John Lescroart: Nothing But The Truth

Hardy came up at a jog, slacks and shirtsleeves, no coat, knowing before he asked. ‘She still in there? She’s really in there?’ Though he never doubted she was. This wasn’t the kind of funny birthday prank Frannie was likely to pull on him.

‘Yep.’

Barely slowing, Hardy swore and turned in toward the jail’s entrance. Glitsky reached and caught his sleeve, stopping him. ‘Hey!’

‘Let me go, Abe. I’m getting her out of there.’

‘Not without a judge you’re not. I couldn’t.’

When Glitsky let go ofhis arm he stayed put, glaring in the dusk. The night had turned windy and cold. The lawyer in him knew that his friend was right – it wasn’t a matter of summoning some patience. They had to find a judge, the night magistrate, somebody. To facilitate night-time warrants and other late business, the judges rotated magistrate duty so that there would be one judge on call every evening.

Even as Hardy said ‘Where’s Braun?’ he was moving again, toward the Hall, Glitsky on his heels.

But though they had no trouble getting by the night guard and into the building, after they took the stairs to the second floor they couldn’t get into the area of the judge’s chambers, which were behind the courtrooms. Hardy banged on doors all the way down the hallway. No answer.

A clerk, working late in one of the rooms, opened her door and poked a head out. ‘It’s closed up back there. Everybody’s gone home.’

Hardy kicked the door and the sound echoed off the walls. Then, suddenly, just as they turned to head back downstairs, the door opened. ‘What’s all this goddam racket?’

Leo Chomorro wasn’t Hardy’s favorite judge, although he was glad enough to see him now. It didn’t appear to be mutual – Chomorro was scowling. Then, noticing Glitsky, he nodded more genially. ‘Evening, lieutenant. What’s going on here?’

Glitsky laid it out in a few words. They needed a judge to vacate a contempt citation and get Hardy’s wife out of jail.

‘Your wife ?’

‘Yes, your honor. There’s been some kind of screw-up.’

Chomorro’s scowl deepened. ‘What was she doing down here? She’s not an attorney, too, is she?’

‘No. She got called before the grand jury and the next thing she knew she was in jail.’

Chomorro looked like he wanted to ask some more questions, but he’d heard the magic word – grand jury – and knew nobody was allowed to discuss anything about its proceedings. They’d already told him the charge was contempt, though – he might pursue that. ‘Who issued the citation?’ he asked warily.

‘Marian Braun,’ Glitsky said.

Making a face and no promises, Chomorro got a few more details, then finally said he’d put in a call to Braun and get some answers if he could. But he told them they shouldn’t expect much – any communication about grand jury proceedings was prohibited. If they wanted to wait…

Glitsky stayed with the judge, but Hardy decided he had to see Frannie.

He’d been to the jail dozens of times and knew the routine, so within minutes he was in the attorneys’ visiting room, waiting for his wife.

He hadn’t really prepared himself. With other clients, he made it a point to pre-visualize their entrance into this room. It was often the first time he would see them in the jail’s orange jumpsuit, and the reality of someone he’d known in civilian life dressed for the slammer was always something of a shock.

In this case, the first sight was more in the order of a physical assault. Frannie, always petite, looked positively gaunt. In the room’s institutional glare, his wife’s cheeks were ghostly – the washed-out, faded yellow-gray of ancient paste. Her beautiful red hair had already lost its luster and now hung flat and drab.

A glance reconnected them and they crossed to each other, nearly falling into an embrace. Frannie clung to him, her face buried in her chest, repeating, ‘Thank God, thank God,’ over and over.

He held her.

Finally, their hands enfolded on the table, they began to get to it, Frannie trying to explain away the subpoena, and the fact that she hadn’t told him about it. ‘I didn’t think it was anything, that’s why.’

Hardy shook his head. This wasn’t tracking right. ‘No,’ he said, ‘you thought it was something , Frannie. If you thought it was nothing, you would have told me about it. You would have said, “I got this subpoena today to go testify in front of the grand jury. I wonder what it’s all about.” Instead, you kept it to yourself.’ She was silent, biting at her lower lip. After a minute, Hardy prompted her. ‘Frannie?’

‘All right,’ she admitted.

‘All right, what?’

Pulling her hands away from his, she crossed her arms over her chest. ‘Now you’re cross-examining me. I think I’ve had enough of that for today.’

Hardy kept his voice in tight control. ‘I’m not doing that.’ He brought it down to a whisper. ‘I don’t know why you’re here. I’m confused. I don’t know what’s going on. You want to help me out with this? I’m on your side.’

Closing her eyes, she let out a breath. ‘OK,’ she said. She reached again for his hand. ‘I know I should have told you. I mean, I know that now. It’s just we’ve had such different lives lately. I didn’t want you to misunderstand, I guess – to have to deal with it at all.’

‘Deal with what?’

She met his eyes, taking a long moment before answering. ‘Ron.’

‘Ron,’ Hardy repeated, his voice hardening in spite of himself. ‘I don’t believe we know a Ron.’

‘Ron Beaumont,’ she said. ‘Max and Cassandra’s dad.’

Hardy knew the children a bit from their visits with his kids, from sleepovers. The older one, Cassandra, had become one of Rebecca’s good friends, maybe even her best friend, although he wasn’t sure of that. Hardy had some vague sense, a dim memory, of a charming, vivacious child, although the ‘kid thing,’ as he called it, had been pushed off – banished from? – the front burner of his life. But he had never met the father. ‘Max and Cassandra’s dad,’ he repeated, his voice flat. ‘Ron.’

Frannie looked at him and he saw desperation, even despair, in her expression. And, behind that, maybe a disturbing hint of defiance. ‘He’s a friend of mine. Like you with the women in your life.’

This was a sore point. Hardy often went to lunch, or sometimes even dinner, with other women, colleagues who he worked with, got along with. Even his ex-wife Jane, too, once in a while. He and Frannie finally had to put a moratorium on questions about who they all were, the various personal and professional relationships. They were all just friends. They’d leave it at that.

But on the other foot, Hardy discovered, the shoe cramped him up.

He suddenly had to get away from what he thought he might be hearing. Walking across the room to its doorway, he stood looking out through the wired glass opening into the hallway of the jail. Finally, he turned. ‘OK, we’ll leave it where you want. But I’ve got to remind you that you brought all this up. I never heard of Ron Beaumont until two minutes ago and you’re in jail because of some subpoena involving you and him. I don’t think a little curiosity is out of the question.’

‘His wife was murdered. He’s a suspect.’

By the door, Hardy stood stock still. ‘And the grand jury decided it had to talk to you about him?’

She shrugged. ‘I was with him – drinking coffee,’ she added quickly, ‘on the morning she died. In public.’

He waited.

‘So they wanted to see if my alibi matched his.’

Hardy was still trying to figure out the logistics. ‘Did you ever talk to the police about this, before today?’