When he reached Kim, she greeted him in her perfect Madrid Spanish. The gentleman’s eyes were brown and as piercing as those of a hawk. When she spoke, he fixed her very briefly with a stare, then shifted his stick from his right hand to his left. Taking her extended hand in his right, he brought it to his lips and kissed her fingertips in a most gallant fashion.In his finest classical Spanish, he greeted Kim and added, “It is little wonder that Maria speaks my language as fluently as she does. With friends like you with whom she can converse, how could she speak otherwise?” Then he added in an undertone, “Such stunning beauty, too! How utterly marvelous.”Kim was introduced to Jaime, and then escorted the two men into the living room where Donna and Maria were seated, waiting side by side on the sofa. Señor Garçia looked at the two and smiled. “Maria, you never cease to amaze me. No other woman would dare sit beside the fabulous Donna Douglas for fear that beside Donna’s beauty, she

Exiting the terminal, they saw a beautiful young woman wearing the uniform of an Army captain. Seeing them, she came over and introduced herself as Katrina Murphy. She explained that she was the aide to General Callahan. “By the way,” she added, “to clarify matters, on duty Mike is General Callahan, while Kelly is still General Jackson.” Then she grinned and said, “Of course, if it ever came to having to make a choice, Kelly would dump ‘General Jackson’ and be ‘Mrs. Callahan’ in a heartbeat.”Introductions were completed and she led the way to an army staff car parked at the curb. As they headed toward Ft. Meade, Kim, seated with Brad in the back seat, said, “I’m curious about something: Katrina, I know that you’re the daughter of President Solov of Russia, but Katrina has never sounded like a Russian name...”“You’re right. It’s not,” Katrina replied. “My mother was German. She was a dancer ... a very good one, I hear. She danced with both the Kirov and the Bolshoi Ballets. My mother

Kelly’s response was to stick out her tongue and wiggle it.“Oh, well ... I guess that’s the way it is with the uneducated: they’re quickly reduced to nonverbal communication.“But you really should have seen that article. Utterly fascinating. It seems that there’s a new book coming out that’s taking the business world — particularly the manufacturing world — by storm. It’s not on the presses yet, but the publisher has already increased the size of the first printing three times.”“And what, dear Dr. Franklin, does a new book have to do with anything?” Kelly inquired.“It’s the content,” Camille replied. “It seems the author, a Ph.D. mechanical engineer from Cal Tech, has come up with totally new designs for machine tools. Far faster, and with precision ten times greater than what came before. But the best part is that they’re less expensive than the machines they’re replacing. It seems that they’re restoring the United States to preeminence in machine tools.”“And... ?” Kelly prompte

“It’s Chris,” one said in a half-dead tone of voice. “What should we do?”“Try to get her on a cot,” said Jenny Clark, the girl they recognized as having sold her body organs to live.“You will like hell!” Brad announced. “Jenny, call security and have them order an ambulance out here right away.” Then he looked around at the condition of the other four girls and added, “Make it ambulances for five! Now!”As the woman was weaving on her feet, Kim grabbed her and sat her down, then called security herself. She was told that ambulances would be on their way.“Okay, ladies,” Brad demanded, “what’s been going on here?”“It’s all my fault, Mr. Kramer,” Jenny said. As she spoke, she slipped off her chair and ended up on her back at his feet. But she just ignored it and continued, “I made the girls do it—”She was interrupted by the vehement objections of the three who were still conscious. And then one of them toppled over.Moments later the first EMTs arrived. Each of the pair started exam

Bill Miller grinned and turned to Harrison. “George, have I told you lately how brilliant you are? But on the other hand, when you insisted on hiring that female mechanical engineer, I knew there would be trouble, and just look... ! She’s turning the whole damned company upside down.”George just grinned. With the others still present, he called Bill Christian into his office and told him of his promotion. Then he explained why Campbell was no longer with the company.“It’s just as well, I guess, George,” Bill finally said. “Because if he hadn’t been gone, I would have been. That guy was living in the Middle Ages ... or somewhere.”“How about the girls?” Kim asked.“Have any ideas?” Harrison replied.“Yes, I do,” Kim began. “First of all, there’s all that overtime. I think we should pay them double-time for all the hours they worked — we can reconstruct them pretty well from the security logs. I think Jane Chalmers can hold down the fort here for the next two weeks ... working 8 to 5,