The Hearing (14 page)

Torrey couldn’t resist a parting remark. “You wouldn’t know an ethic if it bit you on the ass.”

For a long moment, Hardy gave him a flat stare. “Whoa. Clever. I’ve got to remember that one.” He turned to gather the rest of his papers.

Hardy decided he’d just as soon forgo the excitement in the hallway outside. He was all too familiar with the back way out—it was the way he’d come in—but his client Cole had just had bail denied. Even when this was expected, and it had been, it was never an easy moment.

He caught Cole just outside the holding cell behind the courtroom. The bailiffs were busy transporting other defendants up and down from the jail, and there was another defendant and his attorney waiting in the cell itself, so they’d handcuffed Cole to the elevator bars until they could get to him, which would be when it was.

Hardy stood next to him. “We’ll keep trying on the bail,” he said. “It still could happen.”

“So what do I do between now and the preliminary hearing?”

“We’ll have to talk a lot. Maybe see if you can remember something.”

But Cole didn’t seem to hear him. “No,” he said, as though to himself.

“No what?” Hardy asked. “You’re not going to remember anything new?”

“Not that. I mean . . .” He rolled his eyes back and forth. “I mean remembering something . . . that’s not what I’m thinking about.”

Hardy knew what Cole was thinking about—his next hit. “That’s what you ought to be thinking about, Cole. Maybe you can use the time to clean up.”

A shake of the head. “No. I don’t think . . .” He stopped.

This was foreign soil to Hardy. He’d of course been around for much of the beginning of the drug culture in the late sixties, early seventies, but as a marine in Vietnam, and then a cop before law school, he had grown increasingly uncomfortable with the idea of illegal substances. He’d found his excitement without resort to chemicals, and then, later—when he felt the need to escape from the pain of his failed marriage and the death of his son—he gravitated to what the Irish called the good man’s weakness, drink.

But even that had never controlled him. He chose to drink, sometimes copiously, then chose when to stop.

This boy, he knew, was in a completely different world.

“Do you want to get out of it?” he asked.

He shrugged. “If I do, there’s a program for it.” A mirthless laugh. “There’s a program for everything, isn’t there?”

“It does seem like it.” It surprised Hardy—this first moment of connection he’d felt with his client—but he felt the same way. Here in San Francisco, tolerance and understanding for every human frailty or aberration had been politicized, funded, institutionalized. Someone was being paid to help you with whatever ailed you in San Francisco, and if nothing ailed you, someone was being paid to find something that did. “Is there anything I can do?” Hardy asked.

Cole turned his head. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, if you decide, to move the process along, get you counseling, like that.”

“Probably not.” Cole let out a breath. “If it’s going to happen, it falls to me.” He tapped his heart. “In here.”

Hardy knew that this was true, but it was still good to hear Cole say it, to acknowledge that his fate was to some extent his own responsibility. Maybe he wasn’t completely lost after all.

“So what happens next,” he asked, “in the law world?”

“Next I file a few motions. The stuff I was talking about in there.” He pointed at the courtroom door. “The procedural problems, these special circumstances . . .”

“Will that really work?”

“In what sense?”

“I mean, if they didn’t read me my rights—”

Hardy narrowed his eyes. “At the hospital the other day, you told me you didn’t remember if they did. You thought not. Now you’re saying ‘if’ . . .”

He corrected himself. “No. They told me I wasn’t arrested for the murder so I didn’t need a lawyer yet. They were just questioning me because I was in the alley and I ran.”

“So you do remember that?”

“That was after they’d kept me for hours. I kind of woke up halfway through things. ”

Hardy wasn’t thrilled with the constant shifts Cole’s story took, but he saw no advantage in fighting about that now. “Well, if that’s really what they said, then you might have pulled yourself a break. We could get it tossed.”

“I’ll tell you one other thing, though. About those special circumstances.” He shuddered involuntarily. “I sure as hell didn’t kill that girl because she was black.”

The world was suddenly still. Hardy sharpened his tone. “Then why
did
you kill her?”

“What?”

He snapped it out harshly, under his breath. “Why did you kill her, if it wasn’t because she was black?”

After he’d seen Glitsky’s videotape and reasoned things out for himself, Hardy had come to accept at least the possibility that Cole hadn’t been the agent of Elaine’s death. So he’d decided to stay with the case. But now here—apparently—was a second confession. Unsolicited, uncoerced.

Cole’s face registered confusion at the rapid change in Hardy’s demeanor. From protector to inquisitor in the blink of an eye. He twitched. “Hey, come on, what? All I said was it wouldn’t have been because she was black.”

“Wouldn’t have been? Or wasn’t?”

