Michael Crichton - Disclosure

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Michael Crichton - DISCLOSURE
For Douglas Crichton
It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer: (r) to fail or refuse to hire or to
discharge any individual, or otherwise to discriminate against any individual with respect to his
compensation, terms, conditions or privileges of employment because of such individual's race,
color, religion, sex, or national origin or (a) to limit, segregate, classify his employees or
applicants for employment in any way which would deprive or tend to deprive any individual of
employment opportunities or otherwise adversely affect his status as an employee, because of such
individual's race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.
Title VA Civil Rights Act of 1964
Power is neither male nor female.
Katharine Graham
FROM: DC/M
ARTHUR KAHN
TWINKLE/KUALA LUMPUR/MALAYSIA
TO: DC/S
TOM SANDERS
SEATTLE (AT HOME)
TOM:
CONSIDERING THE MERGER, I THOUGHT YOU SHOULD GET THIS AT HOME AND NOT THE OFFICE:
TWINKLE PRODUCTION LINES RUNNING AT 29% CAPACITY DESPITE ALL EFFORTS TO INCREASE. SPOT CHECKS ON
DRIVES SHOW AVG SEEK TIMES IN 120-140 MILLISECOND RANGE WITH NO CLEAR INDICATION WHY WE ARE NOT
STABLE AT SPECS. ALSO, WE STILL HAVE POWER FLICKER IN SCREENS WHICH APPEARS TO COME FROM HINGE
DESIGN DESPITE IMPLEMENTATION OF DC/S FIX LAST WEEK. I DON'T THINK IT'S SOLVED YET.
HOW'S THE MERGER COMING? ARE WE GOING TO BE RICH AND FAMOUS?
CONGRATULATIONS IN ADVANCE ON YOUR PROMOTION.
ARTHUR
Tom Sanders never intended to be late for work on Monday, June is. At 7:30 in the morning, he
stepped into the shower at his home on Bainbridge Island. He knew he had to shave, dress, and
leave the house in ten minutes if he was to make the 7:50 ferry and arrive at work by 8:30, in
time to go over the remaining points with Stephanie Kaplan before they went into the meeting with
the lawyers from Conley-White. He already had a full day at work, and the fax he had just received
from Malaysia made it worse.
Sanders was a division manager at Digital Communications Technology in Seattle. Events at work had
been hectic for a week, because DigiCom was being acquired by Conley-White, a publishing
conglomerate in New York. The merger would allow Conley to acquire technology important to
publishing in the next century.
But this latest news from Malaysia was not good, and Arthur had been right to send it to him at
home. He was going to have a problem explaining it to the Conley-White people because they just
didn't
"Tom? Where are you? Tom?"
His wife, Susan, was calling from the bedroom. He ducked his head out of the spray.
"I'm in the shower!"
She said something in reply, but he didn't hear it. He stepped out, reaching for a towel. "What?"
"I said, Can you feed the kids?"
His wife was an attorney who worked four days a week at a downtown firm. She took Mondays off, to
spend more time with the kids, but she was not good at managing the routine at home. As a result,
there was often a crisis on Monday mornings.
"Tom? Can you feed them for me?"
"I can't, Sue," he called to her. The clock on the sink said 7:34. "I'm already late." He ran
water in the basin to shave, and lathered his face. He was a handsome man, with the easy manner of
an athlete. He touched the dark bruise on his side from the company touch football game on
Saturday. Mark Lewyn had taken him down; Lewyn was fast but clumsy. And Sanders was getting too
old for touch football. He was still in good shape still within five pounds of his varsity weight-
but as he ran his hand through his wet hair, he saw streaks of gray. It was time to admit his age,
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he thought, and switch to tennis.
Susan came into the morn, still in her bathrobe. His wife always looked beautiful in the morning,
right out of bed. She had the kind of fresh beauty that required no makeup. "Are you sure you
can't feed them?" she said. "Oh, nice bruise. Very butch." She kissed him lightly, and pushed a
fresh mug of coffee onto the counter for him. "I've got to get Matthew to the pediatrician by
eight-fifteen, and neither one of them has eaten a thing, and I'm not dressed. Can't you please
feed them? Pretty please?" Teasing, she ruffled his hair, and her bathrobe fell open. She left it
open and smiled. "I'll owe you one . . ."
"Sue, I can't." He kissed her forehead distractedly. "I've got a meeting, I can't be late."
She sighed. "Oh, all right." Pouting, she left.
Sanders began shaving.
A moment later he heard his wife say, "Okay, kids, let's go! Eliza, put your shoes on." This was
followed by whining from Eliza, who was four, and didn't like to wear shoes. Sanders had almost
finished shaving when he heard, "Eliza, you put on those shoes and take your brother downstairs
right now!" Eliza's reply was indistinct, and then Susan said, "Eliza Ann, I'm talking to you!"
