Jigsaw Lovers Page 3

  Ackermann’s analysts had made discrete enquiries and had gathered a comprehensive report together on both the company and its personnel. Ackermann had just finished reading this report when James entered his office.

  ‘What do you make of this Knight character?’ he asked without looking up.

  ‘My first impressions are that I don’t think he’s as clean as the image he likes to portray to people. I think if we delve a little deeper we’ll be able to find some dirt that may help our plans, if we decide to go with this one.’ James seldom gave anyone the benefit of the doubt.

  ‘Good, my feelings exactly. There are aspects here, which on the surface make him out to be too good to be true. Find out more about what Knight is really like. Let’s do an in-depth check on him personally, and let’s scrutinise his business. You know what we’re after – weaknesses – girls, boys, the usual, and have a close look, in particular, at how the company started, and find out exactly what its association with that publisher is.’ Ackermann had a sense that something was a little strange in that area.

  ‘I know what you mean. I’ll do some digging.’

  James left to initiate the next phase of the operation.

  Two weeks later Ackermann chuckled to himself as he read James’s next report about Knight. He always derived a considerable amount of self-satisfaction from seeing his hunches vindicated, and this one was no exception.

  Firstly, Knight was thirty-two, engaged to be married for the last six months to the only daughter of a retired high court judge, who had been left a considerable fortune by her grandfather. Before meeting his fiancée two years ago he had quite a reputation as a womaniser, gambler and party-goer, who had considerable personal debts, with creditors frequently after him. She had sorted all that out for him and he seemed to have settled down. Every now and again though, despite the engagement there were rumours that he was occasionally tempted by his old habits. Apparently, on occasions when he got extremely drunk without his fiancée around he was not averse to visiting various escort agencies. However, James had been unable to find any concrete proof of this, but was of the belief that if necessary this possible weakness could be turned to their advantage.

  It was the other part of the report, concerning the early beginnings of Knight’s company, that gave Ackermann most cause for self-satisfaction.

  The company had started with nothing, just Knight and a part-time secretary, and in a very short time had, surprisingly, been winning major contracts on a regular basis from Amalgamated Magazines. This was despite strong competition, for a sought-after account, from the other research companies whom one would have thought were more experienced and better able to do the work. Looking at the figures he had before him, Ackermann saw that Knight consistently quoted a few per cent below anyone else. If this had happened once or twice it could have been ascribed to coincidence, but it had occurred with such regularity as to be suspicious. It was clear to Ackermann that Knight had been paying kickbacks to someone in Amalgamated Magazines to give him information about rival quotes for market research work. As such he was able to undercut the competition. This enabled his company to grow quickly in a very competitive field and to become established. As far as could be determined, at this stage, the arrangement was still being carried on.

  There was an element of uncertainty about who the person taking the kickbacks was, but James’s investigation had limited it to a choice of two. Therefore, it shouldn’t be too difficult to pin the culprit down. Fortunately for Ackermann’s plans, both suspects now occupied senior management positions within the organisation and so had much to lose from exposure. Their future co-operation was thus almost certainly assured.

  Ackermann was very pleased. ‘Good work James. This is just what we need in order to proceed with our acquisition plans.’

  ‘Yes. Your initial assessment of Knight and his business activities was spot on. He hasn’t been as upright and correct as he’d like everyone to believe.’

  ‘How do you suggest we play it from here?’ He knew exactly what he was going to do, but he wanted to hear James’s views, which invariably, on past performance, were the same as his own. It never ceased to amaze him that the two of them could think things out in a similar way and come to the same conclusions. It was very useful to have someone whose judgement he could rely on, just in case, admittedly a remote possibility, he had missed something.

  ‘I think we put temptation in Mr Knight’s way. We compromise him, and then ask him to reveal the name of the person who he’s been paying off all these years.’

  ‘That shouldn’t be too difficult, given his predilection for pretty girls,’ agreed Ackermann. ‘Once we’ve got this information, how do we use it to help our purchase of his company?’

  ‘Once we know who’s been taking bribes we put pressure on him to cancel Amalgamated’s contracts with Knight Market Research. Without that client the market value of the company drops to next to nothing.’

  Exactly what Ackermann was thinking. ‘And then we make Mr Knight an offer he can’t refuse.’

  ‘Following that we go back to our friend at Amalgamated and suggest that he re-awards the market research contracts to Knight’s new owners. The same arrangement in principal that he had with Knight, except that from now on his percentage is considerably reduced.’

  ‘Very neat.’ Ackermann was enjoying the meeting. ‘Have you any ideas about tempting Knight?’

  ‘That should be quite a simple operation. As you just mentioned, pretty girls.’ He said, also smiling. ‘I think this will be a good one to initiate Diana Johnston. It will give us an opportunity to see how she performs. Unless I’m very much mistaken, I think she will bring out his former life with a passion. Also, since it’s for us, should anything not go quite as we anticipate, then it’s not so serious.’

