by Susan Wolfe
“This is bad, isn’t it?” Georgia asked in a low voice as she and Quan and Ken headed down the corridor.
“It has the potential to be very bad,” Ken agreed. He paused outside his office and looked at them. “Should I be in those meetings tomorrow?”
“Won’t that make it seem like what they have to say is relevant?” Quan asked. “ ‘Not relevant’ is a cleaner message.”
“I think so, too. I must not be expressing it very well.”
“It would be great for the company if that were the problem,” Quan remarked mildly.
Ken looked at Quan’s calm, impassive face for an instant and then snorted. “Okay, guys, another fine day to be alive and working in the Lumina Software legal department. Let’s go wrestle our alligators.”
Thursday was the last day before discovery cutoff in the SAP patent case, and at 10 a.m. Georgia ducked into a conference room to call Jim Prizine on his cell. “Jim, it’s Georgia. Today’s the big day, so I’m just checking in. Have you seen Mrs. Important-slash-Busy?”
“I won’t see her today, Georgia. I’m here in Boston for my cousin’s wedding.”
“You’re where?”
“Boston. Just landed. Didn’t Archibald Moss tell you?”
Surely impossible. “Tell me what, Jim? Why are you talking to Archibald Moss?”
“He called me. Said Paul Holder, one of your board members, wanted to know how the patent was coming. Explained that he’s in charge of intellectual property for the company, and that it was too late to get the patent into the lawsuit. So I talked to him about coming to Boston for my cousin’s wedding, and he told me to go for it.”
Georgia had to loosen her grip on the receiver to stop her hand from hurting. “Okay, first of all, Archibald Moss has nothing to do with this lawsuit. That’s why Ken never told you about him. Second of all, he’s the person who didn’t keep track of the patent and let it be lost for a hundred years. Third of all, if you’re in Boston for your cousin’s wedding, then who’s sitting outside Important-slash-Busy’s door waiting to leap up and get her to give you the seal?”
“Actually . . . nobody.” He sounded sheepish. “Sounds like maybe you guys have your wires crossed. Archibald Moss said it was too late to get the patent into the lawsuit, and he didn’t like to see work interfere with family obligations. That’s why I’m here.”
When she got this angry her muscles locked, and the air sort of rippled.
“Jim, nothing about the status of this patent has changed. Every day has been precious to us, and this is the most precious day of all. We’re desperate. I know this probably seems horrible, but if you aren’t actually in your cousin’s wedding, would you please, please get back on a plane and head to the PTO as fast as you can? I’m holding out hope we might still get the patent issued today.”
“Can I just ask? Why do you and Moss have such different ideas about the urgency of this?”
“Because only one of us inhabits Planet Earth. Time is evidently more plentiful wherever Archibald lives. Can I get Ken to call you back in the next ninety seconds? No reason you should do this on my say-so.”
“No need, Georgia. I’m still in the airport, and I’m walking to a ticket counter now.” She heard a gasp through the phone, followed by a woman’s urgent question. “I really screwed this up by not confirming with you about Moss,” Jim continued. “I hope we haven’t lost a day because of it.”
“Not a day, Jim, the day. The only one left. And we haven’t lost it yet. Text me the minute you get to the PTO, okay?” She hung up.
“Georgia,” Maggie said, sticking her head in a few minutes later. “Are you okay in here? If you keep glaring at that phone you’re gonna melt it.”
Georgia lifted her eyes without moving her head, and made herself inhale. “Momentary loss of perspective, Maggie,” she managed to declare through her tightly constricted throat. “You know what? I think I’ll stay in here a bit and do my mountain meditation. Would you mind closing the door?” In Arkansas her father kept their meditation private, but here it was practically a badge of honor.
Sure enough, twenty minutes later she felt refreshed and clear. Two truths were now evident: First, Archibald Moss’s vigorous incompetence had defeated their monumental efforts to Swiftly Acquire Patent. Second, Lumina Software was about to receive a clean-up service she was peculiarly qualified to provide.
