Damage

by John Lescroart

  “You don’t think that Glitsky is really going to let it drop, do you? Sometimes I’m afraid he might actually be lying in wait somewhere when Ro goes out.”

  “I don’t think he’d do that himself. But he might in fact hire someone else. No, not even hire. It would be some kind of a favor.”

  She put down her cup. “That’s what I mean, Clifford. Why do we have to live with that fear every day? I don’t understand why we can’t have him removed somehow.”

  “We tried that before, if you remember. He’s resilient. I was sure he’d quit when they moved him to payroll. But no, here he is again, and again apparently with the support of his chief. These cops and their stupid loyalty. And there’s just no getting rid of our brand-new chief. Not for a while, anyway.”

  “So here we are again.” Theresa dabbed at her lifeless lips. “I don’t really understand what’s the point of acquiring influence if we can’t keep ourselves a little bit insulated from this riffraff element? Isn’t this what we work for? Instead, with all the money we hand out to that same element and all the good we try to do, it just doesn’t seem right.”

  “It isn’t right, Theresa. But it’s the way this town is. Basically insane.”

  She cut another small slice of pineapple and chewed it primly and completely. “And I don’t suppose,” she said, “that our good Mr. Farrell would let us take Ro with us if we went East, would he? Maybe just for an extended vacation?”

  “I think not.”

  “So why again did we donate all that money to his campaign?”

  “He was the lesser of two evils, Theresa. And in his defense, I have to say that he could probably have made a stronger stance against bail and kept Ro in jail, which he did not do. So I think, all in all, the campaign money was well spent. So far, at least. If he doesn’t try to get too cute and fancy pleasing everybody.”

  Theresa’s eyes went to the platter of bacon in front of her. She moved it forward a couple of inches before thinking better of it and pushing it back. Reaching for her grapefruit juice, she asked, “Why are they so out to get him?”

  “Ro?” He picked up a bite of his own bacon, chewed, swallowed, and sighed.

  “I mean,” she asked, “what did he do that was so terrible? Sowed a few wild oats? Show me a young man who hasn’t done that.” Suddenly Theresa’s eyes glistened with the threat of tears. “When I think of the time he’s already lost and now finally they let us have him again ... but for how long? I don’t know if I can bear it if they take him away again. I just don’t understand the witch hunt, Clifford. I really don’t. What did he really do? I just don’t understand it.”

  “What he did,” Cliff Curtlee began, “was he committed the grave sin of not apologizing for the class he comes from, our class. And in this city, as you know, there is no greater crime. Because we’re all exactly equal, don’t you see?”

  “But that’s so patently absurd.”

  “Nevertheless, that is precisely what—and I take my share of responsibility for this—that’s precisely what we didn’t take seriously enough at the trial. I mean, yes, he might have gotten a little out of control with some of these girls, and of course that was wrong, but he was young and really, who were they? Did they count in any meaningful way? Would they ever?”

  Just at this moment, Linda Salcedo, one of their young and attractive staff, came through the door from the kitchen holding a pitcher filled with freshly made coffee. “Ah,” Cliff said, “here is my savior. Perfect timing. A little more, please, just half a cup. There, that’s good, thanks. You’re a dream, Linda, what would we do without you?”

  Linda gave him a thin smile and curtsied politely. “Gracias.” And turned toward Theresa. “Señora?”

  “No thanks, dear, I’m fine.”

  Another little bow and the young woman disappeared back into the kitchen.

  “Darling girl,” Theresa said.

  “Wonderful,” Cliff agreed, then continued on his earlier topic. “Not saying that if Ro in fact hurt one of these girls, there shouldn’t be some punishment, but clearly his sentence was out of all proportion to the damage he did. And our failure—mine as well as his lawyers—was that we didn’t understand how deep the prejudice of those jurors went, that class divide. The jury wasn’t going to forgive him. They were going to make him an example. In retrospect, and I’ve agonized over this a thousand times, we should have played him down market, the way we did last week. That worked pretty well. That judge couldn’t help but see him not as a boy with a little money and maybe a leadership attitude, but as a beaten-down victim.”

