The King of Torts

41

After eleven days of confinement, Clay was finally set free. A lighter cast was placed on his left leg, and, though he couldn’t walk, he could at least maneuver a little. Paulette pushed his wheelchair out of the hospital to a rented van driven by Oscar. Fifteen minutes later, they rolled him into his town house and locked the door. Paulette and Miss Glick had turned the downstairs den into a temporary bedroom. His phones, fax, and computer had been moved to a folding table near his bed. His clothes were stacked neatly on plastic shelves by the fireplace.

For the first two hours he was home, he read mail and financial reports and clippings, but only what Paulette had screened. Most of what had been printed about Clay was kept away from him.

Later, after a nap, he sat at the kitchen table with Paulette and Oscar announced that it was time to start.

The unraveling began.

The first issue was his law firm. Crittle had managed to trim a few costs, but the overhead was still galloping along at a million bucks a month. With no current revenues, and none expected, immediate layoffs were unavoidable. They went down a list of the employees — lawyers, paralegals, secretaries, clerks, gofers — and made the painful cuts. Though they considered the Maxatil cases worthless, it would still take work to close the files. Clay kept four lawyers and four paralegals for the job. He was determined to honor every contract he’d signed with his employees, but to do so would eat up some badly needed cash.

Clay looked at the names of the employees who had to go, and it made him ill. “I want to sleep on this,” he said, unable to make the final decision.

“Most of them are expecting it, Clay,” Paulette said.

He stared at the names and tried to imagine the gossip that had been raging about him in the halls of his own firm.

Two days earlier, Oscar had reluctantly agreed to go to New York and meet with Helen Warshaw. He had presented a broad picture of Clay Carter’s assets and potential liabilities, and basically begged for mercy. His boss did not want to file for bankruptcy, but if pushed too hard by Ms. Warshaw he would have no choice. She had been unimpressed. Clay was a member of a group of lawyers, her defendants, with a combined net worth that she estimated at $1.5 billion. She could not allow Clay to settle his cases for, say, a meager $1 million each, when the same cases against Patton French might fetch three times that much. Plus, she was not in a settling mood. The trial would be an important one — a bold effort at reforming abuses in the system, a media-hyped spectacle. She planned to savor every moment of it.

Oscar returned to D.C. with his tail between his legs, certain that Helen Warshaw, as the lawyer for Clay’s biggest group of creditors, wanted blood!

The dreaded word bankruptcy had first been uttered by Rex Crittle in Clay’s hospital room. It had cut through the air like a bullet and landed like a mortar. Then it was used again. Clay began saying it, but only to himself. Paulette said it once. Oscar had used it in New York. It didn’t fit and they didn’t like it, but over the past week it had become part of their vocabulary.

The office lease could be terminated, through bankruptcy.

The employment contracts could be compromised, through bankruptcy.

The Gulfstream could be sent back on better terms, through bankruptcy.

The disgruntled Maxatil clients could be stiff-armed, through bankruptcy.

The disgruntled Hanna plaintiffs could be convinced to settle, through bankruptcy.

And, most important, Helen Warshaw could be reined in, through bankruptcy.

Oscar was almost as depressed as Clay, and after a few hours of misery he left for the office. Paulette rolled Clay outside and onto the small patio where they had a cup of green tea with honey. “I got two things to say,” she said, sitting very close and staring at him. “First, I’m going to give you some of my money.”

“No you’re not.”

“Yes I am. You made me rich when you didn’t have to. I can’t help it that you’re a stupid white boy who’s lost his ass, but I still love you. I’m going to help you, Clay,”

“Can you believe this, Paulette?”

“No. It’s beyond belief, but it’s true. It’s happened. And things’ll get much worse before they get better. Don’t read the papers, Clay. Please. Promise me that.”

“Don’t worry.”

“I’m going to help you. If you lose everything, I’ll be around to make sure you’re okay.”

“I don’t know what to say.”

“Say nothing.”

They held hands and Clay fought back tears. A moment passed. “Number two,” she said. “I’ve been talking to Rebecca. She’s afraid to see you because she might get caught. She’s got a new cell phone, one her husband knows nothing about. She gave me the number. She wants you to call her.”

“Female advice please?”

“Not from me. You know how I feel about that Russian hussy. Rebecca’s a sweet girl, but she’s got some baggage, to put it mildly. You’re on your own.”

“Thanks for nothing.”

“You’re welcome. She wanted you to call her this afternoon. Husband’s out of town or something. I’ll leave in a few minutes.”

Rebecca Parked around the corner and hustled down Dumbarton Street to Clay’s door. She was not good at sneaking around; neither was he. The first thing they decided was that they would not continue it.

