Peter stared at her, hard. ‘I’ll tell you what goes on here,’ he said, in a level voice. ‘What goes on here is work. Not talk. Not personal consideration. Not fraternisation. But work.’

Karen, pale-faced, stood up. ‘Work, huh? I suppose feeling my fanny by the water-cooler is work?’

‘Just leave my office,’ said Peter. ‘Type up whatever notes you’ve made so far, and make sure I get them before five.’

‘You’re not going to fire me?’

‘Why should I? When you’re not interrupting me with ridiculous questions, you’re good at your job. And besides, I don’t particularly want all the time-wasting hassle of sorting out your compensation.’

Karen slowly shook her head. ‘You know something,’ she said. ‘I don’t believe you’re real. I just can’t believe that you’re an actual human being.’

‘I assure you I am. Now, are you going to go type those notes before I change my mind about firing you?’

Karen was going to say something else, something spiteful and absurd and angry. But she managed to check herself and take a deep breath instead. She didn’t want to lose this job, not really; and a small, sane voice inside her said that Peter Kaiser was too thick-skinned to care about insults. He’d only enjoy the spectacle of her making her a fool of herself.

She closed her steno pad, smiled shakily at Fran, and said, ‘It’s all yours.’

‘And man the telephone,’ put in Peter, as she left the office. ‘I don’t want to be disturbed for the next two hours.’ Karen nodded, with mock-graciousness, and closed the door.

Back in her own office, a small windowless cubicle along the hall, decorated with nothing more than two postcards from Mount Shasta, Karen put down her pad, and leaned against the wall. She shouldn’t have let Peter shake her up like that. He was only a political office-boy, after all, and a cold-blooded s.o.b. to boot. But she could never get used to his abruptness, and his total lack of feeling. As one of her friends had remarked, you didn’t really object to Peter Kaiser fondling your backside in the corridor, because it was no more interesting than accidentally walking into the handle of an electric floor-polisher.

I could quit, she thought. I could tear up his goddamned banking procedures and stalk out. But that was why women failed in business. They took it too personally. Karen wanted to make it up the tree to those creaking branches where the heavyweights like Shearson Jones were perched, and walking out on Peter Kaiser wasn’t going to help her do it.

Just say after me: One day, Peter Kaiser, I’m going to fix your wagon. Then take seven deep breaths. Then sit down, take the cover off your self-correcting IBM and start typing up his fucking notes.