In most people's lives there is at least one mystery that they cannot solve. They live into their old age wondering what happened and why, but there are precious few clues. I have my own unsolved mystery.

In the mid-eighties, computers were just starting to work their way into the world of graphic design. General Electric had the Genegraphic computer system, on which a designer could produce slides for corporate presentations. There was another company which had a cheaper, slower clone version called the ViaSlide.

I had been trained on the ViaSlide and had been hired by company named Masterpiece Graphics, located on Lexington Avenue in midtown Manhattan. At that time, producing slide presentations for corporations was big business, and computer-trained graphic designers were at a premium.

The ViaSlide was an IBM machine with software for designing color slides, which were then processed by a built-in 35mm camera. It usually took 5 minutes per slide for the slide to be exposed and the camera to "take" the picture. More text on the slide - or a graphic - meant that exposure was longer. So, a presentation of, say, thirty slides meant a processing time of approximately 150 minutes, or two and a half hours.

It could be - at times - a harried, pressured environment, as most business people waited until the last minute to bring in their projects. It was not unusual for someone to bring in a job at four o'clock on a Friday afternoon and expect the result first thing Monday morning. Of course, by four o'clock that same Monday afternoon, the job would be back - with numerous revisions.

The film was then developed at a 24-hour place called "Foto Labs", located in the Chrysler Building, on the same floor where they also shot a soap opera. I forget the name. I think it was All My Young and Restless, Bold and Beautiful Children's One Life to Live as the World Turns.

I was hired to produce slides, graphics, illustrations and brochures. I worked alongside a young, cheerful video designer named Richard, a sweet-natured receptionist named Mary, and occasional freelancers hired to help with the workload. The company was owned by a husband and wife team - Mr. and Mrs. Montgomery - and was housed in a four-story brownstone, with a kitchen and storage in the basement.

There was a cat named "Mr. Whiskers" (which I nicknamed, "Mousebreath"). Whenever I came back from a break and found gibberish typed on my computer screen, I knew that "Mousebreath" had been walking across my keyboard. The Montgomery's also had a half pit-bull, half-Chihuahua- named "Dainty" - which they kept tied up on the foyer, and was forever lunging at me whenever I was in its vicinity. If Dainty saw me down the hall, at the top of the stairs, or through the window, she would bare her teeth and growl.

Dainty's disposition was mild compared to the only other member of the team, the office manager. Her name was Belinda Bailey. She was a grim woman in her late twenties, with forty-year-old crow's feet, who never smiled - at least not around me - and who bustled about the offices all day long making phone calls and keeping an eye on things. She wore horn-rimmed glasses, which were constantly sliding down the bridge of her nose, and usually had a pencil stuck in her hair, which she used to write notes to herself.

She seemed to spend all her waking hours there. She reminded me of a cloistered nun who lived for nothing but God and the convent; in this case Masterpiece. I also got the impression that Masterpiece came first, and then God. We were of an age, but I got along better with the younger Richard and Mary, who were a good deal more relaxed.

In the middle of my second week there, I got the first inking that Belinda didn't care much for me. I was knocking around in the basement kitchen one morning, getting a cup of coffee, when I heard my name mentioned. As I was all alone, I thought at first that the place might be haunted. Then, I realized that the air vent over the sink was carrying the voices of Belinda and the Montgomery's from the conference room on the floor directly above the kitchen. Seeing as I seemed to be the topic of conversation, I listened in.

"We hired Karl because we need an imaginative artist who can work both on the board and on the computer," said Mrs. Montgomery.

"He asks me too many questions!" said Belinda.

This was true. If I had a question about the house style or company policy, I asked Belinda. She seemed to resent it. Then it occurred to me that she had always been cold and distant to me. Try as I would, I couldn't think of a reason I could have given her to dislike me.

I had asked Richard about it, but he didn't have a clue. Mary also was unable to fathom Belinda's distaste for me. No one seemed to know why I bothered her so much. It has remained a mystery to this day. Back then, I decided that I had to chalk it up to bad chemistry. There's such a thing as love at first sight. With Belinda, it must have been loathing at first sight. No other explanation has ever presented itself to me.

The Montgomery's told her I was staying. The discussion ended with Belinda saying, "I just can't stand him!"

We avoided as much communication as possible with each other, from then on. If she had a message for me, she delivered it in a measured, clipped voice and then gave me "The Look". "The Look" was her mouth becoming a grim line of disapproval and her eyes becoming slits of pure hatred. As I was more mystified than angry, I always answered politely.

The favorite buzzword around the office was "concerned", which I always found annoying. When something was late, Mrs. Montgomery was "concerned". If a client made a last-minute change that was needed two days earlier than agreed upon, Belinda was "concerned". Nobody ever got "worried sick" or "aggravated". If Belinda had been first mate on the Titanic, she would have told the captain, "We just hit an iceberg. We're taking on water, and we'll sink in about twenty minutes. I'm concerned."

In the third week, events took a turn that turned our détente into a cold war. Belinda and I both had bad habits. I was a smoker at the time - smoking was still allowed in the office environment - while she constantly drank diet soda pop and left the cans all over the office. By the end of the work day, there wasn't a desk top that didn't have an almost-empty soda can on it or a surface that didn't sport a dried soda ring.

