Little Pink Slips Part 35

"The desserts, please," Cam said. A few Chinese words flew across the room like insects. Sesame rice dumplings, mango pudding, and sticky buns in lotus leaves appeared on a cart beside their small table, which was nestled underneath a window. As Cam leaned forward to check them out, his thigh brushed hers. He poured the last drops of green tea into their cups and raised one. It looked fragile and small in his hand.

"You've been on my mind," he said.

Finally, Magnolia thought. She took a deep breath. "You've been on my mind, too," she admitted.

"I originally called my book The Shy Guy, but the editor changed it," he said. "Deal point." He laughed a musical ba.s.s that Magnolia realized had been an essential background noise in her life for several years. "Shoot me. I'm talking like some L.A. studio exec." He s.h.i.+fted to an imperious voice. "'h.e.l.lo, my name is Trevor, and I demand that my pathetically underpaid a.s.sistant roll my calls the minute people who've tried to reach me walk out of their offices.' "

"Please, don't start walking around, wearing a headset," she said.

"Promise," he said. As Magnolia waited for Cameron to pick up his original train of thought, they heard a bang on the window.

"Get your b.u.t.ts out here," Bebe mouthed through the gla.s.s.

Cam and Magnolia looked at each other. "The queen beckons," he said. Cam paid the bill, and they gathered their coats and umbrellas and met her outside.

"I haven't been to Chinatown in years," Bebe said gaily, her arms filled with large, flimsy plastic sacks. For a woman who, according to every paper and newsmagazine, was worried about a twenty-million dollar investment going south, her spirits were remarkably intact.

"Here, have a bag," she said, handing Magnolia a Gucci knockoff fas.h.i.+oned of industrial-strength vinyl. She c.o.c.ked her head, sized up Cam, and fished out a pimp-worthy faux gold Rolex Oyster, which she attached to his wrist. "For the gentleman," she said.

"Thanks, Bebe," he said. They all began walking back to the court house. "How do you think the trial's going?"

"Are you kidding?" Bebe snorted. "Fabulous! That judge loathes Jock. Can't you see the venom in her eyes?"

"You think?" Cameron said.

"What's your esteemed opinion, Magnolia?" Bebe asked.

"Honest, Bebe, I can't even see the judge's eyes," she said, "with the gla.s.ses and all."

Bebe stopped and scowled at Magnolia. "Why am I asking you any way? I'm not supposed to even talk to either one of you." She ducked into yet another handbag stall. "Later!" she yelled.

Magnolia and Cam reached the courthouse. She returned to her seat, and Cameron joined her. Darlene was now on the stand, explaining her role as Bebe's publisher. "I was in charge of the magazine's business department," she said. "Ad sales and marketing." Magnolia was tuning out Darlene, concentrating only on Cam's closeness-until a doc.u.ment flashed on an overhead screen.

"Is this your pay stub?" the lawyer asked.

"Yes, it is," Darlene said, swelled with both pregnancy and pride.

Magnolia had always suspected Darlene made a lot more money than she did, but with the evidence bigger than life, she sat there, her shoulders hunched, and slumped.

"Could you cringe more quietly?" Cameron whispered. "I can hear your teeth grinding."

"What galls me is she still has a job," Magnolia whispered. Dar lene had been moved to Scary's business development unit, and insiders expected her to soon replace the current publisher of Dazzle. Darlene's paycheck made way for wearying charts of ad revenues, which Darlene interpreted for the lawyer in anesthetizing detail.

"Want to duck out?" Magnolia whispered to Cameron. "Catch a movie at the Angelika?"

"Let's wait a few minutes," he said. "It looks like Bebe's attorney's going to cross-examine." Arthur Montgomery stepped forward.

"Is this your signature?" he asked Darlene.

"Yes, it is," she said. On the screen was a statement from the auditing bureau which tracks magazines' circulations. "I see that Bebe sold 480,500 copies per issue during its year of publication. Is that true?"

Anyone in the courtroom who wasn't blind could see that.

"Yes," Darlene said.

"So, can you explain these figures for me, please?" On the screen, to the right of the statement, a second doc.u.ment appeared, but this one stated that Bebe had sold, on average, only 278,935 copies per issue. Darlene's eyes darted to Jock, the screen, and then to her attorneys.

One of them sprung up from his chair and waved his hand like the smartest kid in the cla.s.s. "I object," he said. "Your honor, I object."