Then Susan began slamming drawers in the hall linen closet. Both kids started to cry.
Eliza, who was upset by any display of tension, came into the bathroom, her face scrunched up,
tears in her eyes. "Daddy . . . ," she sobbed. He put his hand down to hug her, still shaving with
his other hand.
"She's old enough to help out," Susan called, from the hallway.
"Mommy," she wailed, clutching Sanders's leg.
"Eliza, will you cut it out."
At this, Eliza cried more loudly. Susan stamped her foot in the hallway. Sanders hated to see his
daughter cry. "Okay, Sue, I'll feed them." He turned off the water in the sink and scooped up his
daughter. "Come on, Lize,'' he said, wiping away her tears. "Let's get you some breakfast."
DISCLOSURE
He went out into the hallway. Susan looked relieved. "I just need ten minutes, that's all," she
said. "Consuela is late again. I don't know what's the matter with her."
Sanders didn't answer her. His son, Matt, who was nine months old, sat in the middle of the
hallway banging his rattle and crying. Sanders scooped him up in his other arm.
"Come on, kids," he said. "Let's go eat."
When he picked up Matt, his towel slipped off, and he clutched at it. Eliza giggled. "I see your
penis, Dad." She swung her foot, kicking it.
"We don't kick Daddy there," Sanders said. Awkwardly, he wrapped the towel around himself again,
and headed downstairs.
Susan called after him: "Don't forget Matt needs vitamins in his cereal. One dropperful. And don't
give him any more of the rice cereal, he spits it out. He likes wheat now." She went into the
bathroom, slamming the door behind her.
His daughter looked at him with serious eyes. "Is this going to be one of those days, Daddy?"
"Yeah, it looks like it." He walked down the stairs, thinking he would miss the ferry and that he
would be late for the first meeting of the day. Not very late, just a few minutes, but it meant he
wouldn't be able to go over things with Stephanie before they started, but perhaps he could call
her from the ferry, and then
"Do I have a penis, Dad?"
"No, Lize."
"Why, Dad?"
"That's just the way it is, honey."
"Boys have penises, and girls have vaginas," she said solemnly.
"That's right."
"Why, Dad?"
"Because." He dropped his daughter on a chair at the kitchen table, dragged the high chair from
the corner, and placed Matt in it. "What do you want for breakfast, Lize? Rice Krispies or Chex?"
"Chex."
Matt began to bang on his high chair with his spoon. Sanders got the Chex and a bowl out of the
cupboard, then the box of wheat cereal and a smaller bowl for Matt. Eliza watched him as he opened
the refrigerator to get the milk.
"Dad?"
"What."
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"I want Mommy to be happy."
"Me too, honey."
He mixed the wheat cereal for Matt, and put it in front of his son. Then he set Eliza's bowl on
the table, poured in the Chex, glanced at her. "Enough?"
"Yes."
He poured the milk for her.
"No, Dada" his daughter howled, bursting into tears. "I wanted to pour the milk!"
"Sorry, Lize-"
"Take it out-take the milk out-" She was shrieking, completely hysterical.
"I'm sorry, Lize, but this is-"
"I wanted to pour the milk." She slid off her seat to the ground, where she lay kicking her heels
on the floor. "Take it out, take the milk out!"
His daughter did this kind of thing several times a day. It was, he was assured, just a phase.
Parents were advised to treat it with firmness.
"I'm sorry," Sanders said. "You'll just have to eat it, Lize." He sat down at the table beside
Matt to feed him. Matt stuck his hand in his cereal and smeared it across his eyes. He, too, began
to cry.
Sanders got a dish towel to wipe Matt's face. He noticed that the kitchen clock now said five to
eight. He thought that he'd better call the office, to warn them he would be late. But he'd have
to quiet Eliza first: she was still on the floor, kicking and screaming about the milk. "All
right, Eliza, take it easy. Take it easy." He got a fresh bowl, poured more cereal, and gave her
the carton of milk to pour herself. "Here."
She crossed her arms and pouted. "I don't want it."
"Eliza, you pour that milk this minute."
His daughter scrambled up to her chair. "Okay, Dad."
Sanders sat down, wiped Matt's face, and began to feed his son. The boy immediately stopped
crying, and swallowed the cereal in big gulps. The poor kid was hungry. Eliza stood on her chair,
lifted the milk carton, and splashed it all over the table. "Uh-oh."
"Never mind." With one hand, he wiped the table with the dish towel, while with the other he
continued to feed Matt.
Eliza pulled the cereal box right up to her bowl, stared fixedly at the picture of Goofy on the
back, and began to eat. Alongside her, Matt ate steadily. For a moment, it was calm in the
kitchen.
Sanders glanced over his shoulder: almost eight o'clock. He should call the office.
