his green-haired discoveries for Hock Seng. "Have you ever seen one of these before?"
Hock Seng glances up. "The Thai call them ngaw." He returns to his work, treadling through spreadsheets that will never add and red ink that will never be reported.
"I know what the Thai call them." Anderson gets up and crosses to the old man's desk. Hock Seng flinches as Anderson sets the ngaw beside his computer, eyeing the fruit as if it is a scorpion. Anderson says, "The farmers in the market could tell me the Thai name. Did you have them down in Malaya, too?"
"I—" Hock Seng starts to speak, then stops. He visibly fights for self-control, his face working through a flicker-flash of emotions. "I—" Again, he breaks off.
Anderson watches fear mold and re-mold Hock Seng's features. Less than one percent of the Malayan Chinese escaped the Incident. By any measure, Hock Seng is a lucky man, but Anderson pities him. A simple question, a piece of fruit, and the old man looks as if he's about to flee the factory.
Hock Seng stares at the ngaw, breath rasping. Finally he murmurs, "None in Malaya. Only Thais are clever with such things." And then he is working again, eyes fixed on his little computer screen, memories locked away.
Anderson waits to see if Hock Seng will reveal anything more but the old man doesn't raise his eyes again. The puzzle of the ngaw will have to wait.
Anderson returns to his own desk and starts sifting through the mail. Receipts and tax papers that Hock Seng has prepared sit at one corner of his desk, demanding attention. He begins working through the stack, adding his signature to Megodont Union paychecks and the SpringLife chop to waste disposal approvals. He tugs at his shirt, fanning himself against the increasing heat and humidity.
Eventually Hock Seng looks up. "Banyat was looking for you."
Anderson nods, distracted by the forms. "They found rust on the cutting press. The replacement improved reliability by five percent."
"Twenty-five percent, then?"
Anderson shrugs, flips more pages, adds his chop to an Environment Ministry carbon assessment. "That's what he says." He folds the document back into its envelope.
"Still not a profitable statistic. Your springs are all wind and no release. They keep joules the way the Somdet Chaopraya keeps the Child Queen."
Anderson makes a face of irritation but doesn't bother defending the erratic quality.
"Did Banyat also tell you about the nutrient tanks?" Hock Seng asks. "For the algae?"
"No. Just the rust. Why?"
"They have been contaminated. Some of the algae is not producing the. . ." Hock Seng hesitates. "The skim. It is not productive."
"He didn't mention it to me."
Another slight hesitation. Then, "I'm sure he tried."
"Did he say how bad it was?"
Hock Seng shrugs. "Just that the skim does not meet specifications."
Anderson scowls. "I'm firing him. I don't need a QA man who can't actually tell me the bad news."
"Perhaps you were not paying close attention."
Anderson has a number of words for people who try to raise a subject and then somehow fail, but he's interrupted by a scream from the megodont downstairs. The noise is loud enough to make the windows shake. Anderson pauses, listening for a follow-up cry.
"That's the Number Four power spindle," he says. "The mahout is incompetent."
Hock Seng doesn't look up from his typing. "They are Thai. They are all incompetent."
Anderson stifles a laugh at the yellow card's assessment. "Well, that one is worse." He goes back to his mail. "I want him replaced. Number Four spindle. Remember that."
Hock Seng's treadle loses its rhythm. "This is a difficult thing, I think. Even the Dung Lord must bow before the Megodont Union. Without the labor of the megodonts, one must resort to the joules of men. Not a powerful bargaining position."
"I don't care. I want that one out. We can't afford a stampede. Find some polite way to get rid of him." Anderson pulls over another stack of paychecks waiting for his signature.
Hock Seng tries again. "Khun, negotiating with the union is a complicated thing."
"That's why I have you. It's called delegating." Anderson continues flipping the papers.
"Yes, of course." Hock Seng regards him drily. "Thank you for your management instruction."
"You keep telling me I don't understand the culture here," Anderson says. "So take care of it. Get rid of that one. I don't care if you're polite or if everyone loses face, but find a way to axe him. It's dangerous to have someone like that in the power train."
Hock Seng's lips purse, but he doesn't protest