The Hearing

by John Lescroart

  'Don't be so humble. If you hadn't stepped in, Cole would still be over at the jail. They wouldn't be taking care of him like this.' The woman's effusiveness was slightly overwhelming. She grabbed Hardy's hand in both of hers and held it tightly.

  Eventually freeing his hand, he cast his eyes beyond her, to the suspect. He had to work to keep his tone neutral. 'And you're Cole. How are you doing?'

  Jody popped right in, answering for her son. 'He's going to be fine, just fine, aren't you, Cole?' Protectively, she was moving back toward the bed.

  'I don't know, Mom. I don't know if "fine" really covers it.' The young man's voice was deep with a raspy quality and a slight but recognizable defect in enunciation. Hardy knew the latter could be simple fatigue, but more likely that it was the telltale slur of long-term drug use. 'Another day in that cell,' he said, shaking his head. 'I don't know.'

  'They were going to let him die,' Mrs Burgess offered. 'They just wanted him to suffer.'

  Hardy shook his head, told her a white lie. 'I don't think so,' he said. 'Not intentionally anyway. They don't do that.'

  'Then why-'

  'They process a lot of people every day at the jail. This was just one of the times somebody fell through the cracks. The good news is we found out soon enough.' Hardy saw that he was going to have to talk through Jody and didn't know how long he was going to have the patience for it. He addressed himself directly to Cole. 'So they've got you on methadone?'

  'It's kicked in, yeah.'

  Again, the mother. 'It's to help with the withdrawal pains. The idea is to lessen the dose so his body gradually-'

  'Mom!'

  She stopped, clamping her mouth tight with a pained expression. 'I'm sorry. I just want Mr Hardy to understand…' Her voice trailed off.

  'He's probably got the idea.' To Hardy. 'Right?'

  'Some.' He softened his inflection, gave her another reassuring smile. 'Mrs Burgess.' A pause. 'Jody. I'd like a few minutes alone with Cole if you don't mind.'

  It hurt her anew, but there was no avoiding that. Her worried gaze fell on her son, came back to Hardy. 'Of course, sure, I understand.'

  But she didn't move until he prompted her. 'Just knock at the door and the guard will come and let you out. We won't be too long.'

  'She's all right, really,' Cole said when the door had closed behind his mother. 'She's trying to help.'

  But now, suddenly, with the innocent mother out of the room, Hardy abruptly abandoned chit-chat mode. He might have wanted to spare some of her feelings, but he felt no similar compunction toward her son. Moving down to the foot of the bed, he rested his hands on the railing, looked Cole hard in the face, spoke with a flat deliberateness. 'Tell me what happened the other night.'

  The change in tone met its mark. The young man inhaled sharply, shifted his eyes from side to side, finally focused on the sheet in front of him. 'It was bad.'

  Hardy gave it a second, then reached over and slapped the bed next to Cole's foot.

  Startled, Cole looked up. Hardy's expression made him take another deep breath, which he let out slowly through puffed cheeks. 'I mean, I was in bad shape. It was cold as hell, man. I remember that. I hadn't scored all day.'

  'Why not?'

  'I had to get some money. I thought I might go and hit up Mom, but then,' he sighed again, 'then the cramps started to come on, so I didn't want to go all the way out where she lives.'

  'Where's that?'

  'Like Judah, out in the Sunset. I score at Sixteenth and Mission. It was too far.'

  'So you decided to mug somebody instead?'

  'No! It wasn't like that.' Hardy gave him no reaction so he felt pressed to explain further. 'Look, my last score must've been heavily cut, OK? I mean, I was shaking already, cramping up, you know? It was like midnight. I'd scored a couple of pills but they weren't doing it. I had to do something.'

  Hardy waited.

  'So I lucked out. One of the bums was crashed with his cart-'

  'His cart?'

  'Shopping cart. In this spot, I don't know exactly where, south of Mission I think. Anyway, he was passed out and had most of a whole bottle of bourbon by his head, just lying there. So I lifted it. I needed something, you know?'

  'He let you take his whiskey?'

  'No, he was out already. I lifted it.'

  'You didn't hit him and take it?'

