Hardy 05 - Mercy Rule, The (40 page)

In spite of himself Hardy thought he had a point. In fact, he had wondered what Graham’s plans might be regarding his wonderful place. It was human nature to protect his own hearth before he worried about Hardy’s home and family, not that it didn’t rankle just a bit.

‘So that’s it?’ he asked. ‘I realize we’ve got the proverbial loaves and fishes of falsehoods here, but maybe we keep at this long enough we’ll run out. You didn’t run off on your lost weekend and get married to Evans, did you?’

‘No.’

‘You don’t know anything about your father’s money except what you’ve already told me about Joan Singleterry, whoever the hell she is?’

‘Right.’

‘And you don’t know who she is?’

‘No idea.’

‘And if I catch you in even the smallest fib, I get to stick an icepick under your kneecap?’

‘Both of ’em.‘

‘You swear on your father’s grave?’

This sobered him, as Hardy had meant it to. ‘I swear,’ he intoned.

This would have to be good enough and Hardy took it. ‘Okay. Now let’s talk some matters of law.’

Without naming Graham’s stepfather as one source of the idea, Hardy outlined in some detail the suggestion that both Leland and Giotti had proposed as a defense. As a lawyer himself, Graham seemed to appreciate the distinction between admitting he’d done something and having a jury conclude he’d done the same thing. If he never admitted it, ever, to anyone, he would be legally blameless. He could resume his life with a clean slate.

They discussed the strategy until the lunch bell. Graham’s acquiescence was a nice surprise, especially after his earlier refusal to plead to essentially the same thing. But, as Graham pointed out, they weren’t the same thing at all.

Not in the eyes of the law.

Of course, there were great risks. Graham was charged with first-degree murder and, if convicted with special circumstances, would spend the rest of his life in prison. But Giotti’s offer seriously mitigated that risk.

They left it unresolved, but kept the door open.

Driving back uptown, Hardy was going around with it. It was starting to look as though his defense would be to admit that Graham, who couldn’t admit it himself, had committed a murder that in fact he hadn’t committed. For a reason that he didn’t have.

And this, if it worked, might set his client free.

The law, he thought, was a sublime and terrible thing.

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Sarah Evans planned to take full advantage of yet another beautiful wrinkle in the system.

The city and county of San Francisco were physically coterminous; they shared the same geographic boundaries. This created interesting possibilities in the always complicated world of legal jurisdiction.

Practically, one of the results of this arrangement was that the jail was controlled by the county sheriff’s office, not by the city’s police department. Although it was directly behind the Hall of Justice, in what used to be part of the Hall’s parking lot, the jail might as well have been on the moon for all of its official connection to police events at Southern Station, which was the city’s name for the police presence at the Hall.

Sarah told Marcel Lanier she had some reports to catch up on after their shift — she’d hitch a ride home later. He left her working at her desk in the homicide detail.

At some time between six and seven the coming and going of other homicide inspectors slowed down, and Sarah cleared her desk, took the back steps out of the Hall, and walked around to the entrance to the jail, flashed her ID, and told the admitting deputy that she had to see Russo. She signed in, knowing that her bosses in the PD were unlikely to review the log. Attorney room B would be all right. She checked her weapon at the desk.

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‘I can’t come here very often.’

They sat across the table from each other now, inspector and prisoner. Graham longed for her hands over the table, but knew he couldn’t.

A silence settled. They simply looked at each other. Graham told her he loved her. She bit at her lip and found she couldn’t respond. ‘What’s it like out there?’ he asked finally. ‘Outside.’

‘Windy. I’ve got a game tonight, you know. Thursdays.’ She sighed. ‘How are you holding up?’

‘Better now.’ But he couldn’t hide his uncertainty about it. ‘I think I got the right lawyer.’

Sarah nodded. ‘Did he tell you he talked to your brother? George won’t say where he was.’

A shake of the head. ‘Georgie didn’t kill Sal.’

‘Okay.’ She didn’t want to argue about it. She thought it was entirely possible, in fact, that George had killed Sal. Nothing Hardy had told her ruled him out in any way, and her training was to keep pushing until you got to something. ‘But I wish I could talk to him. I’d shake his tree a little harder than he’s used to.’

