by David Cooper
Me: Don’t know who I’d rather work for. You know I’m surrounded by them. She Who Must Not Be Named and her monstrous regiment. So you’re not keen on developing the female line in Bastards, then?
Him: You can say that again. Between you and me, this Bastard vacancy’s going to be filled by a male bastard, by hook or by crook. And the next one. And the next one.
Me: Well, it’s funny you should say that. I had some bloke in for a review this morning. Gave his CV a spring clean, and had a long session with him about what he wants out of the profession. Legal exec, not a solicitor, but he seems pretty clued up on commercial claims. Take a look at the CV. Anonymous, of course. You can keep that. You’d never track him down online anyway.
Him: Interesting. And he’s available immediately?
Me: Redundant last year. Nothing since.
Him: Of course I’d have to keep looking over my shoulder. Knowing the bloody earth mothers, they won’t make their minds up about coming back until the very last moment. If he was any good…Mind you, the thought of any Bastards cash finding its way to your queen bitch would stick in my throat, so I’m afraid it looks like a non-starter…
Me: Doesn’t have to be. I can do things off the books. Why do you think I suggested we had lunch in the first place? [Food arrives.]
* * * * *
“Impressed?” Dawn’s question was laced with sarcasm.
Soraya was the first to speak.
“I wish this could have dropped into my hands just before I started cross-examining Squire. If I’d have been able to walk him through it line by line…”
“I can imagine.” Karen spoke up next. “Him and his sheer brass neck. Not just the story they cooked up over Craven. All this talk about women in the law as well. And they both lied through their teeth about not knowing everyone called them Bastards. Go on, Lennie, tell us what you think. Have we missed anything?”
Lennie remained lost in thought for a few long moments, until he finally found his voice.
“Off the books…so if you hadn’t started the redundancy consultation on that Thursday, Wayne would have placed Craven without telling you and stolen the commission from right under your nose?” Lennie lapsed into thought once more. “Just a minute. There’s still something missing. I can’t see how a dodgy deal off the books would have made Squire go to such extremes, just for Wayne’s sake. Wayne was just as guilty. Once he needed a lawyer, Squire could have introduced him to Wagstaff and backed off. He surely never needed to dirty his hands quite so much. OK, this tape proves what a sexist pig he is, and how much he hated you, Karen, but Squire wouldn’t have known that Wayne had made it…”
“Don’t speak too soon, Lennie.” It was Dawn’s turn to intervene. “There’s more.”
They all stared at Dawn in further amazement as she reached into the folder and passed round three copies of another transcript.
* * * * *
Phone Call with Rufus Squire On Wednesday 13th March (nice and early in the morning)
Me: Hi, Rufus, it’s Wayne.
Him: Hello Wayne, how are you?
Me: Fine, thanks, just sitting in the New Street Station coffee shop right now. All the chaos and bedlam helps disguise calls like this one. Wondered if you’d had any more thoughts on the candidate I mentioned yesterday?
Him: Well, he ticks quite a lot of boxes. Being male, for a start. But I’ve still got a big problem with the thought of that bitch getting her hands on any of my hard earned fee income…
Me: Rufus, when I hinted at certain discreet practices of mine, I was serious. I wish I could have offered you an under the table job when I had to finish off that intro from last summer, the one Karen delegated to me for reasons best forgotten about. Here and now, what Karen doesn’t know about can’t harm her, so it won’t harm you. No VAT and a much better rate if you offer my man a job and we keep my baksheesh off the books. And just think of the pleasure you’d get in putting one across her.
Him: Tell me something. Have you ever had any successful experience of this before now?
Me: Funny you should ask. I can give you a clue.
Him: Go on.
Me: You’ve probably heard of a firm somewhere off Broad Street that shares its name with a famous cricketer. If you were to look at one of last November’s law bulletins, you might find a couple of new recruits mentioned, one whose name has something to do with farming, and the other, let me think, could have fronted a well known seventies rock band. All my own work. Karen won’t find out in a thousand years.
Him: I think I can work out the cricketing connection. That man certainly bowls googlies. About as straight as a corkscrew. So you think I’d be up for something similar?
Me: If I’m right in thinking you despise Karen as much as I do, I’m sure you would be.
Him: Well, I’m never going to pass up a chance to put one across her, and I can’t deny I’m pretty desperate to fill this vacancy, so I’ve half a mind to call your man in. But you’d better make sure the discount’s worth my while if he’s any good, and you’d better not give me any reason to…
Me: Make it the full mind, Rufus, not half a mind, and that way I won’t have any reason to show what a photographic memory I’ve got for certain conversations with certain law firm partners about women in the profession. It would be such a shame if the transcript found its way onto YouTube. And the soundtrack, if you get my drift.
[Long Pause]
Him: I wondered what you were fiddling with yesterday. Touche! You’re a real cunning bugger, in every sense of the word, aren’t you? Right, let’s get it on. Give the bloke a call and get him over here. Well, if I go down, you do too, so I guess that makes us allies in a common cause?
Me: Quite. It’s called Screwing Karen. We’ve both had some experience of that already, of course…
* * * * *
“Sorry about that last bit.” Dawn spoke up once she realised everyone had reached the end. “I could have cut it off, but I thought you’d want the uncensored truth.”
