Glitsky 01 - Certain Justice, A

by John Lescroart

  Bolting straight up in the chair, Glitsky ran back to the hall closet and pulled on his flight jacket. Down the stairway and into his car, he was at the nearest gas station to his house – four blocks away – within five minutes. At the public booth he pushed some numbers.

  The groggy voice answered – it was nearly eleven-thirty – Glitsky said into the receiver: There's a tap on your phone. Don't call Shea and don't let him call you.' He hung up.

  He tried Loretta, each of the three numbers he had. None answered.

  If Reston was at City Hall with Rigby he would have gotten the message Loretta had left for him, wouldn't he? And if so, then why wouldn't she have called him immediately, as she'd promised – sworn – she would? It nagged at him. And where was Loretta now?

  The other question had come to him driving home. And the more he thought about it the more important it became. Maybe it was the only question.

  The last person he could call, he knew, was Hardy.

  Back home now, it was after midnight. He still wore his jacket. He didn't know – he might be going out.

  A mumbled midnight hello.

  'Hardy.'

  'Abe? What time is it?'

  'Why wouldn't Wes Farrell talk to me yesterday?'

  'What?'

  He repeated the question.

  'Because he thought you'd had him followed to his home.' Glitsky then heard: 'It's Abe, honey. Yeah. He's okay, I think.'

  'Why did he think that?' Glitsky asked.

  Hardy ran the facts for him – Sergeant Stoner, the DA investigator, the warrant.

  Now Glitsky was truly stumped. 'I didn't send Stoner, Diz.'

  'That's what I told Farrell. I told him Reston must have. That's why Farrell changed his mind, said he'd talk to you.'

  'They're tapping his phone.'

  'Whose? Farrell's?'

  'Yeah.'

  'Why? Never mind, I know why.'

  How could Reston have sent Stoner? How could Stoner have known who Farrell even was to know to follow him? And pick him up from where, Lou the Greek's. No one had known of Glitsky's meeting with Farrell, not a soul except the two of them. Glitsky had kept it to himself.

  It made no sense. None of it made sense.

  Then, like a tinkling bell, came the thought – he'd mentioned it to no one except Loretta Wager.

  He had told Loretta, told her he was going to be closing up the Kevin Shea matter, was meeting Shea's attorney at the bar across the street, they could expect the whole thing to be over in a day at the most.

  But Loretta wasn't...

  What she was, though, was Alan Reston's ally in this. She could have called Reston, told him about the meeting, directed Stoner to Farrell and brought Shea in before all the evidence about his innocence became public, before she and her daughter, of whom she was so protective, would be made to look so bad ...

  Or was that ridiculous?

  But she was his lover, his ...

  His what?

  And where was she? What the hell was going on?

  Saturday, July 2

  65

  The sound of the wind woke him. His watch read six-eighteen.

  The television was still on in the boys' bedroom, where he had gone to watch the late news. This morning there was another talking head saying something about the Hunter's Point Naval Reservation, about Senator Loretta Wager and the President.

  He sat up. Something was happening with the decommissioned navy base, and whatever it was – the details weren't all in yet – it was a major coup for Loretta.

  They must have gotten something wrong. If she had been in the middle of these kinds of negotiations.. . She had never mentioned anything about it. He stood up abruptly and smacked the power button on the set, shutting the damn thing off.

  He hadn't planned to fall asleep. There was too much to be done – get in touch with Loretta, place a call to Rigby about his job, connect with Wes Farrell, meet with Banks and Lanier and Griffin.

  He walked to the bathroom, then the kitchen, put the water on to boil, walked to the east-facing window over the sink and pushed it open.

  Smoke. The air looked clear – the sky was a cerulean, Maxfield Parrish blue – but he smelled smoke.

  In his bedroom he checked his message machine. He realized that he'd known, without having to verify it, that Loretta hadn't called. Last night – his immobility, the drift off to unwanted and unplanned sleep – his body in denial. Now, suddenly, things were clearer than they had been. Sleep had its place. Patterns had begun to emerge from the chaos. Certain combinations made some sense. Not perfectly yet – all the pieces weren't there – but enough to make it obvious at least where he was certainly, without doubt, going wrong.

