Miranda's War by Howard; Foster Page B

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    â€œI thought you were interested in landscape architecture.”
    â€œI am.”
    â€œAnd sociology.”
    â€œI am.”
    â€œAnd now this, tying up the Conservation Commission in knots?”
    â€œWe shouldn’t have downzoned the land along Route 2. I want to sell the Pierce Estate and use that money to buy the land on Route 2. We solve a lot of long-term problems that way.”
    â€œMiranda, I’ve got clients on state commissions, federal commissions, high-level appointees. Rule one, you keep your head down for a while and do your job.”
    â€œUnfortunately, we don’t have time. I’m up on a hill looking at the enemy’s front lines coming our way.”
    He laughed in his haughty, lawyerly way, and rather than look at his face, she focused on the fillings in his teeth.
    â€œI know you like military history, and that must be coloring your judgment.”
    â€œIt’s informing it.”
    â€œLet’s be candid, you know perfectly well you can’t work on a Commission. You were basically asked to leave.”
    â€œLincoln is lucky to have me at this moment.”
    â€œYou’re not Joan of Arc.”
    â€œAnd just what do you suggest I do?”
    â€œAs your lawyer, I’d like to point out the situation creates an inevitable conflict. Conflicts are bad. I advise my clients to avoid them. I avoid them.”
    â€œYou’re not my lawyer. I take everything you say as Archer’s view amplified through a quasi-legal stereo system designed to intimidate me into submission. And to continue your medieval metaphor, you think you’re his Thomas Cromwell. And maybe you are, but I’m not going to be Catherine of Aragon.”
    â€œTouché, that’s my Miranda,” said Archer. “And if you keep pushing, counselor, you’ll get the full Monty, the whole explanation of how her existence and Lincoln’s existence cannot be squared with antiquated and formalistic rules like keeping one’s head down upon joining a board. She is convinced the utility of such rules is outweighed by her statistical analysis of the danger of the current situation. And she can plot it all out if you want in charts with her multi-disciplinary baton.”
    Miranda smiled.
    â€œYou see, we understand each other,” she said.
    â€œI’ve heard this in one form or another for years,” said Ted, trying to regain control. “But it was always over little things, like not wanting to play the fourteenth hole at Brookline because the angle off the tee was manipulated by eleven degrees, or that Willamette Valley wine was actually superior to Burgundy. And I even respected you for your brilliance and insouciance. But not for something like this, with its public consequences …”
    â€œIf Archer with his brilliance and command of the language can’t convince me to drop what I’m doing, then you can’t either,” Miranda interrupted. “You’re less persuasive, less intelligent, know me less, and should I go on?”
    â€œI thought hearing words of caution from me might give you pause.”
    â€œTell me if I’m breaking the law.”
    â€œI can’t see that you are.”
    â€œThen your job is finished.”
    She thought there was a 30% probability that Ted would actually suggest divorce and bring everything to an abrupt end.
    Instead, he said, “We’ll be back here before long. You know what’s coming. We want to spare your boys the embarrassment of hearing about their mother’s antics on the playground of BB&N.”
    â€œI’m a public official and they know it. Criticism comes with the job. And they respect me, both of us.”
    â€œOf course they do,” he said with an undertone of irony.
    â€œOK, I think we’re done here. If I find I need legal advice with my commission business, I’ll call you.”
    She stood up.
    â€œShall we go?” she asked