Just The Pits (Hetta Coffey Series, Book 5) (3 page)

"Okay, Joe, I lied. I do want to know why I'm here."

"Like I said, you're the project manager's eyes and ears regarding material and equipment purchases and movement. You know, keep a sharp lookout for, uh, inconsistencies."

"So the Trob also told you I'm overly nosy?"

"Not really."

"Well, I am. Who all knows about me?" As soon as I said this I winced. I have tried, honest, to lose my Texas accent when speaking with other professionals, but once in a while something like
who all
slips out. At least I rarely say things like, "Nice meetin' all y'all, y'all," anymore.

“Who all? Well, hell, everybody. Not often we get a female engineer on one of these godforsaken projects.”

I wondered if he was bulling me or whether he really thought I was just a material tracker. Time would tell. I wish Time would tell me what I was
really
looking for. Any mid-level grunt can track and expedite materials and equipment.

"How about the Mexicans?" I asked. "What do they think about me being here?”

"You got a problem with Mexicans?"

"Nope. I have a problem with the way their politics work and I've found it pays to expect hanky panky out of Mexico City, not to mention payoffs locally to keep  things moving."

"Maybe that’s why they want you here."

"To figure out who's on the take?"

"Exactly."

"Then they're wasting their dough. I can figure out who they are, but you can't mess with City Hall, as they say. It's what they do in Mexico. Price of doing bidness."

"Oh, we don't want to
stop
them, we just want to pay off the right people and get it done with. We keep getting hung up on permits and quite frankly we can't figure out who to bribe. Damnedest project I've ever been on. Not that the Canadians especially want to know about any payoffs, but one of my jobs is to grease the skids and I keep running into bureaucratic stonewalling. I don't dare offer any
mordida
for fear we'll insult the wrong guy. And so far, no one has even hinted at being willing to take a gift or two to get the job done. It just ain't natural."

I laughed. "So, the Trob also told you I'm good at ferreting out the bad boys?"

"I heard you're one of the best."

"Did you also hear I
like
bad boys?"

KNOW THE ROPES (Nautical term): Understanding knots, ropes and rigging. Or in my case, getting the lowdown.
 

On the way to my new office Safety gave me a quick jobsite tour, pointing out various areas under construction, laying out schedules for completion, and explaining which subcontractor did what to whom. As soon as I settled in, I'd get a plot plan and an organization chart to put names and companies to the various phases of the project. He said mining was being done at some old pits, but most areas were still under construction.

We parked in a slot with his name on it near the front door of a doublewide with a hand painted sign:
Gerente
. Management.

"Hey, Safety, you ever read a book called
Up The Organization
?"

"Naw."

"It was written eons ago and one of the things I remembered from it was about assigned parking. This guy took over a company and the first thing he did was get rid of honcho spots near the door. He reasoned that if management was so damned important, they should get there first."

As expected, the office facilities were hardly plush. This was, after all, a temporary construction site office set up in connected doublewides. I saw only two private offices, a smattering of cubicles and one fairly large room designated as a Conference Room that would seat maybe ten. I'd already seen training class notices posted at my marina’s meeting rooms back in Santa Rosalia, so figured onsite buildings were already overcrowded.

Safety guided me to a small cubicle with his name and position printed on a little slide-in plaque beside the door opening.

"You know, I don't always see eye-to-eye with the Safety department," I told him.

He looked toward Heaven as if asking for help, but gave me a wink, showing he'd heard it before. The Safety Engineer's job on any project is one of the most difficult and confrontational. Personality issues
can be paramount. These engineers have to be both pleasant and ruthless. They can be the messengers of bad news to a project management concerned with expense and time overruns due to software, chemical, electrical, mechanical, procedural, and training problems. Safety had his job cut out for him in Mexico, what with their tendencies towards mediocre management systems and questionable, to Gringos, business ethics.

"I know what to expect down here," he told me. "My old man was Safety on projects all over the world. We kids were dragged from town-to-town, country-to-country."

"Tell me about it." We chatted a few minutes about our childhoods in construction camps and figured out we almost met a time or two. He was in the middle of recounting a story in India when he was a teen when his pager squawked and we were summoned to the Project Manager's office.

"Am I gonna like him?" I whispered as my new BFF led me through the office building.

"Probably. Most do."

"Good enough for me."

I could sense right off why Safety said most people cottoned to the project manager. Bert Melton had that baby face that makes men appealing to women, and a great head of graying hair envied by men. He exuded a gentle nature with a soft voice and kind demeanor, which made me wonder how in hell he ever achieved project manager status, even though I knew from the corporate literature that the fifty-five year old held a BS in Geology and Mechanical Engineering, as well as an MBA, making him, on paper, more than qualified.

However, in the construction/engineering game most top brass are usually tough SOBs, because brains alone don't count when juggling the politics, budgets, funding, schedules and personnel issues on a project of this caliber. Then I remembered where we were; most companies would deem this a hardship post.

After introductions Safety left, closing the door behind him. Before Bert could say anything, I asked, "So, who did you piss off to get sent down here?"

He looked startled, then laughed and shook his head. "I know that's what some people might think, but actually I asked for this one. I figure this will be my last assignment, if I can ride it out until I retire. I like to fish, I love Mexico and," he waved his hand toward the coast, "the Sea of Cortez is right out there."

"Do you live in Santa Rosalia?"

