Slide (9 page)

The Seaside did its bit, much better than average. Two hundred and ten thousand a week.

Over ten million for the year.

On the inside the Seaside had some features that made it extraordinary. Several supermarkets in its area were just as large, but they didn't appear to be, didn't give the feeling of nearly as much space. That was as planned: the Seaside's ceiling was exceptionally high, twenty-three feet with no supporting interior columns. The effect was openness, room to breathe, conducive to shopping.

Another attraction was the advanced method of checking out at Seaside. It had what the trade called a completely computerized front end. All eleven of its check-out stands were equipped with IBM 3660 scanning systems. Each purchase was exposed for merely a moment to a four-inch-by-eight-inch glass-covered slot in the counter surface. Just long enough for the scanner within the slot to read the Universal Product Code that appeared on each item. The Universal Product Code was a symbol made up of numbers and an arrangement of lines of various lengths and thicknesses. The scanner translated it into price, category, brand and other information. No need for a checker to punch her fingers numb. The scanner did everthing — except make mistakes and steal.

The Seaside's fully electronic front-end system fed data into a central processor. A touch on a console key and instantly there came a readout, a positively accurate count on how much a certain check stand had in its till or how much to the penny was the total take of the market at that moment. The system also kept inventory, showed what products were moving well, which brands were shelf warmers. It advised when to stock, what to push, even gave an early warning signal against overstocking. As one old-time grocer said: “It did everything but wipe the store manager's ass and maybe would have done that if its roll of paper had been softer.”

In other ways the Seaside was similar to other supermarkets of the 30,000- to 35,000-square-foot category. It had twelve gondolas of tiered shelves (islands) for merchandise, each seventy feet long, six feet high. The islands were constructed and arranged according to the recommendations of marketing experts who made a science of such seemingly obvious things. There were no cross aisles, for example. Once a customer entered the store and headed down the first long, sleek, polished terrazzo aisle, it was practically impossible for him not to shop the entire market. It was like being caught in a very well planned maze — down and around, down and around, the shopping cart somehow getting fuller than intended.

To buy a staple such as milk or butter, a shopper had to go all the way to the deepest corner of the store. There was method to the inconvenience. Only the most single-minded or extremely hurried persons could make the long trip there and back without being attracted or reminded to buy other things.

On the perimeter of the store, going clockwise from its southern end, were: frozen foods, produce, dairy products, meats (with special polarized lighting so the meat looked a fresher, fleshier red), liquor (high-profit item set apart within a carpeted alcove), gourmet foods, delicatessen, bakery, housewares, toys and school supplies, photo shop and a pet-supply center. The entire western side of the building, a 7,000-square-foot area, was partitioned out of sight for receiving, storage and stock preparation.

The management office and the computer system's processing center were situated within a wide overhang above the south end of the store. A spiraling metal stairway led up to it. The office had a long window for an overall view.

By no means unseen were the large styrofoam letters displayed across the flat of that dominating overhang. Letters in red. Again that same attention-demanding red. Customers saw it without realizing, the motivational researchers claimed. It splashed the shopper's unconscious with:

BUY THE SEASIDE

The play on words was punctuated before and after by an identical pair of suns. Brilliant orangy yellow styrofoam cutouts with irregular flaming circumferences and smiling, happy-eyed painted faces.

Opposite the supermarket, on the inland side of the Coast Highway, stood the office of Grove Realty. A nice white ideal country house with banistered porch, peaked roof and an eave.

It was a real illusion. Californian, like one of those forty-foot rotating doughnuts, except the house was under- rather than overscale. Only two small rooms.

Less than a hundred feet away on that same side was a Gulf service station, a six pumper.

Both these businesses had literally carved places for themselves — out of the hill that came down right to the edge of the highway.

The hill was one of those called the Sheep Hills.

Part of the San Joaquins.

It went up for almost eleven hundred feet. Poor soil, crumbly in some places, sticky, claylike elsewhere, ranging in color from pale beige to ochre. Sparsely covered by scrubby, shallow-rooted plants that didn't look alive.

