Nick closed his eyes, waited for his heart to stop hammering. When he opened them again, she was gone.
77
Audrey’s e-mail icon was bouncing, and she saw it was Kevin Lenehan, the electronics tech.
She walked right over there, almost ran.
“What’s the best restaurant in town, would you say?” Kevin said.
“I don’t know. Terra, maybe? I’ve never been there.”
“How about Taco Gordito?”
“Why do you ask?”
“Because you owe me dinner. I told you the recording on this baby started at three-eighteen in the morning on Wednesday the sixteenth, right? After the sequence you’re so interested in?”
“What’d you find?”
“The hard drive’s partitioned into two sections, right? One for the digital images, the other for the software that drives the thing.” He turned to his computer monitor, moved the mouse around and clicked on something. “Very cool system, by the way. Internet-based.”
“Meaning?”
“Your guy had the ability to monitor his cameras from his office.”
“What does that tell you?”
“Nothing. I’m just saying. Anyway, look at this.”
“That doesn’t mean anything to me. It’s a long list of numbers.”
“Not a techie, huh? Your husband has to program the VCR for you?”
“He can’t either.”
“Same with me. No one can. So, look. This is the log of all recorded content.”
“Is that the fifteenth?”
“You got it. This log says that the recording actually started on Tuesday the fifteenth at four minutes after noon, right? Not like fifteen hours later.”
“So you found more video?”
“I wish. No, you’re not following me. Someone must have gone in and reformatted the section of the hard drive where the recordings are made, then started the whole machine over, recycled it, so it just looked like it started from scratch at three-whatever in the morning on Wednesday. But the log here tells us that the system was initiated fifteen hours earlier. I mean, it’s saying there’s recorded content going back to like noon that day. Only, when you click on the files, it says ‘File not found.’”
“Deleted?”
“You got it.”
Audrey stared at the screen. “You’re sure of this.”
“Am I sure the box started recording at noon the day before? Yeah, sure as shit.”
“No. Sure you can’t retrieve the recording.”
“It’s, like, so gone.”
“That’s too bad.”
“Hey, you look, like, disappointed. I thought you’d be thrilled. You want proof part of the video was erased, you got it right here.”
“You ever read the book Fortunately when you were a kid?”
“My mom plopped me down in front of One Life to Live and General Hospital. Everything I learned about life I learned from soap operas. That’s why I’m single.”
“I must have read it a thousand times. There’s a boy named Ned, and he’s invited to a surprise party, but unfortunately the party’s a thousand miles away. Fortunately a friend lends him an airplane, but unfortunately the motor explodes.”
“Ouch. I hate when that happens.”
“Fortunately there’s a parachute in the airplane.”
“But unfortunately he’s horribly burned over ninety percent of his body and he’s unable to open the chute? See how my mind works.”
“This case is like that. Fortunately, unfortunately.”
“That pretty much describes my sex life,” Kevin said. “Fortunately the girl goes home with Kevin. Unfortunately she turns out to be a radical feminist lesbian who only wants him to teach her how to use Photoshop.”
“Thanks, Kevin,” Audrey got up from the stool. “Lunch at Taco Gordito’s on me.”
“Dinner,” Kevin said firmly. “That’s the deal.”
78
Nick’s cell phone rang just as he was pulling into the parking lot, almost half an hour later than usual this morning.
It was Victoria Zander, the Senior Vice President for Workplace Research, calling from Milan. “Nick,” she said, “I’m at the Salone Internazionale del Mobile in Milan, and I’m so upset I can barely speak.”
“Okay, Victoria, take a deep breath and tell me what’s up.”
“Will you please explain to me what’s going on with Dashboard?”
Dashboard was one of the big new projects Victoria was developing, a portfolio of flexible, modular glass walls and partitions-very cool, beautifully designed, and something Victoria was really high on. Nick was high on it for business reasons: there was nothing else like it out there, and it was sure to hit a sweet spot.
“What do you mean, ‘What’s going on’?”
“After all the time and money we’ve put in on this, and-it just makes no sense! ‘All major capital expenditures on hold’-what do you mean by that? And not even giving me the courtesy of advance notice?”
“Victoria-”
“I don’t see how I can continue working for Stratton. I really don’t. You know, Herman Miller has been after me for two years, and frankly I think that’s a far better home for-”
“Victoria, hold on. Cool your jets, will you? Now, who told you we’re shelving Dashboard?”
“You guys did! I just got the e-mail from Scott.”
What e-mail? Nick almost asked, but instead he said, “Victoria, there’s some kind of glitch. I’ll call you right back.”
He clicked off, slammed the car door, and went to look for Scott.
“He’s not here, Nick,” Gloria said. “He had an appointment.”
“An appointment where?” Nick demanded.
She hesitated. “He didn’t say.”
“Get him on his cell, please. Right now.”
Gloria hesitated again. “I’m sorry, Nick, but his cell phone doesn’t work inside the plant. That’s where he is.”
“The plant? Which one?”
“The chair factory. He’s-well, he’s giving someone a tour.”
As far as Nick knew, Scott had been inside the factories maybe twice before. “Who?”
“Nick, I-please.”
“He asked you not to say anything.”
Gloria closed her eyes, nodded. “I’m really sorry. It’s a difficult position.”
Difficult position? I’m the goddamned CEO, he thought.
“Don’t worry about it,” he said kindly.
Nick hadn’t visited the chair plant in almost three months. There was a time when he’d visit monthly, sometimes more, just to check out how things were running, ask questions, listen to complaints, see how much inventory backlog was on hand. He’d check the quality boards at each station too, mostly to set an example, figuring that if he paid attention to the quality charts, the plant manager would too, and so would everyone below him.
He made visits to the plant just like Old Man Devries used to do, only when the old man did it, they weren’t called Gemba walks, as they were now. That term had been introduced by Scott, along with Kaizen and a bunch of other Japanese words that Nick didn’t remember, and that sounded to him like types of sushi.
It was the layoffs that made walking the plants an unpleasant chore. He could sense the hostility when he came through. It wasn’t lost on him, or anybody else, that Old Man Devries’s job had been to build plants, and Nick’s was to tear them down.
But he knew it was something he should probably start doing again, both here and in the other manufacturing complex about ten miles down the road. He’d go back to the monthly walks, he vowed.
If he had the chance.
If the factories were still here.
He noticed the big white sign on the front of the red brick building that said DAYS SINCE LAST ACCIDENT, and next to it a black LED panel with the red digital numerals 322. Someone had crossed out ACCIDENT and scrawled over it, with a heavy black marker, LAYOFFS.