from the costume jewelry distributor across the hall had chipped in to buy her a corsage. At best, the corsage disappeared into the print of Ms. Wilbur’s dress.
In fact, the party had a distinctly floral theme. Harden at Regional had sent a small display and Ms. Johanssen at National had sent a slightly larger one. The morning’s Oakland Tribune was spread on a desk to protect valuable company property from any water that dripped from the flowers. Both displays bore friendly, handwritten messages congratulating Ms. Wilbur on her retirement and wishing her great happiness in the future. And Elmer Mueller, the Walnut Creek branch manager, had sprung for sandwiches and punch.
It was all according to the International Surety Operations Manual. Lindsey ought to know that. He’d worked for International Surety for his entire professional life, and the OpsMan was the loyal employee’s Bible. Lindsey had sat in the very chair Elmer Mueller now occupied before he’d strayed from the true path of the OpsMan. In the course of so doing, he had trod on a few sensitive toes and got himself kicked upstairs to the Special Projects Unit/Detached Service. If SPUDS was the graveyard of International Surety careers, then Desmond Richelieu, its chief, was the company’s in-house undertaker. Desmond Richelieu sat in his tower office in Denver and sent out the word. Demote. Suspend. Terminate.
It was not a good thing to be invited to a meeting with Desmond Richelieu, yet Lindsey had survived several such. Maybe Richelieu considered him too small a gadfly to bother swatting. Or maybe he liked having somebody around who could break the rules when he felt that a higher good was involved. It was a funny way to do business, and no one had ever accused Richelieu of having a sense of humor.
Somehow, Lindsey had hung onto his job.
Conversation was desultory, drifting from talk of marriages good and bad to children and grandchildren to recipes and television shows. It was woman talk. Lindsey let his eye drift to the Oakland Tribune peeking out from under the flowers. The local news section was visible; it featured a photograph of a blocky, modernistic building and a headline about the fire at the Pacific Film Archive.
Lindsey slid the page out from under the flowers and read the story. Most of it he knew. Less than twenty-four hours had passed, and the fire was jostling a dozen other stories for space. Another day and it would disappear. It would be replaced by a scandal on the Oakland School Board or a drug bust in Richmond or a real estate scam in Alamo.
But in Berkeley, the Anti-Imperialist Front for the Liberation of People’s Park had issued a manifesto claiming responsibility for the fire and threatening “More Deaths, More Destructin Until Justis Is Serve.” The Central Coordinator of the Front, one Dylan “Che” Guevara, had appeared at police headquarters to demand that the Pacific Film Archive and its host institution, the University Art Museum, be converted into rent-free permanent residences for the poor, to be financed and maintained by the city.
Lindsey wondered if Guevara was the wild-eyed orator of the previous afternoon. But Guevara denied that the Front was responsible for the fire. “We can spell better than that,” he said.
Anthony Roland, manager of research projects for the Archive, condemned the attack as cowardly. “Besides,” Roland was quoted as saying, “the Archive has nothing to do with People’s Park. I was gassed in ’68 and I’m all for the park. Why would they attack us?” The body of the dead researcher, Annabella Buonaventura, would be returned to her family in Milan, Italy, for burial. Condolences would be forwarded to the parents via the Italian consulate in San Francisco.
So Roland had calmed down enough to talk to a reporter. That was something.
Lindsey ran his eye over a few other stories. The most interesting from an insurance viewpoint was the latest in a series of industrial burglaries. The favorite target nowadays was computer components. Somebody had hit a warehouse in Fremont and driven away with a load of top-of-the-line processor chips worth half a million dollars. The loot was literally worth more than its weight in gold. There was no end to human ingenuity when it came to finding ways to make a crooked buck.
With a sigh, Lindsey slid the page back under the floral arrangement.
One of Ms. Wilbur’s friends from the jewelry distributor had brought a portable stereo and the music, something by Barry Manilow out of Neil Diamond, very nearly drowned out the timid tapping at the door.
You could only tell there was a visitor at all because International Surety had rented space in a building nearly due for demolition. They don’t build them that way any more, but each office suite still had a stained-wood door with a frosted glass upper panel and the tenant’s name stenciled on it in gold. It wouldn’t be surprising to open a door like that and see Edward Arnold seated behind a mammoth desk, tough-as-nails Barbara Stanwyck perched on a swivel chair just out of the portly Arnold’s reach, taking dictation and wisecracking every couple of lines.
A visitor’s silhouette was visible against the frosted panel. Ms. Wilbur had been chatting with her female friends while Lindsey and Elmer Mueller, cordial enemies, maintained a stony silence. Mueller had the habit of popping mentholated cough drops into his mouth and crunching them between his teeth. He exuded the minty odor of menthol. Ms. Wilbur started to break away from her friends but Lindsey moved first, relieved to have an excuse to escape from the loathsome Mueller.
For an instant Lindsey thought the visitor was a child delivering an envelope. His mind flashed to Whitey Benedict, a 1940s actor who’d made a career of delivering telegrams, flowers, and department store packages in scores of black-and-white movies.
Then Lindsey realized that the visitor was a wizened little man. He might once have stood five-six but now he couldn’t be more than four feet, ten or eleven inches tall. He wore a threadbare black suit, a frayed white dress shirt and a narrow black necktie. He held a business size envelope in front of him, flat side upward, thin end extended toward Lindsey.
He said, “I want the Global National Guarantee Life Company.”
Lindsey said, “I’m sorry. This is International Surety.”
The little man said, “I can read. I’ve been at the library for weeks. Ever since it happened.”
Lindsey said, “I’m sorry, sir.” He peered down into the man’s face. There was something in his eyes that held Lindsey’s attention. They were almost as dark as his black, wrinkled skin, except for the milky pools of half-formed cataracts. Lindsey said, “Can you see?”
The man said, “Well enough.”
Lindsey studied the man’s face. He said, “Please, come in. Maybe we can help you. This is the International Surety Corporation. I’ve never heard of Global—what was it again?”
“Global National Guarantee Life Company.”
The little man held the envelope so Lindsey could see the return address. There was a corporate logo that looked like a remnant of the Warren Harding era. In typography equally ancient, and in ink that might once have been a vivid green but was now a faded yellowish olive, the name of the company was spelled out.
Lindsey tried to take the envelope but the little man clutched his end. Lindsey tilted his head and looked at the two-cent postage stamp and the faded cancellation mark. The letter had been mailed in Los Angeles, California, on January 31, 1931.
Lindsey detected the odor of menthol announcing the approach of Elmer Mueller.
Mueller said, “What’s this all about?”
The little man started to ask his question again, but Mueller cut him off. “No personal
