Dead Irish

by John Lescroart

  He had seemed legitimately strung out yesterday at finding his daughter’s throat cut, and Glitsky didn’t think it would be too difficult to get him to start talking about some possible connection between Linda’s death and Ed Cochran’s especially if he thought he—Polk—would be named some sort of accessory to his own daughter’s murder.

  What would be ideal, and what Glitsky fervently hoped for, was that Cochran’s death would turn out a clear homicide and get in his own backyard. Glitsky’s thing was homicides. He was getting a lot closer to certainty that somebody had killed Ed, and with Alphonse looking like a lock for Linda’s murder, he seemed a reasonable suspect for having done Ed . . . well, at the least a good guy to start with. Of course, a few hairs in a car seat, by themselves, weren’t going to convince any jury, but Alphonse had proved himself well beyond careless with Linda. Glitsky figured that if he’d killed Ed he’d left some indication of it. And if that were true, Glitsky would find it.

  It was a nice stroke of luck—hitting on Polk’s account. That money was somewhere out there, and that always shook things up, which was good.

  He popped the last bite of his bagel and followed it with a mouthful of cold coffee. Dick Willis, the DEA guy, would be up in another minute, and Hardy any old time. He wiped at the desk with a paper napkin, caught some crumbs in the palm of his hand and dumped them in the wastebasket by his right knee.

  This was the part he really liked. The case should break within the hour. It was all but broken now. With the new leverage, Polk should crack in about five minutes. Tell him the DA might cut him a deal on the Cochran thing, then sit back and let the tape recorder get it all.

  He allowed a smile.

  It was almost too easy, but he’d take it.

  Hardy was whittling a Popsicle stick into a totem pole. He’d already done the eagle at the top, then a kind of half-assed bear’s head (which could as easily have been a wolf—he should have done it in profile), and was about to start on a duck as a goof when Glitsky came back to his cubicle.

  Hardy looked up. He didn’t have to ask, but he did. “Not there, huh?”

  It was two-fifteen. They’d waited until nearly two o’clock, at which time Glitsky had called down to Burlingame to ask if they’d send a squad car to Polk’s house and see if something was wrong.

  Willis from the Drug Enforcement Agency had gone, saying he’d be available whenever Polk did show up, but he wasn’t about to waste any more of an afternoon for a lousy one-yard deal.

  Glitsky figured Polk might have been detained at the morgue, or making arrangements to get Linda’s body to a funeral home, and he’d gone out to make a few calls, then check to see if he’d just gotten directed to the wrong room or something at the Hall.

  Hardy stayed in Abe’s cubicle, whittling. His new doubts about Eddie’s character were still eating at him. It was great that Glitsky had established a link to drug money and to Alphonse, although that didn’t necessarily mean Alphonse had killed Eddie.

  “You think he ran? Polk?” Glitsky suddenly asked.

  “I’m out of practice,” Hardy said. “That never occurred to me. Why would he run?”

  “As in take the money and . . .”

  Hardy shook his head and closed his knife. The totem pole got flicked into the wastebasket without a glance. “I don’t think he took the money. Alphonse took the money.”

  “Yeah, I know. That’s what I’ve been thinking, but where is the guy?”

  “Traffic, Abe. Shopping. In the bathroom.”

  Glitsky straightened the line of something on his desk. “Okay. But I hate getting this close and not nailing it. He might have run, anyway.”

  Hardy decided to let him spew. He might have done anything. But how could he know the police had discovered the money thing? Improbable. No, he would try to bluff things out when they started asking about money. But he’d show. If he didn’t, he’d be running up a flag.

  When Abe had wound down, Hardy said: “The report says the call on Cochran came in at eleven-fourteen p.m. You tape it?”

  “Of course. It was a nine-eleven.”

  “You mind if I give it a listen?”

  “No. Help yourself. You gonna recognize the voice?”

  Hardy hadn’t thought of that before, and wouldn’t that be a nice surprise? “The call came from a booth at the corner of Arguello and Geary,” he said.

