Sanders watched Blackburn walk down the hallway away from the conference room. He was filled with confused feelings. Suddenly, he was being told it was all over, and over without a fight. Without blood being spilled.

Watching Blackburn, he had a sudden image of blood in the bathroom sink of his old apartment. And this time, he remembered where it came from. A part of the chronology fell into place.

Blackburn was staying at his apartment during his divorce. He was on edge, and drinking too much. One day he cut himself so badly while shaving that the sink was spattered with blood. Later on, Meredith saw the blood in the sink and on the towels, and she said, "Did one of you guys fuck her while she was having her period?" Meredith was always blunt that way. She liked to startle people, to shock them.

And then, one Saturday afternoon, she walked around the apartment in white stockings and a garter belt and a bra while Phil was watching television. Sanders said to her, "What are you doing that for?"

`Just cheering him up," Meredith replied. She threw herself back on the bed. "Now why don't you cheer me up?" she said. And she pulled her legs back, opening-

"Tom? Are you listening to me?" Fernandez was saying. "Hello? Tom? Are you there?"

"I'm here," Sanders said.

But he was still watching Blackburn, thinking about Blackburn. Now he remembered another time, a few years later. Sanders had started dating Susan, and Phil had dinner with the two of them one night. Susan went to the bathroom. "She's great," Blackburn said. "She's terrific. She's beautiful and she's great."

"But?"

"But . . ." Blackburn had shrugged. "She's a lawyer."

"So?"

"You can never trust a lawyer," Blackburn had said, and laughed. One of his rueful, wise laughs.

You can never trust a lawyer.

Now, standing in the DigiCom conference room, Sanders watched as Blackburn disappeared around a corner. He turned back to Fernandez.

". . really had no choice," Fernandez was saying. "The whole situation finally became untenable. The fact situation with Johnson is bad. And the tape is dangerous they don't want it played, and they're afraid it will get out. They have a problem about prior sexual harassment by Johnson; she's done it before, and they know it. Even though none of the men you talked to has agreed to talk, one of them might in the future, and they know it. And of course they've got their chief counsel revealing company information to a reporter."

Sanders said, "What?"

She nodded. "Blackburn was the one who gave the story to Connie Walsh. He acted in flagrant violation of all rules of conduct for an employee of the company. He's a major problem for them. And it all just became too much. These things could bring down the entire company. Looking at it rationally, they had to make a deal with you."

"Yeah," Sanders said. "But none of this is rational, you know?"

"You're acting like you don't believe it," Fernandez said. "Believe it. It just got too big. They couldn't sit on it anymore."

"So what's the deal?"

Fernandez looked at her notes. "You got your whole shopping list. They'll fire Johnson. They'll give you her job, if you want that. Or they'll reinstate you at your present position. Or they'll give you another position in the company. They'll pay you a hundred thousand in pain and suffering and they'll pay my fees. Or they'll negotiate a termination agreement, if you want that. In any case, they'll give you full stock options if and when the division goes public. Whether you choose to remain with the company or not."

`Jesus Christ."

She nodded. "Total capitulation."

"You really believe Blackburn means it?"

You can never trust a lawyer.

"Yes," she said. "Frankly, it's the first thing that has made any sense to me all day. They had to do this, Tom. Their exposure is too great, and the stakes are too high."

"And what about this briefing?"

"They're worried about the merger-as you suspected when all this began. They don't want to blow it with any sudden changes now. So they want you to participate in the briefing tomorrow with Johnson, as if everything was normal. Then early next week, Johnson will have a physical exam as part of her insurance for the new job. The exam will uncover serious health problems, maybe even cancer, which will force a regrettable change in management."

"I see."

He went to the window and looked out at the city. The clouds were higher, and the evening sun was breaking through. He took a deep breath.

"And if I don't participate in the briefing?"

"It's up to you, but I would, if I were you," Fernandez said. "At this point, you really are in a position to bring down the company. And what good is that?"

He took another deep breath. He was feeling better all the time.

"You're saying this is over," he said, finally.

"Yes. It's over, and you've won. You pulled it off: Congratulations, Tom."

She shook his hand.

`Jesus Christ," he said.

