The Vig

Chapter Seventeen

Hardy remembered the days when he had been so into his work at the D.A.’s office, the hours passed unheeded trying to piece together something that didn’t fit, deciding on an interrogation strategy, formulating an opening or closing statement. Thinking hard. Caring so damn much.

He stood at the door to Tony Feeney’s office-the dress-for-success assistant D.A. who had hated Rusty Ingraham was lost in his own musings. He was half-turned back to the window, feet up on his desk, far away from anything that was happening in his here and now. Reluctant to pull him from the reverie, Hardy knocked.

The feet came down, a hand came out over the desk. Shaking it, Hardy said, “Dismas Hardy, from the other day.”

“Sure, how you doin’?”

Hardy said he was starting to feel like a cop again, doing legwork.

“You ever get over to see Hector Medina?”

Hardy kept standing. He shook his head. “He’s not a happy man.”

Feeney settled back a little into his chair. “No. No, I don’t suppose he is. Did you read about his latest…?”

“Yeah. It’s interesting.”

“Anything to do with him seeing you?”

“I don’t know. I doubt it. He called Ingraham last week. Then this dog thing. Something seemed to get him going.”

Feeney sat up. “He called Ingraham? No shit?”

“No shit.” Hardy pulled over a metal chair and sat down. “But I wanted to ask you about something else you said the other day.”

“I was playing poker…” Feeney held up his hands, smiling, making a joke. Then, “What did I say?”

“You were telling me about how Rusty got Hector Medina into all this. There was some woman, you said. Somebody he was trying to prove something with.”

Feeney didn’t even have to think about it. He nodded. “Karen Moore,” he said. “But she can’t fit into all this. She and Rusty were years ago.”

“Everybody in this got connected years ago.” Hardy brought him up to date on the Baker investigation, or lack of it. “Hey, nobody else is looking. This old stuff could be related, that’s all.”

Feeney nodded, popping a Life Saver. “That’s not an entirely unreasonable theory, but it’s still a hell of a long shot. You still going on the assumption Ingraham is dead?”

“Ingraham is dead.”

“That’s what you said last time.”

Hardy sat back. “How come nobody seems to want to believe this guy is dead?”

“Oh, I want to believe it. It would enhance my inner peace to believe it. I would very much like him to be dead, but we like bodies. Missing bodies aren’t neat.”

Hardy knew what he was saying. The case against Baker rested on his motive for killing Ingraham. Not Maxine. And the D.A.’s job, without an official finding that Rusty was at least dead, would be to try Maxine’s murder before a jury that might have a hard time believing Baker killed Maxine when he had no motive, didn’t even know her. The alleged death of Ingraham would be irrelevant and inadmissible. If he killed her because she was around and in the way when he killed Ingraham, well, okay. But without Ingraham an official homicide, it would be a hard sell.

“I’m convinced Rusty’s dead,” Hardy said. “His blood was all over his barge. He fell overboard, got washed out in the bay.” Now he was going after Louis, he realized. Never mind his other doubts, he had to play this straight…

“Maybe he’s scared. Maybe he’s hiding.”

“And maybe he’s fish food.”

Feeney smiled. “I’ll grant that. It’s possible, maybe even likely. And you don’t think it’s Baker?”

Hardy gave it a second. “That’s what’s funny. If I’d gotten this case when I was working here-I mean just the file on Baker, leaving out the other suspects, I’d do a number on it. As Glitsky tells me when he’s being real professional, all the elements are there. Except the body, of course.”

“Not exactly a detail.”

“Except that a good expert witness, someone exactly like myself, should be able to convince a jury that Rusty collapsed overboard and the tide took him out.”

“Which is what you believe.”

Hardy chewed his cheek. “That one I’m going with.”

“Well, if you buy that Baker was there, which I guess you’ve got to, what’s the problem?”

“I just can’t seem to convince myself, absolutely, that he’s all of it. Problem is, I seem to be one of the players, and I don’t know what game it is. It makes me nervous.”

Feeney nodded.

“So I thought I’d start over at the beginning. You’d said there was a woman involved-with Ingraham there always was…”

“Right.”

“And there was Maxine Weir dead on his barge.”

“From what you’ve told me, I’d start with her.”

“Her husband, you mean?”

Feeney nodded. “The stats don’t lie. Look to the spouse. Especially this case. Money, jealousy, the works. Why didn’t Glitsky take him in?”

“Well, he may have had an alibi-I’m not sure if he mentioned it to Abe-but they also had Baker.”