Susan came in, wearing jeans and a beige sweater. Her face was relaxed. "I'm sorry I lost it," she
said. "Thanks for taking over." She kissed him on the cheek.
"Are you happy, Mom?" Eliza said.
"Yes, sweetie." Susan smiled at her daughter, and turned back to Tom. "I'll take over now. You
don't want to be late. Isn't today the big day? When they announce your promotion?"
"I hope so."
"Call me as soon as you hear."
"I will." Sanders got up, cinched the towel around his waist, and headed upstairs to get dressed.
There was always traffic in town before the 8:20 ferry. He would have to hurry to make it.
He parked in his spot behind Ricky's Shell station, and strode quickly down the covered walkway to
the ferry. He stepped aboard moments before they pulled up the ramp. Feeling the throb of the
engines beneath his feet, he went through the doors onto the main deck.
"Hey, Tom."
He looked over his shoulder. Dave Benedict was coming up behind him. Benedict was a lawyer with a
firm that handled a lot of high-tech companies. "Missed the seven-fifty, too, huh?" Benedict said.
"Yeah. Crazy morning."
"Tell me. I wanted to be in the office an hour ago. But now that school's out, Jenny doesn't know
what to do with the kids until camp starts."
"Uh-huh."
"Madness at my house," Benedict said, shaking his head.
There was a pause. Sanders sensed that he and Benedict had had a similar morning. But the two men
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did not discuss it further. Sanders often wondered why it was that women discussed the most
intimate details of their marriages with their friends, while men maintained a discreet silence
with one another.
"Anyway," Benedict said. "How's Susan?"
"She's fine. She's great."
Benedict grinned. "So why are you limping?"
"Company touch football game on Saturday. Got a little out of hand."
"That's what you get for playing with children," Benedict said. DigiCom was famous for its young
employees.
"Hey," Sanders said. "I scored."
"Is that right?"
"Damn right. Winning touchdown. Crossed the end zone in glory. And then I got creamed."
At the main-deck cafeteria, they stood in line for coffee. "Actually, I would've thought you'd be
in bright and early today," Benedict said. "Isn't this the big day at DigiCom?"
Sanders got his coffee, and stirred in sweetener. "How's that?"
"Isn't the merger being announced today?"
"What merger?" Sanders said blandly. The merger was secret; only a handful of DigiCom executives
knew anything about it. He gave Benedict a blank stare.
"Come on," Benedict said. "I heard it was pretty much wrapped up. And that Bob Garvin was
announcing the restructuring today, including a bunch of new promotions." Benedict sipped his
coffee. "Garvin is stepping down, isn't he?"
Sanders shrugged. "We'll see." Of course Benedict was imposing on him, but Susan did a lot of work
with attorneys in Benedict's firm; Sanders couldn't afford to be rude. It was one of the new
complexities of business relations at a time when everybody had a working spouse.
The two men went out on the deck and stood by the port rail, watching the houses of Bainbridge
Island slip away. Sanders nodded toward the house on Wing Point, which for years had been Warren
Magnuson's summer house when he was senator.
"I hear it just sold again," Sanders said.
"Oh yes? Who bought it?"
"Some California asshole."
Bainbridge slid to the stern. They looked out at the gray water of the Sound. The coffee steamed
in the morning sunlight. "So," Benedict said. "You think maybe Garvin won't step down?"
"Nobody knows," Sanders said. "Bob built the company from nothing, fifteen years ago. When he
started, he was selling knockoff modems from Korea. Back when nobody knew what a modem was. Now
the company's got three buildings downtown, and big facilities in California, Texas, Ireland, and
Malaysia. He builds fax modems the size of a dime, he markets fax and e-mail software, he's gone
into CD-ROMs, and he's developed proprietary algorithms that should make him a leading provider in
education markets for the next century. Bob's come a long way from some guy hustling three hundred
baud modems. I don't know if he can give it up."
"Don't the terms of the merger require it?"
Sanders smiled. "If you know about a merger, Dave, you should tell me," he said. "Because I
haven't heard anything." The truth was that Sanders didn't really know the terms of the impending
merger. His work involved the development of CD-ROMs and electronic databases. Although these were
areas vital to the future of the company-they were the main reason Conley-White was acquiring
DigiComthey were essentially technical areas. And Sanders was essentially a technical manager. He
was not informed about decisions at the highest levels.
For Sanders, there was some irony in this. In earlier years, when he was based in California, he
had been closely involved in management decisions. But since coming to Seattle eight years ago, he
had been more removed from the centers of power.
Benedict sipped his coffee. "Well, I hear Bob's definitely stepping down, and he's going to
promote a woman as chairman."
Sanders said, "Who told you that?"
"He's already got a woman as CFO, doesn't he?"