‘So why don’t you?’

‘I can’t. I’ve got no case. If I shake him down off duty and he complains, which he would, it’s harassment and there goes my job. Hardy’s trying to get my boss to move on it.’

‘Your boss?’

‘Lieutenant Glitsky — he and Hardy know each other. But it won’t matter. Glitsky won’t do it. There’s nothing to move on, especially since Glitsky’s already got a suspect in jail.’

‘Don’t remind me.’

‘I am looking at the other things, Graham. Craig Ising’s friends. The fish stuff.’

‘I know.’ Then, quietly. ‘I know you are.’

She could see him being brave and it was tearing her up. Say what she would about his chances at his trial, the fact remained that he was locked up, a prisoner. He wasn’t going out to play ball tonight the way she was. He was here, alone, scared. She felt like she had to hold him. He needed her. But she couldn’t do that, although if she stayed any longer, she might. ‘I’ve got to go,’ she said.

The headache had been bad this morning and he’d gotten a call near dawn. He came right on down and gave Sal his shot. His father hated to shoot himself up. Hated it!

After that Sal slept and Graham read for a while, some magazine, passing the time, dozing a little himself. He didn’t have to be in at work until midafternoon and had come to love these times with his dad, even to depend on them, difficult as they sometimes were. In his dad’s presence he felt like he belonged somewhere. He was loved for who he was. He felt important, needed. It was as simple as that. He didn’t feel that way anywhere else.

He heard Sal stirring in his room down past the kitchen and a minute later he appeared. ‘Good boy,’ he said. ‘Still here. How about I take you down for lunch at the Grotto. I love their cioppino. Nobody makes cioppino better than Bruno Giotti.’

Halfway out of his chair, Graham sat back down, his stomach churning, and not over the mention of food. Since his father’s headaches had started, the bouts of forgetfulness had become more frequent as well, but this morning was more than forgetfulness. This, to Graham, was new.

‘Dad, the Grotto isn’t there anymore. It’s Stagnola’s now, remember?’

Sal laughed. ‘What kind of boy am I raising here? What are you talking about, you don’t know your own backyard? Come on, get up, fish don’t bite all day.’

To look at him there was no change. He ‘d even dressed, for Sal, with a degree of proper conservatism: tennis shoes and khaki slacks and a blue workshirt that had been pressed before he ’d taken a nap in it. ‘So we going or not?’

Graham was going to have to talk to Russ Cutler, he thought. He didn’t know what to do, how to handle this — humor Sal or dig his heels in. He just didn’t know.

‘Yeah, we’re going,’ he said.

He’d stick with him until this passed, if it did.

In the alley, getting into the truck, Sal had another idea. ‘Hey, why don’t we swing by the Manor, surprise Georgie and Deb, take ’em out with us? They love the Grotto.‘

‘They went out with Mom, shopping, remember?’

Sal didn’t seem entirely sure, but said, ‘Oh, that’s right. Well, we can still go.’

‘Sure. I’ll drive, okay?’

Again, Sal hesitated before accepting this, but finally climbed up into the cab. ‘That fucking Mario,’ he said conversationally.

‘Who?’

‘Giotti.’

‘The judge?’

Sal gave his boy a look. ‘What are you talking about, the judge? No, I’m talking Mario Giotti, Bruno’s kid.’ He gave his son a hard whack on the arm. ‘You been smoking something, bambino?’

‘No. Sorry. What about Mario?’ Graham was heading east on Mission, down to the old Embarcadero — now Herb Caen Way. He’d turn north at the Bay and head up along the piers to Fisherman’s Wharf. Maybe by the time they arrived, Sal would know where he was. ‘What about Mario?’ he repeated
.

Sal was smiling, remembering something. ‘That fucking guy, he’s in at work last night in his suit and tie, cutting garlic, tomatoes. Can’t decide if he wants to stay and help his old man or go on in the law. I tell him stay and help his old man. Family, huh? That’s what counts.’

Graham nodded, let his lungs go. ‘Yeah. You went to the Grotto last night?’