“Ah, yes, the convenient Baker.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because Baker solves two outstanding homicides -three if you include Ingraham- and that’s good for the department’s numbers.” He ran a finger through his thick hair. “It might not be laziness. On paper, Baker’s a righteous suspect.”

“But you don’t think he’s guilty?”

Feeney held up a hand. “I’m just playing devil’s advocate. You can’t have it both ways. If Ingraham’s dead-and I’m not saying he’s not-then Baker’s a good bet. So is Maxine’s husband. But if Ingraham’s not dead, it opens a few other cans of worms.”

“I’m sure he’s dead. Maybe Baker did him, maybe Weir.”

“You said Weir had an alibi.”

“Maybe an alibi.”

“So find out. Why waste your time with Karen Moore?”

“Maybe it goes all the way back to Medina. Why is he part of the action again just at this time?” Hardy saw the skeptical look, but pushed on. “Look, whatever’s going on here began with Ingraham. He’s the reason I’m in it. Medina, Baker, Ingraham, me. Something started nine years ago. If it leads me back to Maxine Weir, I’ll get back to Ray’s alibi.”

“And you think Karen Moore may know something?”

Hardy shook his head. “I don’t know. She might not know what she knows.”

Karen Moore was an investigator for the district attorney’s office, a jurisdiction separate from the regular police department. One of her colleagues told Hardy that she was down at Hunter’s Point trying to bring in a juvenile witness. She would be back sometime that afternoon, but he couldn’t say when.

He was back in the corridor now, just after lunch, and people were reentering courtrooms after the recess. The halls were crowded. Hardy walked to a phone booth and called Frannie at work.

“Are you still mad at me?” she asked.

“I wasn’t. I just had to go out.”

“Eddie said that before he went out. He got killed.”

“I’m not Eddie, Frannie. And I didn’t get killed.”

“And you’re still out.”

“I am.”

She was silent. “Are you going back to your house?”

“Eventually, I suppose.”

“Tonight?”

Hardy thought about it. “I don’t know. What would you like? I don’t want to fight you about every time I walk out the door.”

“I’d like you to come back tonight.”

“You know I’ve got to keep doing this until it’s figured out?”

“Okay, I know that. Don’t get hurt, will you?”

Hardy smiled. “Hurt’s not in the game plan.”

He got the log-on from Lanier, who had been writing up a report in the otherwise deserted Homicide room, where he had gone to see if Abe had had a change of heart and come to work. No, in fact Abe had called in sick.

Hardy, saying he was referred by Tony Feeney, left a message where he’d be for Karen Moore when she got back, got himself a Diet Coke and found the room-a regular office with a solitary terminal on a pitted desk.

This was San Francisco’s incident report-suspect computer. One terminal, no full-time operators. Random, unsupervised log-ons. They had not had anything when Hardy worked here, so he supposed this was an improvement, but it was still far from the state of the art.

He did not feel he was looking for anything, just killing time, but sometimes killing a few minutes could be productive. He typed in Louis Baker’s name.

It was an interesting screen. According to the computer, Louis Baker-alias Lou Brock, Louis Clark, Lou Rawls (the guy had a sense of humor, all right), street name Puffer (whatever that meant)-was still doing his time in San Quentin.

Hardy wondered how far behind the computer’s records were. He punched in Hector Medina, whose name did not appear at all. Well, that made some sense-he’d been cleared twice.

Ray Weir was in the database, though. Nine years ago -there it was again- he had been arrested for brawling at a Forty-Niners game. The arresting officer was not Medina. There was no record if Ingraham had been involved- he had pleaded nolo contendere and gotten off with a two-hundred-dollar fine. In ’85 he got busted for misdemeanor marijuana possession-another hundred-dollar fine. He had an outstanding warrant on an unpaid parking ticket.

Hardy drank some Coke. So Ray was a brawler too, or had been. And, as Hardy already knew, a heavy user of marijuana, maybe other drugs. Emotional enough to cry in front of other people over his lost love. How emotionally unstable was he? What if he was on dope, strung out, violence prone, and had gone out, as Warren had at first suggested, to ‘settle things’ with Maxine? Ray’s alibi, Hardy was thinking, had better be verifiable. He took down a few particulars from the screen on his yellow pad.

Rusty Ingraham’s car-a blue ’87 Volkswagen Jetta-had indeed been reported stolen on August 29. But that was all the computer had on Rusty. So the database wasn’t more than about three weeks behind, which Hardy figured wasn’t so bad. He was starting to take down the information on the car when there was a knock.

