Stone slipped the disc into his computer and started it. An African-American woman sat on a chair in front of a white background, probably a sheet. She was fortyish, handsome, beautifully coifed. “My name is Martha Shivers,” she said. She gave the date and time. “I’m forty-one years old. When I was in my twenties I worked for Knott Industries in Washington, D.C. I started as a receptionist but was promoted over the seven years of my employment there, ending up as one of two executives to the chief executive officer, Mr. Nelson Knott. During the time I worked for him, Mr. Knott seemed to find me attractive, but he was married, so I resisted his overtures. Finally, one night when I was working very late on a special project, Mr. Knott and I were alone in his office and he pressed himself upon me. I protested and struggled, but he pushed me down onto a sofa and raped me. Shortly after that he went to the studio to do his daily broadcast, and he told me not to leave, that he would come back and do it again. He said this as though I had consented to sex, which I had not.

“As soon as he left the room I got my clothes back on and went home. Before leaving I typed a letter of resignation with immediate effect, signed it, and left it on his desk. I went home, and the next day I started looking for another job.

“A couple of months later I found myself pregnant. Before my encounter with Mr. Knott in his office I had not had sex since my divorce, four years before that, and I had not had sex since my resignation.

“I had lunch shortly thereafter with a former coworker at Knott Industries who told me that something similar had happened to another woman, Helen Trimble. She had a daughter from that experience. I was put in touch with her in New York City, where she had gone to live, and we compared our experiences. She had also been raped by Mr. Knott. She had received a monthly check for two thousand dollars from a New York bank since the birth of her child, but she had not seen or spoken to Mr. Knott since she had resigned from his employment, shortly after she became pregnant and revealed it to Mr. Knott.