For a second I felt stunned, thinking there was nothing I could do about it, no matter how hard I tried. Not even if I was right about Eileen, not even if I was wrong. Because there were twenty others waiting to take her place, itching to take aim. They lined 'em up, like the vice presidents. And they would be met with equal and opposite force, one that had arms as well as the law. There was a war on, truly, a pitched battle. And as clearly as I perceived it, I still didn't know which side I was on. I was in the middle, at sea.

Rowing furiously, and not knowing either sh.o.r.e.

Chapter 4.

I walked to clear my head, striding down Benjamin Franklin Parkway under the colorful, oversized flags that hung from the streetlamps. They billowed like spinnakers in the stiff breeze from the Schuylkill River not ten blocks away, rattling the chains that fastened them to the poles. It made me wish I was out on the river, sculling. The water would be choppy in the wind and there'd be whitecaps, little ones that kept things exciting. Maybe tonight, I promised myself, as I headed to the chrome monolith known as the Silver Bullet, there to find my best friend Sam Freminet and drag him out to lunch.

I hit the building's marble lobby and grabbed the first elevator, only to feel a familiar constriction in my gut as it headed skyward to my old law firm, the huge and insanely conservative Grun & Chase. We used to call it Groan & Waste, as in our young a.s.sociates' lives, but I hide those bad memories away. Groan & Waste didn't own me anymore. n.o.body did.

"Where's that Looney Tune? He in?" I said to the young receptionist when the doors opened on Sam's floor. She had no idea who I was, but knew exactly whom I meant.

"He's in. Should I tell him who's here?" She was reaching for the phone, unsure whether I was a lawyer or a troublemaker, when in fact I was a little of both.

"Bennie Rosato, his favorite Italian," I said, and breezed past her questioning glance. I've gotten that look as many times as I've heard how's the weather up there, because I don't look Italian at all. With some cause.

I charged by the costly Amish quilts and large-scale oils on the walls, past secretaries with files in hand to give their conspiratorial giggling some ostensible business purpose. I didn't recognize any of them; all the secretaries I knew were smart enough to leave. "Hey, ladies," I said anyway, because I have a soft spot for secretaries. My mother used to be one, or so she says.

"h.e.l.lo," answered one, and the rest smiled. They a.s.sumed I was a client, since no Grun lawyer would greet a secretary.

An a.s.sociate scurried self-importantly by, but I didn't recognize him either. Of fifteen of us a.s.sociates, only Sam had stayed and made partner. Since then he'd ascended the cla.s.ses of partners to the tippy-top of the firm, becoming the youngest three-window partner ever, which is the tax-bracket equivalent of a five-star general. If they'd known Sam was gay and not merely eccentric, they would have set him on fire and billed somebody for it.

I reached Sam's sunny office and closed the door behind me. "Honey, I'm h.o.m.o!" I called out.

"Benniieeee!" Sam looked up, blue eyes bright behind neat rimless gla.s.ses. Tall and slim, he had a handsome face, with a straight nose and fine cheekbones, framed by reddish-brown hair that was trimmed every four weeks. "How are you doing?" he said, coming around the desk to give me a warm hug.

"I need cheering up. How are you?"

"I'm looney, as usual, and up-cheering is my specialty. Siddown." He waved me into a leather sling chair and mock-tiptoed back to his desk. "Be vewwy, vewwy quiet. We'we hunting wabbits."

I laughed and flopped into the chair.

"See? It's working already."

"I knew it would. That's why I came." My gaze wandered over the framed cartoon cels hanging on the walls amid Sam's double Yale diplomas. Slumped on a gla.s.s-topped table against the far window were stuffed toys of Sylvester the Cat, Foghorn Leghorn, and Porky Pig. Pepe Le Pew had fallen into a p.o.r.nographic clinch with the Tasmanian Devil. "I see Pepe's out of control again."

"Per usual. That skunk's a regular JFK."

"Don't say that about my Pepe."

"Pepe has no idea what matters in life. Daffy does. He's a duck with priorities."

"Like what?" I asked, though the answer was staring me in the face. A statue of Daffy sat on the desk, roosting atop a mountain of dollar bills and a sign that read BIGGER BETTER FASTER CHEAPER. "Money?"

"Yes, money, and don't say it that way. Daffy is happening, Bennie. Daffy is G.o.d."

"He's too greedy."

"You can never be too greedy, chica. Do you know why I'm the best bankruptcy lawyer in these here parts?"

"Because you're morally bankrupt?"

"Only partly. The reason is, I understand money. Where it went, where it should have been, how to get it back. I have a sixth sense for it. You, on the other hand, maintain the absurd belief that love is more important than money. What kind of lawyer are you?"

