‘No. I’m sorry, but there just wasn’t that much made of it, or, I should say, them. They came and went like the seasons.’ He laughed dryly. ‘No, scratch that, more like the courses of a meal. That was the big difference with May – she was around awhile.’
‘And no one else was?’
‘No. Except Celine, of course.’
Hardy sat riveted to his chair. He felt the blood draining out of his face. The rain beat on his window. Darkness was settling in. ‘Did Celine have a key to the Eloise?’ he asked, keeping his voice calm.
‘Hey, I was kidding about that. Really, a bad joke.’
‘Does she have a key?’
‘Well, I think she does, she used to. But she didn’t -’
‘I know that.’ Hardy forced himself to slow down, to speak calmly. ‘Just another something to think about. Keeping track of these keys, that’s all. But do me a favor, would you?’
‘Sure.’
‘She’s mad enough at me about all this, defending the man on trial for her father’s murder. Would you try not to mention this key business to her if you see her?’
‘Yeah, okay, no problem.’
When he hung up, he didn’t move for several minutes.
The house wasn’t there, nor was his office, nor the rain, nor the darkness outside.
The night Celine had come by for the first time she had quickly left after seeing him in his green jogging suit, the same kind Owen Nash had been wearing on the day he had been shot. Was seeing him like seeing her father’s ghost? She’d reacted, at least for a moment, as though she had… ‘You just suddenly reminded me so much of my father…’
So rethink that visit. How could he have reminded her of her father, with that intensity, if she hadn’t seen him in the same outfit, if she hadn’t been with him on that last day? Of course, she might have seen him other times in his jogging clothes… except that wasn’t very likely. They didn’t live together, they didn’t jog together.
Strout… he had mentioned in the case of May Shinn – though Hardy knew it was true anyway – that standard operating procedure at the morgue was to bag the victim’s clothes. Celine had seen Nash at the coroner’s… but he’d been naked.
Certainly the jogging suit was a better explanation of her extreme reaction than just seeing him in domestic bliss with wife and child. If he hadn’t been so convinced she was in love with him, would he have ever believed her explanation for her reaction? Dismas, the lady-killer. He shook his head in disgust.
But why?
Money? Greed? Well, it was true she stood to benefit with May gone, more than anyone except perhaps Ken Farris, but since she already had more than she needed he’d quickly discounted that potential motive, not to mention that he never considered her a suspect anyway.
He wasn’t happy with it. The more you got, the more you wanted? Money, the alleged root of all evil? Including murder? What about her reaction to May’s death – ‘At least she won’t get the money.’ Greed – one of the seven deadly sins. And greed didn’t presuppose poverty or exclude the wealthy. There had to be more.
It was rocking him. He was aware, sitting back now in his chair, that his stomach had tightened. He consciously unclenched his fists. He knew he was right, but wasn’t sure why. One thing was sure, as the killer she had acted plausibly, smartly – played on his male ego, let him think she was fixed on him in his role as her father’s avenger while May was a suspect. How better to keep him from suspecting her than to fabricate and build their own illicit relationship, to use his libido, as insurance? He was such a fool.
But Glitsky had looked into this. Celine had been in Santa Cruz, she couldn’t have been out on the Eloise.
Hardy thought he had read and reread each of the binders on his desk, but he hadn’t – Abe’s reports following up on alibis for Ken and Celine sat there within their tabs. He had listened to Abe telling him about the two weight lifters who lived with one of their mothers, about Celine spending the weekend remodeling their Victorian house. Now he read Abe’s synopsis of the telephone interview he had conducted.
The telephone rang on his desk and he grabbed at it.
‘Mr Hardy. This is Judge Chomorro.’
And I’m the Queen of Spain, Hardy thought.
But it was the judge’s voice, no mistake. What was he doing calling Hardy at home over the weekend during a trial? This being his first murder trial, Hardy wasn’t certain what to make of it – was a call from a judge to a defense attorney a relatively common practice or another example of Chomorro’s own inexperience? There was nothing to do but hear him out.
He said hello and listened while the judge told him that he had called to give him fair and decent warning that he had decided to deny Hardy’s 1118.1 motion, that the evidence was going to the jury for their verdict. Pullios had also been informed.
‘By the way,’ Chomorro said, ‘again in the interests of total fairness for the defense’ – or covering your ass in an appeal, Hardy thought – ‘I want you to be prepared for the prosecution to object to your argument on the investigation procedure leading to the indictment of Mr Fowler.’ He paused a moment. ‘And I am of a mind to sustain those objections.’
Hardy tried to get out an objection now. ‘I understand we’d covered that in pretrial, Your Honor.’
‘Well, I’ve given it a lot of thought since then, especially since yesterday, going over your eleven-eighteen, and I fail to see any direct relevance to the evidence that’s been presented. Ms Pullios may have moved too quickly on Ms Shinn, but there was ample evidence to indict Mr Fowler in the first place, and certainly enough for a jury to decide to convict. We’ll leave it up to them.’
‘Your Honor, you realize that was the main thrust of my defense.’
‘Frankly, that’s one of the reasons for this courtesy call. I wanted to give you some time to prepare. Talk to your client – he can tell you there was nothing technically improper about his indictment. A trial is supposed to weigh evidence. If you want to impugn the system, you’re of course free to appeal, as I presume you will if you lose.’
Hardy could imagine Drysdale or Locke or both of them having had a chat with Chomorro the previous night or this morning, reminding him ‘a trial is supposed to weigh evidence.’ Right out of the textbook.
Here was the reason for Chomorro’s unorthodox call. He’d talked to somebody and been told that his ruling on the law regarding Hardy’s defense would – perhaps -provide grounds for a prosecutorial appeal. No, Chomorro wasn’t going to screw up his first murder trial. It was a straightforward procedure. Evidence was presented and the jury decided. That was how he was going to play it.
No way he felt he could ask Glitsky. It was a fishing expedition, and Hardy knew it, and Abe had his own work to do. He wouldn’t run off on what he’d consider a hunch of Hardy’s to double-check his own work. Hardy couldn’t blame him.
Frannie called at six-thirty, an half hour late. He hadn’t noticed and swore at himself. ‘How are you? he asked. ’How’s the Beck?‘
Her voice seemed small and far away. He told her he was still working and she said that she’d known that. Erin, Rebecca’s grandmother, had invited her to stay for dinner, maybe even overnight if the rain didn’t let up. He’d be at it until the wee hours anyway. She didn’t think he’d mind. Did he?
He didn’t mind, he said. How could he? This had been his doing and he was going to have to fix it.
He told her he loved her, would miss her but understood. He was getting to the end of it.
Jeff Elliot owed him one. He was an investigative reporter, and if there was something to discover in Santa Cruz, Hardy hoped he was the guy to find it. He only had to sell him on the idea.
‘In this weather? Are you kidding me?’