by Susan Rieger
5. Three (3) years records of all income from self-employment, honorariums, bonuses, residuals, royalties, advances against royalties, and other similar forms of remuneration, April 1996 to April 1999
6. Three (3) years records, certificates, and statements of all accounts in financial institutions or with brokers and/or financial managers, domestic and foreign, including but not limited to all holdings and shares in stocks, bonds, mutual funds, real estate cooperatives, and other financial packages, April 1996 to April 1999
7. Three (3) years records and statements of all pension, retirement, profit-sharing, and deferred compensation plans, including but not limited to all Keogh, IRA, 401(k), and TIAA-CREF accounts, April 1996 to April 1999
8. Three (3) years records and statements of all other financial holdings and accounts, April 1996 to April 1999
9. Current written appraisals of all interests in real property owned or held by plaintiff in whole or part as of March 1999
10. Current written appraisals of any asset and or item of personal property valued at $4,999 or more owned or held by plaintiff in whole or part as of March 1999
11. Three (3) years records of all transactions relating to the sale or other transfer or conveyance of real and/or personal property owned or held by the plaintiff in whole or part, April 1996 to April 1999
12. Current written appraisals of all motor vehicles owned or leased by plaintiff as of March 1999
13. Three (3) years statements of all life and disability insurance policies on plaintiff, April 1996 to April 1999
14. All other records and statements of property, assets, holdings, or interests held by or on behalf of the plaintiff relevant to an equitable distribution of such property, assets, holdings, and interests pursuant to the dissolution of the marriage of Daniel E. Durkheim and Maria M. Durkheim.
Plaintiff’s duty to disclose is ongoing. The requests made here do not preclude other discovery requests or motions.
Certificate of Service
I, David Greaves, Esquire, hereby certify that on the 27th day of April 1999, I caused a copy of the foregoing Notice of Request for Mandatory Disclosure and Production to be served on plaintiff’s attorney by mailing a copy, first-class, postage prepaid, to:
Ray Kahn, 46 Broadway, New Salem, NA 06555.
Signature of Attorney: David Greaves, Traynor, Hand, Wyzanski
* * *
Re: Valuing a Medical Degree
From: Sophie Diehl
To: David Greaves
Date: Wed, 28 Apr 1999 9:04:32
Subject: Re: Valuing a Medical Degree
4/28/99 9:04 AM
Dear David,
I’m following up on Fiona’s email on valuing a medical degree. I’m so sorry—and so embarrassed. I missed Petrus. I read the briefs last night. I say pretty much the same things, but their fact situation is much stronger. Wife has no family money, no job, no education, and she worked solidly to put her husband through college, medical school, and internship. So maybe, given Ms. Meiklejohn’s situation, it’s different??? I’m feeling stupid.
Sophie
TRAYNOR, HAND, WYZANSKI
222 CHURCH STREET
NEW SALEM, NARRAGANSETT 06555
(393) 876-5678
ATTORNEYS AT LAW
April 27, 1999
Maria Mather Meiklejohn
404 St. Cloud Street
New Salem, NA 06556
Dear Mia:
I am forwarding to you a letter from Ray Kahn together with a settlement offer from your husband. The offer is unreasonable but not so unreasonable that we can ignore it. Look it over, then call the office for an appointment. We’ll thrash out a response, equally unreasonable but not so unreasonable they can ignore it.
I am also forwarding a letter David Greaves sent Kahn this morning, responding to his smarmy suggestion that the two men put their heads together and come up with an agreement. David is not defending me or my role in the negotiations (“As if you need defending,” he said); he’s defending you the best way he knows how. If he thought for a minute that the two of them could hammer out a satisfactory agreement quickly and privately, he’d do it. Instead, he has written a letter that is at once disingenuous and bullying, and sent with it a fairly harassing set of discovery requests. My bet is they will annoy your husband. Be prepared (#4 especially is a zinger).
Don’t panic at the request for joint custody or the veiled threat of sole custody. Kahn can’t expect his client to win on that point; he is negotiating. (Kahn’s a bit like a pit bull piddling his way down a lane to mark his territory, completely oblivious to the fact that the dog next door is a very large, ill-tempered rottweiler.) He is likely to give it up when we give up our request for the house. To be truthful, I’ve never understood—or appreciated—the so-called art of negotiation whereby each side stakes out an extreme position and then sits down at the table and begins horse trading, the cat for the dog, the Jenny Holzer for the Persian rug, the pension for the 401(k) plan, the child for the house. But men believe in it (it must make losing easier), so we shall have to play along.
Your father wrote to David to let him know he approves of the two-lawyer arrangement. He also said that if we find we need to bring in a third or fourth, he would pay. We don’t think it will ever come to that, but it’s nice to know we can call out the troops if we need them and if you find it acceptable. We will do nothing of the kind without your explicit and informed consent. We may want to employ a private investigator and a forensic accountant—or at least threaten to employ them, if, as David says, it becomes necessary in “a case of this sort.”
I’ve got some ideas about a counteroffer; I look forward to hearing what you think.
