you are responsible for Electronika acquiring Trinity Electronics in the first place.”
“Yes,” Sam had conceded, “that’s true.”
“So I thought you might be able to shed some light on the problem we’ve discovered,” Brennan said. Pause. He laughed suddenly, kicking his head back. “Christ!” he cried, looking at Sam. “The irony of it.”
“Of what?”
“Asking my black executive if he can shed some light on why we’re assembling machines in Pretoria, South Africa.”
“What?” Sam was up and out of his chair. “What?” he repeated, leaning over Brennan’s desk.
“Yeah,” Brennan said, nodding his head. “You got it. Chet has informed me that the ZT is being assembled in a plant in Pretoria.”
“That’s impossible,” Sam said, dropping back in his chair. “It’s just impossible. The components ship from Tokyo, San Francisco and London for assembly in Nairobi, Kenya.”
Brennan scratched his ear. “So you don’t know anything about the Pretoria plant?”
Sam snorted, jerking his head to the side. He looked back at Brennan. “I know I don’t do business with South Africa, I can tell you that. And I can tell you that nobody I dealt with at Trinity does either.”
“Well, somebody sure as hell does,” Brennan observed.
And so Sam had not slept very well last night. The whole thing had kept spinning around in his head and in his stomach. On the first level, he was furious. On the second level, he was furious because he didn’t know who to be furious at—Trinity Electronics or—or…himself. Could it be possible that he had prompted Electronika to take over a company producing in South Africa? South Africa? Sam Wyatt’s ZT 5000 was being assembled in South Africa? His big coup was with the inventors of apartheid?
Oh, God, his stomach hurt.
No, he had decided, he was not at fault. And Brennan knew that; he had only been looking for answers to a problem. But man, oh, man, if word got out on this—that Electronika was selling to institutional accounts machines that were being produced in South Africa—the ZT 5000 would be killed. It was just the year before that Sam had applauded the student demonstration at Columbia to protest the school’s stock-holdings in companies doing business in South Africa. And Columbia had divested itself of those stocks—and Columbia was a major institutional account for the ZT 5000! (Suddenly, visions of Althea conducting a sit-in in front of the Wyatts’ apartment building swam past Sam’s eyes. Suddenly, visions of protests across the country against Electronika swam past Sam’s eyes. Suddenly, visions of his own photograph accompanied by the headline BLACK EXEC BREAKS BOYCOTT IN SOUTH AFRICA swam past Sam’s eyes.)
Would he be fired? Sam had wondered. What was Electronika going to do? Sam had wondered. What was he going to do? he had wondered. Sit back, let them handle it, or try to find out more about what had happened, how it had happened?
He had decided not to panic, and he had decided to make some calls to Trinity in London to find out what or how this had happened. Sam looked at his watch. His secretary had been on the phone to London for over fifteen minutes. Was no one in? He looked at his watch again. It was only three-thirty in the afternoon there.
Finally his secretary, Mabel, appeared in the doorway of Sam’s office. Sam looked at his phone, saw no lights on, and frowned. “Didn’t you get Lane Smith?”
Mabel shook her head.
“Well, did you try George?”
“Yes, but he’s not—”
“Well then, get Alice on the phone,” Sam said.
“Mr. Wyatt,” Mabel said, gesturing futility with her hands, “there’s no one there.”
“What is it, a holiday or something?”
Mabel looked down at the paper in her hand. “I tried every single name in the Trinity file—Lane Smith, George O’Shea, Alice Tilly, Ian Claremont, John Sawyer—”
“How about that guy in manufacturing,” Sam said, “Peter, Peter—”
“Johnson. I tried him too.” Pause. “Mr. Wyatt, none of them work there anymore.”
“What?” Sam sat back in his chair, thinking a moment. “Were they fired or did they quit?”
“They wouldn’t tell me,” Mabel said, “They just said, ‘He is no longer with the company.’”
5
Mrs. Goldblum at home
Dear Mrs. Goldblum [the letter said], After repeated telephone conversations with you regarding your late husband’s employment with Horowitz & Sons, I am forced to reiterate the facts in letter form in the hope that the matter can be put to rest.
You informed us that from the time of your husband’s death in 1970, until February of 1984, Bernard Horowitz issued certain sums of money to you. You informed us that these payments were from your late husband’s pension plan.
If Mr. Horowitz did indeed make these payments, he did so out of his personal funds. Nowhere—and I have personally gone through every file—is there any record of a pension fund being set up for your husband. In fact, no employee at Horowitz & Sons had a pension fund with the company.
In conclusion, Charger Industries has absolutely no obligation to the estate of the late Robert Goldblum. I hope this answers your questions.
Sincerely,
Phillip S. Robin
“Hey, Mrs. G,” Rosanne said, coming into the kitchen, “Amanda gave me—Mrs. G, are you okay?”
Mrs. Goldblum lowered the letter onto the table. “I’m quite fine, thank you.”
“You don’t look so hot.” Rosanne edged closer. “Bad news?” she asked, nodding toward the letter.
“No,” Mrs. Goldblum said softly, slipping the letter back into the envelope it arrived in. “There is some lovely chicken salad for your luncheon. It’s in the refrigerator.”
“Thanks,” Rosanne said. She looked at Mrs. Goldblum a moment longer and then went over to the refrigerator. “Are you gonna want yours on lettuce or in a sandwich?”
“No, thank you, dear. I’ve already eaten.”
Rosanne frowned slightly. “Well, you sure eat fast then, since I’ve been here all morning.”
“No, thank you, dear.” Mrs. Goldblum rose from her chair and, taking the letter with her, made her way toward the living room. Her hip was quite stiff today and she wondered if she shouldn’t be using her cane. And she wondered if she shouldn’t get over her keen dislike of having such a thing in the house.
Carefully, she sat herself down at her secretary.
Now
