They were sitting on a low brick wall, looking down the canyon at the lush eucalyptus-scented greenery. The microclimate was putting on a show for them; there wasn’t even a light breeze, and the temperature was pushing eighty. Hardy had left his coat in his car, had removed his tie. Graham was barefoot, in khaki shorts and a mesh jersey.
‘I never asked. You play ball this weekend?’ Hardy thought he’d ease into the real reason for his visit. Get some dialogue happening before he dropped the bomb.
‘Luckily.’ Graham pulled at his beer. ‘I told you I got fired from the ambulance company, didn’t I?’
Though Hardy wasn’t happy to hear this, it wasn’t any surprise.
Things were going to get a lot worse for Graham, and anything that helped him realize it was to the good. ‘You make some money?’
A sidelong look. ‘Is this a subtle intro to the fees discussion?’
Hardy smiled. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll send you a bill eventually. No, I just wondered how you were getting along.’
‘Sorry, I’m a jerk lately. Yeah, we played a tournament down in Hayward yesterday. Five games, went all the way.’ He made some dismissive gesture. ‘I pulled down two grand.’
‘In one day?’
‘Five games. The second game we got a bonus of a thousand bucks on the mercy rule. That’s how it works.’
‘Two grand a day?’
‘Best case, if we win. If we’d have lost the first game, I would have made fifty dollars, so we’re motivated to win. The mercy rule helps.’
‘What’s the mercy rule?’
Graham looked at Hardy as though he’d just stopped by from Mars. ‘If a team’s ahead by ten runs, that’s the game, they call off the slaughter. It’s called the mercy rule. The way the sponsors bet, they get double, sometimes more, if the game’s mercy-ruled. The players get a bonus.’
‘That happen a lot?’
‘Team full of ringers like us? Yeah, I’d say.’
‘So the guy who sponsors your team – what’s his name?’
‘Ising. Craig Ising.’
‘So Craig Ising paid your team ten grand in one day?’
Shrugging, Graham gave it a minute. ‘I guess so, something like that.’
Hardy whistled. ‘What did he win? Betting.’
‘More than that,’ Graham said. ‘These guys, they don’t get out of bed for ten grand.’ But this subject, clearly, was making him uncomfortable. He bought his bottle up, took a drink. ‘So? Something tells me you didn’t come up here to talk softball. You get some more news?’
‘Well, actually, I did.’ There really wasn’t going to be any way to sugarcoat it, so Hardy didn’t try.
Graham listened patiently, shaking his head. ‘They’re not going to arrest me again,’ he said easily when Hardy had finished. ‘Sarah’s not going to arrest me. She likes me. I like her. She’s cool.’
‘She’s a cop,’ Hardy said. ‘She’s using the fact that you think she’s cool – that maybe there’s a buzz between you two, you talk to her – she’s using that to take you down.’
‘That would really surprise me,’ he said. ‘When she came by here Saturday night, that wasn’t business.’
‘So what was it, a date?’
Graham laughed at that. ‘Almost. Not quite, but we might have got there.’
Hardy shook his head. ‘Why is it, Graham, that you’re the only person in the city who doesn’t think you’re going to get arrested? You ever ask yourself that?’
Graham shrugged, sipped his beer. ‘They already took their shot with me, Diz. What’s in it for them doing it again?’
‘It’s not the same people. How about that?’ He stood up and walked a few steps away. He was thinking that after all he should have come here with the appearance of panic. Maybe that would have gotten his client’s attention, made him realize the seriousness of his situation. But he hadn’t wanted to scare him off. He’d wanted to keep him talking, not to reject the plea-bargain plan out of hand, out of defensiveness.
Well, there was nothing for it now. Hardy had to make his case. He turned back. ‘Look, Graham, here’s the situation. You’re going to be arrested again in a couple of days, certainly by the end of the week. You’re going to get charged with first-degree murder, maybe even special-circumstances murder. This is going to happen. Even if it’s not your Sergeant Evans, and I think it is, somebody is going to get this done. It’s too big an issue. It’s not going to go away.’
He didn’t win him over, but at least the confident smile vanished. ‘All right. Let’s say that happens. Let’s just say. Then we’re just where we were last week anyway, right? We duke it out.’
‘That’s one approach. But I’ve got a better one.’
He came back to the low fence, handed his untouched bottle of beer to Graham, and laid it all out – his deal with Pratt, the whole strategy. When he’d finished, he waited, watching his client’s face.
It wore a dead sober expression now, conjuring with the possibilities. He blew out heavily, shook his head at something, craned his neck. ‘But I’d have to say I did it,’ he said at last.
‘But you wouldn’t serve any time. Nobody could come back and get you for it. It would be over. The deal’s already cut, Graham. Pratt’s bought it.’
‘It’s a good attorney move, I’ll give you that.’
Hardy tried a light touch. ‘Afterward, you could even call up Sergeant Evans again, ask her out.’
‘But’ – maddeningly, seemingly unable to leave it alone, Graham played his refrain – ‘I’d have to say I did it.’
There was no evading this. ‘Yeah, you would.’
‘But what if I didn’t?’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ Hardy said, surprised by how much he sounded like a defense lawyer. It didn’t matter if he committed the crime? What was he saying? But he pushed at it. ‘It’s just a legal issue.’
‘And I’d be off? That would be the end of it?’
Hardy had him on the verge – he could feel it. Now was the moment. He had to close the deal. ‘You might get a couple or three years probation, but, Graham, listen to me. You’re just starting out in the business world. There’s a lot more to do than be a lawyer. I am a lawyer and I know. It’s ninety-nine percent drudge and the rest is kissing your client’s-’
This brought a smile. ‘Like now, with me? You’re kissing my ass? Somehow it doesn’t feel like you’re kissing my ass.’
‘This is an exception. What I’m saying is you could do anything. You don’t need your bar card. You don’t need to be a lawyer any more than you needed to be a baseball player. They’re just jobs.’
Finally, a heartfelt note. ‘But I’m good, Diz. I made law review. I got the clerk job with Draper. Nobody gets that job except the best.’
Hardy was shaking his head. ‘So you’ve got a good brain. Use it on something else. And if you don’t, you’re looking at prison, Graham. We’re not talking your second or third choice in your career goals, we’re talking years out of your life. Prison. Hard time.’
For nearly a full minute that seemed like an hour, Hardy waited. Birds chirped in the foliage around them, but otherwise the stillness was complete. At last Graham shook his head. ‘I’m sorry. I know you put a lot of thought into this, but I didn’t kill my dad. I can’t say that I did.’
Hardy, his stomach tight, wished Graham could simply leave it that he hadn’t killed Sal, instead of always adding that he couldn’t say he had. He gave it a last try. ‘We don’t have to call it killing him, Graham. We can say-’
‘No! Listen to me! I am not going to say I killed him.’
Hardy listened to the birds chirp for another moment, then gradually stood up. ‘I’ve got to tell Pratt your answer by the morning,’ he said.