Rosato and Associates: Legal Tender Part 16

"Sure." He handed me a ballpoint, smiling easily. "I'm with you on that. TGIF." His red uniform looked boxy on his shoulders and his hat was too big for his head.

"I'm working way too hard lately," I said, stalling with the pen in hand. I needed a name. d.a.m.n.

"Where you work? Grun?" His nametag said Will Clermont, and next to him on the desk was a folded Daily News and a covered cup of coffee. It smelled like hazelnut. Ah, civilization.

"Yeah, I work at Grun. How'd you know?"

"Everybody there works too hard." He laughed again, and I sensed he was lonely on this gray morning, happy to have even a lawyer to talk to. It served my purpose just fine. I needed information.

"How come I never saw you before, Mr. Clermont? You must work the early shift."

"Yeah. Call me Will."

"So you're out by three, huh, Will? Banker's hours."

"You got that right. Gets me home in time to see my girl, my Oprah. She's too skinny now, but I like that lady, I sure do."

I shook my head. "Three o'clock, you're lucky. I leave late, so I know the night guys. The nice one, what's his name again?"

"You mean Dave?"

"Dave, right. I forget his last name."

"Ricklin."

"He's comes on at three, right? He's nice."

Will's dark eyes lit up. "You just like Dave 'cause he's tall, like you."

I made a mental note. "Hah, I could kick his b.u.t.t, no matter how tall he is. Him and the other one, you know him?"

"Jimmy? Black guy, kinda heavy?"

"Right. Heavy."

"Not too heavy."

Whoops. "Not to you. You think Oprah's too thin."

"She is! She looked better before. I would tell Stedman, marry that girl, she's lookin' good!" He pushed the notebook toward me. "Say now, don't forget to sign in."

"Sure." As soon as I think of a name. I took a closer look at the tabloid. LAWYER ON THE LOOSE! screamed the headline. My throat caught. Underneath it said, EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEWS INSIDE, BY LARRY FROST. I lowered my head and scribbled into the book, then stepped away from the desk to the elevator bank. "Well, I'd better get going. See you."

"Stay 'wake now," he said. He was trying to read my entry when the elevator arrived.

I scooted in and hit the b.u.t.ton, but felt uneasy even after the doors closed. I was in the news, probably with a photo, but I'd pa.s.sed the first test despite it and collected the names of the security guards. Maybe my plan would work. I geared up for the next step as the elevator whisked me silently toward Grun.

The doors opened with a hydraulic swoosh onto 32, the Loser Floor. Every big firm has a Loser Floor. It's where you find the low-wattage lawyers who attract lint more easily than clients and spend way too much time with their families. At Grun, the losers lived on the same floor as the conference rooms and were viewed as equally productive.

I looked around the empty offices and for the first time the Loser Floor seemed like heaven to me, not corporate h.e.l.l. It was deserted, with everything mine for the taking. None of the losers were in this early, being losers, so I borrowed an office, a computer, and an office directory, and went to work. Or rather, Linda Frost did.

She found Grun's New York office in the directory and picked out the people she needed. Then she wrote a memo to the personnel office in Philadelphia, informing them that a new a.s.sociate, one Linda Frost, would be arriving from the New York office this Friday to prepare for trial in a very important securities matter, RMC v. Consolidated Computers. The memo requested Personnel to issue Ms. Frost a Grun ID card, a building pa.s.s, and a set of keys, and also to list her on the computer directory in the building's lobby. Given the traditional close communication between Grun's Philly headquarters and its branch offices, it would take Personnel two or three years to catch on.

For good measure, Ms. Frost backdated the memo to last week, printed it, and stuck it in a confidential interoffice envelope. Then she stomped on it, crumpled it up, and ripped off an edge to make it look lost in the interoffice mail before she set it in the nearest out box. It would produce the desired effect as soon as it reached Personnel, which would hop to, since it'd apparently screwed up. Again.