"A dinosaur."

"Extinct."

"So be it. But Pepe Le Pew is my man."

"'Ah, ze l'amour. Ah, ze toujour. Ah, le grand illusion,'" Sam said. " 'Scent-imental Romeo', 1951. You can be bought, too, you know."

"Bulls.h.i.t."

"Si, my little liberal. You're a sucker for a loser, any kind of loser. The more lost, bruised, concussed, and cussed-out, the better. Same way with me, when I spot a bankruptcy. We're the dogcatchers of the profession."

"Thanks."

Sam pouted, sticking out a lower lip. "I'm not cheering you up anymore, am I?"

"It's okay."

"What's up, doc? You still feeling bad about Mark?"

I sighed in resignation. "It's annoying, isn't it? He dumped me a month ago. I should be getting over it." I felt like kicking something, but most of the office furniture was gla.s.s.

"That's not so long, Bennie. You were together for, what, six years?"

"Seven."

"You're going to hurt awhile, expect it. f.u.c.king Eve is so lame. She was here last week with Mark, annoying the s.h.i.t out of me. So smooth and plastic. She's Lawyer Barbie."

I didn't want to dwell on it. "Why'd you call me last night, Samuel? I got home too late to call back."

He hunched over his desk. "I'm worried. I heard a nasty rumor. There's an a.s.sociate defection in progress, did you know that?"

"At Grun, somebody going for the barbed wire?"

"No, at R & B."

"What? At my firm ?"

"That's what I heard," he said, nodding. "A partner of mine in litigation got a call from one of your a.s.sociates. The kid said he'd be looking for a job soon, and another a.s.sociate was looking, too."

"Who? Who were the a.s.sociates?"

"They didn't say. What's going on, Bennie? Can you afford to lose two a.s.sociates?"

"No, not with the cases I have coming in. d.a.m.n." We had only seven a.s.sociates, with Mark and me as the only partners. "It can't be true."

"Why not? You know how these things go, especially lately. Half the firms in the city are breaking up. Look at Wolf, and Dilworth. It's like teen suicides, coming in cl.u.s.ters."

"Why would any a.s.sociate want to leave R & B? Christ, they make almost as much as I do."

"They're ingrates. Socialism doesn't work, autocracy does. Ask Bill Gates. Ask Daffy Duck."

I rubbed my forehead. "We were trying to do it differently. Not like at Grun."

"What a bunch of horses.h.i.t. You should've stayed here. We could be working together, having fun. You could've been my resident beard. All you had to say was 'light chocolate,' and everything would've been different."

I flashed on the day. I had gotten The Call from The Great And Powerful Grun. A gaggle of a.s.sociates flew to my office to prepare me for The Visit, tell me The Question he'd ask, and The Answer I was supposed to give. "Say 'light chocolate,'" I said, remembering aloud. "'Light.'"

"You knew he was going to offer you a G.o.diva chocolate-"

"And ask whether I wanted dark or light-"

"You were supposed to say 'light.' His favorite. But no, my Bennie had to say, 'I don't eat chocolate, Mr. Grun.'" Sam shook his head so mournfully I burst into laughter.

"What? I don't eat chocolate."

"You couldn't eat the f.u.c.king piece of chocolate? It would have killed you to eat it? You would have choked ?"

"Exactly," I said, though I didn't explain. Sam knew my history anyway. I had swallowed so much c.r.a.p already it would have lodged in my throat and cut off my air, throttled me with the terrible need to please, to say yes, whatever you need, at whatever cost. I stood up and started for the door. "I'd better get back to the office. I want to see what's going on. Thanks for the tip."

"Wait, I heard you were on the noon news, defending that animal rights group that started a riot."

"It wasn't a riot and they're a couple, not a group. Two kids, one confused, one not so confused." I meant Eileen, the latter. I'd have to address that problem, but at least for now she was in jail.

"Well, this time I'm on the cops' side. Furstmann Dunn may be close to an AIDS vaccine."

"I know-"

"Tell your clients to come with me when I take groceries to Daniel. He can't even swallow because of the thrush, I have to buy him baby food. Tell that to your clients."

"Client. I got the good guy."

"Good guy? Screw him!" Sam reddened in anger. He had a low flashpoint, especially since he'd made partner. Mark always said it had gone to his head, but I'd disagreed. "Let him represent himself! Better yet, let one of his lab rats represent him, then see how well he does. I hope the cops beat some sense into him!"

"Calm down, you don't mean that."