She stood up. "I'm going to draw up an instrument outlining my conversation with Blackburn, specifying these options, and send it to him for his signature in an hour. I'll call you when I have it signed. Meanwhile, I recommend you do whatever preparation you need for this meeting tomorrow, and get some much deserved rest. I'll see you tomorrow."

"Okay,"

It was slowly seeping into him, the realization that it was over. Really over. It had happened so suddenly and so completely, he was a little dazed.

"Congratulations again," Fernandez said. She folded her briefcase and left.

He was back in his office at about six. Cindy was leaving; she asked if he needed her, and he said he didn't. Sanders sat at his desk and stared out the window for a while, savoring the conclusion of the day. Through his open door, he watched as people left for the night, heading down the hall. Finally he called his wife in Phoenix to tell her the news, but her line was busy.

There was a knock at his door. He looked up and saw Blackburn standing there, looking apologetic. "Got a minute?"

"Sure."

"I just wanted to repeat to you, on a personal level, how sorry I am about all this. In the press of complex corporate problems like this, human values may get lost, despite the best of intentions. While we intend to be fair to everyone, sometimes we fail. And what is a corporation if not a human group, a group of human beings? We're all people, underneath it all. As Alexander Pope once said, `We're all just human.' So recognizing your own graciousness through all this, I want to say to you . . .

Sanders wasn't listening. He was tired; all he really heard was that Phil realized he had screwed up, and now was trying to repair things in his usual manner, by sucking up to someone he had earlier bullied.

Sanders interrupted, saying, "What about Bob?" Now that it was over, Sanders was having a lot of feelings about Garvin. Memories going back to his earliest days with the company. Garvin had been a kind of father to Sanders, and he wanted to hear from Garvin now. He wanted an apology. Or something.

"I imagine Bob's going to take a couple of days to come around," Blackburn said. "This was a very difficult decision for him to arrive at. I had to work very hard on him, on your behalf. And now he's got to figure out how to break it to Meredith. All that."

"Uh-huh."

"But he'll eventually talk to you. I know he will. Meanwhile, I wanted to go over a few things about the meeting tomorrow," Blackburn said. "It's for Marden, their CEO, and it's going to be a bit more formal than the way we usually do things. We'll be in the big conference room on the ground floor. It'll start at nine, and go to ten. Meredith will chair the meeting, and she'll call on all the division heads to give a summary of progress and problems in their divisions. Mary Anne first, then Don, then Mark, then you. Everyone will talk three to four minutes. Do it standing. Wear a jacket and tie. Use visuals if you have them, but stay away from technical details. Keep it an overview. In your case, they'll expect to hear mostly about Twinkle."

Sanders nodded. "All right. But there isn't really much new to report. We still haven't figured out what's wrong with the drives."

"That's fine. I don't think anybody expects a solution yet. Just emphasize the success of the prototypes, and the fact that we've overcome production problems before. Keep it upbeat, and keep it moving. If you have a prototype or a mock-up, you might want to bring it along."

"Okay."

"You know the stuff-bright rosy digital future, minor technical glitches won't stand in the way of progress."

"Meredith's okay with that?" he said. He was slightly disturbed to hear that she was chairing the meeting.

"Meredith is expecting all the heads to be upbeat and non-technical. There won't be a problem."

"Okay," Sanders said.

"Call me tonight if you want to go over your presentation," Blackburn said. "Or in the morning, early. Let's just finesse this session, and then we can move on. Start making changes next week."

Sanders nodded.

"You're the kind of man this company needs," Blackburn said. "I appreciate your understanding. And again, Tom, I'm sorry."

He left.

Sanders called down to the Diagnostics Group, to see if they had any further word. But there was no answer. He went out to the closet behind Cindy's desk and took out the AV materials: the big schematic drawing of the Twinkle drive, and the schematic of the production line in Malaysia. He could prop these on easels while he talked.

But as he thought about it, it occurred to him that Blackburn was right. A mock-up or a prototype would be good to have. In fact, he should probably bring one of the drives that Arthur had sent from KL. It reminded him that he should call Arthur in Malaysia. He dialed the number.

"Mr. Kahn's office."

"It's Tom Sanders calling."

The assistant sounded surprised. "Mr. Kahn is not here, Mr. Sanders."

"When is he expected back?"