‘Yeah, shit, after work. Get some courage before I go home. Your mother… well, I won’t say anything bad about your mom, but this life, me, you kids… it’s the only one she’s got, you know. Her mom and dad fucked her up so bad. Wasn’t for me, she’d be some dried-up old society lady, only sometimes she forgets that and I gotta remind her.’

Sal was right, Graham thought. Helen never should have stopped loving him, no matter what Sal had done. Family counts. She should be here with them now, in this truck. She should see this, help them both. But she wasn’t, couldn’t be. Not now, not anymore. And Graham knew it was a tragedy for her as well.

He reached over and laid a hand for a moment on his father’s knee. ‘She loves you, Sal.’

‘I know,’ he answered breezily, this man who hadn’t seen his wife in fifteen years. ‘But 1 got to talk to her, straighten her out. She s all mixed up. We ought to go home maybe.’ They were getting to the Wharf. ‘After lunch.’ It wasn’t yet noon in midweek and there were plenty of places to park in the lot. The ferry had just disgorged a stream of commuters and Sal bounced out of the cab. ‘We better shake it.’ Graham hustled next to him to keep up. ‘This crowd’s going to beat us, we don’t get a move on. Smell that cioppino. I love that smell, nothing better.’

They came to the door of Stagnola’s and stopped. Sal’s face dropped and he reached a hand out to Graham, as though he needed to be steadied. ‘What’s going on?’ he asked. ‘This isn’t the Grotto!

‘
I know, Dad. The Grotto’s closed
.’

‘Well, that’s just bullshit! I was here last night. Mario was in the kitchen in his suit cutting tomatoes.’

Graham said nothing. He put his arm around Sal, but the old man twisted away and walked out into the street, turning back to look at the building. He stood there a long time, squinting in the bright sunlight.

Graham walked out to him and put his arm around him again. This time his father leaned into him. ‘This ain’t the Grotto,’ he whispered hoarsely, his voice skirting the edges of panic. ‘What the hell’s going on?’

Graham shot up in his cot, breathing hard. He’d almost been asleep, almost been dreaming, wasn’t sure which.

In the jail most lights were out, but even here in his AdSeg unit there were always noises, always shadows.

Sal had slept in the cab again — another nap — and when he woke up he’d pulled out of it that day. Graham knew he should have done something right then. Sal had
told
him he would be going by the Manor, looking up Helen. He should have believed him. He should have done everything differently.

But he didn’t want to believe it. It was too hard. It was easier to deny the progress of the disease, to believe that Sal wasn’t quite gone yet mentally. He had more time. Graham had more time with him.

He lay flat on his back, his arm thrown over his eyes. He missed him horribly. This was the only time he had with Sal anymore.

Memories.

Part Four

26

Dismas Hardy checked his watch. Where was the judge? He was five minutes late. The bailiff had even pulled Graham from the holding cell and sat him next to Hardy, unshackled and in his trial clothes rather than the jail jumpsuit.

David Freeman was sitting at the defense table with Hardy and Graham, and doing it for free. He had joined the defense team — wheedling his way in. Hardy was grateful, not only for the legal assistance, but for the company.

They in were Department 27 in the Hall of Justice on a Monday, the third week of September. As in all of the courtrooms at the Hall, there was no hint of the weather outside, but the morning had been warm and still — unusual in the city for most of the year, but relatively normal in the weeks after Labor Day.

Graham’s trial clothes were a pair of slacks and a sport coat. Freeman and Hardy had decided that a business suit would strike too formal a tone for the jury. They wanted to play up Graham’s ‘regular guy’ image, so for the past week during jury selection, the defendant had appeared in court in a respectful coat and tie, anything but a stuffy three-piece lawyer’s uniform.

Hardy was fighting his nerves. Freeman and Graham were talking quietly to his left. He was half turned away from them, peripherally aware of Drysdale and Soma at the prosecution table across from him on the other side of the courtroom.

He swiveled further to check out the gallery, now filled to bursting for the opening fireworks. Jury selection had taken nearly ten days, with the final juror selected last Friday, just before the evening adjournment. The trial proper was beginning any moment, with opening statements, the first evidence.