Dead Ringer (3 page)

“Carrier, you dyed your hair!” she said, instead of the profane alternative she favored. It was hard not to curse at work. Maybe she could just cut down. Did they have a patch or something? “What possessed you? You’re a lawyer!”

“I’m an artist, too. I’m my own work in progress!” Judy wiggled her hips and bopped her Bubblicious head. “Besides, lawyers can have fun.”

“No they can’t. It carries federal penalties.”

Murphy was bounding over to Carrier in delight. “Jude, it’s so cute! Lipstick pink! I love it!”

Even DiNunzio was squealing. “I love it too, it’s so cool! I wish I had the guts to do it!” She ruffled Carrier’s shorn locks wistfully, though her own dark blond hair was pulled back into a sleek French twist. Mary DiNunzio looked compact and conventional in a navy blue suit, since she thought the term “business casual” was an oxymoron. But in no time, Mary and the other two associates were clucking and cooing in girl overdrive. The only problem with an all-woman firm was the estrogen.

“Yo! Ladies!” Bennie called out, and the girls turned in a startled little row. She put her hands on her hips. “Carrier, have you lost your mind? Pink hair doesn’t belong in a law office. How are you going to meet the new client?”

“Like I would with my old hair.” Judy’s blue eyes flashed defiantly, but under her pink bangs she looked like a psycho baby shower. “My friend Ellen had green hair the last time I saw her in court. The jury went her way, and afterward they all asked her about it.” Suddenly the telephone intercom beeped; Marshall, the secretary, signaling that the new client had arrived. Everybody straightened up, Bennie most of all.

“That’s him!” she said, and hurried for the office door, frowning at Judy on the way. “Carrier, can you put a hat on that? Or a briefcase?”

“Aw, come on, boss.” Judy sounded hurt, so Bennie let it go.

“Okay, we’ll live with it. You and Murphy sit in on this meeting. If we get this case, I’ll need you both. Carrier, tell Murphy the drill.”

Judy turned to Anne. “Take lots of notes, say nothing at all, and don’t go changin’ to try and please me.”

“Funny,” Bennie said, giving her a playful hip check.

Judy laughed. “What kind of matter did you say it was? Corporate?”

“Yes.”

“No murder or mayhem?”

“Corporate mayhem. We’re taking a break from crime scenes and blood spatter. And no whining, van Gogh.” Bennie left the associates and charged down the hall toward the reception area. She forgot about the costly pantyhose and the artistic hair. Her chest swelled with a hope familiar to chronic gamblers and the self-employed.

Ten minutes later, they were all settled at the round conference table in Bennie’s office. The morning sun shone brightly through the large windows on the north side, illuminating white walls dotted with the rowing series by Thomas Eakins. Diplomas from the University of Pennsylvania, awards for trial advocacy, and plaques for civil rights work blanketed another wall. Casebooks, law reviews, and ABA magazines crammed the bookshelves, and fresh coffee brewed on a small Braun machine atop an oak credenza, filling the office with its aroma. Bennie had wanted them to meet here instead of the conference room because it was chummier and she wanted to build owner loyalty.

“Mr. St. Amien, would you like a cup of coffee?” she offered, going to the credenza. She had no qualms about getting coffee for a client, even as a woman professional. Especially as a woman professional. A professional served her client. Period.

“Black would be fine, thank you,” he answered with a polite smile. Robert St. Amien was an elegant fifty-five years old, tall and lean, with dark silver hair and blue eyes sharp behind tortoiseshell glasses. He spoke with an accent from the best arrondissement in Paris, and his manner was almost courtly. A charcoal suit draped expensively on his shoulders, and his print tie reflected the dull shine of silk threads.

“Coffee coming right up.”

“And please, as I said, call me Robert. All of you.” St. Amien glanced around the table at a seated Judy, then Anne next to her. Bennie noted it as a polite thing to do, even though his gaze lingered a little too lovingly on gorgeous Anne. St. Amien was French; maybe he was a French manicure fan.

“Robert it is, then,” Bennie said. She grabbed the only plain coffee mug, bypassing ones that read FEMINAZI, HEAD BITCH, and HELP, I’M TURNING INTO MY MOTHER, filled the cup with hot brew, and handed it to him. She went with Styrofoam for herself, pouring as she spoke. “Now, Robert, tell me what brings you here, and how I can help you.”