  “If you say so,” Glitsky said, “but what difference does it make? Polk gets here and starts talking, ten minutes later we know everything we need to know.”

  “About Linda, maybe.”

  “Also, maybe, about Ed.”

  “It’s the maybes that get to me. Maybe we get lucky, and Polk finks on Alphonse, who maybe killed Eddie in a wild drug-induced spree of passion and mayhem. Then maybe we got a homicide, where the insurance pays on Eddie.”

  “You want to make book,” Glitsky said, “Ed’s a homicide.”

  “Make it official, my job’s done and I’ll go home and be out of your hair.”

  At Glitsky’s baleful stare, Hardy smiled. “I figure until it’s official,” he said, “I can play with it.”

  Hardy walked to what passed for a map of the City and County of San Francisco on the wall of Glitsky’s cubicle. The map had been stabbed to death by pins long ago, but the occasional street name wasn’t completely obliterated. “Arguello and Geary is here,” Hardy said, pointing roughly to the middle of the map.

  “Goddamn. When did they move it?” Glitsky said.

  Hardy punched his finger into the lower right quadrant of the map. “Here’s Cruz’s building.”

  “Yep, just about there.”

  “Can’t exactly throw a hat over ’em, can you?”

  “So?”

  Hardy looked out the window. “Just something else to think about.”

  The phone rang and Glitsky snatched it up before the ringing stopped. He said “Yeah” a few times. Hardy turned around and started hoping this wasn’t about Polk, because if it was it was bad news.

  The scar through Glitsky’s lips turned white with the pressure he was putting on it. He mentioned a few things about jurisdiction, if he could send some men down, like that. Then he hung up, a study in frustration.

  “Say it ain’t Polk,” Hardy said.

  Glitsky sat at his desk, picked up a pencil and broke it. After he put the two halves in his hands and broke them again, he frowned up at Hardy. “They just found him dead in his fucking hot tub.”

  Glitsky, almost to himself, clucked grimly. “Timing. I gotta work on my timing,” he said. Then, “I was thinking about putting a tail on him overnight. I’m slowing down, Diz.”

  Hardy sat. “Well, at least if we can put Alphonse there . . .”

  Glitsky shook his head. “Uh-uh.”

  “Sure, it makes sense. Look. Alphonse knows Polk can identify him—”

  Glitsky held up a hand. “Spare me, Diz. I know the facts and you don’t.”

  “Which are?”

  “No sign of struggle. Polk wasn’t offed.”

  Hardy just cocked his head.

  “We get one of these every few months. You drink too much and sit in a hot tub, you get poached.”

  “Get out of here!”

  Glitsky looked at the bits of pencil in his hand. He sighed wearily. “You get out of here, Diz, I got work to do.”

  He hadn’t even gotten to talk about the Cruz angle, if it was an angle. He almost stopped on his way out of the office, but then figured Abe would only cut him off, and Abe was probably right. It wouldn’t do to forget that Abe had a bona fide murder and suspect in this affair, and anything else Hardy might find might be interesting and all that but wouldn’t have shit-all to do with Glitsky’s investigation.

  So the afternoon gaped open before him. He stopped by the audio lab with the requisition slip Glitsky had signed and got the lady there to give him a copy of the 911 tape. He’d listen to it at home.

  While waiting for it to be copied he glanced through the Chron
icle. There was a story about Linda’s murder (no mention of any connection to Eddie), along with the picture of Alphonse. Hardy read it over and learned nothing new.

  Tape in pocket, he stopped at the concession stand for a candy bar, then walked across the tiles in front of the wall with the names of policemen killed in the line of duty. Sixteen this year so far.

  Andy Fowler was presiding in Courtroom B. When Hardy entered, the judge had his glasses on and appeared to be reading something at the bench. The prosecuting attorney, whom Hardy didn’t know, was whispering to someone by his side. The defense attorney was on her feet, pointing out something that the judge should note on whatever he was reading. Hardy walked up and sat in the second row on the aisle.