The judge peered down at him. "Would counsel approach the bench, please," she said. All Magnolia could make of the conversa tion-which lasted for a few minutes-were aggressive hand ges tures on the attorney's part. "Counsel may continue," Judge Tannenbaum said to Bebe's lawyer.

"May I remind you, Mrs. Knudson, that you are under oath,"

Arthur Montgomery said. "Which of these two statements is cor rect?"

Darlene mumbled softly.

"Could you speak up for everyone to hear, please?" the judge directed.

Darlene returned to her normal speaking voice. "The one on the right," she blared.

"Now let me understand," Arthur Montgomery said very slowly. "I am reading from the joint-venture agreement." He quoted a jumble of legalese. Magnolia leaned forward in her chair and listened care fully, which wasn't hard, because the courtroom had become silent as a cave.

She turned to Cameron. "Are we hearing what I think we're hear ing?" she said, getting close enough to smell the clean sweetness of his skin. "It sounds like Bebe was allowed to walk away from the mag azine if it sold fewer than 350,000 copies per issue."

"That's exactly what it says," Cameron whispered back. His breath in her ear made her tingle.

"And could you explain this?" the attorney asked. On the screen an e-mail appeared to Darlene from Jock, who directed her to "manage the financials."

Cameron and Magnolia looked at each other and just as she was saying, "Scary goosed the numbers," he noted, "They've been caught red-handed cooking the books." As everyone reached the same con clusion, the courtroom came alive like an Italian soccer game. Felicity dropped her knitting needles, stood up, and high-fived Bebe, who whooped, "Hot d.a.m.n. I knew it. Hot, f.u.c.kin' d.a.m.n!"

"Order in the court," the judge said. "Order in the court." Magno lia got to hear the crash of a gavel after all. "Court will convene tomorrow at ten," Judge Tannenbaum said, finally, in disgust.

As they left Supreme Court, Magnolia and Cam stopped and lis tened to Jock giving an ad hoc press conference. "It's common indus try practice to estimate the sales of a magazine before final numbers are in, and occasionally the two figures differ," he said to a growing audience of reporters. "Scarborough Magazines didn't do anything that every other magazine company doesn't do all the time."

As the statement leaped out of Jock's mouth, Magnolia knew it was destined to become the caption for tomorrow's picture in the Post- perhaps even the epitaph on his professional tombstone. So much for damage control. Elizabeth would probably return to her office and fax her resume to every other publisher in the country.

"Don't you just love magazines?" Cam said to Magnolia.

"I do," she said. "In any other industry, if the president of a com pany stood up and said, 'I cheat. We all cheat. We're an entire industry of liars and cheaters,' he'd be found with two broken legs, groaning and bleeding, in a New Jersey garbage dump."

Magnolia and Cam watched Bebe walk past Jock. She didn't say a word but gave him her most high-voltage smile as she swirled her boa, which almost tickled his face.

"Smile all you want, Bebe," Jock snarled at her. "It's never over till the fat lady sings."

Chapter 4 1.

The Curse of the Perfect Memory.

"I'd sooner miss the Oscars than this," Natalie said airily as she took the seat next to Magnolia. The trial had become a spectator sport for every key Scary employee. As always, Natalie looked camera-ready. Velvet peep-toe pumps showed off her elegant feet and dark red pedicure. Magnolia was fairly sure, however, that if Natalie were photographed in the plaid coat she was wearing today, she'd wind up captioned in one of the Fas.h.i.+on Police columns with "Woof! I liked this better on my ba.s.set hound's bed."

Judge Margaret Ruth Tannenbaum had turned out to be a no-non sense jurist. She was moving along the trial at a whirlwind clip, whack ing lawyers' statements in midsentence. Yesterday, to the amus.e.m.e.nt of another full house, Felicity got her turn as a witness, and today Magnolia expected that Big Mama herself would take the stand. She could imagine no other reason for Bebe to sport a Miss Marple fedora.

The court officer stepped forward. "The plaintiffs call Magnolia Gold," he said. Magnolia froze. "The plaintiffs call Magnolia Gold,"

he shouted out again.

Natalie nudged her. Magnolia knew her name was on the list of witnesses who would be required to testify. By now, however, well into the trial's second week, she'd convinced herself that neither side must feel she could fuel their arguments and maybe she'd be granted a pa.s.s.

