He'd begun to make notes again, head bent. "I'll have to ask you to supply the carbons from your files so we can bring our files up to date. Drop them off with Miss Pascoe by noon, if you would. We'll set up an appointment to go over them later."

"What for?"

"We'll need documentation of your hours so we can calculate your rate of pay," he said as if it were obvious.

"I can tell you that. Thirty bucks an hour plus expenses."

He managed to convey astonishment without even raising a brow. "Less rental monies for the office space, of course," he said.

"In lieu of rental monies for the office space."

Dead silence.

Finally, he said, "That can't be the case."

"That's been my arrangement with CF from the first."

"That's absolutely out of the question."

"It's been this way for the past six years and no one's complained of it yet."

He lifted his pen from the page. "Well. We'll have to see if we can straighten this out."

"Straighten what out? That's the agreement. It suits me. It suits them."

"Miss Millhone, do you have a problem?"

"No, not at all. What makes you ask?"

"I'm not sure I understand your attitude," he said.

"My attitude is simple. I don't see why I have to put up with this bureaucratic bullshit. I don't work for you. I'm an independent contractor. You don't like what I do, hire somebody else."

"I see." He replaced the cap on the pen. He began to gather his papers, his movements crisp, his manner abrupt. "Perhaps we can meet some other time. When you're calmer."

I said, "Great. You too. I have a job to do, anyway."

He left the cubicle before I did and headed straight for Mac's office. All the CF employees within range were hard at work, their expressions studiously attentive to the job at hand.