If there was a difference, Cole didn’t seem to understand what it was. He strained to come up with something. “I’m saying black, white, brown. Who cares? It wouldn’t have been a race thing is what I mean. I don’t even think like that.”

Hardy leaned in close, and this time the sweat was his client’s. “You just admitted again that you killed her. Don’t you understand that?”

A deer in headlights, Cole was shaking his head. “I don’t know. I didn’t. I said that?”

“You don’t know if you killed her?”

Finally, a rise. “I don’t
remember
killing her. I told you that. I don’t think I killed her, but I might have . . . if I shot the gun.”

“You
might have
? Cole, listen to me. You just said you didn’t shoot the girl because she was black. Those were your exact words.”

But he was shaking his head from side to side, side to side. “See? No. That’s not what I meant.”

“Okay, tell me.”

He sighed deeply, did something with his hands that caused the cuffs to rattle against the bars. Hunching his head down into his shoulders, he cleared his throat, spoke in a voice barely above a whisper. “Look. If I was ever going to kill somebody, which I wouldn’t, it wouldn’t be because they were black, okay? So if I killed this girl . . .”

“Elaine.”

“Yeah, Elaine. If I killed her—which I don’t remember, so it’s possible maybe I didn’t, too—that wouldn’t have been the reason.”

“But if you don’t remember killing her, why did you admit that you had?”

Cole rolled his eyes. “Didn’t we already go through this? I told you. I was coming down so hard—”

Hardy reached over, put a hand on his shoulder briefly. “Stop, just stop.”

But he couldn’t do that. “You know, man—”

“Cole, call me Dismas, would you? Or Diz.”

“Okay. But I also don’t remember
not
killing her, I just don’t. I don’t remember the gun, how I got the gun . . .” The voice trailed off.

“Did you find it by the body? On the street, maybe?”

“It seems like.”

“Before or after you saw her?”

He closed his eyes, trying to bring it back. “I don’t know. It seems like before, because after . . . I mean, there was no time after, right? I’m leaning over her and the cops came.”

“And you remember that?”

Cole grimaced, the effort at recall out of his reach. He shook his head hopelessly. “Not really.”

Hardy leaned back again. He had lived much of his adult life as a bartender and had great respect for the effects of alcohol, but the kind of total blackout that Cole seemed to be describing was far beyond that. “Cole,” he asked gently, “what do you remember after you picked up your bottle of whiskey?”

The young man raised his eyes. They had become glassy. “I don’t know, man. I just don’t know.”

T
aking the back steps, Hardy made it unmolested up to the fourth floor, down the long hallway, into the homicide detail. Four inspectors looked up from their paperwork, but none of them ventured any kind of greeting. Glitsky’s still-pristine white door was closed again, but this time there was light behind the shade. “Somebody in with the lieutenant?” Hardy asked the room.

A mute chorus of shrugs, so he knocked.

“It’s open.”

He turned the knob and stuck his head in. “Actually,” he said, “it was closed.”

Glitsky had his feet on his desk, his fingers tented over his mouth. “Why don’t you make it that way again?”

“I could do that.” Hardy did, then reached across the desk, opened one of the drawers and withdrew a handful of peanuts. “I must say, though, that the old open-door policy you used to take such pride in seems to be in jeopardy, and this, in turn, might precipitate a drop in your tremendous popularity with your troops, which I’d hate to see.”

It might have been in spite of himself, but Glitsky’s face softened—all the way, say, from diamond to granite. “I wish I was Irish and liked to hear myself talk as much as you do.”

“Were,” Hardy replied.

“Were what?”

“You said ‘was.’ I wish I was Irish. But it’s ‘were.’ Present conditional contrary to fact takes the subjunctive. I wish I
were
Irish. People don’t seem to know that anymore.”

Glitsky shook his head, pulled his feet off the desk. “That’s exactly what I mean. Twenty words when five will do.”

“Five can be good,” Hardy replied. “Brevity and all that. But it’s not all it’s cracked up to be. Twenty words, if they’re the right ones—and that, my friend, is the key—can be downright sublime. And, of course, though few acknowledge it anymore in our jaded age, proper use of the subjunctive is the hallmark of a civilized man.”

Worn down, Glitsky finally came all the way to a smile. “Were I to care, I would make a note of it.” He popped a peanut of his own. “So how’d it go downstairs?”

Hardy sat back. “I somehow escaped contempt of court, but I don’t think by much.” He briefly outlined the highlights of the arraignment, concluding with his surprise that Glitsky had not been in attendance. He indicated the empty desktop. “But then, seeing the piles of work you’re wading through . . .”

