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ing countermeasures as soon as possible. Please, Mr. McLauphin many, many lives depend on it. Well, kiss my ass, muttered Benning. Holy, holy crap, said Caxton. Al Past 170 Cheese on crackers, said Braithwaite. The other two looked at him. It s a Bajan expression, he added. On the Friday following the bombshell McLauphin/Darcy interview, some work was done at Benning, Bynum, Caxton, Braithwaite, but not a lot. That the firm represented Ms. Darcy had been generally known for a while the partners themselves had announced it, proudly, earlier. Now, however, it caused prob- lems. The phone lines had been tied up all day long, as had the cell phones of the partners, the interns, and the secretaries. Throngs of important and less impor- tant visitors clogged the outer offices, and satellite trucks, reporters, and groups of ordinary citizens lined the street outside. A dozen police officers maintained order as best they could. One of the few to get in to see Jack Benning was an aide to the President s chief political advisor, a dough-faced, short haired slicker named Horace Mac- chia. Benning told him what he told everyone else in a statement before micro- phones and cameras later that afternoon, that the firm didn t know where Ms. Darcy was at the moment (which was true), that in his opinion her warning should be taken at face value, which was to say, seriously, that they would be in contact with her soon (which he hoped was true), and that he would have more to say later. In his afternoon statement outside the front doors of the firm, he added that he would answer whatever questions anyone had as best as he could. They came in flurries. Ms. Darcy is fine. She suffered scrapes and a cut in the attack during the mar- athon, but she was not seriously hurt. No, Benning Bynum Caxton Braithwaite did not know Ms. Darcy was from another planet until we heard her say it along with everyone else watching the McLauphin interview. And no, we do not know where she is now. I do not know what Ms. Darcy s future plans are. We know she is unable to return to her base on the moon, and must necessarily stay here for now, probably permanently. She has said she wants to live quietly and has no desire to exploit her status. She is the daughter of an important person in her society, but she has not been authorized to represent them in any way. She is here as a private citizen. The only reason she came here was to bring the warning of danger to this planet from those meteoroid fragments. Assuming that warning proves out, I think we all owe her an immense debt of gratitude for what she did, at considerable risk to her own life, I might add. As far as I know, there are no precedents in the law for the legal status of extraterrestrials. (There was laughter at this.) But I do know that Ms. Darcy is a Al Past 171 bona fide citizen of the nation of Barbados, and is therefore entitled to be accorded all the legal protections of the law thereunto appertaining. In the moment it took for that bit of legal verbiage to sink in, he added, This firm will be open as usual on Monday morning. I expect to have another state- ment for you on Tuesday at noon. Thank you very much. And he ducked back inside. One thing he neglected to mention was that the partners were scheduled to meet with Ms. Darcy the following day, Saturday. They prepared as unobtru- sively as they could, taking home files and printouts in their briefcases when they left on Friday afternoon. The reporters and satellite trucks were still parked out front, but the partners just waved as they claimed their cars and drove home for the weekend. Saturday morning they drove separately to the golf club where their firm maintained a membership, past the gate guard, and toted their golf bags, whose pockets had the folders and printouts zipped inside, into the clubhouse. Dick Caxton had reserved the VIP lounge for a big corporate client, which was cer- tainly true, even if size-wise the client was rather diminutive. They had no bigger client, actually. No law firm in the world had a bigger client. That knowledge made them nervous. Caxton, particularly, paced the floor. Bynum was fidgeting too, sitting at the large table in the center of the room. Dick, quit worrying and have a seat and get your papers in order. You ve done this two hundred times. Yeah, right, I have. But that s not it. It s her; it s that girl. The last time I saw her she was this little scared kid who didn t own a decent pair of running shoes. Now she s the greatest Olympic athlete there ever was, she s from another planet, for God s sake, and she wants to save the earth from total destruction. Can you imagine how many satellite trucks would be parked by the first tee if they knew we were meeting her? You damn right I m worrying! I have not done this two hundred times! I haven t even done it once! He sat down and began fumbling with the papers in front of him. Outwardly, Benning and Braithwaite seemed fairly calm. Benning looked at his three partners. Gentlemen, I don t need to review what we re going to do here. As George pointed out, we do this kind of thing all the time. I know the circumstances are unique. But I want to reiterate that we need to go the extra mile. We don t know the extent to which our client might want to make use of her renown, but even if she flies back into space, she ll still have done more for this law firm than any other client we ve ever had. We are in her debt, even if we don t admit that to Al Past 172 her. We need to do right by her. Just concentrate on the matters we ve prepared and it ll go fine. His cell phone beeped. Yes? OK, good. He looked at his partners. That was Burton. Ten minutes. Burton was the [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ] |
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