  The patterns that did make sense – dimly glimpsed as they had begun to shift and sort out the night before – had shut him down for a while, that was all. It wasn't a reaction he was proud of, but there it was. He guessed his psyche, his body, whatever it was, had needed some time-out to adjust to the new truths, to get them organized. So he'd drifted off.

  He stirred the tea, the phone's cradle tucked under his ear. If it came to it, he would need an ally, perhaps even a wedge; but other things being equal, he would rather go for a finesse. He wasn't at all sure that he was strong enough to win a direct confrontation.

  Elaine Wager sounded exhausted, but after a beat of hesitation she agreed to see him – he could come over.

  Since his discovery of the nature of Elaine and Chris Locke's relationship, as well as her mother's disclosure about the two of them, something personal had developed between Glitsky and Elaine. This was the first time he had ever seen her out of her lawyer's uniform. He thought of her not bothering to dress more formally ... never mind it was Saturday ... as something symbolic, she was open to him.

  It might also mean nothing.

  She wore black baggy pants cinched at the waist with a black nylon cord. She had tucked a purple scoop-neck sweater into the pants. Shades of her mother, she was barefoot. Her hair still wet, she stepped aside after opening her front door, letting him lead the way into the living room. She settled on one of the stools by the bar, crossed her legs.

  He stood a moment, looking west out her windows. The day was clear and bright, the Pacific glittering in the distance. 'Have you heard from your mother?' Glitsky didn't turn around. The clarity of it all out there held his attention. He needed some clarity.

  'Yesterday. We were ... why, is she all right?'

  'I think she's all right. Did you see her last night?'

  'No, not since the afternoon. Abe, what's this about?'

  Now he turned. 'I'm afraid it's still about Kevin Shea. And I suppose before we go on I'd better tell you something else.' As he brought her abreast of the change in his own situation, he was relieved to find her at least still listening. You never knew – the bureaucracy was its own environment, and if he wasn't part of it anymore he would cease to exist to most people still in it, but Elaine wasn't one of them – she kept with him.

  When he finished she said, 'But I'm not clear what this has to do with Mom. We should call her.' She was reaching for the telephone on the bar.

  Glitsky crossed the room quickly, pushed the button down, took the receiver from her hand. 'I don't think so,' he said. 'Not yet.'

  'Why not?'

  He took a breath. This was the moment. 'Because I think she's probably part of it.'

  'What? What are you talking about?' She was off the stool now, on her feet.

  Glitsky kept his voice low. 'Your mother was the only person who knew I was meeting with Wes Farrell, Shea's lawyer. The only one, Elaine, the only possibility. She must have told Alan Reston about it and he had a DA investigator follow Farrell home with a warrant.'

  'And? I'm supposed to think that means something?'

  'Then last night—'

  'No! I don't care what you say. That just isn't my mother! My mother isn't part of anything! How dare you?'

  The reaction. He knew he'd h
it a nerve – Elaine had possibly reached the same conclusion on her own and didn't want to – couldn't? – admit it to herself. She had moved away and now moved back at him. But then the fight abruptly went out of her. All at once her shoulders sagged. Backing up, she let herself down into one of the leather chairs.

  Glitsky went on quietly. 'Right at the beginning you told her I was soft on her Shea theory. She kept me close so she could watch me, Elaine. So she could blow the whistle on me if I got in the way. And that's what she's done.'

  He saw her swallow, sigh, nod – in agreement, in weariness. 'She did it to you, too, didn't she?'

  'Mom gets what she wants, Abe. That's Mom.'

  'And what did she want from you?'

  Still looking for the words that might excuse or at least explain her mother, Elaine said, 'It would have been good for me, too, Abe. I mean, for my career. This was going to be one of the biggest murder cases of the decade – maybe as big as OJ – and I couldn't lose. Nobody could lose it, at least no reasonably competent DA, which I am. It would have set me up.' She looked up at him. 'It wasn't like it was all just for her.'

  'Some of it was, though, huh?'

  Elaine shrugged. 'Some, maybe. That was always the way. Mom got something, but she delivered for you, too.'

