A Cadgers Curse Read online

  The cab took me to HI-Data's main front entrance. I paid another pricey fare and hurried into the building, chased by a gaggle of bold, belligerent geese nipping at my ankles. "You could be somebody's Christmas dinner," I yelled at the feistiest one as it pecked at the closing door.

  "Hey! You got to report in here."

  Startled, I turned to see a young, uniformed guard with a 9mm Smith & Wesson strapped at his slim hip.

  "I'm looking for Personnel. My name's DD McGil, Universal Insurance."

  His black eyes cased me. "Oh, you're the one they told me to watch out for. I got to escort you directly to Personnel and not let you out of my sight. Follow me."

  The bloodless elevator voice announced the third floor. Today we exited and turned right.

  "Page me when you're ready to leave so's I can escort you out of the building," he said. "You can't go nowhere in HI-Data without a card, and I ain't givin' you one."

  When we reached Personnel, he repeated his instructions to the receptionist, making me feel like a high-school truant. The nameplate on the receptionist's desk read "Sparky Groh, Personnel." Her deep reddish-black hair surrounded her thin face like a dark halo. She sported a leopard pin on her black suit, and I approved the hint of citrus from her Michael Kors Hawaii perfume.

  She turned her sharp gaze on me and said matter-of-factly, "You're the one who found Ken's body yesterday."

  "Yes"

  "Norman called a special staff meeting this morning. He threw a fit about you. Imagine-a staff meeting on Christmas Eve. When he couldn't get you canned, he gave strict orders you're not to be left on your own for one second."

  "Usually when a company is paying me to do a job, they don't treat me like an industrial spy. I guess finding a body falls outside the usual personnel regulations"

  "Sorry about that." Sparky's red lips curled into a small smile. She stood, and we shook hands. She had long, shapely legs and topped six feet in her spike heels. She carried herself with panache and made it clear she was in charge of Personnel, not merely a receptionist.

  "Everybody's in an uproar over Ken's death, especially Norman," she said.

  "Why is he convinced I'm involved?"

  "Because he believes Ken's death wasn't an accident. After all, computers don't just up and electrocute you. We'd have to shut down shop if they did."

  She was right. I'd looked up the statistics and the odds of being killed by lightning were 2,320,000 to 1. The odds of computer electrocution were even higher. In fact, they were so high the insurance adjusters hadn't yet calculated them. Instead, I asked if Ken had any enemies at HI-Data.

  "Everybody has enemies in this business," Sparky replied. "Norman's sure you're involved because Ken requested you to do the investigations. That's why you make a good suspect. He's having fits because he couldn't convince the police to arrest you."

  "Well, my name was still on the roster today, so I'd better get on with the job."

  She smiled. "Don't mind Norman. It's nothing personal. He's a real company man. He'd probably sacrifice his wife if he thought it was for the company good."

  Sparky kept her eyes on mine. "Why did Ken want you in particular to do the trainee investigations?"

  "I was hoping you could tell me."

  After a pause, she said, "I almost forgot. Our President, Mr. Fere, wants to see you before you meet the trainees."

  She led; I followed.

  "What's the big rush getting these four trainees vetted?" I was subtly trying to get some information on Tom's "something big" at HI-Data while trying to match her brusque pace through the maze of HI-Data's empty corridors. "I'm being pushed hard to get my reports in by the first of the year."

  "All four of these new employees were hand selected by Ken and Norman to work on a special project vital to HI-Data," she explained, slowing down. "Each has a special skill they bring together to complement the others for the short-term success of the project and the long-term growth of HI-Data."

  "Why are we just getting to this now?"

  "It's Norman. At first, he didn't feel that these new guys had to be put through the bonding process. Then he changed his mind. That's why you're here."

  "Tell me a little about the company."

  "Don't you have any idea what goes on here at HI-Data?" she asked as we turned down another deserted corridor.

  "You mean high-tech research?"

  "No, I mean soap opera stuff." She glanced down the corridor and lowered her voice to a loud whisper. "It's all one big power struggle here. Everybody's busy backstabbing everybody else. You've got to watch over your shoulder every second because someone's right behind you with a knife. Only reason I'm safe, nobody wants my job."