“Mr Hardy?”

Hardy stood up. “Sergeant Moore.”

She laughed, perfect white teeth in a model’s face. “Karen, please. Tony Feeney beckons, I jump. How can I help you?”

She boosted herself up like a schoolgirl on the edge of the desk. She was dressed in what looked like some kind of uniform, though it wasn’t a set of patrolman’s blues. The pants were baggy and a leather jacket with her sergeant’s stripes covered her blouse. She looked bulky, which Hardy guessed was a good cover. Any kind of close look revealed a toned body on a short frame. If she wore any makeup she’d stop traffic. But she didn’t, and with nothing to set off the high cheekbones, the deep-set black eyes, the wide sensuous mouth, she was only pretty. Very.

“I don’t know if you can. I’m looking into something that happened a long time ago.”

“For Tony? Is this an active case?”

“No, not strictly for Tony. He gave me your name.”

She waited.

“It’s a little personal,” Hardy said. “Rusty Ingraham.”

Warily. “Rusty Ingraham. There’s a blast from the past. How is Rusty?”

“Actually, Rusty’s dead, or appears to be.” He explained the ambiguity.

“Well, I’m sorry to hear that,” she said when he had finished.

“Are you?”

“Rusty and I were old news. We split up amicably enough.”

“Tony Feeney acted like he’d just won the Lottery when he heard.”

She nodded. “I’d believe that. Tony hated Rusty. A lot of people hated Rusty. I didn’t. I felt sorry for him, finally.”

“Finally?”

“Well, at first I was attracted to him. You knew him?”

Hardy nodded.

“Then you know. He was pretty charismatic. Very charismatic. Never lost a case, star of the show. That was Rusty. And I was this black single mother of a ten-year-old daughter and-”

“Excuse me, when was this?”

“We’re talking I guess nine or ten years ago.”

“And you had a ten-year-old then?” Hardy had been figuring her for her late twenties.

Karen laughed, acknowledging the compliment. “I’m thirty-six, Mr Hardy. And I’m also a grandmother, but thank you.”

“You don’t look like a grandmother.”

“No, I know. I work at it, too. I like to think on a good day I can give my daughter a run.”

“I’d bet on you. So back when she was ten you had this thing with Rusty.”

“I was flattered. It was also the first white man I’d gone out with”-Hardy noted the “first”-“and at the time I saw it as a bit of a coup, you know. I didn’t realize Rusty saw me -foxy young black chick-the same way. A conquest. Another victory.”

He searched her eyes for some sign of pain or loss and saw none. Ingraham might have been an old schoolteacher, sometimes remembered, sometimes fondly.

“So how long did you two go out?”

She looked up at the ceiling. “I’d guess close to a year, maybe ten months. That was about his limit. A year. Then whoever he was seeing would suddenly be last year’s model, you know, and there was nothing to show off there.”

“And you didn’t resent that?”

“Actually I saw it coming and beat him to the punch. By that time I had him pretty well figured out and was starting to feel sorry for him. And you can’t love somebody you feel sorry for.”

“Why’d you feel sorry for him? I thought he was this super success?”

“Well, that’s why. It was a sickness. I really believe that, that he was a sick man. He couldn’t lose at anything, or even have the appearance of losing. He didn’t care about what was real-it was all the appearance.”

“So what happened with Hector Medina?”

“Well, I think that’s mostly why I broke it off. He just had to prove to me that he was right about Medina. He’d said it in front of a group of us, and he wasn’t going to back down. We fought about it. I wanted him to just let it go. I mean, what did it matter? Medina might not have been a great cop, but he wasn’t worse than a lot of others. He had a family, all that. Why stir it up? The original investigation had cleared him. But Rusty got on his high horse and there was no getting him off.”

“But why?”

“That’s the question, isn’t it? At first, no doubt about it, he thought it impressed me, or would impress me. Solo prosecutor takes on the police department and district attorney’s office and brings in a righteous conviction. He thought it would make him more romantic. The Serpico of San Francisco…”

“And that passed, the part about impressing you, I mean?”

“Well, it never really worked, but after he committed himself…” She shrugged. “But that was just Rusty. His ego.”

“And to hell with Medina, right?”

“Oh, Medina didn’t even exist to Rusty. He was just another trophy, like I was, I guess. He eventually got off again anyway.”

“But lost his job.”

“I know. No one believed him after the second investigation, but there wasn’t enough evidence to bring him to trial, so he walked, but to everybody he was a killer cop.”

“Do you think he was?”

