opinions flatly and backs up his hunches with facts, then he defends his positions very strongly.”
“I think that’s fair to say,” Kate replied.
“It may be fair, but a lot of people don’t find it attractive. Lance can be charming, when it suits him, or when it’s required to get what he wants, but he doesn’t employ charm a lot in intra-Agency relations. As a result, people always approach Lance with some trepidation.”
“And what is the result of that trepidation?”
“People who know him walk into his office and present themselves concisely, and they’re always ready to back up what they say. There’s no shooting the breeze, there’s no idle gossip. Everything has to be to the point when talking to Lance.”
“That’s very interesting,” Kate said. “Of course, I look at Lance from the top down, not from below, so I don’t see that side of him too much. However, I think the characteristic you describe would be an important asset in a director. I’m more easygoing than Lance, so people sometimes talk too much when reporting to me. Sometimes I wish I had Lance’s gift for demanding that they get to the point. What do you think of Lance’s attitude toward the women who work for him?”
“Lance has always-well, nearly always-treated me respectfully. He’s been demanding, but fair.”
“What about the other women who’ve had dealings with him?”
Holly thought some more. “I think when assigning important work, Lance tends to go to men first. He assigns women as women, not as agents. I mean, he’ll assign a woman when the job calls for a woman, explicitly. I’ve nudged him about this from time to time, and he’s responded to a degree, but I think he still shies away from putting a woman in charge of men.”
Kate smiled. “That’s an astute judgment. What do you think Lance will say when I ask him about you? Do you think he would be reluctant to put you in charge of men?”
“Well, when you ask him, I guess we’ll find out how well I’ve trained him.”
Kate burst out laughing.
“Seriously, I have no fear of what Lance might say about me, and I think you should consider his comments very carefully, because they will be just as unvarnished as his views on everything else.”
“Do you think he’s an honest man?”
Holly shrugged. “I’m not sure honesty is a desirable quality in a spymaster. Lance can certainly be devious and, like everyone else, self-serving, but if it matters, I would be happy to work in an Agency with Lance running it.”
“You’ve been very helpful, Holly. Now get back to work.” Kate opened a file and started reading.
Holly got out of there.
22
Herbie Fisher sat in his office, speed-reading files. His secretary buzzed. “Mark Hayes on line one for you.”
Hayes was one of Herbie’s clients, an important one. He ran High Cotton Ideas, a hot software company.
“Good morning, Mark.”
“Good morning, Herb. I have a problem I haven’t been faced with before, and when I have a problem like that, I always come to you.”
“How can I help, Mark?”
“One of my top programmers has disappeared, and I’m concerned.”
“Concerned for his safety or concerned about the work he did?”
“He didn’t show up for work for a couple of days, and he wasn’t responding to phone calls or e-mails, so I sent somebody to his apartment to see if he was there. It was empty, and there were painters at work. Turned out that his lease had expired and he had moved out, but nobody knows where. This morning I got an e-mail from him. It reads: ‘I resign. I’ll let you know where to send my final paycheck.’ That’s it.”
“You didn’t respond to my question about the work he did. Are you afraid he might have gone to a competitor and taken your intellectual property with him?”
“That’s a possibility.”
“Did he have a contract?”
“Yes, I recently promoted him and gave him a big raise. You wrote his contract.”
“What’s his name?”
“Jimmy Chang. He’s Chinese-American, born in this country.”
“Hang on a second,” Herbie said. He pressed the hold button and buzzed his secretary. “Please bring me the executed contract for a Jimmy Chang, at High Cotton.” He pressed line one again. “How long did he work for you, Mark?”
“Nearly three years. He was one of the first dozen people I hired. At first, he was just writing code, but he moved up quickly.”
“Did he have any company stock?” High Cotton was about to go public.
“He did, but like a lot of employees, not as much as he thought he was entitled to.”
“What will his stock be worth at the opening of your IPO?”
“About a million and a half dollars, but who knows? It could double that day.”
“How much was he being paid?”
“He started at seventy-five thousand. He was making half a million when he resigned.”
Herbie’s secretary walked in and handed him the contract.
“I’ve got the contract,” Herbie said, leafing through it. “I remember this one. His attorney asked for some minor changes that you agreed to, but if he leaves the company, he has to give you three months’ notice, and if he leaves during that time and you continue to pay him, he can’t work for anyone else. He also has a non-disclosure clause that prevents him from divulging any of your proprietary information to a new employer. How do you pay him?”
“All salaries are electronically transferred to employees’ bank accounts.”
“Then continue to pay him, to hold up your end of the contract. I’ll write to his lawyer and ask him to remind his client of his contractual obligations and to go and see you immediately. I think we should also start trying to locate him now.”
“Do you know someone who can do that?” Mark asked.
“I do,” Herbie said, “someone very good. I have to divulge to you that I have a personal relationship with this woman.”
“I’m not troubled by that,” Mark said.
“All right, I need you to e-mail me his original employment application and any letters of recommendation you received.”
“It wasn’t much of an application at that time, but you revised it, and I asked everybody to complete the new form, so I’ll send you both.”
“Was he married?”
“No, but he had a girlfriend who seemed to be living with him.”
“Her name?”
“Jasmine. I can’t remember a last name.”
“Okay, shoot me the information I asked for, and I’ll get the investigator on it right now. She may need to get in touch with you. Her name is Harp O’Connor, and don’t call her Harpie or Harpo.”
“Thanks, Herb.”
“Glad to be of help. I’ll get back to you as soon as I hear something.” Herbie hung up and dialed Harp’s cell number.
“Speak to me, Herb,” she said.
“I’ve got you a skip tracer job for a very important client. Can you start right now?”
“I’ll have to make a few calls, but I can start in half an hour. Give me the rundown.”
