“I remember distinctly. We had lunch down at the Angus.”
“Yes, sir. And you told us it was on Friday.”
Beep.
“I did? I don’t remember which day it was. If I said Friday, I must have been mistaken.”
“This was the weekend you went to Taos.”
“I remember what weekend it was. I always fly out to Taos in the morning, which would have been Friday, so the lunch must have been Thursday. I could call the restaurant and double-check.”
“That would be helpful.”
“You want to hold, I can do it right now.”
He came back in about a minute, saying that the restaurant still had the reservation records and it had been Thursday.
There was no way to make this next question sound innocent, but if the answer was yes, it would save Glitsky a lot of footwork. “Mr. Farris, is there staff at the place where you stay in Taos?”
You didn’t have to draw Farris a map. He didn’t answer right away. Glitsky heard him take a breath on either side of the recording beep.
“Owen Nash was my best friend, Sergeant. I don’t benefit in any conceivable way from his death. To the contrary. I’m personally devastated and professionally handicapped in ways you can’t imagine by Owen’s death. I’m sure there’s a substantial paper record of my comings and goings that weekend and if you decide it’s your duty to look into it, you go right ahead . . . If I were you, Sergeant, I’d first spend some time on this judge. But that’s up to you. And now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a full load here.”
The connection went dead in Glitsky’s hand. He tapped his pencil on his blotter. Farris’s reaction was not unusual—folks were generally unappreciative when told they were under suspicion. But, Glitsky couldn’t help but notice, he didn’t say that anybody had seen him in Taos or anywhere else. Could be an oversight, like Thursday or Friday or whatever day it had been when he’d last laid eyes on his best friend. Could be.
It was the kind of thing, though, that Glitsky thought he’d remember.
The nap helped a little, but not much.
After the three black-and-tans in the morning, Hardy and Frannie and Rebecca had shared some outstanding gambas at Sol y Luna. Also, because Frannie wasn’t drinking at all, he’d had a bottle of a light white Rioja. Hell, he was celebrating.
He’d broken the news about his job and she took it in very much the same vein as he had himself. They had most of a quarter million dollars in the bank, the profit check on Hardy’s percentage of the Shamrock was coming in this week—money wasn’t the biggest problem in the world, and she didn’t like what practicing law had been doing to him.
Which called for a little Fundador after lunch.
Frannie drove home and Hardy got his shirt off before he crashed to sleep, waking up to Rebecca’s wails and a thundering head. He walked into the back room and picked up the baby, patting her gently, holding her against him. She tried to fasten herself onto his nipple and cried all the more at the lack of result. Frannie was coming through the kitchen.
“We’re really having another one of these baby things?” he said.
“She didn’t have the lunch you did.”
“She doesn’t have the head I’ve got either.” He held Rebecca in front of his face. “Look,” he said, “I know for a fact I feel worse than you, and I’m not crying.”
The logic didn’t have any effect. He handed her off to her mother and in seconds she was suckling.
“That’s an excellent trick,” Hardy said. He was changing into his running clothes, his green jogging suit next up in the drawer. “You mind if I run a little of this off?”
He took the four-mile circular route out to the beach, along the hard sand south to Lincoln. The air was clear, the temperature was in the low seventies and got a little nippier with the wind off the breakers.
Here he was, unemployed during a major depression, and he smiled as he ran, the headache gone in the first twenty minutes. Down the beach, back along the park, up the Avenues to his home.
He was sitting on his porch, cooling down, the sun still up but hidden now behind the buildings across the street. On the back-half of his run he had decided that, with his calendar suddenly free, the Hardy family should book a flight to Hawaii and disappear for a couple of weeks. He was daydreaming about some serious beach time, rum drinks, Jimmy Buffett riffs on a balmy breeze.
From Hardy’s porch the six-story apartment buildings on either side blocked his vision both up and down the street, so there was no warning when Celine Nash appeared on the other side of his picket fence—stonewashed jeans, sandals, magenta silk blouse.
He might have expected something like this to happen—perhaps he should have called her, Farris, even Glitsky with the news of his termination. Was she coming to offer her condolences, ask what happened, get news about who would now be handling the case? How did she get his address?
He stood up, deciding he was going to change his phone number and have it unlisted. Get his address out of the new book. He should have done it—he now realized—when he had been rehired at the district attorney’s office last February, but with the new marriage, new job, new baby, other things had filled his mind.
He took a couple of steps off the porch. Celine saw him and stopped in her tracks.
He came down toward her and he realized her face was frozen. Had something else happened? She stood stock-still, as though in shock.
“Celine, are you all right?”
He took a few more steps toward her, stopping just before the gate. There was a long moment. She stared at him with a look that seemed to combine horror and loss.
Hardy heard the front door open, heard Frannie say, “Diz?”
Celine’s eyes went behind him, to Frannie, fastened back, first it seemed hopefully, then almost in panic, on him. “I’m sorry,” she said, starting to back away. “I’m sorry. This is a mistake.”
“Celine. What’s the matter?”
She shook her head, looking him up and down. Everything between him and Celine had always been too personal. Now, seeing his house and his wife, she couldn’t ignore the reality. Not only was he a good man, he had a life that didn’t include her on any level. She backed further away, then stopped and seemed to regain some control.
