) Barclay, Garland, Cortland and other Mayfairs in her dealings; she brought them into the companies she formed and used Mayfair attorneys and Mayfair bankers for her transactions. In fact, she always used Mayfairs for business, if she possibly could, instead of strangers. And she put great pressure on other Mayfairs to do the same. When her daughter Carlotta Mayfair went to work for a non-Mayfair law firm, she was disappointed and disapproving, but she took no restrictive or punitive action regarding Carlotta’s decision. She let it be known that Carlotta was guilty of lack of vision.
With regard to Stella and Lionel, Mary Beth was notoriously indulgent and allowed them to have their friends over for days or weeks on end. She sent them to Europe with tutors and governesses when she herself was too busy to go; and she gave diem birthday parties of legendary size and extravagance, to which countless Mayfair cousins were invited. She was equally generous to her daughter Belle, her adopted daughter Nancy, and to Millie Dear, her niece, all of whom continued to live at First Street after Mary Beth’s death, though they were the recipients of large trust funds which granted them indisputable financial independence.
Mary Beth stayed in contact with Mayfairs all over the country, and fostered numerous get-togethers of the Mayfair cousins in Louisiana. Even after Julien’s death and right on until the twilight of Mary Beth’s life, delicious food and drink were served at these affairs, with Mary Beth supervising the menu and the wine tasting herself, and often musicians were hired to provide entertainment.
Enormous family dinners were very common at First Street. And Mary Beth paid out fabulous salaries to hire the best cooks for her kitchen. Many reports indicate that the Mayfair cousins loved going to First Street, that they loved the long after-dinner discussions (described by Richard Llewellyn), and that they were personally devoted to Mary Beth, who had an uncanny ability to remember birthdays, wedding anniversaries, and graduation dates, and to send appropriate and very welcome cash presents.
As already indicated, when she was young, Mary Beth loved to dance with Julien at these family parties, and encouraged dancing among young and old, and sometimes hired instructors to teach the cousins the latest dances. She and Julien would amuse the children with their spry antics. And sometimes the dance bands they hired from the Quarter shocked the more staid Mayfairs. After Julien’s death, Mary Beth did not dance so much but she loved to see other people dance, and she almost always provided some music. In her last years, these affairs were managed by her daughter Stella, and her son, Lionel, and they were as spirited as ever.
Mayfairs were not only invited to these get-togethers, they were expected to attend, and Mary Beth was sometimes unpleasant to those who refused to accept her invitations. And there are two stories of her becoming extremely angry with members of the family who discarded the name Mayfair in favor of the name of their father.
Several stories we have gathered from friends of the family indicate that Mary Beth was both loved and feared by the cousins; whereas Julien, especially in his old age, was considered sweet and charming, Mary Beth was considered slightly formidable.
There are several stories which indicate that Mary Beth could see the future but disliked using the power. When asked to predict or to help make a decision, she frequently warned the family members involved that “second sight” wasn’t a simple thing. And that predicting the future could be “tricky.” However, she did now and then make outright predictions. For example, she told Maitland Mayfair-Clay’s son-that he would the if he took up airplane flying, and he did. Maitland’s wife, Therese, blamed Mary Beth for his death. Mary Beth shrugged it off with the simple words, “I warned him, didn’t I? If he hadn’t gone up in the damned plane, he couldn’t have crashed in it.”
Maitland’s brothers were distraught over Maitland’s death, and begged Mary Beth to try to stop such events if she could, to which she replied that she could give it a try, and would the next time something of that kind came to her attention. Again, she warned them that such things were tricky. In 1921, Maitland’s son, Maitland Junior, wanted to go on an expedition in the African jungles, of which his mother Therese strongly disapproved, and she appealed to Mary Beth either to stop the boy or to make some sort of prediction.
Mary Beth considered the matter for a long time, and then explained in her simple straightforward manner that the future wasn’t predetermined, it was merely predictable. And her prediction was that this boy would die if he went to Africa. But if he stayed here worse things might happen. Maitland Junior changed his own mind about the expedition, stayed home, and was killed in a fire six months later. (The young man was drunk and was smoking in bed.) At the funeral Therese accosted Mary Beth and demanded to know why she didn’t prevent such horrors. Mary Beth said almost casually that she foresaw the whole thing, yes, but there wasn’t much she could do to change it. To change it, she would have had to change Maitland Junior and that was not her job in life, and besides, she’d tried, to no avail, to talk to Maitland countless times; but she certainly felt dreadful about it, and she wished