  'Come on.' Cole actually appeared offended at the question. 'Nothing like that.'

  'How about the gun? Did you threaten him with that?'

  'I didn't have any gun.' His brow darkened for a minute. 'Not then.'

  'Did you get it from him, too?'

  'No.' Then, 'I don't think so.'

  'You don't think so,' Hardy repeated. But he had no choice but to accept it for now. 'All right, then what?'

  'Then I guess I drank most of it. The bottle.'

  'Where were you then?'

  A shrug. 'Just around. I don't know. I was hurtin'. I mean, hurtin' you hear me?'

  'For the record, Cole, you're not breaking my heart. How'd you get up to Maiden Lane?'

  But the lack of sympathy had its price. 'I don't know, man. Maybe I levitated, huh? Maybe I took the Monorail.'

  Hardy straightened up. 'You think this is funny, huh? You're looking at the rest of your life behind bars and you're getting wise with me?'

  'Hey.' Cole went to hold up his hands in a gesture of innocence. The handcuff on his left wrist brought him up short. 'I'm just saying I don't remember getting uptown. I drank the booze. I got loaded. I walked around, tried to keep warm. Maybe I'd run into somebody I knew, I don't know. Maybe score some g.'

  'G?'

  'God. Smack. You know, heroin.'

  'And pay for it with what?'

  Cole shook his head miserably. 'I don't know. It didn't happen anyway.'

  'So what did happen? Did you see Elaine come out of some building? Or just walking alone? What?'

  'Elaine?'

  Hardy's temper flared. 'Elaine Wager,' he snapped, but then checked himself, got his voice under control. 'The woman you've confessed to killing. Elaine Wager.'

  'What about her?'

  'I asked when you first saw her.'

  'I don't really remember, you know? I told the cops this.'

  'Why don't you just tell me, too? What's the first thing you do remember?'

  'The gun. In my hand.' Cole made eye contact. 'Like, there it was.'

  'Where?'

  'Well, I mean it was there on the street and I picked it up. Anybody'll give you money for a gun, right?'

  'So you remember picking up the gun? And then what?'

  He closed his eyes, shook his head. 'I've been through this already. Then I guess leaning over her.'

  'You guess? What do you mean, you guess? Did you see her walking? Did you come up behind her? Or was she already on the ground?'

  Cole's face was taut with the effort at recall. 'I must have blanked it.'

  'What does that mean, you must have blanked it? Are you saying you blanked on pulling the trigger?'

  As though trapped in a cage, the young man looked from side to side for an exit. 'Well, I mean I had the gun, then I was leaning over her and saw all the gold, the necklace, then her purse and the other stuff.'

  Hardy's hands were white on the bed's railing. 'You don't remember firing the gun?'

  'No.'

  'Ever?'

  Cole gave it some thought, then shook his head no. 'But the cop said it was common, blanking the moment. Like people in car wrecks don't remember the last minute before.'

  'What cop?'

  'The guy who questioned me. Black dude. Banks, I think his name was.'

  Hardy tore his eyes from the pathetic young man and looked through the barred window to the gray afternoon outside. Traffic was stopped in both directions on the freeway. Rows of box-like apartment buildings clung to a dun-colored hill. He wasn't going to find any solace in the view and after Cole's last words, he needed some. 'But, Cole,' he began quietly, 'li
sten to me. You confessed to killing her.'

  He nodded. 'Yeah.'

  'But you don't remember stalking her? Firing the gun?'

  'No, none of that. But I must have.'

  'Why do you say that?'

  Cole stared down at the sheet covering him. 'I shot the gun. They tested my hands. I shot the gun.' He brought his eyes up to Hardy. 'So I must have done it. And by then I couldn't hold out any more anyway.'

  'Hold out on what?'

  This got an exasperated rise out of him. 'Hey, come on, what are we talking about?'

  'Elaine Wager's death, Cole. How about that?'

  But he was shaking his head. 'No, man. We're talking g. They got me in that room and I'm coming down hard. I'm dying! You understand? Then Banks tells me he'll see he gets me something as soon as I say I did it. So I told him.'

  'That you killed her?'

