But what the young man lacked in physique, he made up for in intensity. Nodding at the lieutenant, he began. ‘The AG likes everything you’ve both done up to now. We’ve got plenty of evidence to convict. But for the next few days he thinks a change of emphasis might be productive.’
‘To what?’ Lanier asked.
‘To everybody but Graham Russo.’
A moment of silence. Lanier cracked a peanut. ‘But Graham did it.’
Soma nodded. ‘I know that. But Dean Powell wants to turn over a few more rocks, that’s all. You’ve both undoubtedly noticed this one’s a political bomb. We want to head off any accusation that we’re going after Graham for politics. Show that there’s no rush to judgment.’ He altered his tone, lightening it. ‘He just wants to make sure.’
Glitsky leaned back and his chair creaked. Lanier swung his leg and his heel kept knocking into Glitsky’s desk – bump, bump, bump. Deep and hollow sounding. ‘These interviews,’ Soma went on. ‘Do you tape all of them?’
Lanier threw a glance at Glitsky, who was silent, sitting back, arms crossed, listening. ‘Maybe we should have gone to vice,’ Lanier said.
Evans moved forward. The young attorney had moved more into the room and had lowered his voice. She didn’t want to miss anything. ‘Why would we need to go to vice?’ she asked.
But her partner was a veteran cop. He knew what was coming and didn’t wait for Soma before he butted in. ‘You don’t want us to create any paper. Is that what you’re saying?’
The young attorney nodded. ‘That would probably be more convenient.’
‘What are you guys talking about?’
With a nod Soma tossed it back to Lanier. ‘Discovery.’
‘Okay,’ Evans said, ‘I give up. What about discovery?’
‘The prosecution’s got to give everything to the defense, right? Everything they get. So if we go finding alternative suspects and reasonable evidence, guess what? The defense gets to bring them all up in front of the jury, so they can make up their mind.’
‘Essentially,’ Soma added, ‘Mr Powell doesn’t want us to help the defense by providing them with other suspects a jury might get confused about. So you talk to these people-’
‘What people, though?’
A shrug. ‘The rest of the family, where Sal got his fish, who got him the morphine if it wasn’t Graham, like that.’
Lanier: ‘But we don’t run tape, we don’t take notes.’
Soma: ‘Right. Basically, you tell us what you find, but you don’t create discovery.’
‘And as an extra special treat,’ Lanier added to Sarah, ‘you didn’t hear it here.’
Sarah all but glared at the inscrutable Glitsky, hoping that he’d speak up. He didn’t.
‘But-’
Soma stopped her. ‘Except, of course, if someone really starts to look like a suspect.’ He added hastily, ‘But if you think you’ve got something, talk to us before you write it up.’
Silence.
‘We wouldn’t want to create false impressions…’ He trailed off lamely.
In the small room Sarah again became aware of the bump of her partner’s heel. He cracked another peanut. She moved around and sat in the chair in front of her lieutenant’s desk. This type of discussion was all new to her, and it wasn’t settling well. Soma and Lanier must have realized it, as a glance passed between them, and Lanier took the ball.
‘I think Mr Soma’s just talking about the preliminary interviews, Sarah. We get anything that sets off a charge, we come back and do the soup-to-nuts version. Is that it?’
‘But you won’t,’ Soma said, ‘because Graham did it, right?’
‘Right.’ Lanier was with the program, ready to be rolling again. ‘You just want to avoid making a case for the defense. We got it.’
Sarah wanted to make it crystal clear. ‘But we are, in fact, looking for another suspect. Isn’t that true?’
‘Absolutely,’ Soma said. ‘If somebody jumps up at you, we put Graham on hold and go after the new guy. But there isn’t going to be any new guy. Look, Sergeant, you and your partner here found Graham out of a universe of potentials, right?’
‘Right.’
‘So he’s the man. This is just some CYA for the AG. We’re beating the bushes, backfilling, making sure we haven’t missed a bet. Any righteous evidence, I promise you, we cough it up.’ Sarah obviously still didn’t like it, and Soma moved to cut her off. ‘We’re not subverting anything here. We’re not asking you to.’
Finally Glitsky’s chair squeaked again. He came forward, the scar white through his lips, a pulse visible at his temple. All eyes went to him. ‘I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear any of this,’ he whispered. He turned his wrathful gaze to Soma. ‘I don’t know how you boys do things in other jurisdictions, but this department writes up everything. That’s our job. We find what there is to find, all of it.’
Soma had blanched. ‘I didn’t mean-’
His voice still low and taut, Glitsky sounded meaner than he looked, and Evans thought that was a physical impossibility. ‘I know what you meant. I heard you all the way out. And I’m telling the sergeants here that they are going to do it by the book. Every time. Everybody we talk to. That covers our ass. It covers your ass. Everybody stays clean.’
He shook his head, calming down by degrees, still at Soma. ‘Listen. What do you think happens if some defense attorney notices we haven’t interviewed anybody except the suspect? You think this might raise an eyebrow somewhere? What if they find we talked to somebody and “forgot” to tell them? Think that’s a problem? I do. I’ve seen it happen. No. Our position is that if there’s anybody else to look for, we’re looking for them. We don’t find ’em, there’s no other leads, that’s why the case is strong.‘ He met the eyes of all three of them, one at time, slowly. ’Just so we’re clear. Everybody on the same bus here?‘
Nods all around.
In under a minute they’d all filed out. He decided then and there: he would pay out of his own pocket if he had to for a door to close behind them.
14
After his inspectors had gone, Glitsky was drinking a cup of tea, filling out a requisition form for the door. That, he decided, would be his first offensive sally. Stamping URGENT in red ink on the slip, he put his tea down and was taking the slip outside to post in the building mail when he ran into Dismas Hardy in the hallway, coming down in his direction.
‘All right,’ Hardy said, anger all over him. ‘What did you do with them?’
‘What?’
‘My toothbrushes, that’s what. Every single toothbrush in my whole house.’
‘What did I do with your toothbrushes?’
‘Right. They were there yesterday when you came over. This morning they were gone. Ruined my placid morning, upset my domestic tranquillity, which is explicitly guaranteed by the Constitution. The preamble. Right up in the front there, after “We, the People.” ’
Glitsky stood still for a moment. Then he nodded, said, ‘Excuse me,’ and went to post his requisition slip.
When he came back into his office, his friend had settled himself down at his desk, feet up, eating peanuts.
‘What do you think?’ he asked. ‘If I took away the peanuts, would anyone ever again come into my office?’
Hardy gave the room a once-over. ‘I doubt it. As a popular destination it’s a little flat, don’t you think? How come nobody’s ever here anymore? You notice that? Look out there – the place is a ghost town.’
Glitsky glanced back over his shoulder. ‘An hour ago we had to call in crowd control. I don’t know. Everybody’s out working. They come in here to write reports. Why are you here?’