She and Jason Myers had decided to dissolve their marriage amicably. He had initially wanted to seek counseling and delay a divorce, but he also preferred to work eighteen hours a day, whether in D.C., New York, Palo Alto, or Hong Kong. His massive firm had offices in thirty-two cities, and he had clients around the world. Work was more important than anything else. He’d simply left her, with no apologies and with no plans to change his ways. The papers would be filed in two days. She was already packing her bags. Jason would keep the condo; she had been vague on where she would go. In less than a year of marriage, they had accumulated little. He was a partner who made $800,000 a year, but she wanted none of his money.

According to Rebecca, her parents had not interfered. They had not had the opportunity. Myers didn’t like them, which was no surprise, and Clay suspected that one reason he preferred the firm’s branch office in Hong Kong was because it was so far away from the Van Horns.

Both had a reason to run. Clay would not, under any circumstances, remain in D.C. in the years to come. His humiliation was too raw and deep, and there was a big world out there where people didn’t know him. He craved anonymity. For the first time in her life, Rebecca just wanted to get away — away from a bad marriage, away from her family, away from the country club and the insufferable people who went there, away from the pressures of making money and accumulating stuff, away from McLean and the only friends she’d ever known.

It took an hour for Clay to get her in the bed, but sex was impossible, with the casts and all. He just wanted to hold her and kiss her and make up for lost time.

She spent the night and decided not to leave. Over coffee the next morning, Clay began with Tequila Watson and Tarvan and told her everything.

Paulette and Oscar returned with more unpleasantries from the office. Some instigator up in Howard County was encouraging the homeowners to file ethics complaints against Clay for the botched Hanna settlement. Several dozen had been received by the D.C. Bar. Six lawsuits had been filed against Clay, all by the same attorney who was actively soliciting more. Clay’s office was finalizing a settlement plan to be put before the judge in the Hanna bankruptcy. Oddly enough, the firm might be awarded a fee, though one far less than what Clay had turned down.

There was an urgent Warshaw motion to take the depositions of several of the Dyloft plaintiffs. Urgency was required because they were dying, and their video depositions would be crucial to the trial, which was expected in about a year. To employ the usual defense tactics of stall, delay, postponement, and outright procrastination would have been enormously unfair to these plaintiffs. Clay agreed to the schedule of depositions suggested by Ms. Warshaw, though he had no plans to attend them.

Under pressure from Oscar, Clay finally agreed to lay off ten lawyers and most of the paralegals, secretaries, and clerks. He signed letters to every one of them — brief and very apologetic. He took full responsibility for the demise of his firm.

Frankly, there was no one else to blame.

A letter to the Maxatil clients was hammered out. In it, Clay recapped the Mooneyham trial in Phoenix. He held to the belief that the drug was dangerous, but proving causation would now be “very difficult, if not impossible.” The company was not willing to consider an out-of-court settlement, and, given Clay’s current medical problems, he was not in a position to prepare for an extended trial.

He hated to use his beating as an excuse, but Oscar prevailed. It sounded believable in the letter. At this low point in his career, he had to grab whatever advantage he could find.

He was therefore releasing each client, and doing so in sufficient time for each to hire another lawyer and pursue Goffman. He even wished them luck.

The letters would cause a storm of controversy. “We’ll handle it,” Oscar kept saying. “At least we’ll be rid of these people.”

Clay couldn’t help but think of Max Pace, his old pal who’d gotten him into the Maxatil business. Pace, one of at least five aliases, had been indicted for securities fraud, but had not been found. His indictment claimed that he used insider information to sell almost a million shares of Goffman before Clay filed suit. Later, he covered his sale and slipped out of the country with around $15 million. Run, Max, run. If he was caught and hauled back for a trial he might spill all their dirty secrets.

There were a hundred other details on Oscar’s checklist, but Clay grew weary.

“Am I playing nurse tonight?” Paulette whispered in the kitchen.

“No, Rebecca’s here.”

“You love trouble, don’t you?”

“She’s filing for divorce tomorrow. An uncontested divorce.”

“What about the bimbo?”

“She’s history if she ever comes back from St. Barth.”

For the next week, Clay never left his town house. Rebecca packed all of Ridley’s things into 30-gallon trash bags and stuffed them in the basement. She moved in some of her own stuff, though Clay warned her that he was about to lose the house. She cooked wonderful meals and nursed him whenever he needed it. They watched old movies until midnight, then slept late every morning. She drove him to see his doctor.

Ridley called every other day from the island. Clay did not tell her she’d lost her place; he preferred to do that in person, when and if she returned. The renovation was coming along nicely, though Clay had seriously curtailed the budget. She seemed oblivious to his financial problems.

The last lawyer to enter Clay’s life was Mark Munson, a bankruptcy expert who specialized in large, messy, individual crashes. Crittle had found him. After Clay retained him, Crittle showed him the books, the leases, the contracts, the lawsuits, the assets, and the liabilities. Everything. When Munson and Crittle came to the town house, Clay asked Rebecca to leave. He wanted to spare her the gruesome details.