  'Yeah.' He shrugged. 'But hell, I would have told him I'd shot Kennedy if that's what he wanted to hear.'

  The Chief Assistant District Attorney of the City and County of San Francisco did not have a big office. In fact, Gabriel Torrey's office was the same size as the other third floor offices which were shared two to a room by the rank and file assistant DAs. The big difference was in the furnishings – a sofa and matching armchairs of exquisitely soft leather, built-in floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, plantation shutters, twin original Tiffany lamps, a Persian rug over the hardwood floor Torrey had installed. And, of course, there was also the desk – a large, custom crafted, beautifully finished cross-section of redwood burl from an old-growth stand of trees that had been clear cut in the late 1970s.

  The desk had been a gift to Torrey from the CEO of Pac-Ore Timber. In those days, Torrey was a young attorney working as a lobbyist in Washington, DC, representing whatever clients were willing to pay him back then, regardless of their political agenda. The provenance of the Desk was old news by now – it was simply the stunning centerpiece of an intimidating workspace. The old-time DAs, a handful of old white guys who remained from past administrations, remembered the office from the days when Art Drysdale had been the Chief ADA. Back then it had been just like their own – a mess. Battered green files, sagging metal bookshelves that held binders full of active cases, a cork bulletin board, one wall-mounted six-foot length of two-by-four that held Art's baseball memorabilia.

  But Gabriel Torrey believed in the trappings of power. The prosecutors who reported to him would never have cause to doubt that he was hugely important, more so than they would ever be. Victims of crimes and their families would be reassured that their cases were being handled at the highest level. Other visitors to the office -personal guests as well as opposing attorneys and political acquaintances – were greeted not by a faceless bureaucrat, but by an affable, self-assured gentleman in total control of his world. The subtext, Torrey thought, was clear – this man didn't get here, in these surroundings, by mistake. He was a winner. You crossed him at your peril.

  Now, a half-hour after he'd finished a wonderful lunch at La Felce, he sat behind the Desk, the jacket of his Armani suit draped over the wooden valet behind him. He wore a silk tie in deep maroon with gold threads over a starched shirt with a subtle purple hue. On the sofa opposite him was a mid-thirties attorney named Gina Roake. Next to her on the cherry end table, a cup of freshly brewed Blue Mountain coffee, untouched, was turning tepid – Ms Roake was so angry that she couldn't have swallowed a drop to save her life. She was representing another woman named Abby Oberlin in a will contest between Abby and her brother Jim, and things had gotten beyond ugly.

  'But my client loved her mother, Mr Torrey,' she managed to say. 'She's the one who has taken care of her for the past seven years. Jim hasn't so much as visited in, I don't know, forever. Five years, maybe more.'

  'Which is why her mother left Abby the lion's share of her estate?'

  'Yes. Of course.'

  'And it's valued at around eight million dollars?'

  'That's right.'

  'A lot of money.' Torrey let the words sink in. 'And all of it to your client. Less your fee of course.'

  This got Gina's back up. She chose not to respond to the latter comment, but she was going to stick up for her client. 'She took care of her mother and loved her. Jim is just a selfish…' She bit at her lip. 'He is lying, that's all there is to it. There was no abuse. Abby didn't…' The words stopped.

  Torrey leaned forward. He was in prosecutor mode and Gina's client stood accused of a serious crime. Gina could protest about her innocence all day. Torrey would listen patiently, conveying that he'd heard all this before from other attorneys in other, similar cases, and in his vast experience most of them had done what the other family members had accused them of. He spoke quietly, but with a firm edge. 'Nevertheless, your client's brother contends that the will is invalid. That his mother signed it under coercion. Additionally, he has reported this criminal conduct of his sister and this office is going to have no option but to pursue a vigorous prosecution.'

  'But it makes no sense. There's no evidence of-'

  Torrey's expression became even more stern as he interrupted. He tapped a file folder on the desk in front of him. 'Don't play games with me, Ms Roake. There is a real case here-'

  'Her mother fell. She broke her hip. Then she tried to get up too soon and fell again. It happens.'

  'Yes it does. And after the second fall, she contracted pneumonia and died.'

