Coming of Age: Volume 2: Endless Conflict Read Online Free PDF

ready status.
    “We already looked there,” Callista said. “He’s got nothing.”
    “It wouldn’t be a regular account,” Antigone Wells said. “It’s probably not even a company check.”
    “Well, what do you know?” Penny asked reasonably.
    “Someone in the company paid half a million to bribe an LA County official.”
    “Whew!” Penny whistled. “And you want to know who, right?”
    “It might not even be money,” Wells went on. “A bungalow on the beach. Or a couple of fast cars. The actual bribe could be impossible to trace.”
    “But I can find those things, ” Penny said, “if this company bought them.”
    “The district attorney was very specific about the amount,” Callista replied. “It sounded like a lump sum.”
    “District attorney, huh?” Penny said. “So the cops are already involved?”
    “Yeah, we’re all going to jail,” Wells said, “unless we find the perpetrator.”
    “It could be cash,” Callista said. “But try looking for smaller amounts, odd thousands, taken out over—”
    “Wait a minute!” Penny held up her hands. “Start from the other end. What was the bribe for?”
    “Favorable review of our bid on a big highway project,” Wells said.
    “So it’s got to have come from a marketing account,” Penny said.
    “You’ll never find it there,” Callista said. “I’ve already looked.”
    “Yeah, but you have to know what to ask for,” Penny said. “Rover, display the annual budget allotted to the marketing department, subheadings only.”
    Out popped a table of accounts and amounts. The total budget barely topped a million dollars.
    “Sum expenses alongside, year to date,” she instructed.
    The table repeated with a parallel column of amounts paid out for each heading. They showed that only half of the total budget had already been spent.
    “Anything added or missing?” she asked the people in the room. “Bogus accounts? Bogus amounts? Expenses shown as paid that you know for a fact have not been made?”
    They stared and studied, then one by one shook their heads.
    “So, either your marketing people are able to subsist without spending any money—like some kind of air fern—or their regular accounts didn’t supply the half million used in the bribe.”
    “It had to come from within the company,” Callista stated.
    “Rover,” Penny instructed, “do a regression analysis of the entire corporate budget, variance between projected and expended, year to date. Note any outliers beyond ten percent. List and sum the outliers.”
    The screen showed a scattershot diagram, dot by dot, drew a slanted line through the mass of dots, and circled those that lay pretty far outside the main pattern. It then listed the affected budgets and the amounts at variance. The total, combining both over and under variances, came to about two hundred thousand.
    “Any of those look different from what you’d expect?” she asked.
    “Are we really leaking two hundred kay?” the elder Praxis asked.
    “Small potatoes,” the daughter told him. “The year is young yet.”
    “Do you think any of those are hiding your bribe?” Penny asked.
    “Not even close,” Callista said. “Unless you pieced ’em together.”
    “Rover, note all high-side variances and sum,” Penny instructed.
    The screen listed the different headings too fast to note, then gave a total that was more than half a million, but not by much.
    “Is anyone in the company in a position to skim a little bit here, there, and everywhere?” Penny asked. “That is, and not get caught?”
    President and chairman looked warily at each other. They shook their heads at the same time.
    “That would be a neat trick,” Callista Praxis said.
    “The managers involved would scream,” John Praxis added.
    Penny shrugged. “Then we must deduce the money didn’t come from here.”
    * * *
    That evening when Antigone Wells returned with John Praxis to the house on Balboa Street, she could tell from the street