Shadow Woman by Thomas Perry Page A

anybody scanning with a directional microphone from a distance
would pick up the waterfall and eighty customers talking about
nothing.
    It wasn’t the sort of
security that an underground room would have, but it had worked well
enough so far. What he was worried about these days was some kind of
futuristic emergency – some loser driving a car bomb through
the front entrance, or some Japanese cult releasing nerve gas in the
climate-control system. He had consultants working on
countermeasures, but so far nothing they had brought him was good
enough to bring to the big guys. All the plans involved lots of
rebuilding to make space for some strategy they could not guarantee
would work.
    The big guys were never
reluctant to spend money on remodeling. What they hated was having to
shut anything down while they did it. But Seaver believed in outside
consultants, and he was confident that they would solve these
problems, one by one. Security was a matter of batting down specific
threats. Nothing worked all of the time for all purposes.
    He opened the door to the
boardroom, stepped inside onto the thick carpet, and quietly took a
seat at the enormous rosewood table. The door closed silently behind
him. The automatic closer had been Seaver’s idea too. The time
when people were going in and out was a gaping breach in the room’s
integrity. Anyone who managed to defeat the other obstacles could
learn a lot by picking up a few seconds here and there and studying
what he had heard.
    This time there was no meeting
of the Management Team. The only ones in the room were the big guys
themselves, Bobby Salateri, Max Foley, and Peter Buckley. They met
this way more often than people would think, to talk without the
twenty upper-level functionaries who ran housekeeping or finance or
public relations or security.
    Peter Buckley first deigned to
notice Seaver. “Morning, Cal.”
    “Peter,” said
Seaver. Then he added, “Bobby, Max,” as the others saw
him. Then he waited. They took their time, and it was a compliment to
him.
    “Having water misters all
over the place is okay this year. It’s okay next year,”
said Salateri. “How does it look ten years from now? I mean
politically?”
    “It’s not exactly
all over the place,” said Foley. “It’s just on the
golf courses. The sun shelters are already plumbed. It’s just a
matter of installing these little fixtures around the roof. That’s
thirty-six misters. They’ll make the players feel cool and
comfortable.”
    “Yeah, I know,” said
Salateri. “It’s nothing, really. But every single time
some TV station does a report on wasting water I see footage of
misters over some hot dog stand.”
    “The estimate says the
trees around the shelters will catch some of the water and the shade
will keep the mist from evaporating as fast. If there’s ever
rationing, it’s just that much more water grandfathered in.”
    “That’s a point I
hadn’t thought of,” said Salateri. “I can buy it on
that basis. How about you, Peter?”
    “Sure,” said
Buckley. “If things really get stupid, we’ve got
something we can give away: Pleasure Island shuts down misters to
save water.”
    “I’ll have them go
ahead,” said Foley. He turned to Seaver. “Little problem
last night, huh, Cal?”
    “Yes,” said Seaver.
“I wish I had some excuse. I don’t.”
    “So where does that leave
us now?” asked Buckley.
    “Hatcher wasn’t on
any flight leaving McCarran, or a train. A bus is too haphazard for
him. He undoubtedly drove out. If he had the sense to keep driving,
he could be in Chicago by now.” He reached into his breast
pocket. “My resignation is ready, if you want it.”
    “Stick it in your ear,”
said Salateri. “This isn’t the fucking army, where you
get to resign your commission and hand in your sword and go write
your memoirs. We’ve got a parasite that could eat us alive. We
need you more than we did yesterday.”
    “Thank you,” said
Seaver. It was the only