Rough Trade

terrible problem, then that’s exactly what we had.
    “I was just out at Avco’s offices getting the updated financials like you said. Of course, they didn’t have them ready, so I had to sit around and wait for them. After a while I started noticing that there was something going on—you know, people rushing around, whispering, like something big had just happened—-but whenever they saw me, they would clam up. When I started asking around, everybody started looking at their shoes. Nobody would tell me what was wrong.”
    “So did you find out what had happened?”
    “I got it out of some girl who works in accounting. She’s only been with the company a couple of weeks, and I don’t think she realized that I didn’t work there.”
    “So what is it?”
    “Avco was served with an EEOC suit this morning.”
    “You’ve got to be kidding,” I said, suddenly feeling weak-kneed and sick to my stomach. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is the federal agency responsible for all suits claiming employment discrimination. “What’s the complaint?”
    “Four male plaintiffs are alleging that they applied for jobs as food servers at a Tit-Elations in Muncie and were turned down because they’re men. They’re alleging sex discrimination.”
    “The only reason is that they didn’t look good in pasties and a G-string,” I snapped. “I told Eisenstadt that this whole ‘they’re-only-food-servers’ stance would eventually come back and bite us.”
    Anticipating problems from what he darkly described as “conservative elements,” Stuart Eisenstadt had insisted that in all our public filings we characterize Tit-Elation’s barely clad female employees as food servers.
    “Wait. There’s more. Supposedly it’s Reverend Mar-pleson who’s behind the whole thing. They think that a lawyer in one of his watchdog groups must have spotted the red herring for the IPO and realized that if they were really food servers, then there was no reason they couldn’t be men. The whole thing with the four men applying for jobs was probably a setup.”
    “What does Eisenstadt have to say about all of this?”
    “I don’t think you want to hear this.”
    “Try me.”
    “Well, as soon as I found out about the EEOC suit, I went straight to Colin Brandt’s office and asked him when the hell he was planning on telling us about it. He says he called Eisenstadt first thing this morning—the minute they got it.”
    “And have you talked to Eisenstadt?”
    “I called you first.”
    “Did you get a copy of the complaint?”
    “Yeah. I made one before I left. I’ve got it with me.”
    “Good. You head back to the office and wait for my call.”
    I hit the end button when what I really wanted to do was hit Stuart Eisenstadt. The fact that I’d always feared that something like this would happen, that I’d practically held my nose through the entire IPO process, offered no consolation. Knowing you’re going to wind up in shit doesn’t make the reality of finding yourself hip deep in it any less unpleasant.
    Again and again I’d warned Eisenstadt not to underestimate the ingenuity of the morally righteous. It is always fatal to assume that just because someone holds opposing beliefs—or in this case, any beliefs at all—it makes them unintelligent. I may not have agreed with much of what the Reverend Marpleson stood for, but I also knew that he hadn’t become a political force to be reckoned with by being stupid.
    And there was no denying that the good reverend had done his homework. Not only had we characterized the dancers as food servers in all of our preliminary offering documents, but in subsequent communications with the SEC we’d argued that the tips they received (and no doubt tucked into their G-strings) were food service gratuities for IRS accounting purposes.
    I punched in Eisenstadt’s number and paced the floor.
    “Kate,” said Eisenstadt. “I’m so glad you called. I’ve been trying to get hold of you.”
    “How? Using smoke signals? Sherman didn’t have any problem finding out how to reach me.” I was disappointed. I’d expected him to be a better liar.
    “You’ve already talked to him?” he demanded, uneasily.
    “What I want to know is why I haven’t talked to you. Why is it that the only way I find out our client has been sued is after an associate accidentally overhears it from an accounting clerk? Were you ever planning on telling me, or were you going to wait until I