Chris! I told you not to do that. That is going to complicate things." "Hey, but I was going to tell him we've got some guys from Canada starting coming out soon." "Oh you were. And how would that happen?" "I don't know. But don't worry I'll think of something. Don't need him trying to complicate things with his new boss. I hope his mother is keeping an eye on him." I went into my office and pulled down a copy of the PowerPoint from the Ops Center that describes the deals we are doing with the counterparties. I was half way through reviewing the list of counterparties when Chris came in the office and handed me an envelope. "You know why you're getting this, don't you. You can't read so you aren't getting your own credit report." "What does it say?" Chris read the report aloud to me. " 'Canadian Power Master-Inc-Tecent Energy Limited, OTC-US Gas Market-C.' " "That's it." I said. "What's it?" he said. "It's Tecent Energy Limited. Chris, you're right. This is counterparty-related. You know, we've been making trades through them for the past few months. You see, this Canadian trading subsidiary is just a front company. They're the ones who are going to be doing a deal with Odebrecht and this other Canadian company. And they're doing the deal with a partner of ours-Calumet Power. Then this is when we'll be buying the power from them. They'll be buying it from Tecent." "That doesn't make any sense. These guys have to deal through a Canadian company to sell to Odebrecht. Otherwise the company will just refuse to deal with them. So why aren't they getting any money directly from Odebrecht?" "Well, they are getting some money directly from Odebrecht. They're getting paid for arranging the deal through a subsidiary of Odebrecht that isn't in Canada. The company we're dealing with in Canada isn't the one that's actually doing the deal with Odebrecht." "Oh come on! Why didn't you tell me this from the start?" "Because I wasn't sure if you were on top of things or not. Now, what's the problem? What should I do? This is the company that's going to need some accounting help. If they don't make money they don't pay out, you know." "Oh, I get it now. Why don't you talk to that guy Randy we sent down from Finance? He can help you. He'll know what to do." "It's all right. I got it. I'm just glad I know the real truth now." I went back to my desk and told the guys in my group what was happening. They were all in shock. "Are you kidding?" said Mike. "You're telling me you just discovered this today?" "Right." "So, what do we do now?" said Ed. "Are they going to come after us with hammers?" "No. Don't worry about that. They won't know what's happening. Let me get back to those guys in risk who set up these trades. Then I think the best thing we can do is find out from these guys at Odebrecht what happened." "Okay. Then what?" "Well, then we either back out or see if we can make things work out." I went back to my office and wrote a letter to the guys at Odebrecht. I explained what had happened and asked them for a meeting where I could tell them our side of the story. "I can't make any promises, but I'll see what I can do. I'll get back to you by this evening." I took the letter and headed over to the help desk. On my way over I stopped by Randy's desk to see how he was doing. "Still here? Let me tell you a story about some guys. You remember the guys who had the power plant in Arizona that got hit by the wildfire last year? You know-the guys who weren't allowed to get insurance? Well, they hired me to help them with all their insurance problems. You want to know why I was thinking about them? It was because they were in here this morning talking to me about their insurance problems. They need some insurance help, and they need it now. You should go and talk to them. They've got an insurance problem and they've been after me ever since they came in here for help." "Okay. Got it." I went over to where all of the help desks were and found Randy. He was just walking out. "Hey Randy, this is about the insurance problems that you had a few months back. How's it coming along?" "Oh, you mean the insurance problems with the power plant. You remember the insurance problems with the power plant right?" "Sure." "They're coming along fine. I've been thinking about some of those guys you were telling me about the other day. So I went down to talk to them. I figured I would put them on the right track and then we'd get them set up properly with the right kind of insurance coverage." "Well, good luck with them. I hope it all works out. Say, did you ever think about what happened to that accountant they were talking about in your meeting?" "Oh, I didn't realize that he wasn't there. I'll go down and find out what's up with that." I finished my meeting with the guys who work for the insurance company. I didn't really want to tell them everything that had happened. I just had to tell them what was happening. This seemed to have worked out well for everybody. "Hey guys. That was a good meeting. I think we got what we needed. I guess you want me to go ahead and tell you what's going on." "Sure. No problem. I mean I guess we can talk to them. Tell me about the accident. Who was it? A man or a woman?" "It was a woman. Her name was Margaret." "Just a minute. Margaret. The name Margaret rings a bell. Let me try to remember." "Don't worry about it. You'll remember. Come to think of it, she is the accounting clerk for the company who's got the power plant in Arizona. They were here a few months ago. The plant caught on fire and they didn't have the right kind of insurance coverage to cover that. And that's why they couldn't collect the money that they were entitled to from the insurance company." "Hmm. Oh. Yeah. I guess I remember now. They were down here talking to me about it. The guys in the middle of that picture, that was them." "Right. So you remember them." "Yeah. I do. Anyway, I'll let you go. And maybe you should come talk to us later this week. Just call us and let us know. We can see if we can fit you into our schedule." "Thanks." "I really appreciate it." I went back to my office and told the guys in my group what had happened. They were all in shock. I went back to my office to finish up some stuff. I felt really bad that I had a part in this. I knew it was a bad business deal when I first heard about it. But it sure did not seem as bad as it did tonight. I gave my group a call and told them that I had to go home. They all said they understood. One of my colleagues said to me that she was glad that we had a good insurance coverage that covered something like this. And she went on to say that when she and her husband started planning their life in Saskatchewan, she knew it would be rough and there would be hard times. She just wished that she had a little more coverage to fall back on. "In the end, I don't think it's really our problem if people choose to go bankrupt. We can try to help them out and tell them what they can do if they want to do it, but we don't have the power to really help them. We're just the insurance company who helps them out with insurance coverage. We have to play it out that way. And the fact that we've got insurance coverage means that they don't lose a lot." "But there are