John Lescroart - The Oath

Hardy did and it made complete sense, as did the lack of warning. If Glitsky had told him in advance when they were searching, Hardy would have gone there first and removed any shred of anything that could have been construed as incriminating. He decided to move on. "The second question is easier. Have you talked to your two cowboys or know where they are now? We were going to get together again and I thought I'd set it up."

"They're out talking to somebody about the hit-and-run vehicle-hey, we don't call them the car police for nothing-but they ought to be back before five. Inspector Fisk has an aversion to overtime, whatever that is. You want to drop by here on your way home, they'll probably be around. I can congratulate you on getting your client off."

"You got the word, did you?"

"Marlene, just before lunch."

"Which leaves you where with the rest of it?"

"Real close."

Hardy chuckled. "Good answer."

"Why do you care, if it's not your case anymore?"

"It's still my case, Abe. I just don't have a client." A pause. "We had a deal. I may have found out a few things."

Glitsky decided he liked the sound of that. "See you in a couple of hours," he said.

The last time Hardy had just picked up and without any warning decided to pay a call on a working doctor at the Judah Clinic was when he had tried to convince Kensing to talk to him while he was scheduled to see patients. That hadn't worked out so well.

But after two plus hours with Jeff Elliot's documents down in the windowless Chronicle basement, Hardy couldn't abide the thought of returning to his office. When he told Cohn what his unscheduled visit to the clinic was about, he was confident that even if she was busy, she would see him.

But maybe not. He waited outside with his brain on full speed for a little more than twenty minutes and still she hadn't appeared. He would give her another ten before he went inside again and made a stronger demand. It was the sixth consecutive day of sunshine, and he was going to get as much of it as he could before the June fog slammed the city again.

"Mr. Hardy?"

He squinted up, got to his feet, extended his hand. "Guilty."

Judith Cohn's mouth was set in worry, the cause of which immediately became apparent. The same question she'd asked first thing on the phone yesterday. "Is it Eric? Is he all right?"

"He's fine. In fact, he's better than he's been in a couple of weeks." He explained only that his grand jury testimony had made them decide that he was no longer a suspect. He said nothing about the actual alibi, the stop at Harry's bar. If Kensing wanted to tell her about that, it would be his call.

"So he's clear?"

"Looks like."

"Oh God." She put a hand histrionically over her heart, smiling now broadly at him. "That is such a great relief. I am so glad." Then the smile faded. "But you didn't come here to tell me that, did you?"

"No, I didn't."

Her hand was still on her heart. "What?"

He started at the beginning, his call to her yesterday, which had revealed that she did not have any corroboration for where she had been at 10:45 on that Tuesday night. Then the Lopez case. Her problems with Markham. Over-sleeping the morning Markham had been hit. "I'm not saying that I think you've had anything to do with any of this, but the police may not feel the same way if they find out. With very few other people on their radar screens, it's likely that they will. It would be better if you were prepared for their questions."

She'd listened intently and now her face clouded over with dismay. "But I…I was at Eric's. I never thought I'd have to prove that."

"Did you talk to anyone else, see anybody in the hallway? Do you remember if anybody might have seen you?"

She was continually shaking her head, stunned by this development, how it might play. "And so they'd think…I could have killed Mrs. Markham and their children?"

"It would not eliminate you. That's the point. And they're going on the assumption that the same person killed Tim."

"At the hospital?"

"Yes."

For a moment, Hardy thought she might panic. Her eyes locked on his, then combed the street in front of them, as though looking for an avenue of escape. But then, almost as suddenly, the strain bled out of her expressive face. She reached out her hand and placed it on Hardy's sleeve. "Then this would only matter," she said, "if I had been in the ICU within a few minutes or so of Tim's death, right?"

"I don't know exactly. Enough time for the potassium to work."

"So let's even say fifteen minutes outside, and that would be a hell of a long time. That's when I would have had to be there, right?"

"Right. But it was my understanding-you told me last night, in fact-that you were there right after the code blue-"

"I was, but not right before. Right before-a half hour before, at least, maybe more-I was in the ER, putting some stitches in a baby's lip. She dropped her bottle, then fell on it. What a mess. But I had my nurse with me, and the baby's mom. Everybody, in fact. Everybody knew I was there. When they called the code blue, I was just washing up after the stitches and I turned to my nurse and said, 'I've got to go see if that's Mr. Markham.' She'll remember."

When Hardy walked into the homicide detail, it was Old Home Week. Though Bracco and Fisk had not yet arrived, eight out of the fourteen homicide inspectors were at or near their desks. Hardy thought it had to be close to a record for the room. The hazing of the new guys continued, he noticed-a Keystone Kops children's toy, two soft police dolls hanging from a paddy wagon, sat in the middle of their combined desks by the stoplight. While Hardy waited, three separate inspectors pointed out to him that if you squeezed the wagon, it went "oogah! oogah!" When he declined to try it for himself, they all seemed disappointed. Adding to the party atmosphere, Jackman had stopped by with Treya at the close of business and, hearing of Hardy's imminent arrival, had decided to wait around. Marlene Ash had finished up with the grand jury for the day. She wanted to get Glitsky's debriefing of Rajan Bhutan, as well as whatever late-breaking news he might have on the still-live Markham suspects, whoever they might be. Glitsky's office couldn't have held the crowd, so everyone had moved over near the first interrogation room, and that's where Hardy joined them.

After taking the expected grief from Jackman about the merits of the deal they'd made about his client, Hardy listened with growing interest as Glitsky went on about the second proven Portola victim, Shirley Watrous, and Rajan Bhutan. The consensus seemed to be that the two series of multiple murders were unrelated, and that Bhutan remained the prime suspect for the people on Kensing's list. They'd talked to him at length this afternoon, and Glitsky had sent two inspectors over to his home shortly after that with a search warrant.

The inspectors sent up a rousing huzzah when the rookies arrived. Glitsky turned and glared at the world in general, then motioned Fisk and Bracco over to talk with the big boys.

Darrel and Harlen, in Hardy's estimation, had accomplished quite a lot in a very short time. Since they'd just arrived from Markham's old neighborhood and their investigations about the car, Glitsky let Fisk expound on that topic, although his skepticism was evident. He proudly showed off to the assemblage a composite sketch of the car's driver. Hardy was glad to note that the woman bore no resemblance to Judith Cohn except for a halo of unkempt dark hair.

As the composite went from hand to hand around the room, Fisk then announced that their witness, a teenage girl named Lexi Rath, had tentatively identified the make and model of the car that had nearly hit her, and presumably hit Tim Markham. It was a Dodge Dart, probably a model from the last year of the sixties or the early seventies. Fisk had already contacted the DMV and discovered that there were only twenty-three such cars registered in all of San Francisco County. When he'd told Motor Vehicles that they were investigating a homicide, they faxed him the names right away. He now had addresses and registered owners for each of the cars, and with luck, by tomorrow he'd have seen most of them.