"He's out of the office, Mr. Sanders. I don't know when he'll be back."

"I see." Sanders frowned. That was odd. With Mohammed Jafar missing, it was unlike Arthur to leave the plant without supervision.

The assistant said, "Can I give him a message?"

"No message, thanks."

He hung up, went down to the third floor to Cherry's programming group, and put his card in the slot to let himself in. The card popped back out, and the LED blinked oooo. It took him a moment to realize that they had cut off his access. Then he remembered the other card he had picked up earlier. He pushed it in the slot, and the door opened. Sanders went inside.

He was surprised to find the unit deserted. The programmers all kept strange hours; there was almost always somebody there, even at midnight.

He went to the Diagnostics room, where the drives were being studied. There were a series of benches, surrounded by electronic equipment and blackboards. The drives were set out on the benches, all covered in white cloth. The bright overhead quartz lights were off.

He heard rock-and-roll music from an adjacent room, and went there. A lone programmer in his early twenties was sitting at a console typing. Beside him, a portable radio blared.

Sanders said, "Where is everybody?"

The programmer looked up. "Third Wednesday of the month."

"So?"

"OOPS meets on the third Wednesday."

"Oh." The Object Oriented Programmer Support association, or OOPS, was an association of programmers in the Seattle area. It was started by Microsoft some years earlier, and was partly social and partly trade talk.

Sanders said, "You know anything about what the Diagnostics team found?"

"Sorry." The programmer shook his head. "I just came in."

Sanders went back to the Diagnostics room. He flicked on the lights and gently removed the white cloth that covered the drives. He saw that only three of the CD-ROM drives had been opened, their innards exposed to powerful magnifying glasses and electronic probes on the tables. The remaining seven drives were stacked to one side, still in plastic.

He looked up at the blackboards. One had a series of equations and hastily scribbled data points. The other had a flowchart list that read:

A. Contr. Incompat. VLSI? pwr?

B. Optic Dysfunct-? voltage reg?/arm?/servo?

C. Laser R/O (a,b,c)

D. E Mechanical J J

E. Gremlins

It didn't mean much to Sanders. He turned his attention back to the tables, and peered at the test equipment. It looked fairly standard, except that there were a series of large-bore needles lying on the table, and several white circular wafers encased in plastic that looked like camera filters. There were also Polaroid pictures of the drives in various stages of disassembly; the team had documented their work. Three of the Polaroids were placed in a neat row, as if they might be significant, but Sanders couldn't see why. They just showed chips on a green circuit board.

He looked at the drives themselves, being careful not to disturb anything. Then he turned to the stack of drives that were still wrapped in plastic. But looking closely, he noticed fine, needle-point punctures in the plastic covering four of the drives.

Nearby was a medical syringe and an open notebook. The notebook showed a column of figures:

PPU

7

II (repeat II)

5

2

And at the bottom someone had scrawled, "Fucking Obvious!" But it wasn't obvious to Sanders. He decided that he'd better call Don Cherry later tonight, to have him explain it. In the meantime, he took one of the extra drives from the stack to use in the presentation the following morning.

He left the Diagnostics room carrying all his presentation materials, the easel boards flapping against his legs. He headed downstairs to the ground floor conference room, which had an AV closet where speakers stored visual material before a presentation. He could lock his material away there.

In the lobby, he passed the receptionist's desk, now manned by a black security guard, who watched a baseball game and nodded to Sanders. Sanders went back toward the rear of the floor, moving quietly on the plush carpeting. The hallway was dark, but the lights were on in the conference room; he could see them shining from around the corner.

As he came closer, he heard Meredith Johnson say, "And then what?" And a man's voice answered something indistinct.

Sanders paused.

He stood in the dark corridor and listened. From where he stood, he could see nothing of the room.

There was a moment of silence, and then Johnson said, "Okay, so will Mark talk about design?"

The man said, "Yes, he'll cover that."

"Okay," Johnson said. "Then what about the . . ."

Sanders couldn't hear the rest. He crept forward, moving silently on the carpet, and cautiously peered around the corner. He still could not see into the conference room itself, but there was a large chrome sculpture in the hallway outside the room, a sort of propeller shape, and in the reflection of its polished surface he saw Meredith moving in the room. The man with her was Blackburn.