  “I hated seeing him like that. That’s not who he is.”

  “No. But that’s who he may have to be if he wants a lighter sentence next time. Or even no sentence at all.”

  “But best would be if there is no next time.”

  Cliff nodded. “Of course. I agree. And I know that Tristan and Ro are working on that now. So we’ll just have to wait and see how that turns out. And here again, we still may be able to prevail on Mr. Farrell to hold off scheduling the new trial for quite some time, or even canceling it altogether, especially if none of the earlier witnesses can be found to testify again, which looks like it may in fact be the case.”

  “Let’s hope so. But if they do reschedule”—she lowered her voice—“I really think we might want to send Ro someplace safe if we can, where they don’t extradite.”

  Cliff sucked in a breath. “Well,” he said, “of course that’s a possibility. But it’s a ten-and-a-half-million-dollar decision, Theresa. We could do it, but let’s exhaust all our other options first.”

  Without making a conscious decision to do so, Farrell stopped by his former law offices on Sutter Street. He was still one of the name partners at the firm Freeman, Farrell, Hardy & Roake, even though his private practice had dried up on the not-unreasonable assumption that it was a hard sell to clients seeking a defense attorney if you happened to be the person also charging them with their crimes. Still, he supposed that his name had a certain advertising value to the firm; and in terms of the other shareholders in the firm, the plain fact remained that out of the four name partners, three were essentially uninvolved in the practice: David Freeman was dead, Farrell himself was the DA, and Gina Roake was spending most of her time writing her second novel after the modest success of her first one.

  This left as the only practicing name partner Dismas Hardy.

  Farrell came up the main staircase into the lobby and strode across to the circular reception area. Behind the low wall, Phyllis sat at her keyboard, multitasking away in her multiple roles as secretary, chief receptionist, and gatekeeper to Hardy’s office. Catching Farrell on approach, her fingers stopped moving as her mouth first pursed in faint distaste, then rearranged itself into an arctic smile.

  “Mr. Farrell,” she enthused. “Welcome back.”

  “Thank you, Phyllis. Is Diz in?”

  Clearly the question she was hoping he wasn’t going to ask. Her lips reassumed their pained expression and she lifted her arm so that she could consult her wristwatch. “He’s got a scheduled appointment in twenty minutes,” she said, emphasizing the vast difference between that appropriate business moment and Farrell’s unexpected appearance. “Is he expecting you?”

  “No. I just thought I’d drop by for a minute. Maybe you could buzz him for me? Or I could just . . .” He made as if to go around her station and straight to Hardy’s door.

  “No! No!” She held up a restraining hand. “Let me just tell him you’re here.” And she lifted her telephone and pushed a number.

  One minute later, Dismas Hardy closed his office door behind them both. “She’s armed, you know?” he said.

  “Are you kidding?”

  Hardy shook his head. “Not kidding. As of a couple of months ago. She pointed out, and rightly so, I might add, that if somebody really wanted to get by her and into my office to see me, there was no way she could physically stop them. There would be nothing she could do. So I w
ent down with her and we bought her a big ol’ gun. Three-fifty-seven Magnum. Hollow point slugs.”

  “All to stop people from seeing you?”

  “Without an appointment,” Hardy said. “That’s the crucial distinction.”

  Farrell sat on one of Hardy’s Queen Anne chairs. “Like the appointment I didn’t have this morning? And to think I actually made a move in the direction of your door.”

  “You’re lucky she recognized you and held her fire.”

  “You don’t think that’s carrying the whole thing a little far?”

  “I would,” Hardy said, “if it were true.”

  Farrell sat back in his chair. “I’m slowing down. You really had me. Ah, but to discuss the possibility gives it a sort of truth. I have a T-shirt that says so.”

  “You have a T-shirt for everything,” Hardy said. “You want some coffee?”

  “Sure. Two sugars, please.”

  Hardy stirred, carried the cup and saucer over. “People still not joking around too much down at the Hall?”

  “Not as much as you might think,” Farrell said.