“
Eh bien,
to begin.” St. Amien took a neat sip of coffee, then set it down. “As I believe I mentioned on the telephone, I own a medical-lens manufacturing company, which just built and opened a U.S. facility in Philadelphia last year. We have one hundred fifty employees in King of Prussia, and we make specialized lenses for medical equipment and instrumentation, such as fiber-optic microscopes, among other things.”

Bennie took a seat at the table. St. Amien had told her much of this on the telephone. Clients loved to talk about their businesses, and they hired lawyers who shared their enthusiasm. Bennie could be very enthusiastic to get a new client. By the end of this meeting, fiber optics would bring her to orgasm.

“The medical equipment and instrumentation business is undergoing a boom in the Philadelphia area, thanks to the concentration of hospital and research facilities here, and the current changes in health insurance, which increase demand for diagnostic tools.”

“I see,” Bennie said. Sometimes it was good to say stuff, even dumb stuff.

“In connection with my new facility, last month I happened to attend a convention of the national trade association of lens manufacturers, though I hadn’t yet joined the association. I stopped by the meeting to learn, to hear. They were holding various seminars and such. I believe they are called ‘breakout sessions.’”

Bennie sipped her coffee. “I hate breakout sessions. I always want to break out of breakout sessions.”

St. Amien laughed. “Me, too.
Par hasard,
I wandered into the wrong session, there were so many in the various ballrooms, and I took a seat at the back of the room, just at the moment when the young man at the lectern said something about competition from foreign lens manufacturers. In fact, he said, quite openly, ‘Americans should not buy foreign lenses this summer, no matter how low they go on price. No foreign lenses! We have to stick together as Americans, now more than ever!’”

“That’s terrible!” Bennie said. She felt embarrassment at the behavior of her fellow citizens and anger at the injustice to St. Amien. But she couldn’t deny this was good news for Rosato & Associates. The statement was direct evidence of wrongdoing, the proverbial “smoking gun” testimony, and St. Amien’s case was a sure winner. Blood rushed to Bennie’s head, but it could have been the pantyhose, squeezing it upward like a thermometer.

“The one who was speaking was the vice president of the association. I have his name, it was in the program. I could not believe he would be so bold!”

“It happens. Trade associations get sloppy because their members don’t always know the antitrust laws, and criminals are arrogant, whether their collars are blue or white.” Bennie leaned forward. “What happened next?”

“The room applauded, three hundred persons, perhaps, and the week thereafter, I lost a multimillion-dollar contract, my biggest, with Hospcare.” St. Amien frowned, two deep furrows appearing on his high forehead. “The Hospcare contract was the very reason I decided to build a facility here. Two other contracts canceled in the three days after Hospcare, and my last remaining bidder is now showing signs of unease.” He spread his hands palms up. “Well, suddenly I find myself in the position of having no income and no new contracts coming in, in my U.S. operation. As if the rug had been . . .” He faltered.

“Pulled out from under you?” Bennie supplied.

“Précisément.”

She knew the feeling, if not the French. “I see. Your losses must be significant. Can you put a number on the damages? Lost revenue from the contracts?”

“The Hospcare contract was worth almost three million dollars. The other two contracts total slightly over five million. My entire investment in the U.S. facility is now in grave jeopardy, and the costs for the new facility are well in excess of fifty million.” St. Amien rattled it off as if money were his first language. “My losses are approximately sixty million dollars.”

The numbers stunned Bennie. She couldn’t add with all that blood rushing to her brain. She couldn’t add even when blood wasn’t rushing to her brain. She used to think she was just bad at math until she convinced herself she had math anxiety, which upgraded basic stupidity to disability level and made her feel better about herself.

“I am gathering a legal wrong has been perpetrated,” St. Amien said, watching her with an obviously amused smile.

“Well, yeah. Sure. Absolutely. Right you are.”
Focus, girlfriend.
“In addition to breach-of-contract claims against the trade association, there is a significant antitrust claim, which would be far easier to prove, given the statement at the conference. I have to get all the facts and investigate, but basically we’re talking dead to rights, Robert.”

