08.17.2008 / EP. 31
A Few Steps Forward
There was meat, here, for reflection. On one side, a shooting war with Pam. Milly could smooth things over; she excelled at avoiding conflict. And Pam might have been bluffing; captains of industry rivalled Sir Laurence Olivier on stage. Milly might persuade Pam that the decision lay outside her control and grease the wheels with extra profit. Anything was preferable to the alternative, disregarding the clear instructions of the voice to up her market share. But if Milly sold more, Lin’s favourable pricing would create extra profit she didn’t have to share. War with Pam or war with the voice, keep to existing percentages or rev hers up. No contest. Milly called Lin and they made arrangements.
At Milly’s next meeting with her drug crew, she told them Arthur had ordered more sales. There was a chorus of protest. Milly quelled the uproar with incentives. The street price would rise by ten percent, but the distributors wouldn’t pay more per kilo if their sales rose by the same amount. The distributors sell more and make more from the first gram up. They’d work harder, but earn a lot more money.
“Who invented this scheme?” the distributors asked. “Arthur wanted the price increase,” said Milly. “I tried to make it painless.”
The crew batted the implications back and forth, but the core message had penetrated. They were content. Any grumbling will be against Arthur, Milly told herself.
Milly found the photos she’d taken outside her house. If Pam insisted on war, Milly would be ready. The photos showed the car that had followed Pam. They also showed Pam shooting the man. Enhancing the licence plate, Milly searched the government’s registration site. The plate belonged to a rental agency. Its slogan – ‘pamper yourself’; company name – illegible. Someone had obliterated it. Milly dialled a number from memory and indicated what she wanted into the silence. She received the rental agreement by email a few minutes later. Her bank account would be debited $25,000. Well-placed dollars could buy anything. The man who had followed Pam was Gabriel Daloux, resident of Paris. An odd coincidence, Milly thought, France being where Pam’s Resurrection and White Gold come from.
Milly called Paris. There was a Daloux at the address on the form and a man’s voice answered when she tried the number. She hung up. Carrie had been to Paris with the Governor when he’d needed the life-extending drug. Carrie had also told Milly about a handsome man she’d met, a man with connections right to the top. Milly telephoned Carrie and said she was looking into a Senator’s girlfriend. The Senator tentatively supported the Governor and would firm up with the right inducement. The Senator’s girlfriend was fishing in two ponds and the Senator’s competition was in Paris. His name, Milly said, was Gabriel Daloux at such-and-such address. Could Carrie ask her French contact about this Daloux? Yes, discreetly. No one wanted to alert the press. Carrie promised to try.
Andreas paid more attention when he noticed that the call came from America. He feared a wrinkle in the groundwork he’d laid during his recent trip to the US and was relieved to hear Carrie’s voice. No political threads were unravelling. He suppressed a sigh of relief. And Carrie was useful, being middle-management. In his experience, these employees, particularly in government, were malleable and knew where the bodies were buried. They understood who really set agendas, gave decisive advice, and had unlimited access to sensitive data and photocopiers. Carrie was also that rare female bird: intelligent but not above or below using sex appeal to accomplish her goals. He said he’d look into Daloux and called back within the hour. He had bad news. “There’s a barrier up,” he said. Carrie didn’t understand. “Someone influential doesn’t want questions asked. Daloux isn’t an ordinary Frenchman. He’s not a grocer or a teacher or a piano tuner or a janitor. I need more information. What’s the man done?”
Carrie didn’t hesitate, unless precautionary vagueness is evidence of an intuitive suspicion. “Bizarre things are happening here. They don’t make sense.”
“The irrational permeates all quarters of life in America. Come visit me.”
“Hollywood is where things don’t make sense. This is Albany. The opposite. There was a robbery of the Governor’s offices apparently for nothing, a dead body for no reason …”
“What dead body?”
“Nothing that would mean anything to you. No one knows who he is or why he was killed. A rare doll was left at the scene, which coincidentally someone on the Governor’s staff bought, very publicly, a few months ago, a triple marriage…”
“I would really help if you made sense.”
Milly went numb. “I’ll call you right back,” she said.
