by Frank Stein
So that was the answer to the first question. I didn’t discuss the second question too much with Swami because I had an idea of where it would lead. SpacedOut’s clothes were largely cotton-based, and so the Indian cotton contracts represented the single largest piece of the company’s supply chain. The contract cancellation decisions had to have come from someone high up, someone in the California offices. The obvious choice was the previous COO, and if that turned out to be the case, the Network’s protocol would be for Mo to pass the information up to the Network Omega, who would put out an assignment to the cell best positioned to take him down.
By the middle of the third week I had an answer. The previous COO would be off the hook, and Mo and I would be on it. Fine with me. I was ready. If I was going to be killing people like it was my job, I didn’t want to get too rusty.
FIFTY-ONE
Modern enterprise-wide computer systems are data-hogging monsters. You’d be amazed at the details that can get captured and fed into a single company-wide database. While a dinosaur like Walker-Midland used old mainframe-based systems that captured only the basics, and that too in a form that no one except an MIT grad would understand, SpacedOut used cutting edge integrated systems in which no one got to keep his or her full name out of the record books. And since my consulting team had been given access to the contracts database, it wasn’t so hard to look at the usernames associated with the contract changes. I was starting to appreciate the obvious synergies between my dual roles as a management consultant and freelance killer.
To make it even easier for me, there was a single username associated with the thirty-plus cancelled contracts. Since SpacedOut’s contracts database was linked with the human resources database, I was able to link to the employee’s personnel record. Of course, I didn’t have access to salary information or home addresses due to access restrictions, but I did manage to get a full name and corporate phone extension: Theresa Miller at extension 4460.
I wasn’t surprised to find out that Ms. Miller was an administrative assistant. I didn’t expect an executive to be keying in the changes himself. Ms. Miller wasn’t at her desk when I called, so I left a message introducing myself as a consultant and explaining that I was looking for some details about contracts related to the Indian cotton suppliers.
She called me back after lunch. It turned out that her boss, a vice-president of operations, was indeed the right person. He had been informed via a broadcast e-mail from the COO that a consulting firm had been hired to look into the supply-chain strategy, and to provide any assistance requested. And so I requested a meeting with Mr. Raghu Patel, Vice-President of Operations – India Region.
Patel was a short, skinny man. He looked like he had been sweating all day, even though the air conditioning seemed fine. He smelled like a mixture of body odor and Indian food, and he did not seem happy to see me.
When I sat down at his desk, I realized why I smelled Indian food: there were two open containers of some delicious-looking curry on his side table. I had interrupted his lunch, which was probably why he wasn’t too pleased at my presence. I understood that. It was almost a policy of mine not to mess with a client’s food-time.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Patel. I didn’t mean to interrupt your lunch. We can reschedule this meeting, if you like,” I said, putting on the warmest smile I could without appearing unprofessional.
That seemed to break Patel’s funk, because he immediately smiled and shook his head violently and waved away my suggestion.
“No, no. Please. In fact, you must forgive my own rudeness for eating while we talk. My schedule is packed, just packed.” He stopped chewing and swiveled his chair so he was facing me. “But all the VPs have been informed that this project is top priority. So you will have my full attention.”
“Okay, great.”
“Sorry, what is your name again? Theresa did not pass on that information. She simply said that she had scheduled one of the C&C consultants.”
“Oh, how rude of me not to introduce myself. I’m Frank Stein.”
“Mr. Stein.” He paused and gave me a half smile. “Jewish?”
“Yes.”
He nodded, and then he turned to his food and stuffed some roti and curry into his mouth. “So, Mr. Stein, what can I help you with?”
“Well, my team is looking at some of SpacedOut’s supplier contracts. And I noticed that a number of contracts have been cancelled and replaced with others that seem to be at a higher cost.” I paused, and then I shrugged. “Is that one of the strategic moves that got the previous COO into trouble?” I said this in a somewhat joking manner, so that Patel could play it any way he wanted—he could use it as an out and simply pass the buck, or he could dismiss it as a joke and try and explain the business rationale for what I was seeing. This was a standard technique employed by consultants when interviewing client executives. Give them a chance to blame someone else, and you’re more likely to get to the bottom of the problem.