“He had a reputation for being mean. Little things lots of guys do-maybe an extra thwack with the sap, cuffs tight enough to cut-nothing heavy, but they came out in the investigation.”

“You know about now, the accusation against him?”

“Killing that dog? He might have done that.”

“And how about Rusty? Killing him?”

“After all this time?”

Hardy explained about the connection through the Valenti and Raines situation. Putting Medina back into the action.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I guess it could’ve powered him up. But if he didn’t do it when it was fresh, would he now?”

“Except back then he was married, had a good job, a future. Now he’s divorced, raising a daughter alone, his job is nothing. Maybe it brought back all he’s lost, all that Rusty made him lose. He snapped over it…”

Karen slipped off the desk and walked over to the window. She put her hands on her hips and did a couple of waist rolls, keeping loose, stretched like a cat, turned around. “Stranger things have happened, but you’ve got to believe time heals at least a little. If Rusty did something else, something new, I could see it better. You get any sign of that?”

“Nope. In fact, Medina told me he hadn’t seen Rusty in years, although he’d called him recently.”

“To say what?”

“Nothing. He said he changed his mind, hung up.”

There was another question in her eyes but she didn’t ask it. Instead she said, “It might be worth checking his alibi.”

Hardy, sitting, ran his fingers over the keyboard in front of the terminal. “I’ll do that,” he said.

She came up behind him, looking over his shoulder at the screen, which still held the information about Rusty’s car. “Back to basics, huh? He was driving an old Volkswagen?”

Hardy squinted at the glaring green terminal. “Does that mean something?”

“It means he must have had a bad streak at the track. He used to say he’d never drive less than a Lincoln. He’d rather walk.”

“So what’s the track have to do with it?”

“I thought you said you knew him.”

To Hardy, Rusty had been another red-hot young attorney much like himself, trying cases and winning them, putting bad guys away. They got along fine in the office, once in a while had drinks and discussed work. That was it. “I guess not,” he said.

“If you didn’t know his gambling, you didn’t know him at all.” Karen came around and sat on the desk again. “The track is what broke us up, much more than Hector Medina, if you want to know the truth, although it was all part of the same thing, I suppose, the winning thing. He said the ponies were the ultimate challenge. He really believed, or wanted to believe, that you could learn enough, follow the jockeys and horses closely enough, so you’d never have to lose. He used to say it wasn’t even gambling, you could make it a sure thing. Not every race, you understand, but when you were sure, you jumped.”

“And he was successful?”

“He did pretty well.” She glanced over at the screen again. “Except when he lost.”

“Which was often?”

“No, but which tended to be big when he did.” She shook her head. “An old Volkswagen… who would’ve thought it? He must’ve been losing. Big.”

Hardy’s fingers drummed some more on the desk. “And that’s what broke you up?”

“Well, it just showed me who he was. It’s why I eventually came to feel sorry for him. Nobody wins all the time, I don’t care how good you are, what you know. But it was like a personal affront to him every time he lost. He’d go crazy. The universe was against him. Nutso.”

She was lost in the memory now. “A couple of times he hit on me for my check after blowing his, losing on what he thought was a sure thing, and not believing he could go out and lose my check the same way on the next race.” She met Hardy’s eyes. “It was very sad really, the addiction. It was like he won at everything else, so he purposely picked something he couldn’t win at so it could verify that he was really, at the bottom, a loser. Or that’s how he saw himself.” Abruptly, she brushed at her hair with her hand as if something of Rusty had stuck in it and she wanted it out. “That’s just my two-bit psychology, but it makes sense to me.”

“So you think he was a loser, deep down?”

“All the way down. There was just what he’d won and what he’d lost. He just wasn’t there-no person holding it all together, giving any kind of focus. And I think his biggest fear was that people would find out he wasn’t the fantastic winner he tried to appear to be. So he couldn’t lose anything, ever.”

“And yet he constantly tested that at the track?”

“I said it was a sickness. He couldn’t help himself. The track was his litmus test. When he beat it, he could beat anybody. If it started to beat him, he’d nose-dive all over his life. We finally broke up in one of the down cycles.”

Hardy thought of the Rusty who’d come into the Shamrock the week before-a little down and out, clothes not pressed, riding public transport because his car had been stolen. He still had the gab, the line, the presence, but he wouldn’t have impressed anybody as a man who could take on the universe. Hardly a winner.

Karen pushed herself off the desk. “But the horses didn’t kill him, did they?”

“No,” Hardy said. “It was somebody with opposable thumbs.”