Lester's second appointment with the finance broker was shaping up well. The trip into town had been quicker and smoother than he'd expected. The hairdresser had performed wonders, while promising that most of the temporary changes would comb away in five minutes. He was feeling good, looking great.
Even the elevator in Collins Street seemed anxious to please. There was one intermediate stop, and then he was at the receptionist's desk. The Cortis & Carr girl was efficiency on wheels, with appearance to match. The navy skirt with its dozens of pleats had not one extra crease, and the dazzling white blouse looked as though it would crack if you touched it. The chest didn't even bounce as she rose to welcome him.
Probably a rule against it. Don't distract the clients.
"Ah, yes, Mr. Mercer is expecting you, Mr. Conley. He'll only be a few minutes. Can I get you a cup of coffee?"
The reception room felt like a quarter-acre of plush carpet, and the coffee was real. He was five minutes early, and the palatial surroundings, the solid furniture, the deferential manners fitted perfectly with his story.
Mercer was cordial.
"Very glad to meet you at last. I see you survived your car accident OK. Dare I ask about the other fellow?"
They dispensed with the pleasantries and defined the problem. A businessman with a record of marketing success was shortly to receive a windfall from a deceased uncle's will. It would finance a new venture, which would take six or eight weeks to organise. There was twice as much money as he needed, and he planned to use the waiting time to try out some of his theories on the options market. They depended on timing. He needed one iron-clad system for communicating with brokers to avoid delays at the wrong moment. Once the money was available, he would set up a starting portfolio, but he would need to be able to disengage quickly.
Mercer rose to his subject. Cortis didn't deal directly, for instance, on the Options market: trade in listed options was less common, but their associate introduced no more than five minutes’ delay in responding to a transaction request. He passed over an information booklet and covered the salient aspects of the Options Market.
Conditions of trade were vital to a smooth operation, he cautioned.
"We are very firm about dealing with cash in hand to cover your expected transactions. It depends on the likely scale of your operations, but a nominal minimum, say a thousand dollars, might be realistic. As long as we are confident we have the funds, our operators can work very quickly if need be. "I'll have the whole amount fairly soon now," Lester pointed out, "so how can we start up quickly?"
“A cheque at that point is quite acceptable of course, but you'd need to allow time - say three days - for it to clear. If you gave us the required amount as a Bank cheque, it would be a lot faster. Do you intend to invest the whole amount immediately?"
An important question: he's wondering if I know what I'm doing. Better play conservative: it would suit the business image better.
"No, I wouldn't think so, but I do want to be able to grab any opportunities while they are available. If that involves some short-term exposure, I understand it has to be mine. I want to be sure I know the system. Lost opportunities have to be my fault."
Richard Mercer relaxed a little, and smoothly laid out the procedure after setup. Then:
“How much do you expect is involved?”
It was the third time the question had turned up. He really expected some kind of indication. Could Lester bypass the subject again? Probably not; be careful!
"The whole bequest is about twelve million dollars, the solicitors think, but several of the tax aspects are not final. Your own responsibility would be less than half of that, I think. It should be a couple of months yet, though."
He didn't think Mercer quite believed him, but the broker's manner slid to a more deferential mode.
"Well, certainly, there's no alternative to Bank Cheques in that situation. Do you see a need for much deposit and withdrawal from the Account? We need to consider special measures to protect large amounts in transit"
"No," Lester responded," I don't want to shuffle parts of the funds around. Your bank is as good as my bank to keep any uncommitted balance safe while the important arrangements are finalised."
More important than $6 million! That seemed a nice touch, and a good point to part on. The conversation ended with the handover of Cortis's account application, and promises to get in touch nearer the time for action.
Mercer's farewell in the Reception Area was cordiality personified, and Lester fought to keep his satisfaction under firm control.
They'd doubtless do some checking as soon as they had the form back, but so far he'd carried the situation off. The checking would show he had zero substance - better sit on that form a while.
The Bank Cheque would have to fix that problem. When that turned up, they would want to co-operate, regardless of what they thought before. Probably need a second broker, too: the finance lecturers had been paranoid about not having all eggs in one basket. No sweat, he’d be much more sophisticated after this morning’s learning experience.
Next job - return to the person of Lester Bayliss, the moody systems programmer who didn't count for much at all in that big Mulgrave blockhouse.
He stopped off at the flat on the way through Caulfield, changed out of the new clothes, and back into work gear. It took an extra ten minutes to wash all the styling away, and dry out to the unkempt appearance he liked. That $45 haircut didn't last long.
The Security Guard wasn't fooled, though.
"Had your ears lowered, Mr. Bayliss? Think we ought to take a new ID photo?"
"Rubbish, Artie. You'd know me if I was bald. Nobody else throws shit at you the way I do."
True. Nobody else keeps such bloody weird hours either, Artie muttered after his disappearing frame. Must be great to suit yourself when you come to work. Wonder what the young lay-about did here anyway? The younger generation had it made!
Back at Lester's desk, the chaos was about normal, except for the sealed envelope with his name on the front. Love letters, at 11 o'clock in the morning?