But Patel didn’t dodge it. He chewed his roti and calmly made eye contact with me as he dabbed his mouth with a paper towel. Then he leaned back in his chair and gave me that half smile again.
“Frank. Sorry, may I call you Frank?”
“Of course.”
“Okay, okay, great. Well, Frank. Do you know much about how business is conducted in India? Especially when tie-ups between foreign and Indian companies are involved?”
I nodded and gave him a half smile of my own. “Yes, I do.” I let out a small laugh and nodded again. “Yes sir, I do.”
“Okay then. So you follow that the Indian government is always—how shall I put this—a partner in every transaction.” He paused. “You follow?”
“Of course, Mr. Patel.”
“Call me Raghu.”
“Raghu. Yes, of course I follow. That’s not uncommon, and it’s not isolated to India either. Some would say that the United States has its own channels and methods for lubricating the wheels of commerce.”
Patel laughed out loud. “Very well put, my dear Frank. You are a poet.” He closed the plastic food containers, which did nothing to reduce the smell of turmeric, chili powder, and ground cumin seeds. “So anyway, some of those numbers in the contracts are padded as a result of precisely what you said—costs of the lubricant itself.” He seemed pleased with the slight twist he had given to my analogy.
I cleared my throat. “That’s what I figured at first. But after interviewing a few of the other VPs, it appears that the lubricant charges are simply allocated as cash withdrawn from the ‘miscellaneous items’ accounts. And that’s fairly standard for US firms that do business in other countries. It’s well recognized that greasing the skids is part of the costs, and so it doesn’t create any serious legal scrutiny here.”
Patel was quiet, but he didn’t seem worried. He placed both elbows on his desk and leaned forward, propping up his chin with his fists. His eyes were opened extra-wide, and he showed that half smile again. It was like he wanted me to say something more, to ask him something more. I thought back to his earlier inquiry about whether I was Jewish, and I guessed where he was going. Of course, he wanted me to go there first. It was like a politically-correct game of chicken. Which one of us would say it first?
I decided to play innocent a bit longer. “So, are you saying that the new contracts have inflated labor costs because they are padded with expenses that, in the actual ledger books, have been allocated to the miscellaneous expenses account? And if I adjust the numbers in the contract to account for what’s in the expenses account, we’ll find that the new contracts are in line with or cheaper than the old, cancelled contracts?”
Patel leaned back again. The half smile was gone. “Probably. I haven’t seen those numbers matched up. There are a lot of charges that hit those miscellaneous accounts. Feel free to do the analysis and let me know.” He turned to his computer monitor and began scrolling through his e-mails.
I almost kicked myself. Patel was slipping away from me. He kne
w as well as I did that I’d never be able to do a clean analysis. The cash transactions would be labeled as random generic line items that could be explained in a hundred different ways. My theory was based solely on the unlikely coincidence of all the cancelled contracts being with suppliers from Muslim-dominated areas of Gujarat state in India.
So it was I who would have to blink first. “Well, actually, the reason I wanted to talk to you was because I noticed a pattern with the cancelled contracts.” I paused and took a deep breath. “A pattern that made me think that you are a man with principles, a man who likes to make decisions that are morally correct even though they may not be financially sound.”
This hit home. Patel turned back to me, and now his half smile had widened into a beaming grin. “Yes, my Hebrew friend. Without principles, what else is there? You understand this, no?”
I gave him a serious look that I hoped would convey sympathy with his bigotry. “Of course. I understand it as well as anyone. Better than most, I like to think.” I was quiet for a few moments. “And that’s the reason why I came to talk to you alone. You see, one of my fellow consultants is Indian, and my boss is a Muslim. I’m worried that it’s only a matter of time before they notice the same pattern.”