  "Every company has office politics, but murder?"

  "Listen, on any given day, HI-Data's drama can out-do anything on TV. It's a high-stakes game. Your career can go in the dumpster in a second. Take my word for it."

  HI-Data had a corporate culture from hell, I concluded, remembering Norman questioning if I was one of Ken's chippies.

  Sparky flashed her ID card at an elevator panel. "This takes us directly to the executive suite." The doors opened, and I followed the trail of her soft perfume.

  "Oh, be sure to address him as Mr. Fere. And don't smoke. We have a total ban on smoking in HI-Data."

  The executive suite was plush and subdued, a throwback to the formalities of another time. The glass and chrome, laid-back casual of competing computer palaces was conspicuously absent here. The reception area was lined with impressive rosewood doors polished to a gleaming red-bronze. The only concessions to the holiday season were the ornate gold wreaths hung on each door and a small gold tree on the corner of the receptionist's desk.

  A door to our left was marked "Ralph Trout, Sales." One on the right read "Ken Gordon, Treasurer," and someone had draped black crepe over the gold wreath under his name.

  The door directly in front of us was marked "Jeffrey Fere, CEO," and an adjacent door's nameplate read "Norman Richtor, Vice President."

  "April, tell Jennifer I've delivered Ms. McGil from Universal Insurance." The receptionist, April Nimicz, had beautiful long fingernails polished an eye-catching pink. She picked up the phone and drew her lips together in what might have been either a smile or a scowl.

  Jeffrey Fere's door opened, and a trim, middle-aged woman wearing a dark brown suit with her graying hair piled high in a bun came toward us. I assumed this was Jennifer, his secretary.

  "He'll see you now," she announced with a thin smile.

  As she led me toward the inner office, I heard Sparky tell the receptionist to call her after the interview and she would introduce me to the trainees.

  EIGHT

  THE SPACIOUS OFFICE HAD floor to ceiling windows offering a panoramic view of HI-Data's fields and retention ponds to the west and south. From up here, the straggling geese and blanket of snow looked cleaner and more picturesque than they really were.

  Jeffrey Fere was silhouetted against the long windows, swinging a golf club. He putted a ball into a cup on a patch of raised artificial turf. We all waited and watched the putt sink.

  "Great shot," he announced. His fitted Saville Row suit and blue silk tie masked a slight paunch, but he moved with a grace that wasted no energy. He dismissed his secretary, removed his granny glasses and extended his hand.

  The room's rosewood wainscoting, leather furniture, and rich fabrics created the effect of a comfortable gentlemen's club. There was no clutter denoting work except a fancy flip chart against one wall reading "OFFENSE" in red letters with subheadings of "Frontal Attacks, Flanking Attacks, Envelopment, and Isolation." Big business was definitely war around here.

  Motioning to a sofa across the room, he said, "Miss McGil, please take a seat." I thought his slight accent might be Irish or Welsh.

  We settled in, facing each other along a rich expanse of Italian leather. He replaced his gold-rimmed granny glasses and focused his sharp eyes on me.

  "I asked to
see you this morning to impress upon you the importance of getting these new trainees mainstreamed into our topsecret project as quickly as possible. I realize what happened yesterday makes your job even more difficult. However, it is essential we have their final clearances by the first of the year. Do you believe you can deliver on time?"

  "I think so, barring any other unforeseen circumstances."

  "I understand it was you who found Ken's body," he said.

  I wondered what Norman had told him. "Yes, I'm sorry to say I did." "

  I understand Ken had requested you personally, Miss McGil, to investigate these trainees. Why?"

  "People keep asking me that. I don't know. Didn't he tell you?" I asked.

  "I was unaware Ken knew you when he hired you, but it doesn't surprise me. He often did things to help out friends."

  I didn't bother telling him I wasn't a friend and Ken would never have done anything to help me out.

  "Now that we've lost a key person," Jeffrey Fere continued, "getting the trainees on board immediately is even more critical."