  ‘Absolutely. No angry client to try and pacify,’ agreed Ackermann. ‘Excellent. Lets do it.’

  Ian Hamilton was bought his first personal computer by far-sighted parents, not long after computers appeared on the market. It had a single 360k floppy drive, and a minuscule amount of random access memory. However, at the time it was considered incredibly fast and sophisticated – a world leader in its newly emerging class. Until that time computers had been enormous main frames which occupied entire rooms. The one which had sat on his desk had more power than several rooms full of the older type.

  He had always had a lively interest in technological developments and the coming of the personal computer enabled him to indulge this interest at first hand. He spent all his spare time sitting in front of the dark screen which displayed type in phosphorescent green letters, furiously tapping away at the keyboard with a two-fingered technique that a professional typist would have considered clumsy, but which was remarkably efficient to issue the command strings to the central processor. He had a keen intellect, an enquiring mind and a sharp logical approach to problems, which enabled him easily to grasp the fundamental principles of his computer and then to go on to master its sophisticated potential.

  The experience he thus gained, at an early age, led him to read computer science at the University of Cape Town, which provided him with an enormous in-depth understanding of the subject, and upon graduation, to find immediate employment within one of the large multi-national corporations whose southern African operations were based in Cape Town.

  After four years with the company he was a senior analyst programmer, with half a dozen junior staff answering to him, responsible for maintaining and ensuring the smooth running of the company’s accounting systems. He had no problem in fulfilling these responsibilities, but he did have a problem with his immediate superior and above her, his head of department.

  The American parent company was extremely successful. It had been in business for most of the century and had gradually expanded from its small home-spun mid-west origins, to first encompass the United States and then to spread the tentacles of its marketing operations overseas, such that its products were no
w available and produced in many diverse countries all over the world.

  Despite being global, the company had never forgotten its origins, or the principles of its founders. These were basically White, Anglo-Saxon Protestant, and where ever the company went these values were maintained. With the civil rights movements of the sixties and a generally more liberal approach in society the company subtly changed some of its outward attitudes, whilst at heart remaining true to it founders’ beliefs. One or two black faces appeared in junior positions; positions that were given a high public profile but which carried no real authority.

  In fact very few people within the company had any real authority, no matter what their skin colour. There was strict central control, power being exercised and all decisions being made by a select few at head office. This was made possible by a managerial hierarchy that had to seek approval for any decision made, no matter how trivial, from the next tier in that hierarchy.

  As the company expanded globally so the managerial hierarchy expanded as well. No decision, of the slightest importance, was taken anywhere in the world that was not approved by head office in America. This lead to the recruitment of a perverse kind of manager. They were managers in name only. They were ‘yes’ men and women. Initiative and original thought were not pre-requisites for employment; in fact they were positive disadvantages to being recruited. The company wanted the plodders, the unadventurous, those who would do, without question, what was asked of them, in the way in which they were told to do it. It was a formula that had worked well when the company was small, and it still worked well now that it was a global giant, but it meant that real power was centralised and exercised by a high-powered few, and that the majority of lesser executives outside that central core were mediocre non-entities. Such a description could be applied to the majority of the employees of the company, for like attracted like, from the top down.

  Occasionally there was an oversight in the recruiting selection and a person of genuine talent and enterprise would be employed. Unfortunately these people rarely stayed with the company for long. Disillusioned by the frustration of seeing any personal initiative over-ruled, time and again, by superiors whose only qualification to manage them was a complete lack of ability themselves, they left. Individualism was not something that was encouraged.

  The company liked its employees to think of themselves as one big happy family. Social events and gatherings were organised whereby the employees and their own families could meet with each other outside normal working hours, and further strengthen their feeling of gratitude for their benevolent paternalistic employer. The overall effect was to produce a workforce that was grey and pedestrian; that worked uncomplainingly and although efficient at achieving the goals set by world headquarters, really never fulfilled its true potential, that would have been able to develop in a less strict and less regimented corporate environment.

  It was somewhat strange, therefore, that Ian Hamilton should find himself working for such an institution. He had very little respect for authority at the best of times, but even less for the type that was administered by those who did not deserve to wield it.

  During the first week or two as he was finding his feet within the organisation, he realised that all could not go well for very long. He was surprised at the way some things were done, in a somewhat round-about fashion, and when he suggested alternative methods, that would speed the jobs up, he was told that that was the way this particular job had always been done and not to try and be too clever. Any initiatives he tried to take to improve working methods, which he thought would be beneficial for all, were stifled at the outset, by his immediate superior.

  He answered to a woman named Annabel, who was in her mid-forties, and who was strange. She liked to keep the details of her early career quiet, for reasons that became all too apparent, but eventually it transpired that she had started work as a typist in the days of the IBM golf-ball machines. She had then progressed onto the early wordprocessors, and after a number of years had somehow managed to transfer to the computer services side of the company, of which, incredibly, due to her lack of formal qualifications or experience in the field, she was now assistant head. Her position owed more to the fact that she had been with the company a long time, rather than to any innate skill, ability or understanding of the technology that she was now responsible for using, and, in theory, directing others to use.