Nevertheless, it was rich ground.

Propped and nestled on it here and there were homes of the hundred-fifty-thousand to two-hundred-fifty-thousand class.

Twenty-seven altogether had taken advantage of any slight crease on the steep, dug in and spread out. Most had private gates and drives, reflecting name plates, full-grown trees brought in. Got their good green atmosphere from as many hibiscus and gardenia bushes as their expensively hauled topsoil could hold.

All said it was well worth the effort. Especially those situated at the top said that.

What a fantastic ocean view. And practically perfect television reception.

10

“Like another asshole,” Kemp said.

“I didn't mean you need it.” Dan shrugged, palms up, and smiled, easing the sales pressure.

“Know how many items I already carry?” Kemp made it sound as though it were a personal burden, the market and everything in it. He was the manager. It was his usual way to answer himself. “Ten thousand three hundred and some.”

“You do a hell of a job, Phil. Everybody says.”

Kemp agreed. Dan walked with him down Aisle Two toward the front of the store. When they reached the end of the aisle Kemp paused to tidy up bottles of a national brand of salad dressings that were abundantly displayed. He did it only to get to Dan. “Besides,” Kemp told him, “the committee didn't approve it.”

That sounded like a turn-down. Dan knew better, interpreted it correctly that Kemp was inviting a deal. Generally, Kemp had to go along with the buying committee, same as all the other markets in the chain, had to stock whatever brands the committee decided. But the fringes were left for him. It was something upper management undoubtedly knew about, accepted practice as long as it didn't cause any trouble or major losses.

Dan Mandel was one of those fringe benefits. District retail man for a San Francisco company called Future Foods, a division of Western Americana Chemical. Its products were nonfood foods, such as canned puddings that had the most convincing flavors, appearance and consistency. Fifteen ingredients listed in very small print on the label. Fourteen out of the fifteen were chemicals and preservatives. Kids ate them, as suggested, right out of the can, because they came with easy, peel-off lids.

“Our puddings taste even better than real,” Dan earnestly claimed.

The Future Foods line also featured a whipped topping in the skinniest, tallest can. It squirted out fluffier and could be piled up higher than actual whipped cream. There was also a dietetic ice cream-like food that couldn't possibly make anyone fat because it didn't offer nourishment of any sort, 100 percent artificial and mostly air.

At the moment Dan hoped to persuade store manager Kemp not merely to stock his company's brand-newest product but make it a push item.

Morning Squares.

They were sweet, brownie sort of cakes that were said to contain the chemical nutritional equivalent of a juice, bacon, eggs and buttered-toast breakfast. Meant to be nibbled on the way to work or dropped into the stomach of anyone in too much of a hurry.

“They don't spoil,” Dan said, selling.

Kemp acted dubious. There was nothing he disliked more than a product spoiling on the shelf.

“No shit,” Dan assured. And it was the truth. There wasn't anything in Morning Squares that could spoil. To make triple sure, they were loaded with three different kinds of preservatives.

Kemp remained unreadable.

Dan went into his act. Magic was a pastime that suited him. He was a short, quick man in his late thirties. Practically everything about him was quick — his speech, movements, smile. He liked surprises, puzzled reactions. Sleight of hand seemed natural for him.

He had come prepared. He palmed a slip of paper and seemed to pluck it out of Kemp's breast pocket. He handed the slip to Kemp, who unfolded it and glimpsed the name Rita and a Long Beach phone number. He stuffed the slip casually into his pocket.

Dan took that as a sign of agreement.

Kemp continued his indifference, added to it by aiming his attention at Check-out Stand Four. The checker there was a dull-haired blonde, a Phyllis something. Kemp suspected her. He hadn't caught her yet but he was certain she was raking back. A number of times he had noticed the same customers waiting in her line with large orders, waiting even though other lines were shorter.