CHAPTER 11
She was marching with conviction to Archibald’s office the next morning when Ken called out to her from his office. “Georgia! Come on in. Maggie’s looking for you.” It wasn’t like Ken to call out like that. He thought it was impolite. Couldn’t be the old news that they had failed in their efforts to Swiftly Acquire Patent in time for the patent case. She hurried in to see what had happened.
Must not be anything bad. Ken and Zack were tilted back in their chairs like a couple of satisfied gluttons after a big meal. Ken sat up when she entered and announced, “Big news, Georgia. Zack and I just got off the phone with our outside lawyers defending the SAP case. They’ve looked at your International Trade Commission idea, and they want to file the new lawsuit.”
So Ingenious Tricky Countersuit was going to happen.
Zack was grinning, his hands resting comfortably on top of his head. “In fact, they’ve decided they’re real geniuses for thinking it up.”
Ken laughed. “Some things never change, do they? Anyway, they’re pulling together the complaint and the injunction papers now, and need some help checking on facts. Are you available?”
Now Georgia was grinning, too. “Of course I’m available. This is fabulous.” And it was. Archie had slammed one door, but they’d managed to pry open another one.
“Good. I said you and Zack would call them back in ten minutes. The idea is to deliver the papers to Jim Prizine in forty-eight hours. The minute the PTO issues our patent, he takes a taxi across town and files with the ITC.”
“How do you know they’re going to issue it?” Zack asked pleasantly, pushing his glasses up his nose with his middle finger. “Is somebody spread-eagled on top of Archie Moss?”
Ken’s look turned sober. “God, Zack, I know how frustrated you must be. It’s frustrating to me, too, but we have to move past it. Jim’s onto him now, he’ll never listen to another word Archie says.” He ducked his head and half-swallowed a laugh. “You know, though, let’s not tell Archie about the ITC action till after it’s filed.” Zack didn’t join in the laugh, and why should he, Georgia thought. It tarnished her satisfaction to see Ken looking weak again.
“I want Jim to call us from the ITC steps just as soon as the action is filed,” Ken continued. “Zack, can you take the lead on the press release?” He turned to Georgia. “If this succeeds, you’ll deserve the gratitude of this entire company. Now that we finally have something worthwhile to do, let’s get going.”
Her idea had worked, she exulted as she hurried down the hallway behind Zack. Ha! They could use the new patent after all, despite the antics of Archie Moss. What a gratifying way of helping the company, right out in the open where Ken could know about it. Maybe this really could make her seem indispensable, and not a moment too soon. Katie-Ann was heading to California in three days, and Georgia’s financial responsibilities would really kick in.
Did this mean she could forget about trying to rein in Archie for now? No, she decided, exactly the opposite. Now that she had the Ingenious Tricky Countersuit to protect, the visit to Archie was more urgent than ever. She’d head over there right after this call to the patent lawyers.
She knocked politely against the frame of his open door. “Archie?”
He was seated behind his desk, cigar smoke curling around his wide nostrils and up over his corn-colored hair. “Georgia! Savior! My knight-ess in shining armor!” As he spread his arms wide in greeting, a few flakes of cigar ash fell onto his carpet. “Come right in and have a seat.”
“Okay if I close the door?”
He arms dropped heavily onto his desk
and his smile faded. “Uh-oh. You mad about the ’401 again?”
“The patent?” She waved a hand dismissively as she closed the door. The My Little Ponies dotting the rollaway looked limp and defeated. “Nah, I’ve let it go. I mean, what’s the point? The judge was never going to let a whole new patent in on the last day of discovery, anyway.”
“Happy to see my superior perspective is finally rubbing off. You might share it with your buddy, Zack, by the way. He seems a little put out by the whole thing.”
“Does he?”
“Very disappointing. I thought we were all grown men here.”
“I know you did. He’ll get over it. Anyway, I’m here on a whole different subject. Something social,” she confided, tugging his visitor chair a little closer to his desk as she sat down.
“Social?”
