The Ophelia Cut

by John Lescroart

“That’s for starters, and it’s ridiculous, so let’s discount it. What else?”

  “What else is that it strikes me as a little . . . inappropriate. Moses gives him a job to tide him over when he’s going through a tough time, and then he starts going out with the guy’s daughter?”

  “Maybe he didn’t mean to. Maybe it’s true love.”

  “Of course,” Hardy said. “Romantic soul that I am, I’d never rule that out. But she’s my niece, and I worry about her. Tony’s charmed and insinuated himself into a pretty sweet situation, and I guess he moved so fast, I’m leery. Especially since I’m the one who basically put everybody together.” Hardy stared out into the middle distance. “Anyway, I don’t know why I got on to Tony. He’s not the issue.”

  “So what is the issue? Is there one?”

  “I hope not. But evidently, that breakup between Brittany and Jessup—if you can call it breaking up after just one date—didn’t go too well. Jessup wanted to see her again, and she wasn’t going there. After a few days of stalking her, he apparently pushed her or something—”

  “What do you mean, stalking her? He physically attacked her?”

  “She fell or tripped or was pushed or something. The bottom line is he did something that put her in the hospital. It’s a little unclear exactly what it was. Brittany wouldn’t say, or even admit that Jessup did anything. But Moses got suspicious and went down and had a few words with Jessup until he verified what had happened.”

  “Uh-oh. And how’d that go?”

  Hardy nodded grimly. “You know Moses. About like you’d expect. He told me he gave Jessup a bit of a tune-up and didn’t think he would be much of a problem for Brittany anymore.”

  Gina grimaced. “You think the cops will want to talk to him?”

  “It would be a miracle if they didn’t. I kind of wanted your take on it. I also thought, on general principle, that you ought to know.” He didn’t have to draw Gina a map. Moses in jail, where he might mention the massacre while under stress, or possibly get drunk and talkative on jail-made hooch, was a situation they needed to prevent at all costs.

  “I appreciate that.” Then, “You don’t really think he had anything to do with this latest? With Jessup’s murder?”

  Hardy leveled his gaze at her. “No comment.”

  14

  ALTHOUGH THE JESSUP homicide was taking up most of their day-to-day time and imagination, Brady and Sher were almost always working on more than one homicide, and today events surrounding the homicide of Daniel Dejesus were demanding their immediate attention.

  On the Sunday one week before Rick Jessup’s death, Mr. Dejesus, a low-level gangbanger from the lower Mission District, got himself shot by an assailant in a passing car as he stood on a street corner either minding his own business or selling drugs.

  The accounts varied.

  Although it had been broad daylight and the street was well populated with pedestrians, no one had seen anything. But now, a week and two days later, Juan Rios, the owner of Taco Rios—the taqueria in front of which Daniel had spent his last minutes—decided that he needed to talk to the inspectors who’d interviewed him a week before.

  It seemed that Juan had rushed out after hearing the shots and taken a photograph with his cell phone of the getaway car as it drove away. The picture had been in his phone since he’d taken it, but he had wanted to wait and see if somebody else would come forward with evidence, so it wouldn’t have to be him. As it was, Juan wanted assurances of protection for him and his family if he was going to be any kind of witness. In any event, he wanted the violence in his neighborhood to stop, and the police were welcome to the picture of the car to do with as they saw fit, even if Juan wasn’t personally involved.

  The two inspectors spent a frustrating but possibly important hour with the local restaurateur. They said they understood what he wanted, but people in hell wanted ice water. If he were subpoenaed, he would come to court and testify or, with the deepest sorrow and regret, they would come and put him in jail. They didn’t leave with his commitment to testify, or any deal about his protection, though they did have a good shot not only of the red low-rider Chevrolet but of its license plate. With that, even lacking Rios’s testimony, Sher and Brady thought they might be able to shake something loose in the case.

  After they got back in their car, Sher turned the ignition but did not shift it into gear. She stayed in the parking place, her face expressionless, her eyes half closed.