The one way a checker could beat the electronic scanning system was to appear to be exposing an item to the scanner while actually bypassing it. A checker had to be fast to get away with it. Usually the items bypassed were higher-priced ones, such as meat. So an order that should have totaled, say, fifty dollars came out only thirty. By prearrangement, Phyllis would meet her
steady
customers somewhere to split the difference. Kemp believed she could be raking back as much as two hundred a week, maybe more.

He watched her now, running through a big two-cart order, her hands a blurr of efficiency. Kemp was near-sighted. Squinting, he tried to detect any bypassing of the scanner by Phyllis. He thought of putting on his glasses but decided to hell with it, he'd catch her someday — soon.

Dan asked: “Did you see her?”

“Huh?” Kemp had the feeling his mind was being read.

“She walked right by, just now, right here.” Dan directed Kemp's view down the aisle to a nice figure in gray. “Marsha Hilbert.”

“Probably just somebody who looks like her.”

“No way. I've seen all her pictures. That's her. Christ, I wish she'd turn around.”

A moment of silent appreciation for the legs and buttocks of a star. She went from sight. Dan rushed over to the next aisle for another glimpse of her in profile passing across the opposite end.

“Sweet-eating stuff,” he muttered.

“Get her autograph,” Kemp said.

“On my face.”

A scoff from Kemp. “Dream about it.”

“I have, plenty of times.”

They shared brief, knowing laughs.

Back to business. Dan had a brand-new fifty-dollar bill. He had it folded a certain way as tight as possible so it was only a thin half-inch square that showed the face of President Ulysses S. Grant. He flashed it discreetly so only Kemp saw it. Then he made it disappear.

Dan was really good at it, so quick with his hands that Kemp, though watching every move, didn't see him do it. Dan grinned his most winning grin. Kemp wasn't surprised when he fingered inside his breast pocket and felt the fifty there with the slip of paper. They belonged together.

Kemp had decided on it, just in case, from the start. He told Dan, “End of Island Five.” Displayed there now were some private-label cake mixes. They had been there a week, about as much time as the cake-mix salesman had paid for, according to Kemp's way of figuring.

“Front end?” Dan hoped.

“Rear.”

Front would have been better but Dan didn't press. He'd gotten what every peddler wanted: his product displayed at one of the ends of the islands, apart from the common, crowded shelves. Featured in abundance, important looking, announced by the big red words “N
EW
” and “S
PECIAL
,” Morning Squares wouldn't be overlooked. Even if they didn't sell big it was worth the fifty for an end-of-island location at the Seaside. Dan would take color Polaroids of it and use them as leverage with other markets. Also, his reputation with Future Foods would get a nice boost.

“I'll have product here by Monday,” he told Kemp.

The manager was already walking away.

Dan did some mental arithmetic on Kemp's back. Twelve islands. Twenty-four ends. At fifty each, a thousand extra every week for Kemp. Minimum. Cash. Jesus. He doubted that Kemp would use the Rita number, but if Kemp did, he, Dan, owed Rita another twenty-five for her promise to be especially good and not show her impatience. He wondered where Kemp kept all that grease.

Kemp also had his mind on money as he climbed the metal spiral stairs to the office. Not his own money but the next thing to it. He hesitated on the landing and glanced at the safe. Safe enough, he told himself.

The safe was built solidly into the wall, up out of reach, accessible only by a narrow metal ramp off to the left of the office. In plain view of everyone during the day, kept brightly spotlighted so it was easily seen from without all night.

Bothering Kemp was the fact that the Brinks armored car had not made its regular pickup earlier in the week. They'd had to skip the stop, were running behind on all clients because of the rain. Next pickup at the Seaside was scheduled for tomorrow, Saturday. Brinks had told Kemp when he called. They'd be there Saturday for sure.

They'd damn well better. He'd be more than uneasy if he had to leave that much cash in the safe over the weekend.

A hundred seventy-eight thousand.

11

The crack.

It began at the northern edge of the bluff about twenty feet out from the shoulder of the highway. Not zigzagging but almost perfectly straight, it ran parallel with the highway for the entire length of the supermarket parking area.