"I do, too. I'll beat that kid myself, for Christ's sake! Me and every fegola I know. We'll hit him with our purses!"

"Good-bye, honey." I leaned over the desk and stole a smooch.

"I hope they broke his knees! I hope they snapped his d.i.c.k right off!"

"Th-th-th-that's all folks," I said, and slipped out the door.

Chapter 5.

I opened the arched wooden door to R & B's townhouse and experienced a familiar feeling. I was home. Mark and I bought the house as a brick sh.e.l.l with money from his family and remodeled it into law offices as we paid back the loan. I'd sanded and polished the hardwood floors; Mark had put up the dry-wall. We painted the walls and baseboards a golden yellow, and I decorated the offices comfortably, with soft chairs, pine side tables, and gentle watercolors.

"Hey, Bennie," said Marshall, from the half-window above the reception desk. Her dark blond hair was gathered into a French braid and she wore a cotton dress that hung on a frame too fragile to bear any responsibility at all. In fact, Marshall was R & B's receptionist, administrator, and bookkeeper, and ran the little office behind the reception window like Stalin.

"Why aren't you at lunch, lady?" I asked.

"We're too busy. You got a zillion calls." She handed me a yellow stack. R & B, it said at the top of our internal stationery, in a hip font. Mark was in charge of hip, I could only do homey.

"Then go home early, will you? Leave at four and I'll get the board covered." I didn't want Marshall defecting, too. Besides the fact that she ran the place, I felt comfortable with her in a way I didn't with the a.s.sociates, from whom I kept a professional distance.

"You sure? I might take you up on that. I have to get fitted for a bridesmaid dress." She rolled her blue eyes.

"Pink or turquoise?"

"Turquoise."

"Lucky break."

"You got that right."

The phone rang, and she reached for it as I wandered down the hall with my messages, scouting for a.s.sociates. The hallway was empty, so I strayed casually into the law library, which doubled as our conference room. n.o.body was there either. The round, egalitarian conference table was bare, surrounded by thick federal reporters, their gold foil volume numbers running in shiny rows. Maybe the a.s.sociates were out to lunch. Or on job interviews.

I left the library, went back down the hall, and climbed the spiral staircase to peek at the upstairs offices. Each one was the same size, none smaller than Mark's or mine, and each a.s.sociate had been given a thousand-dollar office allowance to decorate it. Between our s.e.xy caseload and permissive management, R & B attracted the best and the brightest from the local law schools-Penn, Temple, Widener, and Villanova. Our a.s.sociates were all Law Review or close to it, and we paid them like the demiG.o.ds they thought they were. What could they possibly have to complain about? And where the h.e.l.l were they?

I walked down the hall, checking office after empty office. They'd put all sorts of c.r.a.p up on the walls, and I hadn't uttered a peep. Bob Wingate's office was a memorial to Jerry Garcia; Eve Eberlein's was redone in feminine chintz. The only businesslike office belonged to Grady Wells, a Civil War buff. It was furnished simply and the walls were covered with antique battlefield maps in wooden frames. Grady kept a map chest with skinny drawers in the corner, but he wasn't in his office.

n.o.body was in, anywhere. I considered snooping to see if there were any resumes lying around, but decided against it. I was committed to our individual liberties. Also, I might get caught.

I headed into my own messy office, kicked my pumps onto the dhurrie rug, and moved some papers so I could curl into the cushy maroon wing chair behind my desk. A client once told me that my sloppiness was the mark of a true outlaw, but he was wrong. I was just a slob, nothing political about it.

I unlocked a rickety desk drawer and pulled the file of computer printouts that listed the a.s.sociates' hours. Whoever was working the hardest could be the most unhappy. I read down the list of a.s.sociates, ignoring the administrative hours, looking only for billable time. Fletcher, Jacobs, Wingate. Most of the a.s.sociates were billing two hundred hours a month. Hard time, so everybody should be miserable. Even Eve Eberlein showed a hundred and ninety hours so far. I tried not to think about which activities she considered billable.

I flipped backwards to the previous months. The times rang true except for Renee Butler, who'd put in a rugged April on trial in family court. Renee had been Eve's roommate since they graduated from Penn with Wingate, but the two women couldn't have been more different. Renee was black, slightly overweight, and committed to her practice of domestic abuse cases. She was all substance to Eve's pure form. Was Renee one of the a.s.sociates who wanted to leave? Was there a way to find out?

Of course.

I tossed the time records aside and crossed the room to the unmatched bookshelves against the wall. Law reviews and treatises were mixed with clippings and reprints, and I forgot where I'd put the legal directory. d.a.m.n. I scanned the cluttered shelves.