A silence settled.

Hardy continued. “Afterwards I had another nice chat with my client. It didn’t exactly perk me up. He doesn’t remember anything. The night’s a complete blank, which is more drunk than I’ve ever been.”

“And you’ve pushed the envelope a few times if I remember, which you don’t.”

“From time to time in my youth. For research purposes only. Anyway, I like to consider myself an aficionado on the subject, and I’ve never had the kind of blackout Cole is describing, which makes me have doubts.”

But Glitsky was shaking his head. “There’s all kinds of new pills nowadays, Diz. The date rape drug. Also, more easily available, Halcion could do it.”

“Halcion?”

“The sleeping pill. When you were doing your drink research, didn’t you ever take Halcion before tying one on?”

“I don’t remember, really. It’s all a blank.” But he broke a smile. “Just kidding. Is that what happens?”

“That’s the word. Complete blackout.” Glitsky glanced at the closed door. He lowered his voice anyway. “I had a meeting of my own this morning. Batiste, Ridley Banks, Strout, the guys at the scene. I wanted to talk about the problems in the tape.”

“Banks was downstairs in court.”

“Yeah, I figured he would be. I told him we ought to back off from the confession.”

“You suggested that?” This was further than Hardy thought Abe would have taken it. “Out loud?”

“Yeah, but Ridley was a little sensitive to the idea that the confession was bogus. Seemed to think it would reflect on the way he conducted it.”

“And he wouldn’t be all wrong.”

“And he knows that, too.” The lieutenant blew out wearily. “It’s tricky, Diz. These are my guys. They gave me what I asked for. I don’t blame them for being ticked off.”

“I don’t either, but ticked off is one thing, letting a guy go down on bad evidence is another.”

“Well, there you go. Anyway, my colleagues and superiors were of a like mind. There was plenty to arrest Burgess, still is. He gave us more when we talked to him. Now he goes to trial. It’s not our job anymore. End of story.”

It was Hardy’s turn to sigh. “But it’s not, Abe. You know it’s not.”

“Don’t give me that, Diz. It might be. And don’t confuse bad evidence with not guilty. Your boy killed Elaine all right. It’s all about how we prove it. I want a clean case, that’s all.”

“I think you want more than that.”

Glitsky cracked a peanut shell. “I’m trying to figure out how to conduct an investigation and get more evidence when we’ve got a suspect already in jail and presumably going to trial.”

“Carefully.” Pointing a finger, Hardy stopped his friend’s response. “See? I can be brief. Pithy, even.”

Glitsky was about to reply again, and again was interrupted, this time by a knock at the door. “It’s open.”

Hardy clucked disapprovingly. “You keep saying that.”

But in an instant it was true. Standing in the doorway was Chief of Police Dan Rigby himself, accompanied by Sharron Pratt and Gabriel Torrey. An uncomfortable Frank Batiste. Behind them was an amorphous assemblage of humanity—workers from the D.A.’s office, uniformed cops, a couple of reporters, perhaps the random passerby. Hardy could see the homicide inspectors from the detail gathered around at the outer fringes.

“Well, well, well,” Torrey said over Rigby’s shoulders. “Isn’t this cozy?”

There wasn’t room for a private party in Glitsky’s office, so at Rigby’s command the players trooped across the homicide main room and poured themselves into one of the interrogation areas—in fact, the very one in which Cole Burgess had spent his sweat time.

Airless and without windows, with a small table now pushed against one wall and three chairs, the interrogation room probably wasn’t a brilliant choice for a meeting either, but the mood was somehow, suddenly,
urgent
.

Torrey, in a kind of triumphant rage, kept repeating “I knew this. I knew it” to whomever would listen. Rigby, torn between the urge to protect one of his men and the need to contain any possible scandal on the force, wanted a door he could close with all the principals behind it, and he wanted it
now
.

“We don’t need Mr. Hardy sitting in on this, Chief,” said Pratt.

Rigby ignored her. He wasted no time on preamble, but turned to his homicide lieutenant and let fly. “Mr. Torrey tells me that this morning, Mr. Hardy here referred to a videotape at the arraignment on Burgess. How’d he get to see it?”

“We’re nowhere near releasing discovery yet,” Pratt butted in pointlessly. “He didn’t get it from our office.”

Everyone already knew that. Rigby kept his eyes on Glitsky. “Abe?”

But Hardy, whose slip in the courtroom had put Glitsky on this hot seat, wasn’t going to let his friend burn. “I never said I saw a tape,” he said. “Cole told me they’d videotaped him.”

“How did he know?” Banks interjected.