  Some, when they heard the story of a lowly typist who had achieved managerial status, thought she may have slept her way to her current post. That was until they first met her in the flesh, at which point they quickly reassessed their opinion, for it would be hard to imagine anyone less attractive or alluring. She was short, with stubby legs and thick ankles, her body was almost foreshortened, which gave the impression of her whole being out of proportion with the parts that made it up. She was possessed of a weasel-like countenance, which held a permanent sour expression – as if she were constantly biting on a wedge of lemon. Her tongue was as ascerbic, usually complaining of others’ inefficiencies in the hope of masking her own.

  Her rather unpleasant physical attributes were further accentuated by her appalling sense of dress. It was not untypical for her to match a purple top with yellow slacks – the international colour combination to denote poison – but more often than not she would wear combinations of muddy browns, that didn’t quite match. This coupled with the strange mixture of colours with which she would configure her computer screen lead those around her to think, rather charitably, that she was, perhaps, colour blind.

  The chairman of Amalgamated Magazines was an enthusiastic follower of the turf. As such for the last few years the group had sponsored a number of race meetings. Usually they would have a marquee with lunch and drinks and invite their clients and business associates along for an entertaining day at the races. Ackermann Public Relations normally received invitations to these events.

  James decided that the next race meeting that Amalgamated sponsored would be a good opportunity to arrange a chance meeting between Diana Johnston and Peter Knight. There was every possibility that he would be there as he was one of their principal suppliers, and was known to enjoy a little flutter on the horses.

  The day before the races James telephoned Knight’s secretary pretending to be from the publishers and asked if Knight would be attending the next day. When the secretary confirmed this to be the case James drove around to Diana’s flat in order to tell her what was required of her.

  ‘Tomorrow we are going to the races. There’s going to be someone there we’d like you to get to know,’ he began. ‘For the moment we just want you to attract his attention, make contact and arrange a way of seeing him again, without appearing to be too enthusiastic.’ James mentioned that the fiancée would probably be there, but that would help as the object was to tempt him by degrees.

  ‘Ultimately we want you to get him to answer one or two questions. You may have to sleep with him unless you can find out what we want otherwise. That’s up to you.’ She didn’t really mind whether she slept with him or not. That’s what she was being paid for, and judging by the photographs James had shown her of Peter Knight he was definitely quite attractive.

  ‘Fine. I don’t have a problem with that. What questions do you want asked?’

  ‘You’ll be informed of that later.’

  When James arrived at ten to pick up Diana he was overwhelmed by how attractive she looked. She was wearing a plain black mini-skirt, with a white jacket that came down to just above the skirt hemline, beneath which was a black lace top, tantalisingly see-through but not overtly so, the lace pattern being slightly denser where it mattered. Black mesh stockings and ankle boots, accentuated the elegant delicacy of her legs. Tied loosely around her neck, adding a startling splash of vibrant colour, was a red and gold silk scarf from Hermès.

  ‘Good morning, Diana.’ he looked her up and down. ‘You look absolutely stunning. Quiet beautiful.’

  ‘Why thank you, James. Y
ou’re very kind.’ she twirled round, one arm raised and gave him a little bow. ‘I’m glad you like it. You don’t look too bad yourself, if I may say so.’ She brushed a speck of dust from his lapel.

  They went down to the street and he held the door for her as she climbed into his car.

  ‘I love leather seats. They always remind me of the South of France, when I was a student.’ she said wistfully.

  ‘Really, why’s that?’ he asked glancing at her with a grin.

  ‘Maybe I’ll tell you when I get to know you better.’ It didn’t occur to her that James already knew about the incident she was referring to.

  ‘Its such a nice day, can we put the roof down?’ she asked.

  ‘Sure, but won’t the wind mess up your hair?’

  ‘A quick brush and it will all be back in place.’ He pushed a button and the sunroof folded itself neatly away.

  It took half an hour to weave their way across London to the start of the M4 motorway. During the trip James noticed that many pedestrians and other motorists were often looking in his direction. It was a combination of the car and the beautiful carefree-looking woman next to him. It must have seemed as though it was a scene straight from the advertisements for this particular masterpiece of German engineering.

  An hour later they arrived at the race course and proceeded through the members enclosure to the Amalgamated Magazines marquee. It was one of the larger ones with blue and white stripes on the canvas, Amalgamated’s corporate colours, and their company flags were fluttering in the breeze.

  Everywhere that they went James was conscious of the looks that Diana was attracting. Both men and woman would look up at her or turn their heads as she passed by. If she was aware of it, she gave no indication of having noticed. He liked her sense of modesty, and he enjoyed seeing the envious looks on the faces of men all around. It gave him a good feeling to be with her.

  He introduced her as a cousin, visiting from working abroad, on a short holiday.