Patel caught his breath and I thought I saw a flash of panic in his eyes. Then it seemed he understood what I was suggesting, and his half smile slowly returned. “You have some recommendations?”
I rubbed my chin. “Well, not yet, but I think if we brainstorm a bit, we can come up with either a good explanation, or a way to reconfigure some of the information in the database.”
Patel stood up and walked to the large tinted glass window. He stared out over the concrete parking lot and nodded. “Yes. But not here.” He turned and smiled. “Do you like Indian food?”
FIFTY-TWO
“So you’re going to Raghu Patel’s house for dinner?” Mo was aghast.
We were sitting in the sprawling lobby of the San Francisco Hilton. I looked up at the frescoes on the ceiling and then back down at Mo. “Yes.”
“Since when do you know so much about Indian Muslims in Gujarat state?” she asked.
I shrugged. “I’m learning. Been reading about the anti-Muslim riots that happened there in 2002. Some terrible stuff—murder, rape, people being burned alive. Just because they had been born into a certain religion.” I sighed and looked at the thick blue carpet. “I’m not particularly religious or anything, but as a Jew, I can’t help but flinch when you see the obvious parallels.”
Mo smiled. “I’m not particularly religious either. But I remember reading about the Gujarat riots. Made me want to go out and do some killing myself. Still, what’s our rationale for taking out Raghu Patel? We have a new Omega contact, and I want to be able to make a solid case for this.”
I nodded. “My first reaction was disgust, which should be a good enough reason, but I know it’s not. Then, after my meeting with Patel, I did some digging into the Muslim situation in India, and it turns out that there’s been a systematic boycott of Muslim labor in many rural areas of India, and especially Gujarat, which shares a border with Pakistan. There’s a lot of propaganda being spread by militant right-wing Hindu extremists in Gujarat—pamphlets and speeches about how the local Indian Muslims are secretly supporting Pakistan’s terrorist activities and hence should be excluded from social and commercial activities.”
“Which is bullshit. Most of those so-called terrorist supporters are poor and illiterate and don’t even know a single Pakistani.” Mo shook her head.
“That’s what I’m getting from what I’m reading. But here’s the problem: even the real terrorists, the foot soldiers in Pakistan and Afghanistan, are just poor people who have no reasonable job opportunities besides joining the militia. It comes down to simple economics. It’s like so many Americans who join the army for no reason other than it’s the best career choice for them. Think about some poor eighteen-year-old kid in a village in Pakistan. He has nothing going for him. Then the Taliban recruiters come in and give him a rifle and a paycheck. It’s the best deal he gets.”
Mo smiled now. “I see where you’re going with this. If economics is the driving factor, then poverty-stricken Muslims in India could become prime targets for recruitment simply because they need to eat, and the best job they can get is to be a terrorist.”
“Exactly. And people like Raghu Patel are perpetuating this. So in some way, their decisions are breeding new terrorists.”
Mo nodded. “Okay. But are you sure he’s doing this voluntarily? If the economic boycott is systemic, then isn’t it possible that corrupt Indian politicians are the ones that forced the changes to the contracts?”
I thought for a minute. “You’re right. His bigotry isn’t enough reason to kill him if the decisions weren’t his.” I nodded and leaned back on the yellow and red pin-striped couch. “I’ll have to flush it out of him over dinner.” I looked at Mo. “But if I confirm it at his house, can I go ahead and take him right then and there?”
Mo sighed and shook her head. “I doubt the Omega will get through the validation process soon enough. I’m not even sure how it’ll get done. I mean, I’m sure the Network stretches into India, but who knows.”
I didn’t want to wait. “But I’m doing the validation. Who else is in a better position to do it? If the Network had Patel in its sights, then we’d have been given the assignment already, right? Didn’t you say the information flow was two-way? The Omega trusts that we’re not just killing people because they smell funny. Or am I missing something?”