Ripping it open, he tipped out a narrow strip of paper with the name "Dark Warrior" printed in bold type, obviously cut from a newspaper.
Of course! First Tuesday in November - Melbourne Cup Day. He owed somebody for buying him a share in the Cup Sweep. He'd been too busy the last couple of days, and even the TV and newspaper references had washed by without registering. There'd be a half- hour of do-nothing this afternoon at 3 o'clock.
The country would stop to watch 20 horses running two miles. Half the country had been poring over form guides, trainer's comments, and track and weather reports for a week, and he hadn't realised it was Cup Day.
Truth is, Lester just wasn't interested, wasn't a gambler's bootlace.
Now wait! Here he was planning the biggest computer heist ever, and he didn't think of himself as a gambler. Well, he mused, it was different when you controlled the risks – that’s not actually gambling. Perhaps his future vocation might allow for some horse race-fixing. That sounded attractive.
Well, there were a few hours of work-time yet, and the job pile wasn't getting any smaller. He ought to start by looking in on Rod's work. The troubleshooting on that Personnel program looked as though it might be a long job. Rodney might be better advised to check the earlier program version before he started. It seemed like a new complaint for no apparent reason, and maybe it was caused by a recent upgrade.
"How's it going?" Lester cut in brusquely.
"Come back in a day or two, Less. I'm trying to restate the problem. Unless you're here to help, of course."
"That's a possibility. You're not short of paper. Only been on it this morning, haven't you?
Rodney ignored whatever implications, and decided to try for the help.
"They just can't make any changes to the records in one area.
“I'm not sure whether to suspect them, the records or the system."
"That's a good frame of mind to start with - healthy suspicion. Can you rule any of those three out?"
"Probably by trying to duplicate the problem. Have you tried that yet?"
"The system won't let me into the Personnel Group's records. I think I need a new password for that. The Security guy's on lunch, though."
"Loafing bastard," Lester muttered, "don't wait for him. Get back to the Personnel Officer who logged the complaint.”
"Anything else I ought to know about?" Rod queried.
"Lots of things, but you've got a year or so yet. I'd look out for whether they had this fault six months ago, under the previous program revision. Max Elliot has moved on now, but he made a lot of changes to that program. His records will be around somewhere. Have you written up the query to IBM on that tape problem you found last week?"
"Left it on Fred's desk. Did you get a horse in the Cup?"
Yes, but he couldn't remember the name.
Left in peace again, Rod mentally sorted through the conversation sequence. Moody as hell, that bastard. Sometimes you couldn't get a grunt out of him with a tyre lever, and then today....
As Lester looked for ways to kill an hour or two, suddenly he remembered that passport. He didn't like that bloke in St Kilda - something sinister about his eyes - but a phone call seemed harmless enough. He fished out the card; what was the chap's name again?
He recognised the voice when the phone was answered, so it didn't really matter about the name.
"I called in a week or so ago about identification," he said. Do you remember me?"
"Yes" the other end answered, sounding rushed and clipped. "Have something for you. Can't really talk right now. Give me your number and I'll call you back in ten."
His in-dial number tumbled out automatically. That’s convenient, Lester thought as he hung up.
Convenient? No, hell no, not so! Lester wasn't anonymous anymore; he’d just given away his work contact details to a really shady contact. Outsiders could find him at work now. What should he do next, he wondered? The best option was to discourage them. He'd receive any details, tell them he wasn't interested.
Fifteen minutes later, the call came.
"Lester, what's doing?" he answered, in one of his routine greetings.
"It's Reg from the bookstore. You the person was looking for an original identification?"
Clever, he thought. "Yes .. No, not definitely. I was wondering about cost and availability. Haven't decided anything yet."
"Yair , that's right," his caller agreed. "I did some checking as we agreed. It depends a bit on the stamps and visas you want - you understand me?"
"Yes," answered Lester," all I want is an approximation, though."
"OK, that's what I thought. My sources said the basic price is $1220. That's for a quality product. That's photos and everything, and it takes a couple of days. How would that suit?"
That seemed impossibly cheap, but the plan now was that he dump them, quickly. These people knew too much about him now. "God, that's far more..What if .. Well, you've given me exactly what I wanted. It's out of the question. Thanks, I don't need anything else. G'bye."
Hoping, praying that his acting was reasonably convincing, he set his mind to brush that mistake aside and get back to work. There weren't any other convenient housekeeping tasks, so he went up to the staff caf and had some lunch with a couple of sales people. The conversation was all Melbourne Cup. They couldn't get any client appointments today. He needed to make some progress, too, on the new software driver for the high speed printer, but it was useless to start until after the Cup broadcast. It would take an hour to find where he left off on the job last week, but then an interruption like a horse race would take him back to the start again.
Dark Warrior ran nowhere; Lester's horses never seemed to win anything, so there wasn't any disappointment. Annette rang a few minutes later: her luck was different. They'd have dinner out this evening - late, that's OK - to celebrate her horse winning second prize in Digital’s sweep.
Altogether a very satisfactory day, with the printer driver job coming four hours closer to completion. There’d be time to test it later this week.
