Her face hardens as she gestures us toward the door. “Come with me now to our principal design room. I will show you how they cheat and steal and lie and take our designs for their own. Why we must find out who is behind this. Why we must stop them.”
It takes us three locks and a keypad code to enter the design room. This closed-access hideaway, at the dead end of a long hall, is as much about security as style.
“It is-pornography,” Zuzu says as she walks to a bank of glossy white cabinets and closets, arranged floor to ceiling along one wall of the design room. The noontime sunshine blasts through a skylight, pouring natural light across the three tilt-topped drafting tables set up underneath. No one is at work now, but I see silver-framed photos on the three elegant wooden desks spaced for privacy along the walls. A conference table.
Opening a tall cabinet, Zuzu extracts what I now recognize as a Diana bag. She holds it up, using only two fingers of each hand.
“Diana?” I say.
“Disgusting. It is trash,” she replies. She yanks open the flap and shows us the inside of the purse. “Look at this lining. It is not the quilted silk of a true Diana. This is cheap nylon. Feel for yourself.”
I take the bag, showing it to Franklin at the same time. “How else, Zuzu, can you tell this is not real?” I pause, not wanting to offend her. Or sound like a clod. “To the untrained eye, of course, this is a very good copy.”
Franklin takes the faux Diana, examining the straps, the zippers, the hardware. “One of the key elements of our story, we hope,” he says, “is not only to educate buyers on how to discern whether a product is authentic, but also to let them know how destructive it is to your business. And to see if we can discover where the knockoffs are coming from. And stop them.”
A buzzer sounds from a telephone on one of the desks and a crackly voice comes over the intercom. “The cameraman is here, Miz Mazny-Latos.”
Zuzu pushes a button. “Conference room six, William.” She turns to us and retrieves the purse from Franklin. “I will agree to describe for you, in this interview, just two or three ‘tells,’ the security devices we have used in the Diana bag. Just to let customers know when they are buying a fraud like this one.
“Of course there are many more tells.” She gestures to a row of red notebooks on the wall. “They are catalogued in these notebooks. But I will not reveal them all.”
“Of course,” I reply. “Then the security tells would cease to be effective. And I do want to ask you about that in the interview. Perfect. I’ll also want to ask about your own security police. Do you have them?”
“They are not police,” Zuzu interrupts. Imperious. “We simply have consultants. Who we hire to monitor the sales and distribution of knockoff products.”
“Of course,” I say again. “And we have been in contact, as you know, with Katherine Harkins?” I pause, waiting to see if Katie is off-limits somehow. I’m haunted by where she is. Wondering what happened to her. Maybe nothing. Maybe nothing good. I keep the follow-up question unspecific. “Have the authorities contacted you? Asking if you’ve seen her recently?”
“Or have you seen her recently?” Franklin puts in. Ultra-casual. “Has she come to Atlanta in the past few days?”
There’s a knock on the door frame. “Miz Mazny-Latos?” William says, opening the door. “Here’s the cameraman from Channel 12.”
And he’s a knockout, my brain replies, before I can stop it. Levi’s, plaid flannel shirt, work boots. I can’t decide to check whether my bangs are straight or whether to check my teeth for lipstick.
He puts his camera and a dark green light kit down on the floor. Dusts his palms.
“Hello, Charlie.” The barest hint of a drawl. “I’m Brian Jordan.” He walks toward us and holds out a hand to Franklin.
Franklin loves when this happens. Says it proves I’m not a hotshot. Which I’ve never said I was.
Franklin shakes Brian’s hand, then gestures with his head. “That’s Charlie,” he explains. “I call her Charlotte. Makes things a lot simpler. I’m her producer, Franklin.”
Brian holds out a hand to Zuzu. “Sorry, Charlie,” he says. His smile is killer.
Zuzu keeps her arms folded around her detested bag for a fraction of a second, then shakes Brian’s hand.
“I am Urszula Mazny-Latos,” she says. Giving him the full-name treatment. “Marketing director at Delleton-Marachelle. That-is Charlie.”
Comedy of errors, I think. Then a wave of sadness washes over me. Why? And then I remember. Pulling myself back to the present, I walk toward Brian, offering a welcoming hand.
“Happens all the time,” I say. “And thanks for coming. We’ll do the interview in a moment, but first we need to get some shots of these purses. The fakes.”
I turn to Zuzu. “Correct?”
Zuzu nods. “The counterfeits, I will be delighted to show you. There are more in the cabinet, evidence seized in Customs raids. Now in our possession. Each one worth-pennies. Like the one I sent you. And sold for sometimes hundreds of dollars.”
She deposits bag after bag on the gleaming conference table, gingerly, as if she were reluctant to touch them. Faux Dianas in all colors, tiny clutches and chunky hardware-laden shoulder bags. Even a fringed suede, exactly like the one I purchased at the party. Zuzu’s every move transmits her anger and repugnance.
“At least this trash never hit the markets,” she says. “I show them to you as proof we are serious. And on the trail.”
I flip through my notebook, checking my notes for questions I may have missed. Or answers Zuzu gave that may not be quite right for television. Too long. Too many pauses. Too technical. Too vague. Actually, just about every answer she’s given. I’m on the verge of freaking. Zuzu, so poised and well-spoken all morning, turned wooden and inarticulate on camera. Perhaps she was worried about her accent, but whatever, she was a deer in the Klieg lights. I just needed to elicit one usable sound bite. But even though I’ve used almost every interview trick in my repertoire, I’m not sure I have it.
“Hang on one second.” I signal Brian with a quick finger-across-my-throat cut sign.
He punches the blue button on the camera, putting his Sony on pause, then clicks a lever, adjusting his tripod.
“Don’t move yet for the wide shot, thanks. I’m just thinking if there’s anything else.” I look at Franklin, knowing Zuzu can’t see the panicked look on my face. Knowing Franklin will give it a try.
Franklin, sitting on the other side of the oval conference table and out of camera range, gets the message. “I have a question,” he says.
Zuzu turns to look at him. “Yes?”
“Just pretend you’re talking to Charlotte when you answer, all right? I know it seems unnatural, but it’s so the camera angle is correct. I’m just wondering-there wasn’t any security when we came in. No sign-in. No inspections. In a place where your trade secrets are so critical, how concerned are you there may be a breach?”
“Well, that’s what you noticed when you arrived at the front door,” Zuzu says to Franklin.
“Zuzu?” I gently prompt her. “Remember to look at me when you answer?” I give Brian the one-finger sign to roll tape.
He nods. “Rolling.”
“So?”
“As I said, that’s when you arrived,” Zuzu begins again. “But you may not have noticed our surveillance cameras. And when you leave, when anyone leaves, it’s a different story. Everyone uses the back door. Everyone signs out. Rejected designs are shredded. Personal bags are searched. Employees. Visitors. It is all the same.”
She looks at her watch, signaling time is up. I look at mine, knowing I’m doomed.
“Time for wide shots?” Brian says. He means: time to cut your losses? He knows a bad interview when he hears one.
“We need to get some pictures of the two of us talking, a wider angle than during the interview,” I explain to Zuzu. I’m keeping my voice casual, to convey we’re finished with that segment. “Also, you said you’re taking us back to the studio, as soon as the designers arrive. Would it be possible for Brian to get some video in there, as well?”