One morning, she came into the art room, grabbed for a soda can she had left there a few minutes before, and took a swig before I could stop her. It was the same can I had been using as an ashtray. From deep in her throat, a deep, dark sound - something like, "Gock!" - came out. She immediately spit a mouthful of soda, tobacco, and filter into a nearby waste basket.

She shot me a look that would have curled lasagna. She radiated such unadulterated hatred that she could have ignited the Hindenberg. Barely controlling her anger, she marched out of the room. I felt bad about it, but I wasn't about to go after her. The incident was never mentioned, but it was always there, between us.

I told Mary the receptionist about the soda can incident, and she said, "Secretary's Day is next Monday. Why don't you send Belinda a bouquet?" I thought it was a bad idea at first. But, I felt very guilty about the whole ashtray-in-a-soda-can affair, so I decided that I would send her some flowers - anonymously, of course - to assuage my conscience.

They came that Monday. She took them as her due, and put them on the top of the file cabinet next to her desk in the art room. I don't know who she thought they were from, but at least she didn't suspect me. Also that day, I had given notice. I had found a steadier, more corporate job. I felt a lot more relaxed now that I knew I was leaving in two weeks.

Early the following Thursday afternoon, Belinda and I were working in the art room when the cat came in and jumped up on my lap to get scratched.

"Hey!" I said, "It's 'Mousebreath'! Hello, 'Mousebreath' the cat!"

"His. Name. Is. Mist. Er. Whisk. Ers." Belinda said in a low, annoyed voice from across the room.

Suddenly, Mr. Montgomery came in, all excited and said, "AT&T just dropped off a very intense slide job that we have to have ready by noon tomorrow! We'll have to pull an all-nighter!"

And so we went to work. I sat down at the ViaSlide to generate a presentation of 120 slides. Mr. Montgomery prepared to program the computer that controlled the nine slide projectors that ran in tandem to present a dynamic multimedia slide show. Belinda began drawing up a project schedule and preparing a bill.

She went to the bottom drawer of her file cabinet and tried to open it. It was stuck. She pulled and rattled it, and suddenly, the vase of flowers on top tipped over and spilled water all over her desk.

I turned to look, speechless. She glared at me, as if I had caused it. Then, Belinda went to get a roll of paper towels. She cleaned up, and put the flowers in their vase and back on top of the cabinet.

Tensions were high. Every half hour or so, Belinda would poke her head in the doorway. "How far along are you on the slides?" she would ask. I would tell her the number of slides done, and she would leave without another word.

At ten thirty that night, the graphics were done, and ready to be rendered into 35mm slides. As I said, the process took about five minutes per slide. For 120 slides, that's more than ten hours of processing. We divided the job into three sets of forty slides. We had two machines there to process two of the sets simultaneously.

At midnight, it became obvious that the job was going to take much longer than usual to process. We called a competitor down the street, who offered their own machine, and I was sent down Lexington Avenue with the third set to be rendered.

I set up the file in the machine, put in the 35mm film, and sat back to watch. After five minutes, the phone rang.

No preamble; just, "Are they processed yet? Mrs. Montgomery is concerned." I recognized Belinda's voice.

"No. This machine is even slower than ours. And the slides are coming out off center."

She hung up without saying anything else, including goodbye.

At three in the morning, I was nodding off. I tried reading a magazine, but I was way too tired. I was feeling grouchy, too. The phone rang, and I jumped.

"Are they ready to go yet?"

"Not yet. Maybe another hour."

"Well, I'm concerned."

That was it. My patience was at an end. I was in no mood for understatement.

I said, "You know what, Belinda? I'm 'concerned', too! I'm 'concerned' about the job. I'm 'concerned' about getting it done in time. I'm 'concerned about you being 'concerned'. I hope that doesn't make you even more 'concerned', because then I'll be 'concerned' about you being 'concerned' about me being 'concerned' about you being 'concerned'. I'm even 'concerned' about that pencil you have stuck in your hair all the time. I think it's contributing to your nasty disposition. It's very 'concerning'. And you should be 'concerned' about those flowers on your file cabinet, because I sent 'em to you!"

There was silence at the other end. From the phone came silent, radiated hatred, and I could tell she was giving me "The Look".

Then she said in a clipped voice, "I'll. Put. Mrs. Mont. Gom. Ery. On."

"You do that!"

Mrs. Montgomery got on, and I told her my estimation of when the slides would be ready.

"Can you take the film directly to Foto Labs when you're done?"

"Of course I can. I'll be happy to. Goodbye." I hung up.

Finally, at five-twenty in the morning, the slides were all photographed. I took the disk with the job and the roll of film, went down the elevator and stepped out onto Lexington Avenue. I walked the eight blocks north to Foto Labs.

It was unusually warm for a morning in late April, and unusually peaceful for Manhattan. The leaves on the trees that lined the sidewalks seemed to have bloomed overnight. Most of the city had not awakened yet, and the street was deserted, save for a Daily News delivery truck that came barreling along. A taxicab shyly poked its nose from around a corner at 33rd Street. Three sparrows poked at the crust of an orphaned hot dog bun. The pre-rush hour air was fresh and sweet.

After I dropped off the film, I walked back to Masterpiece Graphics. The garbage can in front of the office prominently displayed the bouquet of flowers - stems broken and bent - that I had sent to Belinda. Flower petals drifted in the gutter.

I had to laugh. Without uttering a sound, she had had the last word, after all.