"At that time, did you consider her a suspect?"
Here Cuneo showed a little humanity to the jury, another nice move. "That early on," he said with a smile, "everybody's a suspect." Then he got serious. "But no, the defendant wasn't particularly a suspect at that time."
"Okay, and did you get to ask your questions?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because right after she asked me inside and offered me some coffee, she told me that she'd been talking to Deputy Chief Glitsky."
"For the record, you mean Abe Glitsky, San Francisco's Deputy Chief of Inspectors?"
"That's right."
"How did he know the defendant?" "I don't know."
Rosen threw a perplexed glance at the jury. He came back to his witness.
"Inspector, is it unusual to have a deputy chief personally interview witnesses in a homicide investigation assigned to another inspector?"
"I've never seen it happen before."
"Never before? Not once?"
Hardy raised a hand. "Your Honor. Asked and answered." "Sustained."
"All right," Rosen said. "We may come back to the involvement of Deputy Chief Glitsky in a little while, but meanwhile you were with the defendant in her kitchen?"
"That's right."
"Can you describe for the jury what happened next?"
"Sure. She was in the middle of making homemade pasta noodles and she asked me if I liked them. Her husband, she said, was out of town…"
Catherine grabbed at Hardy's arm and started to whisper something to him. He couldn't let the jury see her react badly, and he all but jumped up, raising his voice. "Objection, Your Honor!"
Braun's voice was mild, merely inquisitive. "Grounds, Counselor?"
Hardy's thoughts churned. He had gotten to his feet to shut Catherine up and to challenge Cuneo out of pure rage because he knew the man was lying, but these weren't grounds for objection. "Relevance?"
Braun didn't have to think about it. "Are you guessing, Counselor? I believe you've made a point about this topic yourself in your opening statement. Objection overruled."
The gallery behind Hardy stirred at the promise of more fireworks. Rosen smiled up at Braun. "Thank you, Your Honor." He went back to Cuneo, all business. "Now, Inspector…"
But Hardy whispered quickly to his client and was again out of his seat, cutting off the question. "Your Honor!"
Making no effort to hide her exasperation, Braun pulled her glasses down and peered over them. "Yes, Mr.
Hardy?"
"Defendant would like to request a short recess at this time."
"Request denied. Mr. Rosen, go ahead."
But Hardy wouldn't be denied. "Your Honor, may I approach?"
Her endurance all but used up, Braun rolled her eyes, then folded her palm upward, beckoning Hardy forward with a warning look. He left the desk, came to the base of the podium, spoke in a low voice. "I'm sorry, but my client urgently needs to use the restroom, Your Honor."
"Urgently. That's a nice touch," she whispered. Furious, the judge paused for several more seconds. "This is beneath you, Counselor." Finally she lifted her gavel and brought it down with a snap. "Court will recess for fifteen minutes."
"I can't believe he's just lying like that." "Actually, it's worse than that. He's not saying anything you can deny."
"But I didn't…"
"You did. You told him Will was gone. You asked him if he liked homemade pasta. You've told me this." "Then I'll lie and say I didn't."
Hardy moved his hands up beside his ears. "Don't even privately say that to me, please. We have got to stick with the truth here. It's all we have."
They were in the holding cell, five minutes to go in the recess.
"But they're going to think I wanted to get him close to me so he wouldn't keep investigating around me."
"That's right. That's what they're going to think."
"So how are we going to fight that?"
"I don't know that yet, Catherine. I don't know. But the most important thing right now, the only thing right now, is that you can't react in front of the jury. Don't let them see you do more than look disgusted."
In the end, Hardy couldn't keep it from the jury. Cu-neo's testimony was that Catherine had offered him at least dinner and maybe more. He'd certainly gotten that impression, anyway. He'd had to rebuff her, reminding her that she was a suspect in a murder investigation. She did not take the rejection well and, scorned, had refused to answer any more of his questions. After a while, he'd decided to leave. For the first time, he began to regard her as a possible suspect.
And then, the damage done on that front, Rosen brought it back to Glitsky. "I'm curious, Inspector, did Deputy Chief Glitsky give you any explanation of why he, too, would be investigating the death of Paul Hanover?"
Hardy stood up. "Objection. Hearsay and irrelevant." "Mr. Rosen?"
"Your Honor, this goes to Deputy Chief Glitsky's bias and motive to skew testimony in this case. If he perceives he's under political pressure to obtain a certain result in this case, his recollection, conduct and testimony are all highly suspect."
"Your Honor," Hardy countered, "the deputy chief hasn't testified-he's not a witness so far, so there is nothing to impeach. This testimony, if relevant at all, only comes in after the witness says something that makes it relevant. If that happens later, then it happens, but it's premature right now." Hardy knew he was going to have to face this sooner or later, but he wanted Abe to bring it up first. Have him explain his status in the case in his own terms first, and not take the stand already burdened with the jury's preconception that he was somehow suspect. Hardy knew he was right-that Braun should have waited until there was a foundation to admit the testimony. But she wasn't having any.
The judge took a breath. "Counsel, given what I've heard so far, I'm going to let this in now, subject to a motion to strike. But you're on a short leash here, Mr. Rosen. Keep this very focused."
Hardy didn't like it, but the order of testimony was something within the court's discretion. Rosen had the recorder read the question back to Cuneo-the gist of which was whether or not Glitsky had tried to explain why he would be investigating Hanover's death.
"Yes, he did. He said that Mayor West asked him to become involved."
Mention of San Francisco's mayor brought a pronounced buzz to the gallery, but it died quickly. No one wanted to miss the next question. "Did he tell you why?"
"No, sir. He was my superior. It was a fait accompli. I just assumed it was something political and didn't worry too much about it."
Hardy objected-speculation-and Braun sustained him. But it was a small and insignificant victory amid a string of setbacks. And more to come. "Sergeant, how did Deputy Chief Glitsky's involvement affect your investigation?"
"Well, the most immediate effect was that he warned me off talking to the defendant."
"Warned you off?" Rosen displayed his shock and amazement to the jury. "What do you mean, warned you off?"
"He said that she was threatening to file a sexual harassment lawsuit against me and if I knew what was good for me, I should leave her alone."
"And how did Deputy Chief Glitsky tell you he found out about this?"
"She called him."
"Did he say why she called him?"
Hardy was up again, this time citing speculation and hearsay. He was sustained again, and he took a breath of relief and sat down.
But Rosen never skipped a beat. "Inspector Cuneo, did the defendant in fact file a sexual harassment complaint against you?"
This, of course, had been something Catherine and Hardy had discussed from the beginning. In the end, they'd decided that to bring the complaint after she'd been charged with the murders would only be seen as frankly cynical and duplicitous. So they'd opted against it. Now, of course, it looked like that might have been the wrong decision.
Cuneo actually broke a tolerant smile. He shook his head. "Of course not," he said.