“I’m sorry, Dismas. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
“It’s all right. What is it?”
She shook her head. “Nothing. It’s a mistake.” She was backing away again, turning. She lifted a hand, a diffident wave, and walked away.
“Who was that?” Frannie was up next to him, arm in his.
“Celine Nash. Owen Nash’s daughter.”
“God, she’s beautiful, isn’t she?”
Hardy tightened his arm around her. “You’re beautiful.”
She bumped her hip against him. “What did she want?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe she heard I got dumped.”
She was getting in her car, parked halfway down the street. They both watched her.
“So why didn’t she stay?”
“She’s been sort of unstable since the loss of her father.” They were both going back to the porch. He told Frannie about Celine’s explosion at him the other day, her mood swings. He neglected to mention the after-hours meeting at Hardbodies!
“I know after Eddie I was a bat case.”
Hardy tightened his hand around her waist. “You were a mensch,” Hardy said. “She’s not holding up so well.”
“You shouldn’t be too hard on her.”
Hardy kissed his wife. “I’m not going to be anything on her. I’m fired, remember? All that’s over.”
PART FOUR
38
Hardy did take Frannie and Rebecca to Hawaii, where they stayed for two weeks.
In San Francisco the Owen Nash case fell out of the headlines. During August and September there was no outward sign of activity, although Peter Struler (not Abe Glitsky) kept himself very busy on the case th
at Elizabeth Pullios didn’t want to close; the police department, and Abe, had moved along to other, more pressing crimes.
Now it had been over three months since Hardy had been fired, and Struler and Pullios had put together their case. When they did finally move, they moved very quickly.
The sealed indictment was passed down by the grand jury on the morning of Tuesday, October 13. Superior Court Judge Marian Braun read the indictment and decreed that there would be no bail on the bench warrant. In an unusual move, the warrant itself was hand-delivered by the district attorney himself, Christopher Locke, accompanied by assistant D.A. Elizabeth Pullios and Police Chief Dan Rigby, to Lieutenant Frank Batiste of the Homicide Division at 11:45 a.m. Reading it, Batiste sucked in a breath.
Had this case gone to the grand jury in the normal way, after an investigation by an assigned police officer, service of the warrant would have been assigned to that officer, in this case Inspector Sergeant Abraham Glitsky. But Glitsky, along with the rest of Homicide, was unaware of Peter Struler’s work on behalf of the D.A.’s office. So the service was assigned to Marcel Lanier, who was lounging around the office waiting for something to happen.
Judge Fowler had weathered a cyclone of vitriol and criticism, gossip and embarrassment, but, like all storms, this one had passed. The reprimand he received from the Ethics Committee, due to his long and distinguished career, stopped far short of having teeth, and the Bar Association told him that had the May Shinn trial gone on, it would have seriously considered suspension or even disbarment. But in the end, three months later, he was back in the business of the law with a spacious corner office at Embarcadero One—a partner in the firm of Strand, Worke & Luzinski.
When Wanda buzzed him and told him Officer Marcel Lanier was waiting to see him he said of course, he knew Marcel, send him on in. Fowler hadn’t been completely ostracized at the Hall—a lot of the attorneys and staff saw his side of things, the human side. His colleagues on the bench were less understanding but he’d expected that. There was nothing he could do about it.
To the cops, the Shinn fiasco had been the district attorney’s screwup, not Fowler’s; it hadn’t gone down as a loss for the police department, except for the false arrest, but the grand-jury indictment had de facto corroborated Glitsky’s judgment anyway, so even that wasn’t an issue.
Fowler came around his desk and extended his hand to Lanier. “How are you doing, Marcel? Social call? How can I help you?”
Lanier remained standing. “No . . . not a social call, Judge.”
“Andy, please.”
“Judge.” He took the warrant out of his coat pocket. “I don’t know how to say this, but I’ve got a warrant here for your arrest.”
“For my arrest?”
“That’s right, sir.”
Andy tried to smile. Marcel Lanier wasn’t smiling. “Is this some kind of joke?”
“No, sir. The grand jury issued an indictment against you this morning for the murder of Owen Nash.”
Fowler found he needed to put his weight back against the corner of his desk. “The grand jury,” he repeated. He had gone pale, poleaxed. “Owen Nash?”
Lanier stood mute.
Wanda was buzzing again, and Fowler punched the intercom button. “It’s your daughter, Judge. Lunch.”
“Just hold her a second—”
But Jane had already opened the door. “Hi, Dad. Oops, sorry. Wanda didn’t say you had a meeting.” Seeing him so pale, she stopped. “Dad? What’s going on?”
“Jane, hon, why don’t you wait outside a minute.”
“Are you all right? What’s happening?”
“I’m fine. Scoot, now. Go.”
The door closed behind her reluctant retreat. “This is ridiculous, Marcel. It’s Locke, isn’t it? Payback time.”
“All I know, sir, is I’ve got to bring you in.”
“Sure, I know. I understand, of course. It’s not you. What in the world do they think they have?”
