Paris Match(11)

            “Are you paid for this advice?”

            “Only on a piecework basis.”

            “How much per piece?”

            “I bill them by the hour. I am an attorney, after all, and that is our wont.”

            “You won’t what?”

            “It means our usual practice or desire.”

            “You bill the CIA for your desires?”

            “No, I bill them for their desires. What is your connection to French intelligence?”

            “None,” she said. “They have so many—anagrams?”

            “Acronyms.”

            “Ah, yes, acronyms. French intelligence has too many, and I would never know with whom I was dealing. I have been asked, sort of, to become associated with American intelligence.”

            “In what capacity?”

            “As a conveyor of gossip, apparently.”

            “I suppose you would hear quite a lot of that from your clients.”

            “Constantly, but rarely anything that would amuse the CIA.”

            “You never know what might entertain them,” Stone said. “Did you accept their offer?”

            “Not yet. What is your advice?”

            “Would it amuse you to associate yourself with them?”

            “Possibly.”

            “Then accept, but negotiate the terms.”

            “How do you mean?”

            “You are a businesswoman: whatever they offer you, demand more.”

            “Will I get it?”

            “You will get some of it, that’s what a negotiation is about: you rarely get everything you want.”

            “I nearly always get everything I want,” she said emphatically.

            “I’m not surprised. Perhaps I should hope that you don’t want me.”

            “If I should want you, then God help you.”

            “In that circumstance I would prefer to handle the transaction myself.”

            She laughed.

            “That’s the first time this morning you’ve laughed.”

            “I don’t laugh, unless I am really amused.”

            “Then I will take your laugh as a compliment—assuming that you are laughing with me, rather than at me.”

            “An interesting distinction,” she said. “When I was at school in England I learned, with some difficulty, when Englishmen were being funny. I have had much less experience with Americans.”

            “Anything I can do to help,” Stone said.

            “Was that an offer of or a request for sex?”

            “Not necessarily.”

            “You see! I think maybe that was meant to be funny, but I’m not sure. What does ‘not necessarily’ mean?”

            “Not in every instance. It’s best to go back a couple of sentences to my offer of help.”

            “What sort of help?”