  The judge finished reading, raised his eyes to the gallery, looked from one attorney to another and called a recess. He spoke to the bailiff on his way to chambers, and the man walked across to Hardy and said His Honor would see him.

  When he got into the book-lined chambers, Hardy closed the door behind him. “That’s what I call service,” he said.

  Andy shrugged out of his robes and motioned to the wing chairs in front of his desk, a little tray table between them. “So you seeing Jane again?” he asked.

  “I hate it the way you fiddle-faddle around.” Hardy let Andy pour some coffee. “We’re trying, to see each other I mean.”

  “You got plans?”

  “Well, if it works out I’ll probably try to see her again.”

  “About that far, huh?”

  “That’s a hell of a lot farther than it’s been.”

  Andy put a hand on Hardy’s knee. “No push from here, I mean it. I’m just interested.” He sat back.

  “What I came by for,” Hardy said, “I met your friend Brody this morning. I just wanted to say thanks.”

  “Was he any help?”

  Hardy outlined it for him. Cruz, Ed, Linda, Alphonse, and now the latest with Polk. Andy sat back, interested, listening, sipping occasionally at his coffee.

  “But you have a thread through this Polk structure.”

  Hardy nodded. “Oh yeah, everybody—all the dead people anyway—they’re all connected to Polk one way or the other.”

  “So what’s your problem? You got a suspect, you got motive, you got opportunity.”

  “True, but I’ve got one apparent suicide by gunshot, one murder by knife, and one accidental death. I’m not sure I see the same guiding hand over it all.”

  “This guy Alphonse, isn’t he pretty likely?”

  “He’s pretty likely, I guess, given everything. I mean, a lot seems to have gone on in his neighborhood.” Hardy leaned forward, elbows on knees. “I guess what bothers me is Cruz. If he’s no part of this at all. You know, there’s a whole other scenario here between Eddie and Cruz, and I mean it leaves Polk out entirely, and the damn thing is, it works.”

  “You want it all tied up neat, huh?” The judge chuckled. “You’re in the wrong business, Diz.”

  “Okay, I acknowledge that.”

  The two men laughed. It was an old joke from when Jane had been thinking about going to EST. Hardy and Andy had acknowledged her into submission and she’d eventually given up the idea.

  “You really think Ed was blackmailing Cruz?”

  “That’s what doesn’t work. No way was he that kind of guy.”

  “Then why do you think it?”

  “ ’Cause he could’ve been, I guess. It would have given Cruz a reason to lie to me.”

  The judge stood up. “You gotta cut the deadwood, Diz.” He held up a hand. “I’m not saying it couldn’t have happened. Do you know where Cruz was that night? Didn’t you tell me the report says he was home by nine? That should finish it right there. Look, you just told me that if it comes out he’s gay, it’s bad news for him. So suppose he had a date. He’d cover that, wouldn’t he? He’d lie to cover it, sure he would, and that’s got nothing to do with Ed.”

  Hardy hung on that for a beat. “You’re right, I guess.”

  “Damn straight. You want my opinion, see where Alphonse leads. At least you’ve got a good idea he’s murdered someone. That makes him a killer. Whether it’s a knife or a gun might not matter. Some of these guys get creative. Anyway, I’d check him out first. All this other stuff ”—he shrugged—“more than likely it’s deadwood, and if it is you gotta cut it.”

  “Well, I guess that’s why I came to talk to you. I just couldn’t see it.”

  “You ever work on a case didn’t have half a dozen plausible wrong turns?”

  Hardy stood up.

  “Goes against the grain just to follow the little arrows, doesn’t it?”

  “A little. That’s probably it.”

  The judge looked at his watch, seemed to decide something. “You know, I’m not saying just drop it to make your life easy. If it’s bothering you, find out what he was doing. But it’s probably a wild hair.”

  Hardy smiled. “Probably,” he admitted.

  24

  EDDIE COCHRAN’S CAR was still at the police lot—when Frannie had called that morning from her first day back at work, they had told her it was being held now as part of another investigation.