Karen refilled the two wine glasses.
“To hell with them. Who won? I did. And you all helped me. Give me another half hour on the wine, and I’ll probably see the funny side. What do you think, Soraya?”
“I’m a bit torn. It’s almost as if Squire was being blackmailed. Couldn’t have happened to a nicer man, though.”
“I wondered about that too.” Lennie replied, as he stood up with his empty glass in his hand. “But Wayne told Squire all about his own shady dealings as well. If you want my take on it, Wayne might have had Squire by the throat, but Squire had him by the balls. Consenting adults, of course.”
Soraya thought for a moment as Lennie headed in the direction of the bar.
“I guess so. Wayne was calling in a favour, every step of the way, and Squire was hell bent on his mission to hit back at you. He never stopped and thought about what he was doing. Or he just assumed you’d never take it all the way to trial.”
“And of course they could never have known I’d be telling Wayne he might be redundant, right at the crucial time.” Karen remembered. “So everything escalated from then on.”
“I’ve thought of something else.” Dawn spoke up. “Remember when he walked out? He went on and on about a missing tape. Asked me to drop everything and look for it. No sign of one anywhere. He never said it was an envelope with a tape in it. I’d have kicked myself if I’d found it straight away and sent it back to him…”
“I bet you would. I wonder what Tom Ritchie would make of this?”
“I really wouldn’t do that.” Soraya advised. “It’s overkill. Right now, he’s got the Craven emails, the judgment, and Craven’s evidence from yesterday. That’s more than enough. Best leave Squire’s personal vendetta against you where it belongs. Dead in the water.”
“That’s true.” Karen replied as Lennie returned and sat down. “I’ve just remembered something else. You didn’t hear what Tom said to me just before I gave him the emails. He’d worked ou
t straight away that I was the good guy. I’d better let it lie.”
“Talking of good guys, can I propose a toast to a man of unquestionable virtue and honesty, the man who accidentally swung you a bigger victory than you could ever have hoped for?” Lennie raised his glass. “Ladies, I give you – Paul Craven!”
“Paul Craven!” Raising their glasses, Karen, Dawn and Soraya acknowledged Lennie’s tribute in the traditional manner.
Epilogue
Paul Craven did not survive the fallout from Karen’s decisive victory. Having only taken one day off, he returned to BLH Solicitors on the Friday morning after the trial, after misguided dedication to his client matters prevailed over common sense. Immediately upon arriving, he was unceremoniously frogmarched from the office by Seb Finnie after a peremptory order to clear his few personal effects. Finnie could not contain his anger when Craven asked him to forward his written grievance, and tore it in two right before Craven’s eyes.
Craven was left to contemplate a week’s pay in lieu of notice and a termination letter that spoke of ‘a gross breach of trust that leaves us quite unable to continue your employment’ before finishing ‘and you do not of course have qualifying service to claim unfair dismissal’. He licked his wounds alone for a few days, before his online research led him to conclude that his dismissal had surely involved disability discrimination, and that the offensive emails between Squire, Wagstaff and Finnie might enable him to claim damages for hurt feelings for that very reason.
But he made the unwitting mistake of succumbing to the smooth talk of an unqualified advisor, lured in by ‘no win no fee – employer always pays’ advertising. His claim against the firm was settled for substantially less than he would have obtained by pursuing it further, and he immediately lost a considerable percentage of the settlement to the advisor, having signed up to retainer terms that were verging on unconscionable.
Craven only found out that Lennie would have represented him without charge when he plucked up the courage, after three months of unemployment, to contact Karen and ask her to take him on as a candidate client ‘despite everything’. He could never have known that Karen would have welcomed him back to Ripple with open arms straight after the trial if only he had asked.
* * * * *
It was just as well that Karen had never held out any real hope for a significant financial victory when she decided to sue Avery, being driven only to protect her business. The euphoria of the judgment in her favour did not crystallise into recovery of any more than a trivial fraction of her damages award. On the day before the payment deadline expired, Wave Professional Recruitment Limited ceased trading, already owing many thousands of pounds to other unsecured creditors.
Faced with an indefensible statutory demand for the judgment debt, alongside numerous personal guarantees for Wave’s liabilities, Avery entered into an individual voluntary arrangement. His employment prospects in the recruitment industry were effectively destroyed by Tom Ritchie’s newspaper report on what would otherwise have been an instantly forgettable commercial dispute. The story quickly gained momentum and rendered him untouchable.
Avery avoided bankruptcy only because none of his creditors wished to go one step beyond the IVA and throw good money after bad. Karen weighed up the possibility of doing so on principle, but chose to let matters rest after Edward Buckler persuaded her to draw a line under it and concentrate full time on her business. She valued his advice and his friendship, but was left to wonder whether the scars he clearly still bore from his divorce would ever let the friendship develop beyond platonic.
* * * * *
Karen did at least have greater success in recouping her costs of the litigation. Just over two weeks after the trial concluded, the application for a costs order against BLH Solicitors came back before Judge Banks. She gave short shrift to the suggestion that the firm should be given any benefit of the doubt, decided that they were culpable for their blatant misconduct and complicity, and ordered that the firm was to be jointly and severally liable for the entire costs award.