She pressed the heels of her hands against her eyes, which were already burning from the smoke. “Yeah. Remember that first night we met at the Saloon? You were saying how hard it can be to know if somebody’s interested in you romantically.”
“Yeah. Don’t remind me. Just look what happened the other night.”
“Well, that was different. That lady seemed very interested, she was just unavailable. But after what happened, it occurred to me you might be happier if you had a steady girlfriend.”
“No kidding. Safer, too. Why? You have someone in mind?” He bared his yellow teeth in a rakish grin and tapped his cigar against the rim of the ash tray.
“I might,” she said with a slight shrug. “If you’re interested. You know who Lucy Feiffer is?”
“Lucy. Certainly. Lucy in HR.”
“Well, I happen to know she thinks you’re hot.”
“Really? I had no idea. She’s very pretty.”
“I thought you might have missed the signals, and you wouldn’t want to waste another opportunity. The thing is, she’s on the shy side and a little uptight, so it takes a fairly assertive person to get her to respond. She really needs someone to push through her shyness and sweep her off her feet. She’s drawn to nice men, but then she complains they have trouble being as, you know, assertive as she wants. Oh, this is a little embarrassing.”
“She would be foolish to think that about me. I’m a grown man. I can be very assertive if I know it’s what the lady wants.”
“Really?”
“Absolutely.” He leaned back and blew a smoke ring.
“Well, and do you like Lucy?”
He spread his arms expansively. “I like all pretty women. She’d be fine.”
“Well, if that’s the case . . .”
“By the way, assertive in what way, exactly?”
“Well . . .” Georgia hesitated. “I don’t mean hurting her, of course, or anything physical. All I really mean is she, um, sort of likes dirty talk. You know Henry Miller?”
“Yeah. Saw his play once. Very depressing.”
“Actually, that might be Arthur. Henry’s a different guy. Henry Miller lived in Paris for a while, and he wrote the book called Tropic of Cancer. You heard of it?”
“No.”
“Well, anyway, Lucy loves Paris, and she really loves the language of that book.”
He shrugged. “Okay. Anything in particular?”
“Well, if you want you can google ‘Henry Miller’ and just say ‘six inches’ and ‘bone’. You’ll see the kind of thing Lucy goes for.”
“You don’t just wanna tell me?”
Georgia held up a flat palm, and gave her lowered head an embarrassed little shake.
“Hold on,” he said, setting his cigar in the ashtray and turning to his keyboard. He studied his screen, punched his keyboard a few times and then studied some more. While she waited, smoke spiraled lazily into the air and then bent into an unmistakable beeline for her face.
“You kidding me? She wants me to say that? Not very romantic.” Suddenly she felt mortified by how ridiculous it all sounded. Come on, even a numb-nut like Archie was too smart for this crap. What on earth had she been thinking? She almost groaned with humiliation.
Maybe she could still back-peddle. “I mean, I just thought it could be an example . . .”
“Wow,” he said appreciatively, turning to grin at her. “Who knew?” He shrugged. “If it works for the lady it works for me.”
“Really? She’d like that.” She coughed as the smoke touched the tip of her nose and began to fan sideways across her cheeks.
“I’ll have to sort of build up to it over time, though, won’t I?”
“No, no,” she said, coughing and fanning the air. “Not sure that would even work. The thing that excites her is knowing she’s driving a man wild. So just put it right out there, and I’m pretty sure she’ll take it from there.”
“I’d be happy to take her out this weekend.”
“Perfect. Or, you know what?”
“What?”
“Tomorrow’s her birthday. Her sister was coming to see her, but then the sister’s baby got sick. So I was going to cook dinner at her place, but wouldn’t it be a nice surprise if you showed up instead of me?”
He shook his head. “Don’t know how to cook.” Georgia smiled gently. “Oh, I get it, maybe if it’s me we won’t have to cook. I can take her somewhere after. Shall I tell her you sent me?”