  “Don’t let him get you down,” Brady said, “he’s just scared. He’ll come around, and even if he doesn’t, we—”

  Sher held up a hand, stopping him, and turned her head. “We’re morons,” she said.

  “No. We had to get what he had, even if—”

  “Not that,” she said, cutting him off again. “Jessup.”

  “What about him?”

  “Not him. Let’s start with her, the rape victim.”

  “Who shall remain nameless because—”

  “Right. Privilege. But guess what? We know that our victim, Jessup, dated her a while ago, right? And she must have dumped him, since we also know that he was trying to get back with her.”

  “Okay. But so what?”

  “So how hard could it be?”

  Brady thought about it for two seconds, then said, “Goodman’s office. City hall. Where he worked.”

  “That’s what I’m talking about,” she said, slamming the car into gear, peeling out into the traffic.

  THE SUPERVISOR WASN’T in and hadn’t been since a half hour after he’d gotten the news about Jessup. In Goodman’s absence and with the tragedy, the office had ceased to function. Diane Galen had sent the interns home at lunchtime, and when Sher and Brady knocked on the locked outer door, she greeted them with a weary politeness, then led them into a small and windowless conference room where she apparently had been sitting with a cup of coffee.

  They’d gotten through the preliminaries, and Sher had started to give Diane their condolences, when the woman waved her off rather abruptly. “This is a very difficult and confusing time,” she said, “and I don’t mean for this to sound callous, but I’m afraid that I wouldn’t say Rick and I were exactly friends. We didn’t see each other outside of work. I think he considered me and the interns somewhat beneath him. He made it very clear that there were the professionals—which included himself and Mr. Goodman—and then everyone else was more or less staff. Although in terms of longevity in the office, I am by far the most senior.”

  Sher leaned forward, elbows on the table. “He didn’t share many of his personal feelings with members of the staff?”

  “No. He did see Mr. Goodman outside the office from time to time.”

  “In your opinion, would anyone here besides Mr. Goodman know anything about Mr. Jessup’s personal life?”

  “I don’t think so. Although you could ask the interns when they come back in, which should be tomorrow.”

  “Will Mr. Goodman be back then, too?”

  “I hope so. We haven’t been in contact since he left yesterday.”

  “So they were close? Mr. Jessup and Mr. Goodman?”

  Diane found something of interest in the grain of the table, and she studied it for a moment or two. “Perhaps less close than they used to be. You know they came to work here together from Mr. Goodman’s law practice before he was elected. I don’t suppose it’s any secret that Mr. Goodman is thinking about running for mayor and that Mr. Jessup had planned to move up with him.”

  The inspectors exchanged a glance. This was far removed from what they’d come here to discuss, but they would get to that in due time. They were investigating a murder, and if an unexpected path opened up, it was usually worth exploring. Brady took the ball from his partner and said, “Did those plans appear to be changing?”

  Diane took another minute, then she sighed. “I don’t mean to speak ill of the dead, but Mr. Jessup had a pronounced streak of arrogance that, most of the time, in public, he managed to camoufla
ge very well. He was very jealous of his place in Mr. Goodman’s life. In the past few months, trying to control access to Mr. Goodman, he managed to alienate a few large donors to the campaign, notably Jon Lo, and I think Mr. Goodman became aware of that, or was made aware of it. Some days there would be a palpable tension in the office. I don’t know if Mr. Goodman now would be a source for information about Mr. Jessup’s private life.”

  “Well,” Sher said, “thank you. We’ll keep that in mind when we talk to Mr. Goodman. Actually, we were hoping you might know the names of any of Mr. Jessup’s girlfriends, or women he dated, who might have had significance.”

  She was shaking her head. “No, I didn’t know who he dated, and I don’t have—” Abruptly, she stopped. “Wait a minute. A woman he dated?”

  “Yes. And broke up with, or she with him, a couple of months ago.”

  Diane raised her eyes to one of the room’s corners, and the two inspectors let her remember. At last she came back to them. “A man came by here several weeks ago, asking for Mr. Jessup. He told Rick to stop bothering his daughter, and then they both went out to the hallway. Rick never came back in that day. I think he was out a couple of days after that. The rumor among the interns was that the man had hit him out in the hall. Can you give me a minute?”