"Yep. I've been here almost five years already. I was with the first group of scientists sent to test the waters, so to speak. See if mining again was feasible. I bought an old miner's house near the hospital and spent, or rather the wife did, almost a year renovating it."

As he said this his jaws tightened, which I understand completely. "Been there, done that. I rehabbed a hundred-year-old home in Oakland once and at times wanted to throw a bomb into it. Rewarding, but a lot of work and money. Well, good for you. I love staying in town, but sure don't look forward to the commute."

He smiled knowingly. "I’ll get Safety to have another talk with Pedro."

"Don't do it on my account. I'm gonna have my own wheels after this weekend."

"Probably a wise move. I have a company truck, but the downside to that is we can't drive anywhere off site between dusk and dawn."

"Kinda puts a kink in your social life."

He looked uncomfortable for a moment, making my nosy meter twitch, but then he smiled. "Not really. I can walk everywhere in town and if I don't feel like hoofing it back up the hill to the house, there are taxis. I hear you're living on your boat."

Hmmm. There were a lot of I's there for someone whose resume said he was married.

"I love living on a boat, but when we get those trailers up here I might stay over a few nights a week to avoid that death-defying drive twice a day, if that's okay by you. Say, I saw a boat in the marina named
Lucifer.
Is that yours?"

"It's the company boat, but I can use it when I want. Nice little Whaler. Some of us go out any Sunday we can."

Nice little
expensive
Whaler and perk for a project that was hemorrhaging money,
I thought, but kept that comment to myself. "By the way, if you want to hang on to your fishing poles, you'd better take them off of
Lucifer
, or at least put 'em inside the cabin. I thought about snagging one for myself."

"I'll tell the guys. No one has felt much like going down there since the accident."

"What accident?"

"Safety didn't tell you? We still don't know what happened. All we know is one of the guys in Purchasing, a Mexican national, must have taken
Lucifer
out by himself. Some
pangueros
found the boat beached near their fish camp at San Lucas cove, south of here a few miles. Funny thing is, Rosario wasn't authorized to use the boat and everyone here swears he would never take it out without permission. He was doing us a favor by repairing the radio. He's good with things like that. A nice young man, kind of quiet and, as the kids say these days, nerdy, but a college grad and a big help around here. I miss him."

"You had to fire him?"

"No. He never came back to work. Some say he's too embarrassed that he took the boat out and ran aground or something. But most say there is no way the kid would do anything like that. Who knows?"

"Didn't the guard see him, or the boat, leave the marina?"

"No, it was cold and the night guard was holed up trying to stay warm. Wind was howling. Certainly no night to be out on a boat, that's for sure."

"Well, at least it wasn't an OTJ."

Melton looked surprised, then grinned. "Yeah, I guess. On the job accidents are bad for any project manager's career."

"Never seemed quite fair to me, blaming the head guy for an accident, but it works for the military. Anyhow, how long ago did this guy disappear?"

"Over a week now, so it doesn't look good, even if he—" a whistle blew. "You hungry?" he asked. "The mess hall has pretty good food and we can make the first serving."

"I brought a sandwich, but if you're buying, I could eat."

Biftek Milanesa
is breaded cube steak, Mexican-style, served with a side of the ubiquitous refried beans, rice, and tortillas. There was also a salad, and flan for dessert. If that roll above my waistband wasn't gonna balloon, I'd have to bring my own lunch for sure.

During our meal, I grilled Bert like a Texas T-bone, garnering as much info as I could absorb about who did what to whom, project-wise. When we returned to the offices he turned me over to a sweet-faced, middle-aged secretary named Laura. She led me to a desk in a tiny room.

"So Laura, where do you keep the mops and brooms now?"

She looked puzzled. I know better than to use sarcasm on other nationalities. I spent ten minutes explaining my lame joke. 

Finally she got it, smiled and then blushed. "I am sorry, Miss Coffey. I am told there will be a trailer brought in for you soon. For now, if you prefer, you can use my desk, but we will have to share the telephone until we can get you one of your own."

Safety stuck his head in the door. "How was lunch?"

"Great. I'd invite you in, but I left my can opener back on the boat."

He found this hilarious and went off to save lives or whatever it is he does.

I settled in at my desk with a plot plan of the site, a long-term construction and operations schedule, a sheaf of organizational charts starting with the big picture. I was penciled in under the Project Manager as: Project Materials Engineer: Temp/Consulting/Liaison.

The organization chart was in its tenth revision in nine months, never a good omen. Personnel instability is the bane of all projects, and turnover makes it harder for me to snoop. My eyes were drawn to the little box still existing for Rosario Pardo. His was a minor position, but still only one rung down from the Purchasing Manager.

I found myself thinking about him taking the Whaler out on a stormy night and wondered whatever possessed him. What a nightmare, falling overboard into an angry sea; it was a fear that plagued me on occasion, making me wake with a dry mouth. In which case, one might think I'd consider living somewhere besides a boat?

I headed for our little break room for a bottle of water and when I returned, there was a guy painting my name on a board. He had sanded it down, but I could see the faint remains of a name: Rosario Pardo. Gone for a little over a week and already being erased. A shiver ran down my spine. I don't really believe in ghosts, but sitting in a guy's chair who was missing and presumed drowned gave me the creeps, and had me asking myself,
If he's dead, was it really an accident?

I vowed to learn much more about
Señor
Rosario Pardo.