“Sir, I have to tell you that you have the right to remain silent, and anything you do say . . .”
“Marcel, please,” Fowler said, holding up a hand. “You have my word I won’t plead Miranda.”
“It’s got to be pure harassment. Locke swore a thousand times he’d crucify me. Now he thinks he’s got the chance.”
The crumbs of a hero sandwich littered David Freeman’s desk. The last few bites had been interrupted by Andy Fowler’s telephone call from the Hall of Justice. Fowler hadn’t spoken to him since he’d refused to challenge his department that day last July in the May Shinn matter, but now, in trouble himself, he had called again.
What Fowler was saying made little sense to Freeman. Christopher Locke might in fact hate Fowler’s guts, but he wasn’t going to take another hit being wrong on a high-profile murder like Owen Nash. They must have found some real evidence. And Freeman knew Fowler had more motive to kill Owen Nash than had ever been imputed to May Shinn.
“Listen, Andy, I’m not sure I can take this one.”
“What do you mean you’re not sure? What would be the problem?”
“Well, two come to mind. I’m not saying no just yet, Andy, but I’m going to have to consider it. Number one, I’m still representing May Shinn in some civil work. I’d want to avoid the appearance of any conflict there.”
“I can’t see how that would apply, David. May and I are totally separate.”
“Yes. Well, the other one is our collusion . . .”
“Collusion?”
“That’s what it was, Andy, so damn close to conspiracy I still get nightmares. And I believe you know it.”
“There was absolutely nothing illegal about that relationship and you know it.”
“Well, be that as it may, I’m having a little trouble envisioning the two of us together at a defense table and getting anything like reasonable treatment from the bench.”
“So we’ll file for a change of venue.”
Freeman leaned back in his chair and took another bite of his sandwich. Again, he didn’t agree with Andy. Change of venue was called for when you didn’t think you could get a fair trial in a certain locality because of pretrial media coverage and other excessive public awareness of the purported facts in a case. But it presumed that the prejudice you’d encounter would be on the jury.
What Fowler was ignoring, and what Freeman knew to be true, was that there wasn’t a judge in the state, perhaps in the country, who didn’t know what he’d done, and wouldn’t be prejudiced against him for it. He was this year’s legal Benedict Arnold.
Any judge of Freeman’s acquaintance, and he knew most of them, would be far tougher on one of their own—on an Andy Fowler—than they would on other miscreants, all other things being equal. Andy Fowler had, in their official view, befouled their collective cave, and David Freeman understood that. It would be this side of a miracle if Fowler could get a fair trial anywhere, and with Freeman, his colluder, beside him, the chances became more remote.
“Venue is an issue all right, Andy. But I’ll really have to give this some consideration.”
“Meanwhile, David, what do you recommend?” Freemanwas surprised to hear the note of anger in the judge’s voice. There was nothing personal here, and Fowler must know that.
“I could recommend an interim counsel, Andy. Several, in fact. What did they set bail at?”
Fowler clipped it. “There’s no bail on the bench warrant. They want to be sure I’m here for the arraignment. Look, David, my two minutes are about up and I need some representation here.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
Freeman put down the receiver and popped the last bite of his sandwich. There must be something in the San Francisco air, he thought. Dry salami, mortadella, sourdough bread. Any food that sat and fermented picked up something from it, some essence, that enhanced its flavor.
He put his feet up, chewing. He figured Fowler’s bail would be at least a million, if he got it at all. He could guarantee offhand that
three judges out of the six on Superior Court would let the judge rot in jail just to express their displeasure. And it would all be impartial, impersonal, within the bounds of their prerogatives.
Institutionalized pettiness. Perfectly legal. The law was a many-splendored thing.
39
Jane Fowler walked into the Little Shamrock and back to the dartboards, where Dismas Hardy was playing for money. She let him finish his round, let him turn and see her. They hadn’t spoken in three months, since she’d yelled at him about forcing her father to retire. He hadn’t returned her phone calls—four of them altogether, one about every three weeks.
After seeing her father led from his office wearing handcuffs—that was the drill—she didn’t care what he thought about it, she was going to see him, so she’d driven out to his house. Frannie, obviously pregnant again, had about six other infants and a few other women in their house. Had they opened a daycare center or what? No, this was their playgroup—other new mothers supporting each other. There was a pang. This hadn’t been a feature in Jane’s life during the months she and Hardy had been new parents.
Frannie had been, as always, polite, and had told her where she could find Dismas, who always left the house on Tuesday afternoons. She explained that Dismas was good around one infant or perhaps even two. But when the number got to four plus their mothers, he reached his critical mass and tended to want to disappear. He was undoubtedly playing darts at the Little Shamrock. She should try there.
Seeing Jane, Hardy lit up briefly, then frowned. “What’s the matter?” he asked. She told him in about twenty seconds. Hardy’s dart opponent had finished his turn. “Hardy,” he said.
He told Jane to give him a minute, went to the chalk line and threw three darts—a twenty, a seventeen, and a double six. The other man swore and took out his wallet. Hardy was already pulling the flights from his darts, putting the shafts back in his leather case.
“Double or nothing?” the other man asked.
Hard Evidence Page 31