When one of the workers commented on the fact that they had been very fortunate, Charly threw a warning glance at McKinnon, and he just agreed that they had indeed been fortunate.
The drive back to Picton seemed to pass very quickly. There was such a sense of kinship with McKinnon now that Charly found it very difficult to remember he was her superior, although the manager was her immediate boss. They had established a close rapport last night, and it was impossible to go back to their former sterile relationship.
It seemed that McKinnon felt the same way. "I want you to promise me something, Charly. I won't be going out inspecting with you any more, so if you have problems with anyone, I want you to let me know immediately. We've told the office staff not to take any verbal abuse from anyone - clients or brokers. So now I'm telling you the same thing. If anyone gives you a hard time about their insurance, you refer them to the manager or one of us. Just don't let them be rude to you. You'll be a little more exposed to that kind of thing then the girls in the office, so you'll have more difficulty dealing with it. They can always hang up the phone. Promise?"
"Promise, McKinnon. And thanks. I won't deny that there will be problems of that nature. I saw it yesterday. But if I go out without the expectation of running into it, it won't happen."
"More witchcraft?"
"No, just positive thinking, another thing that works very powerfully, if people but knew it. As I told you before, thoughts are things, so you do bring to yourself whatever you focus upon."
Looking over at her with a half-grin, McKinnon said, "Will you have dinner with me in the near future, Charly? Call it a belated celebration of your hiring, but really I want to talk to you more about these things."
"Perhaps. I expect we'll be too busy for a while, though. There's going to be a great deal of cleaning up to deal with. And I imagine your Claims Adjustor will be run off his feet for the next while."
Her words proved to be very true. Everyone in the office was pressed into service as information was gathered, assembled, and claims were sorted out and dealt with. Most of the storm victims had found shelter by the time Charly and McKinnon had returned to civilization.
Friday afternoon she was just leaving the office when she saw McKinnon walking towards her. Pausing on the steps, she waited for him to reach her.