Next, Ms. Frost typed a memo to the billing department, requesting a client code and matter number for RMC v. Consolidated Computers. She opened the matter as a "transfer" from the New York office so that it wouldn't be flagged by the New Client Committee, set up to screen out those wannabe clients who couldn't afford to be gouged by Grun. In addition, the industrious Ms. Frost wrote a memo to the facilities department, reserving Conference Room D on the 32nd floor for "the foreseeable future" for her exclusive use on the above-captioned confidential securities matter.

Finally, she fired off a note to the supplies department, ordering a computer and office supplies be sent to Conference Room D for use in trial preparation, and sent a separate note to the kitchen, requesting that a sandwich be sent up every day at noon, with a Diet c.o.ke and a carton of whole milk, such meals to be billed to RMC v. Consolidated Computers.

I sent the last memos by e-mail, so that in a nanosecond, I would have a new ident.i.ty, an office, and a job. An entirely new life and citizenship. True, it was temporary, valid only within the Silver Bullet, like a corporate green card. But for the time being, I was hiding in plain sight.

But wait, a loose end. I sat back in the Loser Chair and thought for a minute. Other lawyers might become curious about the redhead in the conference room. Maybe they'd inquire, even stop by. No lawyer is an island. Hmmm. I called up a blank screen and tapped out under today's date: TO: All GRUN PARTNERS and a.s.sOCIATES FROM: LINDA FROST.

RE: HELP!.

I am an a.s.sociate from the New York office presently in Conference Room D on the 32nd floor, working on RMC v. Consolidated Computers, a ma.s.sive securities matter with extensive doc.u.ment work. Although the case is dry and somewhat technical, I would appreciate some help, as trial is in two weeks in the Middle District of Pennsylvania. I cannot promise your time would be billable, since this client is extremely touchy about its bills. Anyone wishing to lend a hand in this difficult case should feel free to stop by at any time.

Perfect. It would send any lawyer worth his billings screaming in the opposite direction. I'd be dead and petrified before I'd see a partner or an a.s.sociate from this firm. They'd slip the food under the G.o.dd.a.m.n door, like I carried Ebola. I hit the SEND b.u.t.ton on the e-mail menu, feeling a swell of satisfaction.

I was back in business.

Chapter 23.

I spent the morning in Conference Room D, working and watching wage slaves bring me a computer, a phone, and office supplies. I thanked them enough to be polite but not memorable. Between their visits, I studied Mark's file, which was spread out at the far end of the conference table, shielded from view by a bunker of dead files from one of the other conference rooms. I kept the door closed, so the room was soundproofed against the losers trundling in at nine o'clock. Didn't they know the day was half over by then?

My best friend Sam Freminet would have arrived at work bright and early. He would already be at his gla.s.s runway, billing time in his office just floors above me, on the polar opposite of the Loser Floor, the Gold Coast. The Gold Coast was home to Grun's heavy hitters, rainmakers, movers and megashakers: the offices of high-density department heads and Executive Committee members, not to mention the throne-room of The Great and Powerful. Pay no attention to that man behind the client.

I scanned the computer printouts of Mark's checkbook and found two additional cash payments to Sam Freminet, for one thousand each, in the months before Mark was killed. The midday sun edged onto the papers, but I wasn't distracted. I was wondering why Sam, he of Gold Coast and gold card, had taken cash payments from Mark. Sam?

I powered up my new computer and fiddled around until I remembered how to find the New Matter Reports, the listing of the new cases opened each month. The New Matter Reports were supposedly put on the computer to alert the partners to possible conflicts of interest, but the real reason was so they could say, LOOK AT THE BUSINESS I'M BRINGING IN! I'M PAYING FOR YOU, CHUMP! And of course, the time-honored, MINE REALLY IS BIGGER THAN YOURS. YOU'RE GONNA NEED A CRANE FOR THIS MOTHER.

I selected number 4 from the menu.

SEARCH WHICH ATTORNEY? said the computer.

I tapped out Sam Freminet.

SEARCHING FOR NEW MATTERS OPENED BY MR. FREMINET, said the computer. PLEASE WAIT.

"Sure," I replied, just to have someone to talk to. I thought of Grady, but pushed that thought away, and fast. There was no contacting him. The cops had to be watching, maybe tapping his phone. Then I thought of my mother. Dare I call?

