“I’m sorry,” Dina said. “I’ve had no time to prepare. I will have everything ready for our next meeting.”
“Does this committee have no right to know?” Vlad asked in an ironic tone. “Are we expected to act like sheep? Or perhaps like the blind?”
“What do you mean?” Dina demanded hotly.
“Questions have been asked about the club’s finances,” Vlad retorted. “Is it not strange that you brought nothing—no records, no balance sheets—to this meeting? Why is that? Are you afraid of what we might see if we looked at them?”
“I am afraid of nothing you may say or do!” Dina declared. “Cyril, I insist that the steering committee examine the club’s books—immediately!”
“I don’t think—” Cyril began.
“I mean it,” Dina said. She jumped to her feet. “Now! Right away!”
Nancy could almost read Cyril’s mind. Would it take less time and energy to give in to Dina’s demand, or to go on arguing about it?
“Very well,” he said.
Five minutes later the members of the IFC steering committee, plus Nancy, Bess, and George, trooped into Dina’s room. They crowded around her desk and watched while she turned on her computer.
“You will see now,” she said, turning around to face them. “There is nothing—”
From the computer speakers came a loud, rude noise.
Nancy stared.
Instead of the usual opening screen, the monitor showed a cartoon face with its tongue stuck out. Under it, in big splashy letters, was the message:
HA! HA! YOU’RE HOSED, SUCKER!
13
Virus Attack!
Dina read the mocking message on her computer screen. The blood drained from her face. “What—!” she gasped. “I don’t understand.”
She grabbed the mouse. She tried to open one file, then another and another. Each time she did, a box with a big exclamation point came on the screen.
DISK ERROR: THE FILE ‘FINREC.IFC’ HAS BECOME CORRUPTED.
IT CANNOT BE OPENED BY THIS PROGRAM. MESSAGE -32H
“Why is this happening?” Dina wailed. “It is never like this!”
Joann pushed to the front of the crowd. “I think your computer has been infected by a virus,” she said. “Let me see if I can do anything.”
“I’m going to call Lance,” Penny announced. “I bet he can help.” She stepped away and pulled out a cell phone.
Nancy peered over Joann’s shoulder as she typed a series of commands. After a few moments she straightened up and said, “It looks to me as if the disk directory has been damaged.”
“This is a disaster,” Dina said. “What do I do? My notes, my research papers, my letters home . . . . ”
“And all the IFC’s financial records,” Vlad said in an undertone.
Cyril and J. P. glared at him. Dina didn’t hear or at least didn’t respond.
“It could be a lot worse,” Joann told Dina. “If I’m right, a specialist can recover almost all your data. It takes time, though, and it is not cheap.”
Nancy stepped forward. “Joann, do you have any idea how this could have happened? Some problem with the computer hardware?”
Joann shook her head. “I do not think so. A faulty hard disk does not put an insulting message on the screen. As I said, the most likely cause is a virus. That is a destructive program that infects the computer from outside and damages the files and programs.”
“Infects it how?” Bess asked.
Joann frowned. “Most often, the virus is concealed in an e-mail attachment. When you open the attachment, the program installs itself on your machine and goes to work.”
“Dina?” Nancy said. Dina didn’t look up. Nancy touched her shoulder and repeated, “Dina? Did you get any e-mail messages with attachments lately?”
Dina blinked a couple of times, then said, “Only one, yesterday. But it was a mistake. When I looked at the attachment, it was blank.”
Nancy glanced over at Joann. She nodded. That was probably how the virus arrived.
“Do you remember who sent it?” Nancy asked Dina.
Her forehead wrinkled. “Who? Of course. It was Vlad. I could not understand why he would send me a joke. It was not even very funny.”
“I?” Vlad exclaimed. “I would never send jokes by e-mail. They are the pest of the century. When I see one in my box, I always delete it unread.”
“The point isn’t the joke,” George told him. “It looks as if the virus came along with it.”
