“But that’s just my point,” the resource manager said. “You didn’t care about her at all. You just wanted to build a case. It’s the worst kind of muckraking.”
“What else could I do?” The journalist let out a sigh. “Such are the times we live in. You can’t sell an idea, no matter how passionately you believe in it, unless you serve it cooked up with a scandal. Believe me, if the editor weren’t so squeamish I’d have sent the photographer to shoot that woman in the morgue, because the director there told me … he said she’s … I mean was … in his opinion … a good-looking woman. Or special-looking, anyway …”
The resource manager thought he would choke. “Good-looking? Special-looking? Incredible! How dare you talk that way? Such good friends you two, he gave you a peep show. Don’t deny it! You make me want to puke …”
“Calm down. Who said I saw her?”
“You’re the scandal, not us.” He was getting carried away. “You complain of our inhumanity, but you don’t mind your friend abusing his position to tell you intimate things about the dead. A good-looking woman? Who gave him permission to discuss her? Is that any way to deal with a terror victim? Unbelievable! The man is sick — and you’re his accomplice. I could file a complaint against both of you. Who are you to give victims marks for being beautiful or ugly? I felt nauseous from the moment I started reading your article. It’s not only nasty, it’s pathological …”
There was a chuckle of satisfaction at the other end of the line.
“Suppose it is. Why shouldn’t it be? When everything around us is collapsing, it’s pathological to fight it.” True, his friend’s praise for the woman’s beauty — the weasel was decent enough to admit it — was what had aroused his interest in the first place. But why was the human resources manager surprised? Now that he knew who she was, he surely remembered her.
“Remember her? Of course I don’t.” Once again something quailed in him at being linked to the dead woman. “How could I? Our firm employs, in both of its branches, 270 or 280 workers in three shifts. Who can remember every one of them?”
“Well, you might at least tell me her name. What was her job? There must be a photograph in her file that we can publish. Or are you saving it for your apology? It will pep up the story. Our readers will love it …”
“A photograph? Forget it! And you’re not getting her name from me, either. You’re not getting anything unless you promise to withdraw your article altogether, or at least to tone it down.”
“But why should I? It’s a solid piece of writing. The one thing I’m willing to do is investigate the whole matter more thoroughly. How can a company fire someone and still keep her on the payroll? I wouldn’t mind looking into that … she deserves as much …”
“For what purpose? To tell more lies and make more mistakes? Tell me: When Jerusalem is burning, does any of this matter? I’m not even talking about your photographing me in the street without permission or dragging in my divorce as though it were of public interest, although that’s one thing that at least you could have left out …”
“Why? Don’t tell me it’s fiction,” the journalist said. “I’ve already told you: a little bit of harmless gossip can make a point better than all the generalizations in the world. The public deserves to know how jobs are handed out in big companies. And why doesn’t it matter? People like to read about terror attacks. They’re not abstract. They’re close to home and could happen to them. We all put ourselves first. The next time you’re in a café, look at the customers. Apart from their depression and resentment at the situation, you can see how delighted they are, all the same, to be alive … Why are you so angry with me? I don’t deserve it. If you were to meet me in person, you would remember that we were once in the same class at university, in an introductory lecture course on Greek philosophy. That’s why it surprised me to discover that you were heading the company’s personnel division. I wouldn’t have imagined you in such a cut-and-dried job. I don’t suppose it’s coincidence that the poor woman got lost in all your paperwork. She must have been a cleaning woman or something …”
“Something.” The resource manager winced.
“Won’t you at least tell me her name?” the journalist pleaded. “You obviously know it.”
“I’m not telling you anything.”
“You’ll have to mention it in your apology anyway.”
Feeling the weasel’s teeth sink into his throat, the resource manager regretted having phoned him.
“No, we won’t,” he protested. “We’re not divulging any details. In the end, we may even choose not to respond. You just want to make us look terrible, to keep hitting us below the belt. Why help you? You can crawl in the dark on all fours, mister weasel, you can crawl like a blind animal and eat dirt …”
There was no surprise or anger at the other end of the line. Only a chuckle of satisfaction. The human resources manager hung up.
8
He was now not only bone-weary but hungry as well. Before calling home again to see if his daughter had arrived, he went to the men’s room to freshen up. It was being cleaned by someone new, a young blonde woman he had never seen before. Startled by his appearance after office hours, she took a step back while he graciously signalled her to carry on and then went to the ladies’ instead. There, on his secretary’s initiative, a full-length mirror had been installed. Facing it in the stillness of the evening, he saw a thirty-nine-year-old man of average height and powerful build, with hair clipped short in boot-camp style — a vestige of his many years in the army. In recent months, he had not liked the way he looked. A gloom had settled over him, narrowing his eyes in an expression of vague injury. What’s bothering you, he silently scolded the figure staring glumly back at him. Was it only the owner’s self-indulgent concern for his humanity? Or was it also the prospect of his own photograph in the local weekly, accompanied by a cynical reference to his divorce? The journalist, he now realized, was more cunning than he had thought. Barring a clear apology, he would probe some more and come up with a new accusation for next week’s instalment. Once he knew the woman’s name, it would be only a matter of time before he got to her fellow workers. Anyone who could make friends in a morgue could make them in a bakery too. Someone there had already leaked the connection between his divorce and his new job. He was quite sure it wasn’t his secretary. Not that his reputation mattered to her, but the human resources division’s did.
He splashed his face with water while considering the option of not reacting to the article at all. An aloof silence might be the best strategy. But such a strategy would make the owner say he was dodging his duty, which was the last thing he wanted. He ran a small, fine-toothed comb through his crew cut, took a tube from his pocket and rubbed Vaseline on his chapped lips, and returned to the men’s room, determined to find out who the new cleaning woman was and who had hired her. She was gone, vanished like a ghost.
The office manager knew it was him even before he said a word. “We’re all fine,” she reassured him gaily. “We’re heading back to the car with all the homework, even her assignments for the weekend. We’ll get to work on it as soon as we get home. I’ll help with the English and my husband will freshen up his maths. Would you like to say hello?”
His daughter’s habitually estranged, defensive voice had a new, hopeful note. “Yes,” she told him. “They’re very nice and they’ve promised to help with my homework. You don’t have to hurry.”