THE INFORMATION YOU REQUESTED IS ALMOST READY. PLEASE WAIT.

I half expected to hear a little ca-ching. Maybe the screen would turn green.

HERE IS THE INFORMATION YOU REQUESTED. IT IS CONFIDENTIAL AND SHOULD NOT BE RELEASED TO THIRD PARTIES WITHOUT THE EXPRESS WRITTEN APPROVAL OF THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE.

"Kiss my a.s.s," I said, skimming the long roster of Sam's new matters. Twenty-one corporate bankruptcies: Rugel Industries, Lafayette Snacks, Inc., Zaldicor Medical, Quaker Realty Trust, Genezone, Ltd., Atlantic Partners. Apparently solid, certifiable, and marked Approved, meaning they had pa.s.sed the New Matter Committee. New business, each one a transfusion of fresh whole blood, keeping alive the body corporate. Sam was doing great. Why did he need cash from Mark? By the same token, why would he care about the executor's fee?

Maybe the clients weren't paying, or couldn't. They were bankrupts, after all. Or maybe Sam's receivables were low, and The Great and Powerful was withholding his distribution check. I needed more information, namely Sam's monthly billings and his partnership distribution record.

I clicked around the computer menus, looking for the billing information, but no soap. It was computerized, but I'd never seen it because it was hidden. a.s.sociates couldn't access those menus, Grun being as free with information as the Kremlin. So my first task was to convince the computer I was a partner, preferably Sam, since it was his information I was after. To do it I'd have to guess his pa.s.sword. I thought a minute and typed in: DAFFY DUCK.

WRONG Pa.s.sWORD, said the computer.

I tried: FOGHORN LEGHORN.

WRONG Pa.s.sWORD.

SYLVESTER THE CAT.

WRONG Pa.s.sWORD.

"Sufferin' succotash," I said, and got busier.

Half an hour later, I still hadn't hit the pa.s.sword. Luckily there was no limit on attempts, because I'd gone through every Looney Tune I could dredge up, then tried TV characters I knew Sam loved: Gilligan, Little Buddy, Maynard G. Krebs. Jeannie, Master, Major Nelson. Lucy, Ethel, Little Ricky. Still, no show.

A woman from Grun's kitchen brought me a tuna fish sandwich when I was in my rock 'n' roll phase. Jerry Garcia, Bootsie, RuPaul. John Tesh, for a wild card. I gobbled half of the sandwich as I segued into show tunes. Rodgers, Hammerstein, Andrew Lloyd Webber. I had high hopes for Stephen Sondheim, but washed out.

s.h.i.t. If I saw wrong pa.s.sword one more time I'd scream. I felt rammy, cooped up. It was the golden retriever in me, I needed exercise. I stretched and walked around the conference table, then lapped it. I jogged to the window. I raised the Levelors and lowered them again. I was running in place when there was a sudden knock at the door, which gave me enough time to scramble back to my chair. "Come in!"

"Ms. Frost?" said a young messenger. "This is from Personnel." He handed me the envelope, sniffing the air. "What's that smell?"

"What smell?"

"Kinda like a gym?"

"Tuna fish," I said, waving him gently out of my lair. I opened the envelope and spilled its contents onto the conference table, where they slid out like precious emeralds and rubies. A Grun ID, a building pa.s.s, and a set of keys to the firm. Beautiful. Plus a LEXIS/NEXIS card. Good, it would get me online. I could read the newspapers on the computer and see how close the cops were to nailing me. It had been at the back of my mind all through the musicals.

I plopped down in my chair and typed in my new LEXIS number. Then I went into NEXIS, popped in Rosato, and limited the search to the past week, which is when I got really famous.

YOUR REQUEST HAS FOUND 345 STORIES, said the computer.

"Terrific," I mumbled, and punched up the first one, which would be the most recent. The headline told it all: FUGITIVE LAWYER SUSPECTED IN THIRD DEATH.

I read it, then the stories that followed. RADICAL LAWYER ON KILLING SPREE. WOMAN ON THE RUN. There were interviews with "highly placed sources in the police department," but they didn't tell me more than I already knew about the cops' efforts to find me. No mention of sightings, no quotes attributed to Azzic. The party line was the same: she can run, but she can't hide. Oh yeah?