“’Dead to’ . . .” St. Amien’s voice trailed off. He was obviously unfamiliar with the idiom, so Bennie decided against “cold-cocked.”

“Let me explain, briefly.” The law centered her when caffeine failed. “Under our antitrust laws, anyone may refuse to do business with anyone else, but what they cannot do is agree as a group not to do business with someone. That’s a group boycott and it violates federal law. Damages are tripled under the antitrust law, and your recovery would more than make you whole.”

“That’s excellent news.” St. Amien permitted himself another smile.

“Frankly, you have a case that even my dog could win, but I doubt it will ever get to trial. The evidence is so clear and the damages so lethal that the trade association will surely settle, maybe even in six months.”

“Even better.”

“I’ll say,” Bennie blurted out, then caught herself. She realized something she had overlooked in her greed attack. “Wait a minute. Robert, the speaker mentioned all foreign lenses, not just yours. Are there other foreign manufacturers he was referring to, do you know?”

“Ah,
oui
. There are many others like me, though my losses are the greatest. I have many colleagues who have been harmed, three from Germany, several from the Netherlands. Also from the Far East, the Japanese in particular, and I know they plan to seek an attorney.”

“How many other lens manufacturers do business here?”

“Perhaps thirty or more across the country, who would all be affected. It is a national trade association, not just local.”

Uh-oh.
Bennie took the bad news like a man. In nylons. “That changes things, Robert. I’m not sure I should represent you.”

“What?” St. Amien’s finely etched lips fell apart slightly. Next to him, Judy and Anne exchanged confused glances.

“You don’t have an individual claim, you have a class action.” Bennie took a sip of coffee so she didn’t burst into hysterical tears. That would definitely
not
be professional. “I’m not a class-action lawyer, and your needs would be best served by one of them. They could represent you and the others against the trade association.”

“A class action?” St. Amien inclined his silvery head.

“A class action is a lawsuit designed for people in your situation, when there are lots of people who have the same case against the same entity, and there is basically the same fact pattern. Technicalities aside, that is,” Bennie added, but she didn’t know them herself. She had just told the man all she knew about class-action law, which was the problem. “I’m not a class-action expert, but I can help you find one.”

Across the table, Murphy was shaking her head in disagreement. Her shiny auburn mane swung back and forth as if in a Pantene commercial. “I’m sure we can handle a class action, Bennie. I did class-action work before I came here.”

Next to her, Judy looked equally unhappy. “Boss, we can maintain a class action. We’ve done tons of antitrust work, and we can read the class-action rules as well as anybody. It’s only a procedural difference.”

Bennie was about to throttle them both when St. Amien joined in. “I truly wish that you represent me, Benedetta. I have heard of your reputation as a trial lawyer, of your abilities and your experience. My son is being educated in this country and he told me that you even judged his moot-court competition, at Harvard Law School. He told me about you, and he says you are something of an outsider. A maverick, no?”

Mavericks don’t wear seventeen-dollar pantyhose
. “I don’t know . . .”

“You
are
a maverick. Your office is not pretentious. Your manner is honest.” St. Amien gestured at the associates. “Consider Mademoiselle Carrier. She is permitted to express herself freely, in her ideas, and even in her appearance. This speaks volumes about you.”

Bennie fell speechless. She couldn’t even think of anything dumb to say, which was a first.

Judy grinned. “It’s true, she’s always been that way. And she
loves
my hair.”

St. Amien continued, “I am an outsider also. A French national, making my new home in Philadelphia. Making my way here, until this association blocked me. Ruined my business, merely because I am not one of them. For many reasons, I want you to represent me.”

“Robert, wait a minute,” Bennie said. “To represent you, I’d have to represent the entire class, and your damages are so great, you’d probably be the lead plaintiff, the most important member of the class.”
Lead counsel!
It would not only be interesting, but if she was lead counsel, she’d represent all the members of the class who didn’t opt out, and most didn’t. And the legal fees in class actions ranged from Mars to Pluto. “I’ve never been lead counsel to a class. I’ve never even represented a class member.”

St. Amien shrugged. “So, represent the class then. I’m sure you will do an excellent job.”