  “As much as you need,” Brady said.

  Getting up, Diane left the room with a resolute stride. Brady crossed his fingers and held them up, and Sher nodded in acknowledgment, then sat back in her chair and crossed her arms to wait.

  “Okay,” Diane said as she came back through the door, appointment book in hand. “I’ve got it. I keep the calendar for both Mr. Goodman and Mr. Jessup. It’s critical to have a record of who’s been in to see whom in this business. Even though this man didn’t have an appointment, he introduced himself to me, and I put him in the log. He was”—she looked down as she read—“Moses McGuire, owner of a bar called the Little Shamrock. He said it was about his daughter Brittany.”

  BUSINESS WASN’T EXACTLY booming at the Shamrock. Happy hour wouldn’t start for another forty-five minutes; there were only five customers, a middle-aged tourist couple at one of the tables, Dave with his Miller Lite in his usual place up at the front of the bar, and two hipsters in the back room playing darts. Lyle Lovett’s “This Old Porch” played low through the music system.

  Back at the well area, Moses McGuire checked the front door one more time, just to be sure no one else was coming in, and then—seeing no one—he free-poured a half inch or so of vodka, a tiny refresher, into his club soda, squeezed in another wedge of lime. He’d barely taken the first sip when another couple appeared through the large plate-glass window that looked out onto Lincoln Way. A moment later, they were standing in front of him.

  Not customers, as it turned out.

  They laid their badges on the bar in front of him, and the glib McGuire said, “I don’t need your IDs. You guys look twenty-one to me.”

  Paul Brady’s entirely businesslike smile came and went as he introduced himself and his partner and said they were hoping to talk to Moses McGuire.

  “You found him. How can I help you?”

  Sher told him what they were investigating and asked if he’d heard about it.

  “I have. I read about it this morning.”

  “Did you know Mr. Jessup?” Brady asked.

  “I did. I talked to him a couple of times. I was wondering when you guys would come by. He dated my daughter a few months ago and treated her badly, so I went and found him and told him he should leave her alone.”

  Brady again. “And how did he take that?”

  “I think I convinced him that it would be a good idea.”

  “Did you strike him?”

  McGuire sipped from his glass. “Do you have a report saying that I did?”

  “Is that a yes or a no?” Sher asked.

  “It’s an entirely separate question,” McGuire said evenly. “Are you talking to me because I’m a suspect in his murder?”

  The question obviously set the two inspectors back for a beat or two as they exchanged glances. Sher said, “We don’t have any suspects yet. We’ve barely begun to look.”

  Brady added, “That’s another way to say everybody’s a potential suspect.”

  “Do you want to answer our question?” Sher asked. “Did you strike Mr. Jessup?”

  McGuire lifted his glass again, took a serious pull. “Yes, I did. I didn’t really hurt him. I just wanted to get his attention.” He wiped away an imaginary speck on the bar with his towel, then looked back up at the inspectors. “When was he killed?”

  Sher got half a nod from Brady, tacit permission. “Two days ago. Sunday evening sometime.”

  “Sunday,” McGuire repeated. “Sunday’s my day off here, as luck would have it. Sunday and Monday.” He hesitated, squinting in apparent concentration as he tried to dredge up the memory. At last it came. “I was fishing from about four o’clock till dusk out on the beach by the yacht club. The St. Francis.”

  “We didn’t ask,” Brady said.

  “No, but I thought it couldn’t hurt to get that out of the way.”

  Sher asked, “Any luck? Fishing, I mean?”

  “Couple of small ones I threw back.”

  “Were you alone?”

  McGuire inclined his head a fraction of an inch. “I was, except for the usual half dozen Asians or so, who would probably remember me, since I was the only Irish guy down there. Now I’ve got one for you, if you don’t mind. If I’m not a suspect in this killing, what did you want to see me about?”

  At the end of the bar, Dave brought his empty beer bottle down with a thump. Several years north of seventy, Dave wasn’t much of a raconteur, and when the service slowed to the point where the bartender didn’t notice he’d gone dry, he’d tap his bottle with increasing intensity as the seconds ticked.