Mo was quiet, but I could tell she was holding back a smile. “Yes, Frank. It is a two-way deal. But I don’t know much about the new Omega. More importantly, he or she probably doesn’t know much about us. And two Network members connected to us have just died.” She sighed again. “I just want our next job to be clean and by the book.”
I snorted. “The Network specifically picks people who are willing to do things outside the rulebook. And you’re arguing that this new Omega is going to be impressed by how obedient we are?”
Mo finally let her smile break. “Fine. Leave the authorization to me. The more important question is what’s your plan? And how am I supposed to get into Patel’s house? The way you’ve positioned yourself, this meeting is supposed to be happening without my knowledge, correct?”
I nodded. “I’ll do it alone.”
Mo laughed. “Getting a little bold, are we? No. That’s unacceptable. I can’t allow it. Not so soon.”
“How’s that knife wound healing for you?” I had noticed Mo’s stiffness over the past few days, and had guessed that the travel and long hours hadn’t done much for her.
“Screw you. I’m fine.”
“I’ll do it myself. I already have a plan.” Of course, I didn’t have a plan, but now I’d have to come up with one in about fifteen seconds.
“Okay.” She looked at me with a smirk. Mo could read me like I was one of those books with extra large print. “You going to stab him with a fork at the dinner table? In front of his wife and kids?”
I hadn’t thought about Patel’s family. I gulped, and then I looked up and smiled. “Poison,” I said with confidence. “I’ll get the information out of him over a pre-dinner drink. And if it’s a go, I’ll put something in his food. Indian food should be able to mask the taste of pretty much anything.” I shrugged. “Maybe get something that’ll take a few hours to kick in so I’m long gone.”
Mo smirked some more. “Do you know much about poisons?”
“What’s to know? I’ll do some web browsing from a public computer that can’t be traced back to me, figure out what’s easy to get a hold of in the next couple of days, and that’s that.”
“That’s that, eh?” Mo shook her head. “Okay. Do your digging and let me know.”
FIFTY-THREE
Digging was indeed the correct term. After some light browsing, I settled on one of Mother Nature’s finest killers: Amanita Ocreata—the
Death Angel, an all-white mushroom, half a cap of which is enough to kill a man. Symptoms would only emerge after several hours, by which time severe internal damage would have taken place. And given that the symptoms are vomiting and diarrhea, chances were that Patel would try and get through it without going to the hospital. If he did go to an emergency room, it was unlikely they’d diagnose the problem as being amanita poisoning—after all, Patel wouldn’t know he had eaten a strange mushroom.
Best of all, the mushroom could be found on the outskirts of wooded areas. Like some of the areas across the Bay, around the Berkeley Hills. So it was settled. I would spend the next three evenings picking mushrooms.
I told Mo about this, and she laughed at first but then came around when she read up on the deadly fungus. It was no joke. The toxins destroy the liver, and once the symptoms are visible, the treatment of choice is an emergency liver transplant. Just imagine: you eat a tiny bit of a beautiful, pure white mushroom, and soon your only chance for survival is to get your liver replaced. And that’s only for a chance at survival—the mushroom’s kill rate is over forty percent, and even then only if you’re lucky enough to get a new liver in time. Good lord. I thought back to the “magic” mushrooms I had eaten without question at a Phish concert during college. I shivered, and then pushed my morbid thoughts aside and focused on work.
That evening, after the team drove back to San Francisco and ate dinner together, I took the shared rental car and drove out across the Bay Bridge, past Oakland, and towards the hills. I had taken some directions to a state park that would be open, and I had photographs of the Death Angel mushroom.
I felt silly poking around in the bushes looking for a mushroom to use as a murder weapon. It was like I was some insane evil genius planning an unnecessarily complicated way to kill my target. Like in those old James Bond movies, where the bad guy designs an elaborate machine for the one specific purpose of killing 007. I shook my head when I remembered that Bond always got away. Then I reminded myself that I wasn’t the bad guy. I was only the killer, and those two terms were no longer synonymous in my world.