And now, in spite of her ammunition, Ash couldn't seem to make a hit. She'd had Kensing now for an hour and he'd cordially rebutted each of her assaults with reasonable responses that rang true.
He hadn't been worried about losing his job under Markham (as the correspondence had made clear). The relationship between Markham and his wife was insulation against that. In fact, Markham's death had actually imperiled his employment. He was currently, under Dr. Ross, on administrative leave, proof that in a way Markham had been his reluctant protector, and not a threat at all.
He had once felt rage for Tim Markham and his wife. Certainly. Who wouldn't? But as a matter of fact, he was in a satisfying relationship at the moment. In retrospect, he realized that his wife leaving him had been an opportunity, albeit a painful one. There was no anger anymore. If anything, he was doing better than Ann. The divorce was proceeding amicably. They were sharing visitation.
Ms. Ash was misinformed. There had been no fight last weekend. Ann had had an accident. He had filed no charges against her, and she'd brought none against him. She was hurt and angry and wanted to lash out because Tim Markham had left her the week before. Her rage was understandable, his nonexistent. He took the kids until she was back home. He and Ann had talked for several hours just two days ago. The police had regrettably misunderstood.
Again, Ms. Ash was misinformed. He had never admitted killing Tim Markham. No, of course he hadn't. He wasn't sure what Ann thought she'd heard. She had probably misunderstood. He hadn't wanted to discuss her testimony with her in advance because his lawyer had told him not to.
He readily admitted that the Baby Emily case had exacerbated the already strained relations between him and Parnassus. There he had simply done the right thing, and doing so had angered the money people in his company. This was a recurring theme in medicine everywhere-money versus care. He was a doctor, and made no bones about where he stood on the issue. Did this, he inquired, make him guilty of something?
He had come here voluntarily. He could take the Fifth Amendment, yet did not. He wanted to clear the air, clear his name, so he could get back to his life, his patients.
"All right, then, Dr. Kensing," Marlene Ash said at last. "You were the last person to see Carla Markham alive, were you not?"
"I can't say, ma'am. I'd assume that would be her murderer."
A snicker rippled across the jurors.
"When did you leave the Markham house on the night of Mr. Markham's death?"
"At a little after ten."
"And you told Lieutenant Glitsky you drove straight home, isn't that true?"
"Yes, ma'am. That's what I told the lieutenant." He took in a breath, then came out with it. "But that was not true." He had his hands locked on the table in front of him, and addressed himself to the jurors. "Lieutenant Glitsky interrogated me on this issue. I didn't want to tell him where I'd been. When I talked to my lawyer, he told me that today I would be under oath. He told me my testimony would be protected and you would keep my secret. I'm sorry I lied to the lieutenant, but I didn't go straight home. The truth is, I'm an alcoholic and…"
Fisk and Bracco had decided that their priority was to collect the facts that they'd been unable to gather previously. To do this most efficiently, they should split up. Bracco had drawn Brendan Driscoll, called him from the Hall of Justice, made an appointment. The suspect seemed enthusiastic.
Driscoll had dressed for the interview-pressed dress slacks, shining wing tips, coat, and tie. When he opened the door, Bracco's first question was if he was going someplace.
The answer surprised him. "Don't I know you?"
"I don't think so, no." He held up his badge. "Inspector Bracco. Homicide."
"Yes, I know. Come in, come in."
They went into the living room, off to the left of the hallway at the front of the duplex. It was a bright space, made more so by the slanting sun through the open windows, the white-on-white motif. Water bubbled soothingly from a Japanese rock sculpture in the corner.
Bracco was suddenly, intensely uneasy. He could not place the other man's face, but there was an unmistakable recognition, a shift in the dynamic between them. Driscoll indicated one of the chairs, then sat kitty-corner all the way back on the couch, almost lounging, one arm out along the top of the cushions. Bracco got out his tape recorder, turned it on, and placed it on the glass tabletop, next to a large, flat tray of raked white sand and smooth stones.
Keeping himself busy with the standard preamble, he finally looked over again at his potential suspect. "I'm going to cut to the chase, Mr. Driscoll. I understand you were at Carla Markham's house in the late afternoon through the evening on the day her husband was killed."
"Yes. That's true."
"Do you remember what you did later that night?"
Obviously the question was unexpected, and resented. "What I did? Why?"
"If you could just answer the question."
"Well, I can't just answer the question without a reason. Why would you want to know what I did later that night? I thought you were coming here to talk about Dr. Ross or Dr. Kensing, that maybe Mr. Elliot had come upon something in what I'd given him."
"Jeff Elliot? What did you give him?"
Driscoll had to some degree recovered his aplomb after the insult. "Some of my files from work. Evidence, I would suppose you'd call it. Although the grand jury didn't seem interested when I talked to them."
"You think these files contain evidence relating to Mr. Markham's death?"
"Absolutely. Of course they do. They must."
"And do you still have copies here?"
Driscoll hesitated for an instant, then shook his head. "No. I gave them all to Mr. Elliot."
Bracco didn't believe this for a moment. "And yet you thought I was coming over here to discuss them with you?"
"I thought you must have talked to him."
"No." Bracco met Driscoll's eye. "But maybe I should."
"On second thought, he probably wouldn't show them to you. Sources, you know. But I could call him and get them back, then let you know."
"That might be helpful," Bracco said. "Or we could get a search warrant and go through them ourselves."
Driscoll was shaking his head, supercilious. "You're way late, Sergeant. Ross has erased all the good stuff by now. Everything about him and Tim, anyway."
"But you say you had it and gave it to Jeff Elliot?"
A self-important shrug. "I didn't read it all, but some of it was certainly provocative, if you know what I mean. He was definitely firing Ross, you know?"
"Markham?"
"I'm sure he was taking kickbacks for putting drugs on the formulary. Tim got wise to it, too, after Sinustop. He just needed more proof before he could accuse him directly. But if you read between the lines, you can see it. It was over between them."
Bracco decided not to press anymore with Driscoll the issue of whether he'd kept copies of his files, or what might be contained in them. He'd come here today to talk about the Tuesday night, and he returned to that topic. "I'm still wondering about after you left the Markhams'."
A petulant glare, then a sigh of capitulation. "All right, then, I came home here."