In the seventeen months since he’d left OPD, Clay had earned $121 million in fees — $30 million had been paid to Rodney, Paulette, and Jonah as bonuses; $20 million had gone for office expenses and the Gulfstream; $16 million down the drain for advertising and testing for Dyloft, Maxatil, and Skinny Bens; $34 million for taxes, either paid or accrued; $4 million for the villa; $3 million for the sailboat. A million here and there — the town house, the “loan” to Max Pace, and the usual and expected extravagances of the newly rich.

Jarrett’s fancy new catamaran was an interesting issue. Clay had paid for it, but the Bahamian company that held its title was owned completely by his father. Munson thought the bankruptcy court might take one of two positions — either it was a gift, which would require Clay to pay gift taxes, or it was simply owned by someone else and thus not part of Clay’s estate. Either way, the boat remained the property of Jarrett Carter.

Clay had also earned $7.1 million trading in Ackerman stock, and though some of this was buried offshore it was about to be hauled back. “If you hide assets you go to jail,” Munson lectured, leaving little doubt that he did not tolerate such thinking.

The balance sheet showed a net worth of approximately $19 million, with few creditors. However, the contingent liabilities were catastrophic. Twenty-six former clients were now suing for the Dyloft fiasco. That number was expected to rise, and though it was impossible to throw darts at the value of each case, Clay’s legitimate exposure was significantly more than his net worth. The Hanna class-action plaintiffs were festering and getting organized. The Maxatil backlash would be nasty and prolonged. None of those expenses could be predicted either.

“Let the bankruptcy trustee deal with it,” Munson said. “You’ll walk away with the shirt on your back, but at least you won’t owe anything.”

“Gee thanks,” Clay said, still thinking about the sailboat. If they were successful in keeping it away from the bankruptcy, then Jarrett could sell it, buy something smaller, and Clay could have some cash to live on.

After two hours with Munson and Crittle, the kitchen table was covered with spreadsheets and printouts and discarded notes, a debris-strewn testament to the past seventeen months of his life. He was ashamed of his greed and embarrassed by his stupidity. It was sickening what the money had done to him.

The thought of leaving helped him survive each day.

Ridley called from St. Barth with the alarming news that a FOR SALE sign had appeared in front of “their” villa.

“That’s because it’s now for sale,” Clay said.

“I don’t understand.”

“Come home and I’ll explain it to you.”

“Is there trouble?”

“You might say that.”

After a long pause, she said, “I prefer to stay here.”

“I can’t make you come home, Ridley.”

“No, you can’t.”

“Fine. Stay in the villa until it sells. I don’t care.”

“How long will that be?”

He could see her doing everything imaginable to sabotage a potential sale. At the moment, Clay just didn’t care. “Maybe a month, maybe a year. I don’t know.”

“I’m staying,” she said.

“Fine.”

Rodney found his old friend sitting on the front steps of his picturesque town house, crutches by his side, a shawl over his shoulders to knock off the autumn chill. The wind was spinning leaves in circles along Dumbarton Street.

“Need some fresh air,” Clay said. “I’ve been locked in there for three weeks.”

“How are the bones?” Rodney asked, as he sat beside him and looked at the street.

“Healing nicely.”

Rodney had left the city and become a real suburbanite. Khakis and sneakers, a fancy SUV to haul kids around. “How’s your head?”

“No additional brain damage.”

“How’s your soul?”

“Tortured, to say the least. But I’ll survive.”

“Paulette says you’re leaving.”

“For a while, anyway. I’ll file for bankruptcy next week, and I will not be around here when it happens. Paulette has a flat in London that I can use for a few months. We’ll hide there.”

“You can’t avoid a bankruptcy?”

“No way. There are too many claims, and good ones. Remember our first Dyloft plaintiff, Ted Worley?”

“Sure.”

“He died yesterday. I didn’t pull the trigger, but I sure didn’t protect him either. His case in front of a jury is worth five million bucks. There are twenty-six of those. I’m going to London.”

“Clay, I want to help.”

“I’m not taking your money. That’s why you’re here, and I know it. I’ve had this conversation twice with Paulette and once with Jonah. You made your money and you were smart enough to cash out. I wasn’t.”

“But we’re not going to let you die, man. You didn’t have to give us ten million bucks. But you did. We’re giving some back.”

“No.”

“Yes. The three of us have talked about it. We’ll wait until the bankruptcy is over, then each of us will do a transfer. A gift.”

“You earned that money, Rodney. Keep it.”

“Nobody earns ten million dollars in six months, Clay, You might win it, steal it, or have it drop out of the sky, but nobody earns money like that. It’s ridiculous and obscene. I’m giving some back. So is Paulette. Not sure about Jonah, but he’ll come around.”

“How are the kids?”

“You’re changing the subject.”

“Yes, I’m changing the subject.”

So they talked about kids, and old friends at OPD, and old clients and cases there. They sat on the front steps until after dark, when Rebecca arrived and it was time for dinner.