A Calculated Risk, Katherine Neville [english novels for students txt] 📗

both done well, I see,” I told them. “You’re looking fine, and if I’m not mistaken, there’s even more hardware here than ten years ago!”

“Actually, we’ve gone into the mail-order business,” Harris2 explained. “Charles Babbage is the president of our corporation, and we’re the vice-presidents. There was plenty of machine time unused here, and going to waste for many years. We were endlessly bored, sitting about each night—that’s why Harris2 took that daytime job at the bank. We found we could manage this place, even with one of us working outside. Then we got a bit more creative and opened a business. We’ve made quite a bundle—the three of us—these past few years.”

“Sounds wonderful, if slightly illegal,” I told them. “After all, you don’t own this data center.”

“You’ve been using Charles Babbage yourself, for the past ten years,” Harris1 pointed out. “We do read the logs, you know! But we’ve said, many times, that if you hadn’t saved his life as you did, we’d never have amounted to much ourselves. Charles has somehow given us the inspiration we needed to become entrepreneurs.”

I was flipping through some of the listings in Charles’s print basket as we spoke.

“What is this stuff?” I asked them.

“That’s an inventory of a mailing we do for our largest client,” Harris2 explained, “a consortium of East Coast universities. They’ve combined their alumni mailing lists so they can cull the cream of the crop—the really wealthy alums—and solicit special types of joint endowments.”

“We’ve refined the data,” chimed in Harris1, “by adding information from Dun and Bradstreet, the Social Register, and even real estate holdings, along posher sections of the seaboard. If we chose to sell this mailing list, it alone might go for half a million.”

As I listened I studied the list more closely. Not only did it include name, rank, and serial number—but family statistics, political affiliations, business connections, club memberships, property holdings, and tax-free donations made to various institutions. It was gold, and I knew it. That list might be worth half a mill to the Bobbseys, but it was worth far more to me.

I smiled. Once again, Charles Babbage had come to my aid, without even knowing it. I had to set up thousands of dummy accounts when I got back to San Francisco, didn’t I? Accounts where I could put all that dough while I invested it, without anyone getting suspicious over the size of the deposits passing through. I could hardly think of better names than those on the list before me. And now I wouldn’t even have to invent social security numbers or credit status; it was all spelled out right here.

But the clincher, of course—from my point of view—was that many of the muckete-mucks on that list were also members of the Vagabond Club! Maybe there was some justice in this world.

I whistled all the way back to my hotel. Fifth Avenue was strung with lights like a Christmas tree. The scent of winter was in the air, and the crowds moved at a brisk pace up the glittering thoroughfare. It was nearly dark when I swept through the glass revolving doors of the Sherry.

When I got to my room to change for dinner, I saw the red phone light flashing, so I rang up the desk to collect the messages. There’d been two calls—one from Pearl, one from Tavish, in San Francisco. I glanced at my watch: seven-thirty here meant four-thirty in California, not yet quitting time at the bank.

I decided I had time for a shower first. I phoned room service for a bottle of sherry and went off to make my ablutions. When I came out of the steamy bathroom fifteen minutes later, my hair wrapped in a towel, the tray with glasses was set up in the living room. I poured myself a drink and picked up the phone.

“Miss Lorraine isn’t at this number any longer,” the bank secretary told me. “She works for Mr. Karp now. Please hold, and I’ll transfer you.”

After a minute, Pearl came on the line.

“Hello, sweetheart,” said Pearl. “I’m glad you called back. I thought I should let you know that a few things are going on here. Our pal Karp and your boss Kiwi have been plotting something dire in your absence. I have the office next to Karp’s—if you can call this dump an office—and I can hear everything they say through the walls. I foresee a long ocean voyage in your future.”

“What do you mean? They’re trying to get me fired?”

“Worse than that, sugarplum,” she said glumly. “They’ve somehow learned that your little quality team is looking with maximum scrutiny at their systems. The latest plan is to get you transferred to Frankfurt for the winter—a charming place this time of year. With no one here to stop them, they could make your project vanish, get rid of me with impunity, and Karp could do with Tavish as he wished. By the way, it’s Frankfurt, Germany—not Kentucky—and it’s not considered a promotion!”

“A lateral arabesque,” I agreed. “Well, I’ll be home tomorrow—we’ll discuss it when you pick me up. If you can bring Tavish to the airport with you, do. It’s time I shared some other news, as well.”

“Since we’re alone, I’d better ask now—seen any action in Manhattan?”

“I’ve hardly spent my time dashing around trying to ‘get laid’—if that’s what you mean,” I told her curtly.

“Use it or lose it,” Pearl said with a sigh.

“Thanks for the sage advice,” I replied, and hung up.

Tavish wasn’t at his desk, I assumed, when I heard the phone roll over to another location. Someone picked up at last, and while I waited I could hear the squeak of disk drives in the background, and the open whir of the climate control systems, before Tavish came on the line.

“Where are you—the machine room?” I said. “Can you talk?”

“Not just at present,” he told me in hushed voice. “But you-know-who is taking a very active interest in our work. He’s asking for status