Yours,
Anne Sophie Diehl
MARIA MATHER MEIKLEJOHN
404 ST. CLOUD STREET
NEW SALEM, NA 06556
April 29, 1999
Anne Sophie Diehl
Traynor, Hand, Wyzanski
222 Church Street
New Salem, NA 06555
Dear Sophie:
Your letter with the enclosures brought on an attack of nausea. I’m not kidding. I felt a rise in my gorge when I saw the fat envelope with your firm’s name on the flap. I took a Xanax before I opened it. I would never have guessed getting divorced was so mentally disorganizing. I was ready for depression, but this is something else. I feel I’ve lost my underpinnings, literally, like a desk chair that’s thrown a pin and wobbles precariously on its shaft. And yet, I don’t feel as miserable as I thought I would. After that breakdown in your office three weeks ago, I’m more anxious and worried than depressed—and intermittently more optimistic too. Do you know the Emily Dickinson line “Hope is a thing with feathers”? Every so I often I feel a fluttering of hope, hovering nearby, like a hummingbird at my shoulder. I’m also really pissed at Daniel.
I know I shouldn’t go on like this, and I’m truly ashamed of myself, but I don’t know who else to talk to. I’m the first in my crowd to go through a divorce. Cortez upon a peak in Darien. It’s funny, a couple of acquaintances—not real friends, but parents at Jane’s school—have asked me out to lunch, ostensibly to offer support but really, I think, to see what it’s like, being dumped and having to rethink your whole future. I let them know it isn’t pretty. Whatever thoughts they had of getting out of their marriage, they sober up quickly. Then they start worrying that I might be after their husbands. As if.
I know you said Danny’s offer was unreasonable, but did you do the math? He’s offered to pay $24,000 in child support, $14,000 for Jane’s tuition, and $36,000 in alimony, for a total annual outlay of $74,000. If you take away $12,000 for the taxes I’ll have to pay on the alimony and the tuition, which I’ll never see but will go directly to the school, Jane and I would have $48,000 a year. Rent will take at least half that and my car another sixth. Meanwhile, Danny gets to keep $200,000 a year after taxes, probably more, since the alimony is tax-deductible.
I called this morning to see about coming in tomorrow, but they said you had a criminal court date. On Monday, the 3rd, I’m going down to Philadelphia to see my sister. I’ll be back on Tuesday night. I’ve made an appointment to see you on Wednesday morning, the 5th. Unless, it’s an emergency, I’d rather not put off my visit to Cordelia. We always plan our visits ahead of time, and she counts on my coming.
Your discovery order was very thorough. Danny’s going to have a fit over your request for all the records of his NIH grants. There’s always money in a grant for the chief investigator, though I’ve never been quite sure how it was handled. I’ve always assumed it was included in his salary and W-2 forms, but it may not be. Of course, you should hire an accountant and a detective if you think they would be useful. You can hire an enforcer and a voodoo priest if you think they would be useful. I’ll pay. I trust you and David.
Yours,
P.S. April 23 was Jane’s 11th birthday. She was wretched and I was wretched, but her father was as jolly as a Macy’s Santa. He wanted to have a celebratory dinner with her and couldn’t understand why she didn’t want to go. He told her to buck up. I thought she’d burst into tears. As a present, he got her Rollerblades but no helmet, no knee pads, no wrist guards. Let’s hear it for pediatricians.
P.P.S. Where in God’s name did they get the $6 million valuation of my mother’s house? We haven’t had it appraised since she died. It’s worth real money, or at least the land is, but not that much. They are so full of shit. Excuse me.
MRS. DANIEL E. DURKHEIM
245 CLAREMONT AVENUE
NEW YORK, NY 10 027
Sanity
* * *
From: Sophie Diehl
To: Maggie Pfeiffer
Date: Sun, 2 May 1999 13:23:16
Subject: Sanity 5/2/99 1:23 PM
Dear Maggie—
Thanks for talking me down last weekend. I was a mess. I went home and slept for the next 11 hours. When I woke up, I had a message on my answering machine from Harry. He said he had been called away on an emergency and would be back in New Salem the end of this week, Friday at the latest. I spent all of last weekend reading What Maisie Knew. Have you read it? I thought it was going to be cool and ironic (I don’t know why). Not a bit. It is so cruel, at times I couldn’t go on reading. Maisie’s parents are so awful, so mean, the absolute worst, not counting those who lock their children in closets or put their cigarettes out on their legs. (And I can’t seem to get away from divorce.) But slowly, sanity returned, as it must with James. You have to pay attention to those goddamn sentences.
I won’t do anything about my mother’s letter. I reread my deranged email. You were right. I was jealous. And infantile. Our parents don’t want us to have sex until we’re grown. And we never want them to have it.
Let’s have dinner Tuesday night. I’ll take you and Matt to Racquets. You take such good care of me. What would I do without you? Well, we know the answer to that. I’d ruin everything and make an ass of myself to boot.