Immediately after the court’s formal order was drawn up and sealed, Lennie sent copies to the firm’s senior partner and managing partner, letting them know in no uncertain terms that he would be instructing high court enforcement officers to attend at their city centre office with a view to collecting the debt if it was not paid on time. He noted their request to allow them to complete a full internal enquiry before addressing any question of payment, and turned it down politely and firmly in a manner that left no room for further debate.
The payment materialised in Lennie’s client account with one hour to go before the deadline, preceded by an email in tones of exceptionally bad grace. Lennie acknowledged the bank transfer politely and was able to refund Karen’s interim payments in full as soon as he had cleared his final bill.
* * * * *
BLH’s woes were compounded once they had submitted the full text of the judgment, and their file, to Avery’s legal expenses insurers for a full audit under the policy conditions. The insurers were entitled to have sight of both, in case their contents might have a bearing on what fees BLH ought reasonably to be paid for the time they had spent on Avery’s defence and the Counsel fees they had incurred in the process.
It did not take long for the insurers to assert that they would only pay costs covering the firm’s initial instructions and the notional time that would have been involved in telling Avery that he had no realistic chance of defending the claim at all. They invoked material non-disclosure and breach of the underlying requirement for utmost good faith. BLH ended up with less than ten per cent of their overall costs, and almost all of their claim for the reimbursement of Grant Collins’ fees was disallowed.
The managing partner of BLH made a plea to Collins’ clerk for an abatement in his outstanding fees, a plea that the firm could pitch no more strongly than a request for a goodwill gesture and the sharing of some of the pain. The clerk saw no basis for any concession, and insisted upon payment of the outstanding fees in full in order to avoid a formal complaint of professional misconduct. BLH’s losses in connection with the Avery dispute increased by a further substantial five figure sum.
* * * * *
The internal enquiry at BLH Solicitors resulted in severe reprimands and sanctions for Squire and Wagstaff. They were made personally liable in equal shares, out of their partnership profits, for the costs that the firm had to pay out to Karen following Judge Banks’ order. The two of them were lucky to avoid motions being tabled for their expulsion from the partnership. In due course, BLH’s professional indemnity insurers pointedly refused to reimburse the firm for the costs penalty in Karen’s favour, once they found out exactly what had led to its imposition.
Were it not for the newspaper story that followed Tom Ritchie’s report, Squire might have succeeded in keeping his personal disgrace a matter for internal consumption alone. But Judge Banks’ forceful criticism of his evidence at the trial soon came to the attention of investigating officers at the Solicitors’ Regulatory Authority, alongside his own heartless abuse of a disabled employee in the internal emails that were now very much out in the open. He was notified that he would face a formal disciplinary investigation involving potential charges of acting dishonestly, acting with a lack of integrity and behaving in a manner likely to diminish public trust in the profession. Wagstaff and Finnie could only bide their time and await their own fate once the regulators’ investigation had run its course.
* * * * *
Jake Hutchings’ career in the legal profession ran into a hard and unyielding obstacle a month after the trial, in the form of the car that he struck when driving while disqualified and uninsured. His impulsive decision to flee the scene of the accident may have spared him the consequences of a breath test, but otherwise only compounded his guilt. The family and social connections that had enabled his training contract to be transferred to BLH Solicitors, after his earlier misdemeanours at the City firm where he ha
d begun, were rendered worthless once his brush with the law came to the attention of higher professional authorities responsible for the supervision of training contracts. The firm made it quite plain to him in the meantime that even if he was allowed to continue on the path towards qualification, he would have to do so elsewhere.
* * * * *
Dawn Vallance continued to serve Karen with her customary loyalty and dedication. Occasionally she thought about the deadly look that she would give Avery if she ever had the misfortune to meet him again. She would never know whether Avery might one day distribute the embarrassing photo of her to a wider audience, or keep it for his own guilty pleasure, or delete it. The uncertainty would always be a constant nagging worry.
* * * * *
Judge Marian Banks noted the effusive apology that the senior partner of BLH Solicitors had sent to the presiding regional circuit judge, and decided that it would be futile to refer any of the matters aired before her at the trial to the Crown Prosecution Service, despite what she considered to be blatant perjury on the part of Avery and all of his witnesses save for Craven. She had little doubt that the junior level CPS staff would in practice understand little of the evidence, or might at best refer it upwards only for it to be shelved due to lack of time and resources.
* * * * *
Soraya was naturally pleased to have been so victorious at a trial that won her some unexpected personal publicity, all the more so for having built a promising new working relationship with Lennie in the process. But her triumph was not one that she would ever feel able to look upon with complete pleasure, once she heard that Karen had been cheated of her own spoils of victory.
For his own part, Lennie’s feelings were scarcely any different. He had managed to end up on the winning side of a demanding and lucrative case, and had also gained some incidental acclaim of his own as a result, but felt little urge to bask in reflected glory when Karen had achieved nothing beyond saving her business from a cowardly attack.