  I sat quietly, wondering if he was going to ask anything more about Ken and me and Frank. I felt certain HI-Data knew everything I'd told the cops.

  "The police now believe Ken was deliberately electrocuted. I would like to find out exactly what did happen. Perhaps, as a trained investigator, you might have seen something that could help us."

  "Mr. Fere, if it was no accident, then somebody rigged that computer. Whoever sat down and turned it on, in this case Ken, became part of a conducting path between two terminals of a high voltage source. I'm sure the police have already or will soon identify whatever path was used. Tell me, did Ken use both hands to type on his keyboard?"

  "I would have no idea," he responded, looking puzzled. "But a secretary or our Personnel Administrator might be able to tell you.

  "Why does Norman think I'm involved?"

  "For that, Ms. McGil, I apologize. I have already spoken to Norman about his over-zealousness. I assure you he will not pursue the matter any further. But I'd like to know exactly what you saw and what you think."

  "I really can't tell you anymore than I told the police, Mr. Fere."

  "I'm hoping you might recall some little detail that could assist us. Ken was a tremendous asset to HI-Data."

  "I wish I could help, but I don't know anything else. Maybe Ken wasn't the target."

  He looked up at the ceiling and was silent a long moment. Then he smiled at me warmly. "You see, Miss McGil, this is my company. I started it from nothing except brains and luck, and it bears my indelible imprint. It's my child, and every employee here is like a member of my family. For Ken's sake, as well as for everybody else at HI-Data, this has to be cleared up. And if Ken wasn't the target, we need to find that out, too. Please, if you think of anything else, get in touch with me personally."

  I nodded. "I'll let you know."

  He rose, signaling the end of our interview, and walked to his massive desk, all the more impressive because it was free of clutter. Not even a computer was in sight, although I did spy a tap-detector plugged into his gold phone. Today, even that precaution is no guarantee against spying from the newest high-impedance monitoring devices.

  He block printed a phone number on an embossed card with a gold pen out of a fancy penholder in the center of his desk. "You can reach me anytime at this private number," he said, handing me the card. "I'll look forward to receiving those reports on the trainees as soon as possible. Happy Holidays."

  A door opened without warning on the far side of Jeffrey's office, and Norman popped in like a jack-in-the-box. He must have been eavesdropping from his office on the other side of the adjoining door.

  Norman ushered me out past the receptionist, and when the elevator doors slid closed, he hissed, "You made me look bad in front of my CEO. Nobody does that to me."

  "Norman, I'm here to do a job. The quicker I do it, the quicker I'm gone, and we'll both be happy."

  "HI-Data is a good luck company because Jeff is lucky. He's a genius, and I'm proud that he's my CEO. But you're bad luck, you're going to wreck everything. I can smell it."

  The elevator voice announced the third floor and the doors opened.

  "You really believe in bad luck?" I asked.

  "You bet I do. Luck is everything. And you're a jinx."

  Not even an autographed Miss Manners book was going to help Norman, so I said, "Just stay out of my way, and I'll be gone by the first of the year."

  Neither of us spoke the rest of the way to Personnel. I remembered that the odds of a meteor landing on my apartment were 182 trillion to one, and I realized the odds of my ever having a good thought about Norman were even greater.

  "Ready for the trainees?" Sparky asked.

  I nodded.

  "Follow me. They're in room 333T, doing an introductory R&D tutorial."

  "How do you know where you're going around here?" I asked. "It's so confusing. Nothing's marked."

  "That's done on purpose," she explained. "HI-Data's like England during WW II when all the signposts were removed. Once you're here a month or two, you get used to it. Until then, you just have to leave trails of bread crumbs." She laughed. "It's a good security device. If somebody looks like they don't know where they're going, we automatically stop them for questioning. Nine times out of ten, they're just lost and not snooping, but still, they're where they're not supposed to be. It's a small security technique that seems to work."

  "Speaking of security, I see there are cameras everywhere in HI-Data. I asked the cops for a look at the surveillance tapes when they were grilling me, but they told me there weren't any. What happened?"

