Bipin Shah is in the last category. A Philadelphia-based multimillionaire banker, Shah finds himself on the cover of the Times forthcoming domestic edition on account of his bizarre story that the magazine has used to highlight the drama and trauma of divorce agreements. And disagreements. Allegations of infidelity, spousal abuse, lies and deceit, the staple of most separations, is grist for the Time mill.

Shahs tawdry domestic spat centers around his second wife, the former Ellen Dever, who he married in 1985 after a brief office romance, divorcing his first wife of 19 years in the process.

Migrating to the United States in 1958 at 19 with $100 and a scholarship, Shah had worked his way to a $ 600,000-a-year salary as executive vice-president at the Philadelphia National Bank, where Ellen, then 26, was a $ 24,000-a-year computer programmer. The two fell in love, married and had two children, Sarah, now 8, and Genevieve, 6.

Shah would go on to embody the American story, riding on the success of developing automated teller systems. Plush homes, swank cars, dream holidays... they had everything. Somewhere down the line things fell apart. Ellen accused her husband of spousal abuse. He accused her of infidelity. Thanks to a pre-nuptial agreement, they appeared to have a fairly amicable divorce in 1993 under the terms of which she got a $ 600,000 house, some $ 140,000 in support and alimony each year, plus all expense for his daughters, who were to be with him on Thursday, Friday and Saturday each week. But the agreement over visitation rights soon broke down.

Ellen says Shah abused her in front of her children and threatened to kill her. Shah,who by then had started his own company Gensar -- and sold it for $ 200 million in 1996 -- says she began to milk him for more and more money... $43,000 because ``the girls would like a swimming pool for themselves and their friends,'' $9,289 for a vacation, $5,239 for a new chest of drawers for Sarah, $6,379 for new wallpaper in the girls' bathroom and $1,224 for a new TV stand for Genevieve.

Ellen has documents to show she filed for protection from the courts. Shah waves letters from Ellen where things graduate for her calling him ``bunny'' and ``sweetheart'' to confessing to an affair and then asking him to go back to India and ride camels.

Last year, Shah filed for full custody of his children. It was a move that provoked an unexpected disappearance. Ellen sold the house she and her children got, pocketed $90,000 in cash, wired $420,000 into a Swiss bank account, and fled with the girls. Her ally in this famous getaway, the talk of Phillys social circles and the Indian community, is Faye Yager, whoruns an outfit called Children of the Underground, for victims and kids of spousal abuse. An acclaimed big sister, Yager, 49, herself a victim of spousal abuse, is a controversial figure in the US, where she has helped many alleged victims of abuse escape spousal wrath. She usually gives them new names, new looks, new place to start a new life in. Not everyone is convinced of her methods. Her critics, and even former colleagues, say she takes on cases indiscriminately. Her organisation faces several lawsuits from the attorneys and even the FBI.

In the Shah case, her critics contend that she is on weak ground. Shah certainly thinks so. He has suedher for $ 100 million and promised to destroy her. The crusading Yager is not one to back off either. She says she is not afraid of Mr ATM having faced many bullying spouses in her life. But Shah may be different (which is why he is probably on the cover of Time). And certainly his case does not necessarily reflect the 350,000 cases -- nearly 1000 a day -- ofin-family abductions are reported each year in the US. Weepy and heartbroken at the disappearance of his daughters, he has forsaken his work and spends up to 15 hours a day on The Hunt. With a $ 1 million already spent and a $ 2 million bounty, Shah thinks he can get someone to bite. ``There are no failures in life, he says. There are only delays.''