  “So you haven’t heard about the two Canadians playing twenty questions?”

  “No, but ...”

  Hardy couldn’t wait. He started right in. “So the guy who’s ‘it’ thinks up the word moosecock. And the other guy’s first question is, ‘Can you eat it?’ and the first guy goes, ‘Well, yeah, I guess you could.’ So the other guy thinks a minute and says, ‘Would it be moosecock?’ ”

  Farrell had a mouthful of hot coffee when Hardy got to the punch line. His reaction was immediate, trying to hold the coffee in for a half second or so, during which time Hardy thought he might be choking. But then Farrell lost the fight altogether and exploded into laughter as a fine spray of coffee filled the air in front of him. “Oh God, Diz, I’m sorry. Your rug ...” Farrell had his handkerchief in his hand; coffee was coming out his nose.

  Another bout of hysteria shook him. And another.

  Hardy whirled on the spot, quickly peeled off a couple of paper towels from the wet bar’s roll, went to a knee, and began dabbing at the rug.

  Farrell came down with his handkerchief and joined him. But the residue of the laughter still hung there between them. The rug hadn’t sustained any major damage. Farrell got back up and sat again on his chair.

  Hardy’s own grin creased his face. “I should have waited till you swallowed. Don’t worry about the rug. It’s my fault.”

  Farrell sat back, sagging in the chair. “Wow,” he said. He took a few more breaths, retaining his equilibrium. When he’d gotten himself together, he got down to it. “I was just hoping to hear an objective voice around all this Ro Curtlee stuff, that’s all. I’m getting it from both sides in the newspapers, Sam’s barely talking to me, Amanda Jenkins still might quit over it. And we’re not even talking about Glitsky.”

  “What about Abe?”

  “He thinks Ro’s killed somebody else. A woman named Janice Durbin.”

  “And she is?”

  “The wife of the jury foreman at his trial. But Abe can’t arrest Ro again now, not after the fiasco last week. Crawford wants him shitcanned just on general principles anyway. And Vi Lapeer’s had to go to bat for him, which makes her own job security a little tenuous, to say the least. The whole thing’s just a complete clusterfuck, and Sam might be right thinking it’s all my fault. But I don’t really know what else I could have done, or could do now, for that matter.”

  Hardy stalled for a moment, sipping his coffee. “What do you want to do?”

  “Go back to Baretto. Just rewind the clock.”

  “Unring the bell,” Hardy said. “If only we could. What would you do different?”

  “I’d recommend in the strongest terms that bail would be inappropriate, that Ro was a killer and a danger to the community.”

  “Forgive my ignorance, but what did you tell him last time?”

  “Last time, I didn’t say anything. I sent Amanda to court and let her do her thing.” At Hardy’s look, Farrell went on, “I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking I buckled under to the Curtlees.”

  “I don’t know anything about you and the Curtlees, Wes, so I promise you, that’s not what I was thinking. What happened, they lobby you?”

  “They probably thought it was subtle, but it was more or less a full-court press.”

  “And after that, you didn’t go chat with Baretto?”

  Wes shook his head no. “But I wasn’t going to before that either.”

  “Why not?”

  “Besides the fact that it would have been totally unethical? I actually thought it was his decision. And, you know, ten million bail isn’t exactly chump change.”

  Hardy sipped his coffee.

  Farrell’s shoulders settled. He shook his head. “I fucked up, didn’t I?”

  Hardy shrugged. “How long had you been in office when you made the call? Three days?”

  “Something like that. But I had another chance last week with Donahoe and I blew that one, too. And now we’ve got another dead person and I wouldn’t be surprised if we’re going to see more of them.”

  Hardy took a minute. “How about the grand jury?”

  “I’ve got no evidence, Diz. And I don’t mean a little. I got nothing.”

  “Then how do you know it’s Ro?”

  “He leaves the shoes on his victims. Both women have a connection to his trial. He’s a psycho and he’s loving this.”

  “That’s evidence. It might be enough for the grand jury. Then they indict him for both killings and there’s no bail.”

