"Yesterday morning. They got him over to Portola, where he died."
"God, in his own hospital. I love it. They must be shitting over there." Farrell broke a smile. "Maybe I could call his wife and see if she wants to sue them. Wouldn't that be sweet?"
"Sue who?"
"Portola, Parnassus, the usual suspects."
"Except that they didn't kill him, Wes. He got hit by a car."
Farrell sat forward, still grinning, his elbows on his desk. "Listen to me, Diz. Did you know Tim Markham? Well, I did. He gets admitted to a hospital filled with the doctors he's been screwing for fifteen years, he's not getting out alive no matter what. I guarantee it."
Hardy was smiling, too. "It's a good theory, Wes, but I don't think it happened."
Farrell pointed a finger. "You wait," he said.
Hardy sometimes wondered why he had a downtown office. He'd stopped in for an hour after seeing Farrell. Then he and Freeman had eaten a long lunch in Belden Alley. At a little after three o'clock, he had finally settled into the brief he was writing when he was interrupted by a call from his friend Pico Morales, who didn't want to bother him, but it was an emergency, having to do with one of his friends. He needed a criminal lawyer. Could Hardy please come down to the Steinhart Aquarium and talk to him? The guy, Pico said, was one of his walkers. Hardy knew what that meant. When Pico went on to say that the friend was a doctor named Kensing with Parnassus, that clinched it. Hardy was going for another drive, back to the Avenues.
As the curator of the Steinhart, Pico's long-standing ambition was to acquire a great white shark for the aquarium in Golden Gate Park. Four, six, nine times a year, some boat would haul up a shark and Pico would call his list of volunteers. A lifetime ago, Hardy had been one of the first. He would let himself in to the tanks in the bowels of the aquarium where, his mind a blank, he'd don a wetsuit and walk a shark for hours, round and round in the circular tank. In theory, the walking would keep water moving through the animals' gills until they could breathe on their own. It had never worked yet.
Half-hidden by shrubbery, the back entrance was all the way around behind the aquarium, down six concrete steps. In the dim hallway someone had left on a small industrial light. Hardy pushed at the wired glass door, which opened at his touch.
After all the years that had passed since he'd last been here, he was surprised at how familiar the place felt. The same green walls still sweated with, it seemed, the same humidity. The low concrete ceiling made him want to keep his head down, although he knew he had clearance. He heard muffled voices, sounding as if they came from the inside of an oil drum. His footfalls echoed, too, and he became aware of the constant, almost inaudible hum-maybe generators or pumps for the tanks, Hardy had never really learned what caused it.
The hall curved left, then straightened, then curved again right. At last it opened into a round chamber dominated by a large above-ground pool filled with seawater, against the side of which leaned the substantial bulk of Pico Morales. Under an unruly mop of black hair, Pico's face was a weathered slab of dark granite, marginally softened by a large, drooping mustache and gentle eyes. He held an oversize, chipped coffee mug and wore the bottoms of a wetsuit, stretched to its limit by his protruding bare stomach.
In the tank itself, a man in a wetsuit was dealing with the shark, one of the largest Hardy had seen here-over six feet long. Its dorsal fin protruded from the water's surface and its tail fanned the water behind him. But Hardy had pretty well used up his fascination with sharks over the years.
The man who was walking the shark, however, was another matter.
"Ah," Pico said in greeting. "The cavalry arrives. Diz, Dr. Eric Kensing."
The man in the tank looked up and nodded. He was still working hard, and nearly grunting with the exertion, step by laborious step. Nevertheless, he was close to the edge of the tank himself, and he nodded. "You're Hardy?" he asked. "I'd shake hands, but…" Then, more seriously, "Thanks for coming."
"Hey, when Pico calls. He says you're in trouble."
"Not yet, maybe, but…" At that moment, as Hardy and Pico watched, the fish twitched and broke himself free from the man's grip, and he swore, then turned to go after it.
"Let it go," Pico snapped.
The man turned back toward the side, but paused for another look behind him. It was only an instant, but in that time the shark had crossed the tank, turned, and was heading back toward him, picking up speed. Pico never took his eyes off the shark and didn't miss the move. "Get out! Now! Look out!"
Kensing lunged for the side of the pool. Hardy and Pico had him, each by an arm, and hoisted him up, over, and out, just as the shark breached and took a snap at where he'd been.
"Offhand," Hardy said, "I'm thinking that's a healthy fish."
"Hungry, too," Kensing said. "Maybe he thought Pico was a walrus."
Hardy nodded, deadpan and thoughtful. "Honest mistake."
They were all standing at the edge of the tank, watching the shark swimming on its own.
Pico kept his eyes on the water, on the swimming fish. He'd had his hopes raised around the survival of one of his sharks before, and didn't want to have them dashed again. "You guys need to talk anyway. Why don't you get out of here?"
The Little Shamrock was less than a quarter mile from the aquarium. After the doctor had gotten into street clothes, they left Pico to his shark, still swimming on his own. Hardy drove the few hundred yards through a rapidly darkening afternoon. Now they had gotten something to drink-Hardy a black and tan and Kensing a plain coffee-and sat kitty-corner in front of the fire on some battered, sunken couches more suited to making out than strategizing legal defense.
"So," Hardy began, "how'd you get with Pico?"
A shrug, a sip of coffee. "His son is one of my patients. We got to talking about what he did and eventually he told me about his sharks. I thought it sounded like a cool thing to do. He invited me down one night and now, when I really can't spare the time, I still come when summoned. How about you? I heard you used to volunteer, too. I didn't think Pico allowed people to quit."
"I got a special dispensation." The answer seemed inadequate, so he added, "I got so I couldn't stand it when they all died."
A bitter chuckle. "Don't go into medicine."
"No," Hardy agreed. "I figured that one out a long time ago." He killed a moment sipping his pint. "But rumor has it you need a lawyer now." For the first time Hardy noticed a pallor under the ruddy complexion, the fatigue in the eyes.
"You know who Tim Markham is?"
Hardy nodded. "He got hit by a car yesterday, then died in the hospital."
"That's right. I was staff physician at the ICU when he died. And he was fucking my wife."
"So you're worried that the police might think you got an unexpected opportunity and killed him?"
"I don't think that's impossible."
"But you didn't?"
Kensing held Hardy's gaze. "No."
"Were you tempted?" Trying to lighten things up.
He almost broke a smile. "I used to fantasize about it all the time, except in my version, it was always much more painful. First I'd break his kneecaps, maybe slash an Achilles tendon, cut his balls off. Anything that would make him suffer more than he did." He shook his head in disappointment. "There really is no justice, you know that?"
Hardy thought he maybe knew it better than Dr. Kensing. "But justice or no," he said, "you're worried." It wasn't a question.