  Gina could not entirely keep the panic out of her voice. 'You're not implying Abby killed her, are you? Or caused her death somehow? Even Jim's not saying that, and he'd stoop to anything to get some of the money.'

  Torrey shook his head. 'I'm not accusing your client of anything. What I am saying is that we've got significant resources that we can and will bring to bear in this type of investigation. Prosecuting instances of abuse of the elderly is one of Sharron Pratt's highest priorities. We can and will subpoena your mother's medical records. Jim Oberlin contends that he believes his mother was over-sedated.' He sat back, lawyer to lawyer. 'Look, Ms Roake, you know how it works. Investigators will talk to Abby's friends. If she's ever complained about all the work her mother required-'

  'Well of course she did! She's not a saint. I'm sure there were days…' Gina Roake shook her head.

  'Even so.' Torrey spread his hands wide as if to tell her that's what he meant – it could look very bad for Abby Oberlin. He let a silence gather and then sighed heavily, a brief wash of compassion coming to his face. 'Ms Roake. Gina. Did I not ask you to come and see me as a courtesy?' She nodded.

  'Why do you think that is?' He patted the folder again. 'When based on the accusations your client's brother has brought against her, I would have been justified sending out some officers to place her under arrest?'

  'Under arrest?'

  'That's right. Her name in the paper with the whole story, everything Jim has accused her of.'

  'No, you can't do that. It's not…' Visibly, she brought herself under control. When she spoke after half a minute, her voice was calm, reasonable. 'Jim just wants money, Mr Torrey. He has no career. He'll never hold a job. That's just who he is. He's desperate. Abby didn't do anything he says.'

  Torrey crossed his hands on the desk, reapplied the stern visage. 'You didn't answer my question.'

  She wrung her hands. 'I'm sorry. What was it again?'

  'Why do you think I asked you down here today?'

  'I don't know.'

  'Well, I'll tell you.' The tone softened again. 'I've prosecuted more cases like this than I'd care to tell you about, and I've developed a good sense, a very good sense if I may say so, of how these things play out. In this case, there was verifiable physical trauma to Abby's mother. A finder of fact will conclude that there are grounds for a hearing, and after that in all likelihood a full-fledged trial. You know this. Your client probably will be arrested…' he held up a hand, stopping her protest, 'although bail will be reasonable. She'll spend, if she's lucky, about half a million dollars in att
orneys' fees, experts, investigation, which is good news for you, except that she won't be able to take any of it out of the estate while it's being contested. The process will take a minimum of two or three years out of your client's life and after all that, even if we don't prove she did anything she's charged with, some civil jury might give her brother all the money on the theory that definitely he did no harm and your client might have.'

  Gina had all but collapsed back into the soft leather of the couch. 'So what do you suggest?' she asked helplessly, talking all but to herself.

  He leaned forward, suddenly friend and perhaps savior. 'The truth is that I believe you. Jim doesn't care what happened to his mother, beyond that she is dead.'

  'That's what I've been-'

  'But that's not saying he won't let all of this… unpleasantness… proceed. From where I sit, it's a no-lose situation for him, and it's no-win for your client.'

  She came forward on the sofa. 'She's not going to give him any of the money, Mr Torrey. He doesn't deserve it. He's an evil man, and this is wrong.'

  The Chief Assistant nodded in agreement. 'Nevertheless, if this prosecution moves forward, the next time I see you, we won't be talking like this.' He leveled his gaze at her. 'Tell your client that although it's a repugnant solution, if you throw a bone to her brother, I believe you could settle his civil claim. And if he's satisfied, I don't think we'd see any need to file a criminal case. If I were her, from a purely self-protective, even selfish motive, I'd think about that.'

  'But it's so wrong…'

  Torrey couldn't argue the point and didn't try. 'Be that as it may, that's my advice while I'm still free to give it. After today, we're on opposite sides.'

  Gina Roake stood and thanked Torrey. He told her he appreciated her coming by, and hoped that she would come to the right decision, and she told him she'd discuss it with her client, but they would both consider his advice very seriously. Then she left. He could still hear her footsteps in the hallway outside as he picked up the telephone.