Chapter 75: Back Home

We went home on Saturday. Harlan and Anna Lee were treating us like normal again by Wednesday, which was a damn good thing. They were too good a pair of friends to lose because they couldn’t handle our having money. Tusker and Tessa had handled it well, but Tusker had figured it out on his own. We made them promise to visit us sometime in the summer of ‘83 when he had built up some leave.

We flew home on Saturday, and since the time zones were working against us, we landed sometime on Sunday. We were both totally exhausted and fell asleep as soon as we got to the town house. It was at times like this that I truly envied Marilyn’s ability to fall asleep anytime and anywhere, within ten seconds of closing her eyes. Now, if I could only figure out a way to control her snoring...

Monday morning, I woke up early, did my workout, and then cleaned up and left early. I drove over to the house and discovered that the framing was finished, and it was starting to look like a house, and not a war zone in the mud. Happy, I headed back towards civilization and went to the office. We had our regular Monday morning meeting, and it was positive.

“Well, I’m simply going to start off by saying thank you to everybody here. There were a whole lot of ways this thing could have fallen through, and it didn’t. This was what will prove to be a potentially gargantuan deal,” I told them. “So, here’s my agenda for today. First and foremost, thank you all. We worked hard, we worked as a team, and we got this accomplished faster than I thought we could. I just came back from vacation. Now it’s your turn. Everybody needs to call Taylor and schedule a vacation.”

John and Jake looked surprised at that, Junior had a thoughtful look, and Missy smiled, but otherwise seemed a touch distracted. Jake said, “A vacation?”

I nodded. “I don’t care whether the company pays for it, or I pay for it. Everybody gets a week. Get crazy, Jake.”

“Huh?”

I grinned at him some more. “Let’s put a limit on it. You get one week anywhere in North America or the Caribbean, airfare, rooms, whatever. Take a cruise, go skiing, hang-glide over the Grand Canyon. I don’t care. Take your wife, too, if you want. Or your mistress. Hell, take them both!” That got me a bagel thrown in my direction. “Just call Taylor and sort it out.”

Junior smiled and muttered, “Wow!” The others just looked at each other and smiled.

“Second item on the agenda. We need to debrief what we did right on this deal and what we did wrong. We can always improve. We’ll be doing more deals as time goes on. How do we do them better? Third item - over the next few days I want to meet with each of you individually. Same questions, what are we doing right, what are we doing wrong, how do we do things better? The final item is what do we do next? I want to go over that with you all as well.” I looked around the table and saw everybody nodding in agreement and understanding. I grabbed a notepad and a pen, and said, “Let’s get started.”

The next few days were busy and productive. If nothing else, doing the Microsoft deal had boosted our confidence that we could pull something like this off. Maybe we weren’t all crazy! There were some valid concerns. For one thing, we would need to boost the staffing on the legal and accounting ends, to do the due diligence and reviews necessary. If we did that, then we needed to start accounting for costs involved in the purchases and investments, so we had to set something up for that. There was considerable concern about where we would come up with the next few deals. If we got big enough, people would come to us, but for the time being, it was much more likely that we would need to find the deals, and not the reverse.

By mid-week it was obvious to me that John had been correct about Melissa. She was certainly distracted about something. I asked her about it when we met one-on-one. “Melissa, is everything all right? You’ve seemed a little distracted lately.”

She shook her head. “No, nothing’s wrong.”

“Are you sure? I’ve been noticing you’re acting differently lately, and it’s not just me. John and Jake mentioned it also.”

She reacted angrily to that. “Is that what you guys do? Gossip about me behind my back?”

I held up my hands pleadingly. “Missy, you’ve known us a long time now. You know we wouldn’t do that. We’re your friends and we’re worried for you. Are you feeling all right? Is it your health? Or is it something at home?”

That got a bit of a response, if only in the way her eyes flickered around. “My health is just fine. I don’t see why this is anybody’s business!” I just sat there silently and waited for a further response. A few seconds later she sighed and continued, “It’s not my health. It’s Bob. We’ve been drifting apart. It’s only getting worse these days. When I told him the other night about the vacation trip, it was like he didn’t care.”

It was my turn to sigh. Personal lives are a minefield for a boss to get involved in, but Melissa was the type of person who wore her heart on her sleeve. Some people can compartmentalize their work and personal lives, but some can’t, and Melissa Talmadge was the latter. “Has this been going on for some time?” I asked.

That got me a shrug and a nod. “I had been hoping that the baby would bring us closer again, but it hasn’t. Things have been shifting, sort of, since last year.”