  “So he gets arrested twice in a week? How’s that look?”

  “Who cares? It’s happened before. And the grand jury’s going to take longer than a week anyway to get your indictment. Then send a SWAT team down and bring him in. Maybe you’ll get lucky and he’ll resist arrest again and you can shoot him dead.”

  “Your mouth to God’s ear,” Farrell said.

  Hardy shrugged again. “Look, Wes, you’re the DA now, not a private citizen, and certainly not a defense lawyer. Get used to it. Whatever you do, you’re going to make enemies. So, given that, the only thing you can do is what you think is right. You think this guy needs to be in jail, find a way.”

  Farrell took this advice in silence. After some seconds, he reached out and sipped at his coffee. After he swallowed, he met Hardy’s eyes. “Shit.”

  “I know.”

  “I asked for this, didn’t I?”

  “That’s the rumor.”

  Farrell dragged himself to his feet. “Well, Diz, I appreciate the straight talk. And sorry again about the rug.”

  “Don’t mention the rug. I’ll tell Phyllis the machine malfunctioned and spit coffee all over. She’ll want to buy a new one, and then I’ll say I really like this old one, in spite of the malfunctioning aspect. We ought to go around on whether or not to get a new one for a couple of weeks at least. It’ll be really fun.”

  Farrell smiled in spite of himself. “Why again did I quit working here?”

  “Destiny came calling. And you’re welcome back anytime. But Wes ... ?”

  “Yeah?”

  “While you’re still in public service, do yourself and everybody else a favor and put this fucker away.”

  16

  He picked up the phone in his office on the first ring. “Glitsky.”

  “Lieutenant, this is Michael Durbin.”

  Glitsky took a beat. “How are you holding up?”

  “To be honest, it’s a challenge these last couple of days.”

  “I’m sure it is.” Glitsky, surprised by this call, scratched at a spot on his desk.

  “Lieutenant?”

  “I’m here.”

  “We didn’t talk about it much when you came by on Saturday, but over the weekend I realized maybe I should have . . . What I’m trying to say is that I felt in the aftermath of Ro’s trial that we had developed something of a personal relationship.”
/>   Glitsky considered his words before he spoke. “We had a couple of cups of coffee together afterward. I remember that.”

  “As I recall, Lieutenant, you drank tea.”

  “That’s right. Still do.”

  “Well, I felt then that we had a certain simpatico between us, both being hassled by the Curtlees as we were. I thought maybe we could kind of have a little off-the-record talk now like we did then.”

  “About your wife’s case?” Glitsky pulled his yellow pad up in front of him.

  “In a way, yes. I got the impression—I should have mentioned it at the time, I know—that you thought I was some kind of suspect.”

  The thought that Michael Durbin was any kind of a real suspect had never really entered Glitsky’s mind, and for an instant he felt a degree of satisfaction that he’d sold his objectivity so convincingly. But he didn’t want to confide that, or anything else, to the man he was talking to. “Mr. Durbin,” he said, “I’ve just begun my investigation. I’ve got any number of people who could conceivably be suspects and probably ...”

  “But wait. No, no, no. You can’t have me as one of those people, because I’m not in it. I can’t be a suspect, Lieutenant. You know that.”

  “How do I know that?”

  “Because you knew who I was back after Ro’s trial, and I haven’t changed. You know that I’m no killer. I couldn’t kill a fly. I didn’t kill my wife or light the fire.”

  “We don’t even know if the fire killed her yet, sir, or if somebody else killed her and then set the fire. We’re hoping to get some lab and autopsy reports soon, and then we’ll have more of an idea of what we’re even looking at.”

  “Okay, fine, but whatever that is, my wife’s dead, and the investigation into her death can’t include the possibility that I had anything at all to do with it. Which is what I keep feeling you must be considering. And especially when I think you and me must already know for a fact who did this anyway.”

  “We do?”

  “Oh, come on, Lieutenant. Think about it.”

  “I’ve been doing little else.”

  “And Ro Curtlee hasn’t occurred to you?”

  Glitsky said nothing.