She got up out of her chair and sleepwalked to the front. From a remote brain cell the thought occurred to her that at least she was wearing a sober black suit, not a ruffled cancan dress. On her way to the bench, from the corner of her eye, Magnolia saw Bebe offer a thumbs-up.

Magnolia lifted her right hand and swore her oath.

"What is your relations.h.i.+p to Scarborough Magazines?" asked their lead attorney.

Magnolia doubted adversarial was the answer they wanted. "Could you clarify the question, please?" she asked.

"I believe Counsel wants to know your work history and current a.s.sociation with the company," the judge said.

"Currently, I am no longer employed at the company, but before it was turned into Bebe I was the editor in chief of Lady magazine," Magnolia began.

"Solid magazine," Judge Tannenbaum interrupted. "My mother always subscribed, and so did I."

"We had four million readers," Magnolia said.

"I liked those little paper dolls."

"That was McCall's," Magnolia pointed out but continued to beam. "I get them all mixed up."

"Everyone does."

As this homey banter continued, the Scarborough attorney glow ered. Judge Tannenbaum eventually gestured for him to continue.

"Can you, please, explain why Lady was turned into a magazine for Bebe Blake?" he asked.

"No," Magnolia answered.

"Shall I clarify? Can you explain why the failing financials of Lady paved the way for Bebe?"

"I can't," Magnolia said. She looked at the judge to see if she was allowed to continue. Judge Tannenbaum nodded. "You see, the maga zine wasn't failing. Our newsstand sales were reasonably strong, and according to the business meetings I was invited to, we were prof itable."

"Then can you explain this?" the attorney asked. A doc.u.ment appeared on the overhead screen showing that Lady, in the last year of her life, clearly belonged in a financial hospice.

"No," she said. "I can't."

"Shall we call an expert witness to interpret these figures?"

Magnolia was quite certain no one missed his tone of condescension. "I understand them," she said. "I can't explain them."

"Why not?" the attorney asked petulantly.

"Because they conflict with these," she said. From her Tod's tote, Magnolia pulled out her own white rabbit, Darlene's update from the final Lady business review. It was Wally who insisted she open and sort the tower of boxes sent from Scary that had been collecting dust in her foyer. With Sasha's help, she spent the better part of the previ ous weekend digging through them.

"According to this memo," Magnolia said, handing it to the attor ney, "the magazine wasn't losing money."

Scary's lawyer put on his reading gla.s.ses and examined the memo.

As he huddled with Jock, Darlene, and the other Scarborough law yers, Magnolia strained, unsuccessfully, to hear their conversation.

There were several minutes of animated discussion after which Mag nolia's memo was labeled and entered as evidence. Then the lawyer looked at the judge and said, "We are finished with this witness."

Magnolia's hands were trembling so obviously, she grabbed both sides of the chair. Under her jacket, her starched white s.h.i.+rt felt damp.

"Mr. Montgomery, do you care to cross-examine?" the judge asked.

"Thank you," he said in his courtliest Southern accent. "I do."

Arthur Montgomery stood in front of Magnolia and clasped his hands behind his back. His genial smile revealed his large teeth. "Miss Gold, did you support the concept of turning Lady into Bebe?"

Magnolia thought back to the previous June's original meeting, the lunacy of which she could recall as if it had happened the day before.

"No," she replied, "I did not." As she spoke the words, she could feel the blitzkrieg of Bebe's menace roll toward her like World War III.

"When Scarborough Magazines presented the idea to you, what, exactly, did you say?" Magnolia hesitated. She reminded herself she was obligated to tell the truth.

"I said that Bebe didn't stand for anything bigger than herself, that she was a collection of interests that didn't add up to a clear vision for a magazine." The courtroom had become quiet except for Felicity's saying, "That little ferret."

"Was there anything else you said about my client, Miss Blake?"

the attorney asked.

There are times in life when a perfect memory is a curse. "That she could be a player," Magnolia said. She was certain she'd used that word instead of nympho, s.l.u.t, or child molester. "And difficult to work with." Magnolia began to hear laughter, which started lightly and multiplied with such volume that Judge Tannenbaum got another chance to exercise her gavel. "Order," the judge demanded as she crashed it on the bench. "Order."

The room complied.

"Did you become an editor on the magazine?"

"Yes," Magnolia said.

"Mr. Montgomery, is there a point here?" the judge asked.

"Yes, your honor." A smile broadened on his sharp, lupine face.