  She was stunned to hear that Linda Polk had been killed, but what did Eddie—what did their car—have to do with that? She asked if they were saying that Eddie had been murdered. No, they were not saying that. Not yet.

  Still very weary of everything to do with Eddie’s being gone, shaking off some morning sickness, she hadn’t pursued it with them. She did take out Dismas Hardy’s card and left a message for him to call her when he got home.

  Then she worked most of a whole day without taking a break or lunch or even thinking about it. The paperwork, after a week off, had piled up, which had taken most of the morning, what with everybody coming by and wanting to know if she was okay.

  Well, no, she wasn’t okay. But it wouldn’t do to say it. She still hadn’t put it anyplace where she could accept it. She still expected to get home and then be making dinner and hear the door slam and Eddie’s cheerful voice doing the “Honey, I’m home” Ricky Ricardo impression he’d picked up the last month or so.

  But she just nodded, trying to be polite with all the questions, saying she was fine.

  It was odd. Until the seed had been planted today that Eddie might have been murdered, Frannie had slowly been letting herself get convinced that her husband had in fact killed himself. And each time that supposed reality struck home, it cut deeper. If Eddie killed himself, it meant he hadn’t loved her the way he’d said he did, the way she felt he had.

  But you couldn’t argue with facts. If he probably had killed himself, and the police had investigated and said he had, then whatever she had thought they had together hadn’t been true. And what did that make the baby she was carrying?

  She worked it around and around, coming back to it like a tongue to a hole in a tooth, forcing herself to feel the pain so that maybe she could get used to it. Eddie had rejected her. Eddie hadn’t loved her like she’d thought.

  But then, this morning, as soon as she’d heard some official doubt, it was like a fresh wind clearing the rooms of her mind. If the police weren’t even sure, then she wasn’t a fool to believe it wasn’t true. She never should have stopped listening to her heart.

  She remembered the time making love when she’d conceived. She knew it had been that Saturday morning when she had come back to the bedroom after her shower, to Eddie sleeping in. There was no faking his response to her. And afterward, lying there, touching her everywhere, nibbling. “I love your eyelids,” he said. “I love your elbow.” And laughing. “I love this little spot—what you call this?” right at the top of her leg in the back.

  She had to believe he loved her. He did love her. And if he loved her, he didn’t kill himself.

  That’s why the anger surprised her. Before, up until today, since Eddie had died, all she’d felt was this numb, horrible loss. Almost sleepwalking, trading consolation with Erin, not le
tting herself think too much.

  But now, at ten to five, cleaning off the desk for another day tomorrow, she had to put her head down, the wave of anger came so strongly. “Oh, Eddie!” She almost said it out loud.

  Because now the next reality hit. Before, while she was thinking he had committed suicide, it hadn’t mattered. But now, if somebody had killed him, she had a pretty good idea of why they had done it.

  All of his pushing, all of his idealism, his visits to Cruz and Polk, trying to convince them to be something they weren’t, to be little perfect Eddies, play fair, do the right thing.

  Oh, Eddie, she thought, shaking now, why couldn’t you just leave them alone and be like everybody else? I told you a hundred times it wouldn’t do any good. If you’d have listened to me you’d be alive now.

  The shaking passed. Somebody walked by and asked if she was all right. Again.

  She thought about the insurance money on the bus going home. It was the first time it had occurred to her, and like her anger earlier, it made her feel guilty.

  Maybe this was the process, she thought. Little things moving in to take the place of the pain. She told herself this was probably natural, the beginning of the healing, but it didn’t help with the guilt.

  She didn’t really care about the money. Then, for a sickening moment, she did. Well, not really, it was just if she did decide to have the baby, then she’d be able to stay at home with it for a while instead of having to keep working.

  Something else was happening, and she tried to keep it out of the forefront of her thoughts. Like so many other things lately, though, it seemed out of her control.

  It might be romantic nonsense, but that first day she’d found out she was pregnant, all she could think was that it was her and Eddie’s love, the mixture, that had made the baby. It was as though their love had become a separate thing outside of themselves, proving it, existing alone.