“Come on. He assumed,” Hardy shot back. “It’s not like this is some secret procedure. Everybody gets taped.”

But Torrey was ready for this denial. He pulled a piece of paper from his pocket, directed his gaze to Rigby. “Here’s what Mr. Hardy said exactly. I took the liberty of having the court reporter type it up for me.” He read. “ ‘He was drunk and barely coherent, your honor! The tape of his interrogation shows it clearly.’ Sounds to me like he saw it.”

Hardy wasn’t backing down. “Doesn’t prove a damn—”

But Glitsky put a hand on his arm. “It’s okay, Diz.” He turned to Rigby. “I played it for him.”

After a shocked moment of silence, Banks blew out heavily. “Jesus.”

Torrey pumped a fist. “Fuckin’A,” he whispered.

Pratt cleared her throat. “Well, Chief, in light of this admission, you can’t—”

“Sharron! Please.” Rigby stopped her with his palm, turned to his chief of homicide. “Lieutenant Glitsky, are you telling me you gave evidence in a murder trial to a defense attorney? Am I hearing this right?”

Glitsky inclined his head an inch. “Yes, sir.”

The chief sighed heavily. “All right.” His mouth worked. He might have been grinding his teeth. “All right,” he repeated. “We’ve got to look into this. Meanwhile . . .”

Torrey: “What’s to look into? He’s admitted—”

“MEANWHILE . . .” Rigby bellowed to shut him up. He turned to Batiste. “Meanwhile, Frank, I’d like you and Abe to meet me up in my office in”—he checked his watch—“thirty minutes. Lieutenant, if you’d like to bring a grievance officer along with you, that might be prudent. Everybody else”—his voice hardened—“I’d appreciate it if anything mentioned behind these doors stays here until I can prepare a statement after we get to the bottom of what went on.” He glared at Pratt and Torrey. “And if there is a statement to make, we’ll make it together. Is that clear?”

“We can agree to that,” Pratt stated.

“Though it should be sooner rather than later,” Torrey added.

“As soon as the facts are in,” Rigby replied crisply. He cast a last slow look around the room, finally rested on Glitsky, shook his head. “Jesus Christ, Abe,” he said under his breath, “what were you thinking?”

Then he turned the knob and was out the door, leaving it open behind him.

Gene Visser’s law enforcement career began in a promising fashion. He spent three years working the streets in a squad car, then got moved up and earned a stripe and an inspector’s job in burglary. After three years in that department, he put two more in vice, took the sergeant’s exam, and applied for the next opening as inspector of homicide, which was pretty much the top rung in the ladder for working cops. When he got that promotion at thirty, he was one of the youngest inspectors ever to attain that rank and position.

But Visser had a couple of character flaws that were going to negatively impact his aspirations on the force. The first one was a tendency to theorize before all the evidence was in. He’d get a feeling about who among the various suspects in a case was the most likely culprit, and he’d focus his energies trying to prove his point. The first couple of cases he’d handled, this approach had even worked—quite often, the guy who looks like he did it actually did.

But not always.

And the law of averages—along with the complexity of motives and situations in real-life homicides—finally caught up with him in a high-profile case.

This was where his second major failing—a lack of focus regarding loyalty—came into play. Visser thought it only made sense to have friends in the press and the D.A.’s office as well as with the police. It couldn’t hurt to give a reporter a little advance heads up on what might be coming down the pipeline, sometimes before it was supposed to be public. These people—the D.A.’s and reporters—after all, were the end users of his product. They ought to be entitled to an early look.

And in their zeal for convictions (pre-Pratt), the occasional prosecutor would sometimes use Visser to funnel something to the press that they couldn’t say themselves. If you were nice to reporters, they were nice to you in print. It was you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours. Visser may even have thought that everybody did it, although in this belief he was mistaken.

Until one day, stunned, he found himself transferred out of homicide. Soon he found it prudent to resign and get another job as investigator for the district attorney’s office, where he was pretty much like a police inspector, but not really.

That new position lasted only eighteen months. He could have stayed on, of course—he hadn’t really done anything wrong—but he felt frozen out. He became the prosecutor’s last choice if they needed a real investigator. Finally, deeply embittered by the system that had rejected him, he quit and, encouraged by several defense attorneys with whom he’d become friendly and who promised him steady work, he hung up a shingle as a private investigator.

Visser had once been handsome, with a full head of sandy-colored hair, chiseled cheekbones, a well-trimmed goatee. In the decade since he’d had his own business, though, he’d gained forty pounds and two inches of forehead. He’d also lost the facial hair that had hid his chins. Now the skin of his face stretched tightly over too much flesh through which smallish eyes perpetually seemed to squint.