Love,
Sophie
TRAYNOR, HAND, WYZANSKI
222 CHURCH STREET
NEW SALEM, NARRAGANSETT 06555
(393) 876-5678
MEMORANDUM
Attorney Work Product
From: Sophie Diehl
To: David Greaves
RE: Letter from Mia Meiklejohn on Settlement Offer
Date: May 3, 1999
Attachments: Letter from MMM
Mia Meiklejohn wrote me a letter responding to the Settlement Offer from her husband. It’s a doozy. Is that the way divorce clients usually respond? She seems to think so. If Jerry Springer ever decides to do a talk show with Mensa members, she’d be a natural. Among my clients, those who show an epistolary bent tend to ramble incoherently, suggesting improbable alibis or character witnesses (I’ve been asked to depose the pope and Hillary Clinton) or attacking the prosecution (one client said the assistant district attorney was prejudiced against him because he had killed two children and she was a mother).
Ms. Meiklejohn’s decision to go to law school strikes me as very sensible. She’s logical and sharp. She did the math, adding up the proposed child support and alimony offers. There can’t be many clients who are able to focus so clearly and so effectively at this stage of a divorce, if ever. (Do you remember she got a valuation on the St. Cloud Street house even before she met with me?) It’s a bit daunting. I don’t think I’ve ever had a client who wasn’t a psychopath who was smarter than I. Or better read. I had to call my mother to find out what she meant by “Cortez upon a peak in Darien.” (Keats, “On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer.” You knew that, didn’t you? Your generation is so much better educated than mine.) It threw me for a loop. I kept thinking of Darien, CT, which made no sense.
Ms. Meiklejohn is coming in Wednesday morning at 10. We’ll hammer out a bottom-line proposal as well as an extravagant counteroffer to send Ray Kahn. She suggested (humorously?) we hire an enforcer. Did she realize that I actually know enforcers, the whole range of hired goons, from stalkers to bone breakers to hit men? With most clients, I’d say no; with Ms. Meiklejohn, who’s to say. She’s one tough cookie.
Did you notice the letterhead? On April 8 (I was so curious that I went back through the docket to find my memo), Ms. Meiklejohn told me she was going to resume her maiden name. In three weeks, she has had new stationery printed up—even though she’s probably going to move out of the St. Cloud house within the next six months. (The envelope only has the address, so she can keep using the old ones. A savings!) Once again, I am reduced to saying admiringly, the rich are different. (Fitzgerald 2; Hemingway 0.)
Bliss is a new king-sized bed. Is that true for men too?
* * *
THE UNIVERSITY OF NARRAGANSETT
SCHOOL OF LAW
The Dean of the University of Narragansett School of Law and Mrs. Seamus FitzGerald request the pleasure of the company of
Ms. Anne Sophie Diehl
at a dinner in honor of
Fiona McGregor, ’85
PARTNER, TRAYNOR, HAND, WYZANSKI
James R. Donaldson, ’70
and
Robert Fenstermacher, ’55
PARTNER, FARROW ALLERTON
SATURDAY, JUNE 5, 1999 AT 7 O’CLOCK IN THE EVENING
HOTEL NARRAGANSETT
74 WHALLEY AVENUE
NEW SALEM, NARRAGANSETT
Black Tie RSVP 393-875-8777
* * *
TRAYNOR, HAND, WYZANSKI
222 CHURCH STREET
NEW SALEM, NARRAGANSETT 06555
(393) 876-5678
MEMORANDUM
Attorney Work Product
From: David Greaves
To: Sophie Diehl
RE: Letter from Mia Meiklejohn on Settlement Offer
Date: May 3, 1999
Attachments:
Mia Meiklejohn’s short math ex
ercise hits the nail on the head. It should go in your letter, right at the top. She’ll make an excellent lawyer. She’s a natural—and she wants to win.
Her letter is more literate and much more literary than most, but substantively, it’s pretty much what you’d expect. Most divorcing clients say terrible things to their lawyers about their spouses. And they say even worse things to each other, often in front of their lawyers. Body parts figure prominently.
She’s right about her father. If we let him loose, he will take Durkheim apart, and as she says, Durkheim won’t know it until it’s over and Bruce Meiklejohn has handed him his head on a tray. (Different body parts, same modus operandi.) He didn’t get to be so successful by ranting against Jews, though early in his career, it may have served him. People underestimate him. Never do that, Sophie. You’ve never met him. Under the right circumstances, he can be highly engaging. Maybe I’ll set up a lunch. It might do you good. It might do him good.
I do know the Keats poem; I read it in English 101 my freshman year at Mather. Maybe we old guys were better educated back then, but that’s no excuse for not having read Keats. And you can’t blame Columbia for not knowing that poem. (Doesn’t Columbia still have a Great Books curriculum?) People over 21 are allowed to read Keats. Your education doesn’t stop when you graduate.
I’m sure she knows you know enforcers. I bet her father knows them too.
I’ve gotten used to the rich; they rarely surprise me anymore. I knew a woman who had monogrammed paper tissues, white with three blue initials. That did surprise me.
Recently divorced women buy new beds; recently divorced men buy big-screen TVs. You tell me what it means.
TRAYNOR, HAND, WYZANSKI
222 CHURCH STREET
NEW SALEM, NARRAGANSETT 06555
(393) 876-5678
ATTORNEYS AT LAW