Johnson said, "So what if Sanders doesn't bring it up?"

"He will," Blackburn said.

"You're sure he doesn't-that the-" Again, the rest was lost.

"No, he-no idea."

Sanders held his breath. Meredith was pacing, her image in the reflection, twisting and distorted. "So when he does-I will say that this is a-is that-you mean?"

"Exactly," Blackburn said.

"And if he-"

Blackburn put his hand on her shoulder. "Yes, you have to-"

"-So-want me to-"

Blackburn said something quiet in reply, and Sanders heard none of it, except the phrase "-must demolish him."

"-Can do that-"

"-Make sure counting on you-"

There was the shrill sound of a telephone. Both Meredith and Blackburn reached for their pockets. Meredith answered the call, and the two began to move toward the exit. They were heading toward Sanders.

Panicked, Sanders looked around, and saw a men's room to his right. He slipped inside the door as they came out of the conference room and started down the hallway.

"Don't worry about this, Meredith," Blackburn said. "It'll go fine." "I'm not worried," she said.

"It should be quite smooth and impersonal," Blackburn said. "There's no reason for rancor. After all, you have the facts on your side. He's clearly incompetent."

"He still can't get into the database?" she said.

"No. He's locked out of the system."

"And there's no way he can get into Conley-White's system?"

Blackburn laughed. "No way in hell, Meredith."

The voices faded, moving down the hallway. Sanders strained to listen, finally heard the click of a door closing. He stepped out of the bathroom into the hallway.

The hallway was deserted. He stared toward the far door.

His own telephone rang in his pocket, the sound so loud it made him jump. He answered it. "Sanders."

"Listen," Fernandez said. "I sent the draft of your contract to Blackburn's office, but it came back with a couple of added statements that I'm not sure about. I think we better meet to discuss them." "In an hour," Sanders said. "Why not now?" "I have something to do first," he said.

Ah, Thomas." Max Dorfman opened the door to his hotel roomand immediately wheeled away, back toward the television set.

"You have finally decided to come."

"You've heard?"

"Heard what?" Dorfman said. "I am an old man. No one bothers with me anymore. I'm cast by the wayside. By everyone including you." He clicked off the television set and grinned.

Sanders said, "What have you heard?"

"Oh, just a few things. Rumors, idle talk. Why don't you tell me yourself?"

"I'm in trouble, Max."

"Of course you are in trouble," Dorfman snorted. "You have been in trouble all week. You only noticed now?"

"They're setting me up."

"They?"

"Blackburn and Meredith."

"Nonsense."

"It's true."

"You believe Blackburn can set you up? Philip Blackburn is a spineless fool. He has no principles and almost no brains. I told Garvin to fire him years ago. Blackburn is incapable of original thought."

"Then Meredith."

"Ali. Meredith. Yes. So beautiful. Such lovely breasts."

"Max, please."

"You thought so too, once."

"That was a long time ago," Sanders said.

Dorfman smiled. "Times have changed?" he said, with heavy irony. "What does that mean?"

"You are looking pale, Thomas."

"I can't figure anything out. I'm scared."

"Oh, you're scared. A big man like you is scared of this beautiful woman with beautiful breasts."

"Max-"

"Of course, you are right to be scared. She has done all these many terrible things to you. She has tricked you and manipulated you and abused you, yes?"

"Yes," Sanders said.

"You have been victimized by her and Garvin."

"Yes."

"Then why were you mentioning to me the flower, hmm?"

He frowned. For a moment he didn't know what Dorfman was talking about. The old man was always so confusing and he liked to be-

"The flower," Dorfman said irritably, rapping his knuckles on the wheelchair arm. "The stained-glass flower in your apartment. We were speaking of it the other day. Don't tell me you have forgotten it?"

The truth was that he had, until that moment. Then he remembered the image of the stained-glass flower, the image that had come unbidden to his mind a few days earlier. "You're right. I forgot."

"You forgot." Dorfman's voice was heavy with sarcasm. "You expect me to believe that?"

"Max, I did, I-"

He snorted. "You are impossible. I cannot believe you will behave so transparently. You didn't forget, Thomas. You merely chose not to confront it."

"Confront what?"