* * * *
It turned out quite simple to get a passport; just as easy as he thought. The Travel Agent at the local shopping centre up the road had the application forms and it took a week to get photos and another copy of Roger Conley's birth certificate. A local pharmacist was easily talked into confirming his identity. He only needed to claim he shopped there, but that was only every month or two because his partner usually did that shopping.
Annette would wonder about Conley's mail if she arrived home first, though, and he wondered how safe it was to use the Post Office Box scheme. Although he hated the idea, perhaps he needed a discreet friend.
Annie?
Definitely not. Two people "in the know" would be far more than double the risk of error, indiscretion and detection. Annette might be useful once the job was finished, though. A couple in a new business might help to throw pursuers off the scent. He'd make that choice later. She was actually nice to have around.
There wasn't a mail problem at all, he discovered. The Department of Immigration wanted him to collect the Passport from their office in person.
He was grateful for that outcome, because complications were growing in his life at the site. Fred was under pressure again to make some progress with the management reporting system for March, and he was starting to pass the pressure down,
Rod McAllister and Henry Chu were both bogged down with seemingly insoluble problems in the new system, and several of the senior people were heavily loaded, too.
As luck would have it, Lester had a light workload, and it suited him to keep it that way. The planning he could do now might help a lot to ensure a post-Christmas "departure."
Monday's review meeting, then, was a tense affair with almost all parties under pressure.
Lester's turn came. "You've got my job summary, Fred. Three of those tasks are urgently-needed fixes, and I haven't been able to do a tap of work on the two others. We ought to regard testing Harry's patch as high priority, and the development work will have to wait."
"Well, what are you going to finish this week?"
"If I knew that, Fred, I'd put it in the report," Lester snapped, and heads turned around the conference table. Lester was in good company: two of the three other programmers were bordering on temper tantrums.
"I might get all three "urgents" resolved, and the write-ups, and maybe some testing next week. On the other hand, I might spend most of the week with Rod if he can't make more progress. That means less progress on my work, of course."
"Should we shift Rod's supervision to somebody else? Would that help?" Fred prodded. The new boys were both away on a course.
"Sure, it'd help me, but who else would take it." Lester looked around the table, smirking inwardly at the row of flinty glares. Fred wouldn't make much progress on that tack.
"Look, we've got to make some progress. The system seems like it's full of holes, and the pile is just growing. Any suggestions anybody, anything at all." Fred was pleading, and the hostility could be felt like a physical presence in the room.
Phil Bailey wriggled in his chair and offered tentatively, "If it's that bad, Fred, why don't you kick the IBM people a bit. The current list does seem to have a lot of basic bugs. Don't we pay 'em for software maintenance?"
Of course we paid; enough to support three people. Fred had raised that point, several times. By the time you proved that it was their fault, though, the task was 95% completed. That ploy got you management Brownie points, but didn't help with workload.
“Are the new boys performing? Lester, Phil, what do you think?"
"For Christ's sake, Fred," Lester snapped, "the kids have only been here six weeks or so. They hardly know where the dunny is. You've got to be a bit patient!"
Phil didn't disagree, on Henry Chu's account.
"Get some more people, Fred, if you can't get supplier effort free," Varney volunteered.
"We just got two people. All it's got us is a training load, as far as I can see."
"What did you expect? If you wanted quick results, the company should have shelled out for a couple of experienced people."
On that highly unsatisfactory note, Fred Hart closed the discussion, and the review broke up. He had six job lists, no timetable, and no solutions - not even any good ideas. Tomorrow's management meeting stood to be a lot worse than this.
It might be worth one more try in a smaller group.
"Phil, Lester, would you stay a minute?"
Lester saw the chance to build an impression that might be useful in a month or so.
"This whole business of progress is really getting worrisome," Fred began, "I need an honest answer. Are the boys performing?"
Both seniors didn't have anything to add to their earlier comments. It was far too early to make a firing decision; skilled help was what was needed if extra progress was mandatory.
"We've had bad spells before, Fred." Phil commented. "Can't we just ride this one out? In two or three weeks it's likely to go all quiet again."
Lester didn't favour that plan. It suited him better to keep the pressure up. The perfect outcome for him personally was to implement a scheme, and have himself sent on an enforced holiday. Time to plant that idea.
"This whole thing is too silly for words," he started. “Talking isn't helping. While I'm here, I'm not working. While we talk about it, we can't make any progress. We all need peace and quiet and a clear go. Last week I got a blast from the Personnel guy again about excessive accrued leave. Just tell 'em to piss off, so we can get some work done. That's my last word."
That should be outrageous enough, Lester thought. Slapping his notebook closed to underline his feigned annoyance, he hauled himself up and headed for the door.
Fred waved Phil out wordlessly, and set out to develop an approach to tomorrow's overview meeting. Perhaps Bayliss did need a holiday, he ought to check how much leave actually was overdue. When he burst out like that, a man was tempted to fire him, but he’d never get away with it. Anyway, losing Bayliss would only make the problem worse.
The clamor of the phone destroyed that line of thought for the moment.