  'Not for me,' Abe said, 'not this time.' He came and sat on the ottoman, pulled it away a bit. 'But this isn't about me. At least not much anymore. Maybe not even you, except I think a little more than me. It's your case and it's gone sideways, Elaine. Your mom knows it – I told her last night. She called Reston, all right, but not to call him off.'

  'But she wouldn't—'

  'I think she would.'

  'Would what?'

  'I think you know exactly what, Elaine.' Glitsky met her eyes and knew he had to go further. Being cryptic wasn't going to cut it. 'I think your mother is going to let something happen to Kevin Shea. You said almost the same thing yourself yesterday.'

  But this, suddenly, was too much for her. It was, after all, her mother. 'She would not go that far, Abe. That's not my mom. I'd need some proof about all this.' She matched his own gaze. That's what we do, isn't it? Isn't that what you've been saying? Well, okay, my mom maybe could be part of some of this. Maybe that's who she is. But I need a lot more than you getting put on leave, more than the case going sideways.'

  'I'll tell you some facts, Elaine. Leave your mother out of it if you want.'

  She sat back down.

  By now it was all too familiar to Abe – the knife wounds, Lithuanian Rachel and Colin Devlin, the interpretation of Kevin Shea as hero and victim. And then, even to Glitsky as he spoke, the last cog falling in. He remembered Hardy's comment about clients speaking for themselves, that they lied once too often, how that one lie was the tip-off that there were more. But the one 'lie' on Kevin's videotape – that the police had betrayed him – turned out not to be. At the time, Glitsky simply hadn't known about it. He told her: 'Everything Shea said on the tape is true.'

  Elaine was shaking her head. 'I don't understand what she could possibly get out of all this, assuming what you say is true. Why would she...'

  'She's got her man in the DA's office, she's got Philip Mohandas and his people thinking she's on their side, she's even got the president of the United States—'

  'Get real, Abe, that's just—'

  He held up a hand, stopping her, and told her about Hunter's Point. It had an effect. Elaine became silent, taking it in.

  'We're talking a hundred thousand votes, Elaine, minimum. We're talking another term, more influence, more power, maybe even the vice-presidency, if Kevin Shea is innocent, if there's even a serious perception that he's innocent.'

  'It wouldn't all go away. Not just over that.'

  'Yes it would. You think about it.'

  Elaine could do the figuring. If Shea was guilty, then Loretta Wager was the crusading personification of justice who had the guts and vision to put her outrage to use in the service of her people. But if he was not, if he were innocent and she'd led the rush to judgment, she became a strident harpy, a bigot herself seeking only a white scapegoat. To satisfy the gaping maw of her own ambition.

  'She can't let him be innocent, Elaine – she's invested too much in his guilt. She doesn't have a choice ...'

  Elaine sat there. 'But what if it came out after . ..'

  Glitsky was shaking his head. 'How would it do that?'

  'Well, you, for example. You could—'

  'No, I'm a discredited police inspector who didn't follow orders. My credibility is shot as it is. I pull anything like this and it only gets worse.'

  'Okay, then, Wes Farrell...'

  'Shea's own attorney? I don't think so. And I don't think you're it either – not after the fact, if something does happen with Shea, not if you don't have any hard proof that Shea didn't do it.'

  'I could find—'

  Glitsky was shaking his head. 'No you couldn't. You can't prove a negative, which is the bitch about getting accused in the first place. I think it's why we're supposed to prove people did do something, not didn't, although normally I don't go around preaching for the presumption of innocence. But it does have its place.'

  Glitsky stood and walked back to the windows, to the blessed clarity. 'And that leaves nobody to argue for Kevin Shea, not after he's dead. Can you think of anybody else? I can't. This has been well thought out. Reston, the FBI, getting rid of me ... and after Shea is gone and it's over, the whole thing gets – pardon the phrase – whitewashed. And it's going to work unless we do something now.'

  Elaine sat back in her chair. 'And what do you propose, without destroying my mother?'

  'I want to bring Kevin Shea in to you. You're still the DA of record on the case, right?'

