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.Anyway, 30he told me that Madeleine —”31“I’m sorry, Ms.Paine, I don’t mean to interrupt, but are you talk-32ing about Hercules Spivak?”33Spivak.Kate realized that she’d never known Hercules’s last ort 34name.“How did you —”reg 35“Let’s say his name has come up a few times.” Valencia’s voice 9858_02_153-356_r6jm.qxd 9/28/00 3:59 PM Page 167E Q U I V O C A L D E A T H1 6 7was dry.“We spoke to him.At his loft.” She paused.Kate tried to 1imagine Valencia’s reaction to Hercules’s artistic oeuvre.Had she 2noticed the Barbie doll?3“Then this probably isn’t anything new.It’s just that he used to 4be a paralegal at Samson.I didn’t know that before.He worked 5with Madeleine.He also cut her hair.She was actually his first 6Samson client.”7“I see.” said Valencia.Her tone was neutral.Kate couldn’t tell if 8she was surprised.“Aside from his prior acquaintance with Ms.9Waters, is there anything else about this man that seems signifi-10cant to you?”11“Well, if you were down at his loft, you probably noticed 12his.artwork.”13“Yes.” Again, the same dispassionate tone.14“There was this one piece that caught my eye,” Kate said.“A 15Barbie doll that sort of reminded me of Madeleine.It was partly 16the coloring, I guess — pale skin and dark hair.Also, the way that 17the hair was arranged, sort of rippling out from her head.Anyway, 18he’d done this really brutal thing to the doll, stabbing her again and 19again with knitting needles.There must have been six or seven of 20them, sticking out from the body.And it made me think.”21Kate’s voice trailed off.22“I did see the doll,” Valencia said.Her voice had softened a bit.23“Ms.Paine, do you have any reason to think that Hercules had any 24recent dealings with Ms.Waters?”25“No.Like I said, it’s probably nothing.”26“Is there anything else that comes to mind, anything that wor-27ries you?”28Kate paused for a moment, recalling Hercules’s looming form as 29he watched her descend the stairs.“No,” she said finally.“I don’t 30think so.”31“Well, please don’t hesitate to call back if you think of anything 32else.We need all the help we can get.Oh, and Ms.Paine? I 33wouldn’t want you to worry too much about Mr.Spivak.He was 34 shout of town the night that Ms.Waters was killed.”35 re9858_02_153-356_r6jm.qxd 9/28/00 3:59 PM Page 1681 6 8A M Y G U T M A N1As she hung up the phone, Kate was feeling sheepish.Andrea 2was right: she needed to get a grip.She returned her attention to 3the memo, erasing all other thoughts.4She’d been working intently for some time when she was star-5tled by a knock on the door.6“Greetings,” said Peyton.“Hope I didn’t frighten you.”7Already, Kate felt at a slight disadvantage.Peyton had a way of 8doing that.Today, he was wearing a dark suit and bow tie, along 9with a pair of tiny glasses with hexagonal steel-rimmed frames.10The glasses were a calculated risk, an ironic twist to the starched 11propriety of his clothing.Against all odds, it seemed to work.12“So let’s see what you have.” Peyton settled into a chair and 13folded his hands before him.Kate recognized the gesture immedi-14ately: vintage Carter Mills.15“I’ve summarized the relevant law on sexual harassment,” Kate 16said, handing him her current draft.“I’m still finishing up one sec-17tion — the standard by which a claim is evaluated.Basically, the 18conduct at issue has to be both subjectively and objectively outra-19geous.In other words, it’s not enough that a given plaintiff was 20outraged by what happened if a so-called reasonable woman would 21not also have been.And vice versa.If a reasonable woman would 22have been outraged, but this particular plaintiff would not have 23been — again, there’s no cause of action.”24“So, if we could show that Friedman was less sensitive than most 25women to sexually aggressive conduct, that should help us, right?”26“Exactly.”27“And what about the state law claims?”28“I’m still looking into them.”29“What can you tell me so far?”30Kate glanced at her notes.“In the first section, I’ve considered 31the various grounds on which we could move for pretrial dismissal 32of the sexual harassment claims.”33“And?”ort 34“I don’t think we have any really strong arguments.The action reg 359858_02_153-356_r6jm.qxd 9/28/00 3:59 PM Page 169E Q U I V O C A L D E A T H1 6 9is timely.Well within the statute of limitations.And Friedman 1properly filed with the EEOC before moving to federal court.”2“So where does that leave us?”3“As I see it, we have two main avenues of defense.First, we’ll 4want to show that Friedman had no problem with Thorpe’s behav-5ior.That she was a willing participant in whatever went on.That 6in itself should dispose of her claim.Second, as I was just saying, 7we’ll argue that Thorpe’s conduct wasn’t outrageous.And that, 8even if it might have been seen that way by some women, it 9wouldn’t have been seen that way by Friedman.Based on what 10Carter says — and on our meeting yesterday with Linda Morris —11I think we’ll have strong arguments on all of these points.Still, 12they’re all factual issues, and that means we can’t get a pretrial dis-13missal.”14“What’s this about the First Amendment?” Peyton was pointing 15to a footnote.16“It’s a thought I had,” Kate said.She felt a surge of intellectual 17pleasure in Peyton’s quick grasp of the issues.He’d rapidly zeroed in 18on the one innovative section of what was, for the most part, a 19pedestrian summary of current law.20“It’s like this,” Kate said.“To prevail on her sexual harassment 21claim, Friedman has to show that Thorpe’s advances were unwel-22come.My point is that this kind of factual showing should be a lot 23more difficult here than it would be in other workplace situations.24Everyone knows that Catch is basically a sex magazine.When 25Friedman took a job at Catch, she had to assume that the work-26place atmosphere would be sexualized [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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