“Oh, don’t give me the credit. Just let it be that you’ve been thinking about her, and could no longer stay away. It would be so great if the two of you got started on the right foot. Just say it like you mean it, okay?”
“Don’t worry. I can be very dramatic.” He took a giant drag on his cigar and then exhaled through a smirk.
“I’m sure you can, Archie. Maybe have a couple of other, you know, similar remarks in reserve, just in case. Let your words work their magic, and then just follow her lead. I know that’s important to her. I was supposed to get there about 6:30. 1201 White Oak Avenue here in San Jose. She’s in number 14.” She peered through the smoke to make sure he wrote it down correctly, and then stood up.
He turned back to his computer screen and tapped the ash from his cigar. “You’re sure about this. Sounds kind of, I don’t know, aggressive.”
She held both palms up vertically, fingers spread in a gesture of full disclosure. “Let’s just say I’m as sure as I was about the boyfriend.”
“Good enough for me. Thanks, Georgia. If this pans out I’ll owe you a whole barrel of scotch.”
Did scotch even come in barrels, she wondered as she headed back to her building. She wished he’d been slightly less grateful. Too bad he wasn’t an out-and-out crook instead of just a relentless, serial fuck-up.
But he really was relentless. And serial. He’d wrecked their patent case as surely as if he’d been trying, and would wreck the Ingenious Tricky Countersuit with equal oblivion if she didn’t stop him. Do your work and step back. Time to turn her attention to those facts for the new lawsuit.
The next morning she strung a homemade “Do not disturb” sign over the corner of her cube while she chased down a few final facts for the ITC complaint. She still needed to confirm the approximate value of all software sold by SAP into the U.S. in the last five calendar years, and so far all she could find was fiscal year . . . She ignored the phone for the first three rings, then changed her mind and snatched it up just before it went into voicemail.
“Will you accept a collect call from Katie-Ann Griffin?”
Georgia went on hyper-alert. “I will, operator. Thank you. Katie-Ann, is that you?”
Katie-Ann was crying. “Georgia, the money’s gone.”
“The money for your ticket?”
“Yes, and the extra.”
“Are you sure? Where was it?”
“Really sure. I had it in the back of our closet, in the jewelry box Daddy gave me. The jewelry box is right where I left it, but the money’s gone. Over three hundred dollars, and nothing left but the pennies. I think Mama found my hiding place and just drank it.”
Georgia was mindful that Beatrice�
�s cube had gone very quiet. She lowered her voice. “When was the last time you saw it?”
“Two days ago. I put my tip money in there every day as soon as Mama leaves for work, but she didn’t go yesterday.”
“Did you count it two days ago?”
“No, I haven’t counted it since last week. Oh, Georgia, what’s the difference? I have no way to get there now. What’ll we do?”
Georgia considered. If Mama had ‘borrowed’ the money for whiskey, she probably would have done it little by little to keep from being noticed. If she took the whole thing at once, maybe she’d gone to Johnny with it to get his advice about what Katie-Ann was up to. Damn those AA people. “Was Johnny there last night when you got home?”
“They were talking in the TV room with the door closed.”
Why hadn’t they mentioned the money to Katie-Ann? She felt a chill across the back of her neck.
“Katie-Ann, how much money do you have now?”
“About twenty-two dollars in cash, and my paycheck for forty-seven.”
“Good. Here’s what I want you to do. Put on your uniform like you’re going to work, but then call and tell them you’re sick. You need to get out of there today. Take some food that will keep for a day or two, but don’t clean the place out so it gives you away. Cash your check at the bank, and then try to be on the 5:30 bus to Little Rock. Can you collect your clothes and get there in time?”
“Yes, if I hurry.”
“Take your jacket. The bus might get cold. Try to change out of your uniform so you won’t be conspicuous. The minute you get to Little Rock, call me collect again. I’ll figure something out in the meantime.”
“I’m scared, Georgia. What’ll I do in Little Rock with no money?”
“I’ll figure something out, Katie-Ann. Whose daughter are you?”
“George Griffin’s daughter. Same as you.”