  Lyle Lovett had given way to Michael Bublé crooning “Everything.”

  McGuire excused himself, turned and opened the refrigerator, then popped another bottle of beer and took it down to Dave. When he came back, he asked, “Where were we?”

  Brady told him, “You were asking why did we want to see you. And the answer is we didn’t necessarily. The fact is, we wanted to talk to your daughter Brittany, and you were the fastest way to get to her.”

  “Why do you want to talk to her?”

  Brady came right back at him. “Why don’t you tell us how to reach her, and then she can tell you after we talk?”

  “Because you’re Homicide inspectors, and if you want to talk to Brittany, it’s going to be about Mr. Jessup, isn’t it? What is it, exactly, that you want to know?”

  “Mr. McGuire”—Sher stepped in to ramp down the intensity—“we understand your concerns and your desire to protect your daughter. We can tell you that she is not an active suspect, but she may have information on the case, and we’ll need to talk to her to find out if it relates and how. Does that seem so unreasonable?”

  “I never said it was unreasonable. I asked why you wanted to talk to her, and now you’ve told me. Which you could have done from the get-go instead of laying all of this suspect nonsense on me first.”

  “Look,” Brady said, “you assaulted a guy who later got killed. At some point, we were going to follow that up, so while we had you here—”

  “Look yourself,” McGuire shot back, “the guy assaulted my daughter. I delivered a message that I’m pretty sure he got the gist of. Which I thought would be the end of the story. And now you want to talk to Brittany but won’t tell me what you think she knows. Damn straight I’m trying to protect her.”

  AS THEY WERE rolling back downtown, Sher said, “Bottom line, he gave us her number. We ought to be thankful for small favors.”

  “Favor my ass.” Brady was hot from the conversation. “You’re telling me that the guy finds out his daughter’s been raped and he doesn’t do something about it? I wanted to take his picture on my phone and go show him to some of our witnesses.
”

  “Oh yeah, getting his permission for that? That would have calmed things down.”

  “I didn’t want to calm things down. I wasn’t necessarily going to ask his permission, either. McGuire admits he assaulted our victim. That puts him closer than anybody else.”

  “Paul, come on. Maybe there’s a connection between hitting a guy and knocking his brains out with a club. Let’s remember, we don’t even know for sure that Brittany was raped. All we know is she was dating Jessup at one time. It could have been anybody he happened to rape on Saturday. We’ve got to get to that first if we’re going to get anywhere with McGuire.”

  “No. First we pull his DL picture and six-pack it to our witnesses.”

  “Well, of course.” That was standard procedure, taking McGuire’s photograph from his California driver’s license, inserting it into a plastic sleeve with five other photographs—a six-pack—and hoping to get a positive identification. “I just don’t want you to get all psyched up.”

  “Perish the thought. I think we can at least admit there’s a likelihood that the rape and the murder are connected, wouldn’t you say?”

  “That’s what we’re going on,” Sher said. “It’d be a stretch if it were anything else.”

  15

  WHEN WES FARRELL got home—a small Victorian house across the street from Buena Vista Park in the Haight—his keen perceptive ability sensed something amiss right away. The chair tipped over on its side in his dining room was the first clue, but the full roll of paper towels on the kitchen floor was another good indication.

  Sighing, he picked up the offending debris, then took off his suit coat and hung it over the back of the chair. He considered removing his dress shirt and tie, hoping for a little giggle with today’s T-shirt—which read MAMMALS SUCK—but if history was any indication, his sense of humor would not assuage Sam when she was embroiled in a holy cause.

  As she was today.

  He climbed the steep staircase to their bedroom and, when he discovered she wasn’t there, continued to the ladder off the hallway that ended in a half doorway out to the roof. Sam, most beautiful when she was fiery, sat facing him in a low director’s chair, arms crossed. Behind her, the sun was unmolested by cloud cover all the way out to the horizon, and in the insane perversity that was San Francisco’s weather, the temperature hovered near eighty with nary a hint of breeze—a gorgeous evening.