I hit a key for the next story.

AND THEY ALL CAME TUMBLING DOWN, read the headline. The byline was Larry Frost, my long-lost cousin, and his story was a collection of interviews with R & B a.s.sociates. A quote from "Rosato a.s.sociate" Renee Butler, who said she felt "betrayed" by me. Bob Wingate "just wanted to forget about it" and was conducting an unsuccessful job search. Eve Eberlein was unavailable for comment but was reportedly preparing the defense of the Wellroth trial. Jennifer Rowlands had landed a job with another Philly firm. In a sidebar, SILVER LINING IN CLOUD OVER LAW FIRM, Jeff Jacobs and Amy Fletcher announced their engagement. Jesus.

I hit the b.u.t.ton and the next story appeared. Its headline caught me up short.

MEMORIAL SERVICE TODAY FOR ATTORNEY.

A memorial service was held at the Ethical Society today for Mark Biscardi, Esq., Center City resident and named partner in the law firm of Rosato & Biscardi. The service and the following interment were attended by many of the attorney's clients and friends, and was organized by Eve Eberlein, Esq., an a.s.sociate in the firm. A eulogy was given by Sam Freminet, Esq., of Grun & Chase.

I leaned back as if a weight had pushed me there. Mark was gone, really gone. I'd even missed his funeral. I fell into a fugue state, thinking about him, then what Grady said that night in the boathouse. Turning it over and over. Had Mark really loved me? Did Grady?

My heart ached. I sat staring at the story on the computer until the monitor was the brightest light in the room, a modern-day beacon. I checked my watch. 7:45.

The floor sounded quiet, all the losers had gone home. The cleaning ladies made their rounds about 8:00, but the sign I put on the door would have warded them off. It would be safe enough to go out at this hour, especially on a Friday night. I had lots of questions I couldn't answer from a chair.

But first things first. I stood up, uncramped my legs, and turned off the computer. Then grabbed what I needed and ventured out of Conference Room D.

It turns out you can use an In box for a litter box. Fill it with machine-shredded legal briefs, add one kitten, and there you have it. A Martha Stewart Moment. I sat contented in the front seat of the bananamobile as my little tan furball scratched through the spaghetti of citations. It was an improvement over her using the car for a litter box, or Grun lawyers using their briefs for anything else.

Afterwards, the kitten batted a morsel of tuna fish around the front seat, ignoring my attempts to get her to eat it or drink the milk I'd brought her. I petted her as she played, and she looked up at me with that delicate triangle of a face. China blue eyes, spongy pink nose. She was cute even though she wasn't a golden retriever, and she deserved a name.

"How about Sylvester the Cat?" I asked her.

She blinked. Wrong pa.s.sword.

"Gilligan? Little Buddy?"

She looked bored, then climbed onto my lap, curling into a clump.

"Samantha? Endora? Tabitha?" I didn't even know if the kitten was a boy or girl. I picked her up and was finding out when I heard a sharp rap on the car window, next to my ear.

I turned, startled, and found myself eye-level with a nightstick. A gun in a black holster. Round chrome handcuffs hanging from a thick belt. I felt a bolt of fear and looked up, into the shiny badge of a Philadelphia policeman.

Chapter 24.

Out of the car, Miss," the cop said.

My heart stopped. I had no choice. I flashed on the women's prison. Then on my mother, lost. I held on to the cat and opened the car door.

"That's her! That's the one!" said an old woman behind him. She was strange-looking, with penciled-in eyebrows and lipstick crimson as Gloria Swanson's. She had an oddly receding hairline, with platinum-white hair covered by a white hairnet. She pointed at me with a bony finger that ended in a scarlet-lacquered nail. "She's the one, with the red hair!"

The cop waved her off with a large hand and focused on me with a grave expression. "I have a few questions for you, Miss."

"Yes, Officer." My heart began to pound. I scanned his ruddy face, but it wasn't one I'd sued. Stay calm, I told myself. Think Linda Frost.

"This your car?"