That made me think a bit. Melissa had had her baby the first week of July, so it was now a couple of months past that. “I don’t know what to tell you on this one, Missy. Do you think it’s over?”

“I don’t know. We haven’t said anything, but something’s wrong. I mean, it’s been a couple of months now, and he and I, well, nothing, you know.”

I gave a wry grimace at that. Missy was a good-looking woman and had certainly lost the weight she had gained with the baby. If her husband wasn’t taking care of business again, there was something wrong. As delicately as I could, I asked, “Do you think his interests have ... shifted?”

She looked at me some more and shrugged. “If you’re asking, is he cheating on me, I don’t think so. I mean, I know the wife is always the last to know, but there’s no strange phone calls, he’s not suddenly staying late at work, or taking sudden trips. There’re no lipstick stains on the collar. And I’m not fooling around on him, either. I think we’re just drifting apart.”

“Well, I don’t know what to tell you. If there’s anything that I or the rest of us can do, let us know.”

“Is it that obvious? Is it affecting what we’re doing?” she asked.

“It’s obvious, but it’s not a problem. We just want you to be happy.”

“I wish I could separate myself like that. You seem to be able to do it. How do you keep your business and personal lives separate?”

I scratched my head at that. “Years of practice, I guess,” I answered. “I’ve always been able to do that, even as a kid. Maybe it comes from having to keep secrets from a psychotic family. It’s not always great. I know Marilyn would like me to be more open at home, and sometimes I’m not. You can be too separated, and that’s what I have to watch out for.”

We split apart at that. I didn’t know how to help, but I knew it wouldn’t help if I blabbed it out to the others. I just mentioned that she was having a few issues at home, and to leave her be.

It was now into early September, and it was obvious to everybody that the severe slump the stock market had been in for a few years was ending. We were getting concrete indications that the coming computerization of almost everything was underway and was having a profound effect on the entire economy. Missy and I went over our holdings and where we thought they were heading and began shifting the portfolio. For years we had been invested in a high oil cost and recession-based portfolio. Now we were going to shift into a tech mode. That was where the biggest returns were.

Our next investment was in late September, and was brought to us, surprisingly, by Jake Junior. He announced it at a Monday morning meeting in a roundabout manner. “What’s the procedure for introducing a business proposal?” he asked.

I looked at the others and shrugged. “I think you just did. What’s up?”

“Well, I have this close friend from college, and he’s gone into business for himself. This is sort of like you and your friend Jim Tusk, I think. Anyway, back when we graduated, he wanted me to go into business with him, but I was already planning on law school. We’ve stayed in touch, and he’s invited me back on board a couple of times. I want to help him, but I don’t want to leave here, and I am pretty sure he is looking for an investment, and not just me. He’s legit, though, not just looking for me to bring money,” he stressed.

“What’s his name? Do I know him?” asked Junior’s father.

“It’s Barry Bonham. You met him a couple of times, at school. He was my roommate my junior and senior years.”

“What kind of business is it?” asked John.

“Well, that’s the thing. It’s not anything computer related, and I know that’s where we’re headed. It’s a pet supply company.”

“Pets?” asked John.

Junior nodded sheepishly, as if it was embarrassing. “It’s called ‘Tough Pup’, and they make pet toys and chews.”

Tough Pup? That name rang a bell! A good bell! “Like what?” I asked.

“Well, you know, tug of war toys and ropes, rawhide chews, for dogs. Really good ones, too! The ropes and toys are practically indestructible!” Junior was really excited about this.

“Where is this company?” asked Melissa.

“Here! Well, Baltimore, actually. Barry rented an old warehouse over in Pimlico and set up inside it. He’s been in business for a couple of years, and has been growing the business, but to get bigger, he needs capital, and nobody wants to invest. He was telling me that unless it had a computer in the name, nobody was interested.”

I snorted at that. If he thought it was bad now, wait a few more years. I remembered a company named Tough Pup that made all sorts of pet supplies, it was a brand name for Hartz or Sargent or one of the big pet care companies. Maybe this was how it started out!

I looked around the table and shrugged. “I think it all depends on the company’s growth potential and how much we would be on the hook for and how much we would get out of it. I like the idea of investing locally. It’s not like Baltimore is overflowing with jobs, either.”

Jake Senior and John nodded agreement, and Missy simply shrugged. “We’ll need to know more, a lot more,” she said.

“Agreed,” I added. I looked over at Junior. “Well, let’s figure this out. You’re obviously the point guy. Get together with your buddy and work up a business plan. You mentioned my friend Tusker. Before I ever loaned him a penny, I made him go over the business plan a dozen times, with all sorts of stuff detailed, just like in business school. He might be your friend, but we need to do it like a real business.”