  'I think so.' Then, at his sharp glance, 'Sure. Yes.'

  He crossed back to her. 'All right. I think you're a lot safer right now than the jail. I also don't believe your mother would ever let anything threaten you. If he's with you, he's safe. So I've got to contact Farrell, get in touch with Shea, bring the boy in.'

  'And then what?'

  'Then I don't know, tell the truth. We're guaranteeing Shea's safety, and essentially, that's all he wants.'

  'All right, that can be arranged. We can go to one of the towns down the Peninsula ...'

  'Try someplace small and upscale. Say, Hillsborough or Atherton. I've got to have something I can give Farrell.'

  'Abe.' She reached a hand out and touched his knee. 'Do you really think this is what's happening?'

  He fixed her with his eyes. 'Yep.'

  'And you think you can really do this, get Shea in custody this morning?'

  'I'd better.' Then: 'You want to call your Sergeant Stoner for me, see if you can find out if he remembers where Farrell lives?'

  'Can't we just call Farrell and ask?'

  Glitsky shook his head. 'I don't know if I mentioned it. I'm pretty sure Farrell's phone is tapped,' he said. 'It gives me pause.'

  66

  Philip Mohandas normally would have been gratified by the turnout so far, but he'd been wrestling with demons for the better part of the night and they had beaten him down.

  It was just seven-thirty and already there were hundreds of people milling about Kezar Pavilion on the southeastern border of Golden Gate Park (about three hundred yards from the apartment at Stanyan and Page where Kevin Shea and Melanie Sinclair were just waking up). He could see the stream of people flowing down the side streets across the lawns of the park. It was a beautiful morning, a little windy with a heavy smoky smell to the air.

  Mohandas knew that the combination of wind and fire was making problems in Bayview, for the first time in North Beach, and he noticed a small pillar of smoke rising due east and a little south, perhaps over by Divisadero. The march might have to jog north a few blocks if it got much worse, but the wind wasn't really his problem.

  His problem, if he was going to have one, would be crowd control. This was the case often enough that he
was used to it, but it always caused him concern, especially here today when his credibility was so clearly on the line. This was his show. He'd called it into being, and the response – from the look of things so far – was going to be overwhelming. He couldn't allow things to get out of hand.

  And unfortunately, in spite of the early arrivals – a good thing – there were signs of other, potentially disruptive elements.

  First was the presence of so much armed authority – he had passed truckloads of National Guard troops on his drive out here earlier, mobilized and ready to roll, parked all along Fell Street. In addition, at least a hundred city police were on patrol, many on horseback but a large number on foot, too, in the open pavilion and its surrounding streets, even by the tent that he was using as his staging area.

  The uniforms weren't the worst of it. Since the release of Kevin Shea's tape the previous afternoon, he had become increasingly aware of the backlash problem, which – to be honest – he'd expected a little sooner. But now, even though the official response to the tape had initially been skeptical across the color spectrum, he had been hearing reports of spontaneous outbreaks of angry white people taking to the streets.

  Already this morning he had seen the police subdue and carry away one belligerent white man with a placard. True, it was an isolated case, but it was worrisome. That the man had come out at all, knowing how badly he'd been outnumbered ... he must have thought there would have been others, perhaps many others.

  Mohandas held no illusions – he knew any meeting between a white and black group, in this context, today, could get ugly fast. He had to get the show on the road as quickly as he could, keep his crowd moving and focused. That was the key.

  Suddenly Allicey was standing next to him. 'Lot of the people with us, Philip, hearing us, what we're saying.'

  He nodded. She motioned out to the growing crowd. 'This is it,' she said. 'This is the difference between you and Loretta Wager. You are with the people.'

  'You think so?' He often thought that the most important function Allicey served for him – out of hundreds – was her belief. She never wavered. The mission was the freedom of her people, of their people. They had been oppressed for so long, still were. And that's because they had struggled to be included. That had been wrong, he'd decided. The path lay in separation and connection with your own. It – was a spiritual thing, a constant battle, and you could not afford to lose your faith, to mingle with those who would dilute it. Or, like Loretta Wager had done, sell it out for power and influence.