  "A few days ago, Ken had everything disconnected except for the entry level. All the cameras feed into one system, and they're very high resolution. Ken was worried that the cameras might be hacked into and used by competitors to find out details of SAFECRACKER and other HI-Data secrets. Norman disagreed, but Ken was a partner and Norman isn't. That's one of the reasons you're here."

  Sparky used her electronic access card in the double door panel of Room 333T to gain entry. We each pushed opened a door and entered the semi-dark training room.

  Ken Gordon was in the front of the room, speaking to the trainees.

  NINE

  WE WERE LOOKING AT a Power Point presentation at the front of the lecture room. Ken was up there on a giant screen, his animated, smiling face and white-wing sideburns engaging the audience. He was in his element-selling.

  "HI-Data's SAFECRACKER program," Ken's web-cast voice was saying, "is our brand-new, state-of-the-art proprietary dissas- sembler program. Our version one point oh-two has the unique ability to easily allow a user to reverse engineer ANY computer program. SAFECRACKER represents a breakthrough on several fronts. First, it allows HI-Data R&D to examine the source code of ANY software application. Second, it allows HI-Data to select, modify, and mix-and-match the best from each application to create a superior application with perfect, non-buggy code. This makes HI-Data competitive with anyone. If we can get a competitor's beta version, we can beat them to market with a superior version of the application."

  The webcast image of Ken smiled broadly. I watched in fascination as a close-up revealed a dab of spittle at the corner of his lips. "And so," he continued, "I don't need to tell you the enormous value of this SAFECRACKER software to HI-Data. Distribution and access to this software is VERY tightly controlled to prevent it from falling into the wrong hands. Creation of the software involved a completely different starting point and some good fortune on our part and I doubt our competitors could recreate it without long delays and ruinous costs."

  "Sparky," I whispered, "should these trainees be seeing this before the full investigation?"

  "It won't be a problem," she whispered back. "This is a sales presentation Ken put together to attract other investors. It doesn't contain anything that's program specific."

  Fine, I thought to myself, but I knew Scotty, my comput
erexpert lover, would have given a lot to be in this room. Their new program sounded like a tremendous breakthrough. To me, it also sounded like it should be illegal, but business ethics was not what I was investigating.

  Somebody switched on the lights and killed the webcast, and Ken's image disappeared.

  Sparky called the names of the four trainees and told them to accompany us. Then she gave the command to resume the R&D tutorial.

  One of the trainees loudly complained about having to leave the tutorial and miss a crucial concept.

  Sparky bristled and stopped in her tracks. She pointed at the offender, but included the whole group in her admonition.

  "Mister Olson, I'm not going to debate you. If you fail to pass muster from Ms. McGil on the comprehensive background check, you're out of HI-Data. Technically, we stretched a point to let you see this presentation before you were fully cleared. Now let's get going and stop wasting company time."

  We single-filed out after her like goslings following our imprint. We had to. She was our Ariadne, the only one who knew where we were going.

  TEN

  I GENERALLY START A comprehensive background check by talking with the object of my investigation. It's unorthodox, I know. Most investigators never meet their subject and don't want to. I'm different. I look at the subject as raw data. Everything else confirms or denies.

  Sparky had put us in a small conference room-me, the four trainees, and a pile of paper that constituted their confidential personnel files, all together in the Palaestra. Let the games begin.

  "All right, it's now 10:22 a.m., December 24." I opened one personnel file as a visual aid. "As of now, none of you has any secrets."

  I smiled broadly and, I hoped, somewhat evilly. The group got restless which made me happy. I like to scare the pants off my subjects right from the start so they tell me their sins. It's the nearest I get to being James Bond, and considering human nature, the technique's generally a success. In my experience, nobody ever tells the whole truth. In one out of every three investigations I run, some body quits the job the next day. This way, I figure, we're all happy. Nobody gets caught, nobody gets embarrassed, and I get paid the full amount by doing only half the work. It's my version of increased productivity, and it's one reason I like my job. And I was as far as I could get from studies of English literature and those dark days after Frank's death.