"Yes, sure. For a long time, now." Stephanie Kaplan was DigiCom's chief financial officer. But it
seemed unlikely she would ever run the company. Silent and intense, Kaplan was competent, but
disliked by many in the company. Garvin wasn't especially fond of her.
"Well," Benedict said, "the rumor I've heard is he's going to name a woman to take over within
five years."
"Does the rumor mention a name?"
Benedict shook his head. "I thought you'd know. I mean, it's your company.
On the deck in the sunshine, he took out his cellular phone and called in. His assistant, Cindy
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Wolfe, answered. "Mr. Sanders's office."
"Hi. It's me."
"Hi, Tom. You on the ferry?"
"Yes. I'll be in a little before nine."
"Okay, I'll tell them." She paused, and he had the sense that she was choosing her words
carefully. "It's pretty busy this morning. Mr. Garvin was just here, looking for you."
Sanders frowned. "Looking for me?"
"Yes." Another pause. "Uh, he seemed kind of surprised that you weren't in."
"Did he say what he wanted?"
"No, but he's going into a lot of offices on the floor, one after another, talking to people.
Something's up, Tom."
"What?"
"Nobody's telling me anything," she said.
"What about Stephanie?"
"Stephanie called, and I told her you weren't in yet."
"Anything else?"
"Arthur Kahn called from KI. to ask if you got his fax."
"I did. I'll call him. Anything else?"
"No, that's about it, Tom."
"Thanks, Cindy." He pushed the END button to terminate the call. Standing beside him, Benedict
pointed to Sanders's phone. "Those things are amazing. They just get smaller and smaller, don't
they? You guys make that one?"
Sanders nodded. "I'd be lost without it. Especially these days. Who can remember all the numbers?
This is more than a telephone: it's my telephone book. See, look." He began to demonstrate the
features for Benedict. "It's got a memory for two hundred numbers. You store them by the first
three letters of the name." Sanders punched in K-A-H to bring up the international number for
Arthur Kahn in Malaysia. He pushed SEND, and heard a long string of electronic beeps. With the
country code and area code, it was thirteen beeps.
`Jesus," Benedict said. "Where are you calling, Mars?"
`Just about. Malaysia. We've got a factory there."
DigiCom's Malaysia operation was only a year old, and it was manufacturing the company's new CD-
ROM players-units rather like an audio CD player, but intended for computers. It was widely agreed
in the business that all information was soon going to be digital, and much of it was going to be
stored on these compact disks. Computer programs, databases, even books and magazineseverything
was going to be on disk.
The reason it hadn't already happened was that CD-ROMs were notoriously slow. Users were obliged
to wait in front of blank screens while the drives whirred and clicked-and computer users didn't
like waiting. In an industry where speeds reliably doubled every eighteen months, CD-ROMs had
improved much less in the last five years. DigiCom's SpeedStar technology addressed that problem,
with a new generation of drives code-named Twinkle (for "Twinkle, twinkle, little SpeedStar").
Twinkle drives were twice as fast as any in the world. Twinkle was packaged as a small, stand-
alone multimedia player with its own screen. You could carry it in your hand, and use it on a bus
or a train. It was going to be revolutionary. But now the Malaysia plant was having trouble
manufacturing the new fast drives.
Benedict sipped his coffee. "Is it true you're the only division manager who isn't an engineer?"
Sanders smiled. "That's right. I'm originally from marketing."
"Isn't that pretty unusual?" Benedict said.
"Not really. In marketing, we used to spend a lot of time figuring out what the features of the
new products were, and most of us couldn't talk to the engineers. I could. I don't know why. I
don't have a technical background, but I could talk to the guys. I knew just enough so they
couldn't bullshit me. So pretty soon, I was the one who talked to the engineers. Then eight years
ago, Garvin asked me if I'd run a division for him. And here I am."
The call rang through. Sanders glanced at his watch. It was almost midnight in Kuala Lumpur. He
hoped Arthur Kahn would still be awake. A moment later there was a click, and a groggy voice said,
"Uh. Hello."
"Arthur, it's Tom."
Arthur Kahn gave a gravelly cough. "Oh, Tom. Good." Another cough. "You got my fax?"
"Yes, I got it."
"Then you know. I don't understand what's going on," Kahn said. "And I spent all day on the line.
I had to, with Jafar gone."
Mohammed Jafar was the line foreman of the Malaysia plant, a very capable young man. "Jafar is
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file:///F|/rah/Micheal%20Crigthon/Crichton,%20Michael%20-%20Disclosure.txtMichaelCrichton-DISCLOSUREForDouglasCrichtonItshallbeanunlawfulemploymentpracticeforanemployer:(r)tofailorrefusetohireortodischargeanyindividual,orotherwisetodiscriminateagainstanyindividualwithrespecttohiscompensation,term...

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