Donnally surprised himself when the answer came. It was an old anger, an old outrage, not only at the death of Hamlin and at whoever murdered him, but at Hamlin the man.
But he wanted to think through what that meant before expressing the thought to Janie.
“Be sure to take good notes,” Janie said, “and maybe you can explain him to me.”
She paused for a moment, then said, “But don’t kid yourself, pal. Whether you solve the enigma of Hamlin or not, now that you’re in it, you won’t be walking away until you figure out why his life ended this way. And it’s not that I think you’ll like doing it. You won’t. You’ll despise every minute of it, but your world will seem disjointed until you get the answer.”
Donnally’s thoughts continued moving after they disconnected the call, first returning to those that had begun the day, the ones about matter and motion, and then toward Hamlin’s body at rest in the medical examiner’s office, and finally toward Jackson’s terror. And he wondered whether he had it backward. Maybe he’d been wrong and Janie only partially right. Maybe it wasn’t just whether the world was done with Hamlin, but whether Hamlin was done with the world-for the momentum of the lawyer’s existence-the chains of causes and effects, of things done and suffered-hadn’t ceased with his death.
And Donnally wondered whether that was the real source of his anger.
Chapter 6
The uniformed officer standing on Mark Hamlin’s porch raised his hands as though in a protestation of innocence as Donnally and Navarro climbed the stairs of the three-story Victorian duplex facing Buena Vista Park and overlooking the distant downtown.
They’d just pushed their way through four reporters from local television and radio stations, two from national cable channels, and five from newspapers, all jabbing video cameras and microphones toward their faces and asking nonsensical who, where, how, and why questions that if they already had the answers to, they wouldn’t be bothering to search Hamlin’s residence.
“I didn’t do it,” the officer said, “I didn’t touch a thing.” He turned and opened the front door of the multimillion-dollar property and gestured toward the interior. “It’s just the way we found it.”
Donnally and Navarro drew on latex gloves and slipped on polyethylene shoe covers and crossed the threshold into the foyer. Straight ahead was the hallway leading to the kitchen. They turned left and examined the living room. The plaster walls were eggshell white and pristine, looking as though they’d never felt the impact of a child’s ball or a bicycle tire, seeming as though never touched by life at all. The couch, chairs, and tables, on the other hand, were as strewn with trash as the passenger seat of Hamlin’s Porsche. Books, pleadings, and files were also piled on the Oriental rugs covering the parquet floors. The only unlittered furniture were the bookcases standing along the wall opposite the fireplace and framing the television and DVD player. These bore dozens of Asian artifacts, from pottery bowls to brass statues to a collection of long-stemmed clay pipes, all spaced and positioned as if part of a museum exhibit.
“Try not to focus too long on paper you’re not supposed to be looking at,” Donnally said to Navarro as they walked through the living room.
“Unless there’s blood spatter on it or it’s a signed confession from the killer, I won’t be paying much attention.”
Navarro stopped and glanced at the chaos of half-used legal pads and scattered folders lying on the dining room table. Interleaved were misfolded newspaper sections, legal journals, and flyers announcing political events.
“I know Goldhagen was playing like she wants to leverage this investigation into a way to reopen a bunch of Hamlin’s old cases,” Navarro said, “but I don’t see her doing it. I suspect that his closet has got a few bones from her skeleton in it, too.”
Donnally looked over at Navarro. “What do you mean?”
“A lot has happened since you moved north. Hamlin and a bunch of his pals did some fund-raisers for her reelection campaign.”
“You’ve got to be-” Donnally remembered Goldhagen’s aggression-apparent aggression-toward Hamlin and his practice, and realized it was an act for his benefit, or maybe for the judge’s or Navarro’s as a way of demonstrating her independence.
“It’s true,” Navarro said. “He’d done enough posturing over the years about civil rights and lesbian and gay rights and transgender rights and immigrant rights and dog and cat rights that he could deliver up to any politician any group that devoted itself to playing the victim. It’s like a. .” Navarro flicked his fingers next to his head like he was flipping through note cards in his mind. “What do you call it where two people share the same delusion?”
Donnally guessed that Navarro assumed he’d know the word because the nature of Janie’s work-and he did.
“A folie a deux,” Donnally said.
“That’s it. That’s what he has with the LGBT groups. They act like we live in a Jim Crow world, but they control who gets elected in this town, who gets appointed police chief, and who gets the big city contracts. Whenever something bad happened, Hamlin would undergo some kind of mind meld with them in their fake victimization. Some transgender idiot would get his ass kicked, and Hamlin was on TV declaring a hate crime. Never considered the possibility that the asshole might’ve deserved it. Lot of rough stuff happens in the Castro and most of it people bring on themselves.”
“Sounds like you’ve joined the Log Cabin Republicans,” Donnally said. “I wouldn’t have expected it.”
“Being gay doesn’t mean I have to follow the party line and wiggle my ass in a conga line at the pride parade. I moved out here in order to fit in and live a normal life, not to keep drawing attention to myself.” Navarro tapped his chest. “I’m a cop. Not a gay cop, or a fag cop, or a ho-mo-sex-u-al cop. A cop. If I hear somebody yell one more time, ‘We’re here. We’re queer. Get used to it,’ I’ll rip out his vocal cords. Everybody in San Francisco is already used to it.”
“How about just give him a bus ticket out of town?”
Navarro half smiled in embarrassment, realizing that his rant was irrelevant to their task, then said, “That’ll do, too.”
Navarro turned and led the way into the kitchen.
“Doesn’t seem to be part of the same apartment,” Donnally said, as they stood looking at the clean granite counters, the bare butcher-block island, the slick Sub-Zero refrigerator, and the polished walnut table and chairs. “Either he’s got a cleaning service or somebody did a helluva job destroying evidence.” Donnally pointed through the doorway toward a bathroom across the hall. “Check that one for anything that smells like lavender. I’ll take a look upstairs.”
Donnally walked back to the foyer and climbed the stairs to the second floor. He glanced into two small bedrooms as he made his way down the carpeted hallway and then turned into what appeared to be Hamlin’s master suite, shadowed within closed curtains. The blanket and spread were draped off the side of the bed and both pillows showed depressions. He resisted the temptation to conclude that they had been used the previous night. That was a fact not yet in evidence, and might never be.
The only illumination in the room came from a shaft of sunlight spreading out from the bathroom. He followed it inside and sniffed the air.
Lavender.
He spotted a bar of soap on the shower floor, then opened the glass door and kneeled down to inspect it. A brown hair was stuck to it and partially wrapped around. A curled black one lay on the tile next to it. At least two people, or one with dyed hair, had used it. He suspected that the black one was from Hamlin, but only forensic testing would tell.
Donnally pushed himself to his feet and returned to the bedroom. He flicked on the overhead light and checked the visible portions of the pillows and sheets for hair or semen stains. He found none. He figured he’d leave it to the evidence technicians to do a more thorough search.