In his mind, Sanders saw the stained-glass flower, in bright orange and purple and yellow. The flower mounted in the door of his apartment. Earlier in the week, he had been thinking about it constantly, almost obsessing about it, and yet today

"I cannot bear this charade," Dorfman said. "Of course you remember it all. But you are determined not to think of it."

Sanders shook his head, confused.

"Thomas. You told it all to me, ten years ago," Dorfman said, waving his hand. "You confided in me. Blubbering. You were very upset at the time. It was the most important thing in your life, at the time. Now you say it is all forgotten?" He shook his head. "You told me that you would take trips with Garvin to Japan and Korea. And when you returned, she would be waiting for you in the apartment. In some erotic costume, or whatever. Some erotic pose. And you told me that sometimes, when you got home, you would see her first through the stained glass. Isn't that what you told me, Thomas? Or do I have it wrong?"

He had it wrong.

It came back to Sanders in a rush then, like a picture zooming large and bright before his eyes. He saw everything, almost as if he was there once again: the steps leading up to his apartment on the second floor, and the sounds he heard as he went up the steps in the middle of the afternoon, sounds he could not identify at first, but then he realized what he was hearing as he came to the landing and looked in through the stained glass and he saw

"I came back a day early," Sanders said.

"Yes, that's right. You came back unexpectedly."

The glass in patterns of yellow and orange and purple. And through it, her naked back, moving up and down. She was in the living room, on the couch, moving up and down.

"And what did you do?" Dorfman said. "When you saw her?"

"I rang the bell."

"That's right. Very civilized of you. Very non-confrontational and polite. You rang the bell."

In his mind he saw Meredith turning, looking toward the door. Her tangled hair falling across her face. She brushed the hair away from her eyes. Her expression changed as she saw him. Her eyes widened.

Dorfman prodded: "And then what? What did you do?"

"I left," Sanders said. "I went back to the . . . I went to the garage and got in my car. I drove for a while. A couple of hours. Maybe more. It was dark when I got back."

"You were upset, naturally."

He came back up the stairs, and again looked in through the stained glass. The living room was empty. He unlocked the door and entered the living room. There was a bowl of popcorn on the couch. The couch was creased. The television was on, soundless. He looked away from the couch and went into the bedroom, calling her name. He found her packing, her open suitcase on the bed. He said, "What are you doing?"

"Leaving," she said. She turned to face him. Her body was rigid, tense. "Isn't that what you want me to do?"

"I don't know," he said.

And then she burst into tears. Sobbing, reaching for a kleenex, blowing her nose loudly, awkwardly, like a child. And somehow in her distress he held his arms out, and she hugged him and said she was sorry, repeating the words, again and again, through her tears. Looking up at him. Touching his face.

And then somehow . . .

Dorfman cackled. "Right on the suitcase, yes? Right there on the suitcase, on her clothes that were being packed, you made your reconciliation."

"Yes," Sanders said, remembering.

"She aroused you. You wanted her back. She excited you. She challenged you. You wanted to possess her."

"Yes . . ."

"Love is wonderful," Dorfman sighed, sarcastic again. "So pure, so innocent. And then you were together again, is that right?"

"Yes. For a while. But it didn't work out."

It was odd, how it had finally ended. He had been so angry with her at first, but he had forgiven her, and he thought that they could go on. They had talked about their feelings, they had expressed their love, and he had tried to go on with the best will in the world. But in the end, neither of them could; the incident had fatally ruptured the relationship, and something vital had been torn from it. It didn't matter how often they told themselves that they could go on. Something else now ruled. The core was dead. They fought more often, managing in this way to sustain the old energy for a while. But finally, it just ended.

"And when it was over," Dorfman said, "that was when you came and talked to me."

"Yes," Sanders said.

"And what did you come to talk to me about?" Dorfman asked. "Or have you `forgotten' that, too?"

"No. I remember. I wanted your advice."

He had gone to Dorfman because he was considering leaving Cupertino. He was breaking up with Meredith, his life was confused, everything was in disarray, and he wanted to make a fresh start, to go somewhere else. So he was considering moving to Seattle to head the Advanced Projects Division. Garvin had offered him the job in passing one day, and Sanders was thinking about taking it. He had asked Dorfman's advice.