"Another loss," said Palmer.
"What about the planes? Planes are always good," said Schwartz. "We've done well with our planes. It's our basic. And don't tell me we're dealing with babies or laborers in first-class cabins. Those are usually the first ones to go. We've had industrialists in those cabins. We've had good litigation."
"The problem with a plane," said Palmer, annoyed that Schwartz was missing the obvious, "is that you get one plane at most from any provable negligence. When you're dealing with aircraft and airlines, whenever a flaw is discovered, it's changed. Engines are always being redesigned. So are tails and wings, and anything that might remotely cause an accident."
Nathan Palmer rose in trembling indignation. "The terrible fact is that if you prove a flaw in one kind of airplane, that's the safest kind to fly next because they always fix it. We've never gotten more than one suit from any plane disaster. Not one."
"The cars were good," said Schwartz.
"Cars are another thing. But how many manufacturers would now consider mounting the gas tank in the rear bumper?" asked Palmer.
"The gas tank in the bumper was the best. Went up like bombs. We had hundreds of bombs on American highways and the best part of it was some idiot at the auto company had figured out it was cheaper to pay a judgment than to take the gas tank out of the bumper," said Rizzuto.
"We did do well on the gas tanks in the bumpers," sighed Schwartz.
"We made them change that policy," said Rizzuto.
"Fifteen years ago," said Schwartz. "What have we had since? Break-even airplanes, construction-company losses, and baby bottles that were at best a nuisance value to the company."
"If we could do surgeons, those big-income guys who do the fancy operations, then we would have something," said Schwartz.
"What would we get? Three surgeons at most? And what would we have to pay for it? The problem, gentlemen, is that paying for these accidents is breaking us."
"Makes you want to go back to honest law," said Schwartz.
"No such thing," said Rizzuto. "You remember what they taught us at law school? There are two things in law. Winning and losing."
"Yes, but what about the ethics they taught?" asked Schwartz. He had a problem he shared with the others. They hated to lose arguments even if winning got them nowhere. Perhaps that was why they had all entered law, Schwartz had often thought. It was competitive. There were winners and there were losers and when one applied his mind day in and day out to the angles of winning, other considerations tended to dissolve.
Like ethics. All three felt they had all the legal ethics they needed. They had studied enough to pass the California bar, and after that there was no need to follow their oaths. If they got into any trouble with an ethics committee, they could always bring it to court and probably win.
Besides, the way they operated, no one ever found out what they did. That was the genius of their method or, as Palmer had once said, the method of their genius.
"Our problem is we have been using our genius the wrong way," said Palmer.
"He's never gotten us into a bit of trouble," said Schwartz.
"That's because he knows how everything works," said Rizzuto.
"I have called you here today to tell you that if we continue to use our genius in the manner we have been, we will all be bankrupt within a year."
"God help us," said Schwartz.
"My bookie is going to carve my liver," said Rizzuto.
"I've got seven ex-wives, and I'm getting married again," said Palmer.
"Really? Congratulations. What's she like?" asked Rizzuto. He liked Palmer's taste in wives. He had made love to half of them, give or take. Which meant he'd come out even on his bets with himself. The gambling on which ones would and which wouldn't had been the best part.
"Like the other seven, of course," said Palmer.
"Nice," said Rizzuto, who thought it proper to wait until after the wedding before asking when Palmer would be taking another business trip.
"All of which is neither here nor there," said Palmer. "None of us is going to be able to support our human failings unless we change our ways."
"What failings?" asked Rizzuto. "I had a half-million dollars' worth of action going, and it was going to turn. It had to turn. You called me away. You cost me a half-million cool ones."
"I hardly consider a stock market that reacts in peculiar fashion a failing of my mathematical formulas."
"Yes," said Palmer, the most realistic of the three. "And I have at last found my own true love in number eight."
"Okay. You win. What are we going to do?" asked Rizzuto.
"You must have a plan of some sort," Schwartz said. "You never do anything you don't know the outcome of, unless it's marriage. Of course, you do know the outcome of that, don't you?"
"Don't be nasty, Arnold," said Palmer. He walked to the window, paused as the California sunlight bathed his fine features, turned to his partners as though addressing a jury, and then showed the other two, who basically found him a pain in the ass, why he was a worthy partner.
"I am thinking of a city. A city with doctors, lawyers, a mayor. A city with homes, with families. With mothers bringing up children, fathers supporting families. I am thinking of homes, entire family units. Industries. Their lives cut short by some deliberate negligence by a multinational corporation whose assets we can seize."
"I like it," said Schwartz. "A city has bankers and industrialists in it too."
"A city has hope. A city is a world unto itself. A city represents us all, everything that is most civilized about any culture. All our artists and great ideas come from our cities," said Rizzuto.
"Snuffed out cruelly," said Palmer.
"By a multinational whose assets we can freeze," said Schwartz.
They all nodded to the old scratched wood desk in the glass case.
"Well," said Palmer quite pleased with himself. "It looks as though we won't have to break out that one for a while, will we?"
"A city will be expensive for the genius," said Schwartz.
"Everything is expensive for the genius," said Palmer. "That's why we're in so much overhead trouble. "
"But a city is going to be worth it," said Rizzuto, knowing he himself would now get back into action. With an entire city injured and in pain, he could create an image of the end of the world, which meant of course the end of a juror's world. The rewards would be enormous.
Thus it was decided in the elegant Century Park City offices in Los Angeles that a call be put in to the genius.
The price tag was a whopping five million dollars. When Palmer, Rizzuto agreed to deliver it immediately, there was one question.
"Do you have any particular city in mind?"
"No. Any one you think is right."
"I don't do things that aren't right," said the voice. The phone call from the partners' office was picked up by an automatic program on CURE computers. While ordinarily sounds would be translated into written words, examined, and compared to a data base of flash signals to warn Smith of special dangers needing his attention, this phone call from Palmer, Rizzuto did not register as being received at any registered location. Someone had bypassed the general electronic circuitry of the phone company, something CURE's computers continued to insist was not happening even while it was being done. Nor did the computers pick up the word "Gupta" coming back to Palmer, Rizzuto There was some indication of trouble because one of the secretaries dutifully reported the preparation of a disaster team. This was not only filed in the law firm's computers but also secretly was forwarded to the CURE data bank, which could not place its importance immediately.