Chapter Four

Hardcastle wasn't surprised by the security he encountered entering Clement Upton's estate. The man had a reputation for eccentricity, but anybody with his net worth would be a fool not to establish some sort of perimeter, and Upton was no fool.

It had been more of a surprise that his call earlier that day had produced such quick results. He'd expected to run up against the usual walls that surrounded rich eccentrics, not have his request for a meeting be returned, within the hour, with an almost neighborly invitation to "come on over."

The wrought-iron gate and security cameras were more in line with his calculations, but the gate opened majestically at the mention of his name, and a sonorous, butler-like voice advised him to proceed up the drive. He proceeded. The place made his own spread look like a workman's cottage. The final approach was a straightaway suitable for landing small aircraft and at the end of that was a neo-classical mansion with all the trimmings.

The man who went with the butler's voice showed him in and escorted him to Upton's study, scaled to the rest of the place, with large windows, and a set of French doors that opened onto the back porch. Upton was standing, hands clasped behind his back, admiring the view down—a grassy sward, no doubt maintained at great cost, and beyond that the blue Pacific.

"Nice," Hardcastle said, admiringly.

The butler gave him a disapproving glance. The judge figured he'd broken some protocol, speaking before he'd been introduced, but Upton had glanced over his shoulder and smiled pleasantly.

"Judge Hardcastle, no doubt." Upton gestured him in toward a set of comfortable wingbacks that faced the windows and then nodded toward the butler. "Coffee, James, I think—unless you'd prefer something a little stronger, ah-?"

"Call me Milt," Hardcastle said expansively.

"Milt, excellent. My friends call me Clem, and I hope you include yourself in that group. We never had a chance to meet, but I remember you well."

He paused to savor Hardcastle's puzzled expression and then he smiled and added, "From the mayoral race."

"Ahh." Hardcastle nodded. "Not my shining moment—"

"On the contrary. I was impressed. I thought you brought a sense of honesty to the campaign. Of course it was J.J. who insisted you were the man to back." Upton's smile faded. "But even a broken clock tells the right time twice a day."

"Well, thanks. I guess it all turned out for the best. I'm still not putting it on my resume, though." Hardcastle cleared his throat slightly and plunged in. "So you're not tight with ol' J.J. anymore, huh?"

"No," Upton said firmly. "He took me for a substantial amount of money. Several millions. I'd trusted him." He frowned. "It might have been more if you hadn't exposed him when you did. The audit was enlightening."

He paused, and then cocked his head. "I still think you would have made an excellent mayor."

"I think the current one is doing just fine."

"You do?" Upton sounded surprised. "You mean you're not canvassing?"

"For what? Hell, the next election's three years off."

"It's never too early to begin building a donor base."

Hardcastle shook his head. "I think I finally figured out I'm not the political type."

"Too bad. I know a great deal about fund-raising and philanthropy." It was Upton's turn to look puzzled. "But then, to what do I owe the pleasure today?"

"Professor Hawksworth, from the law school," Hardcastle paused for a moment and watched the other man's face.

Upton's expression didn't budge an inch—just polite curiosity.

Hardcastle cleared his throat and plunged ahead. "You know he died a couple weeks back."

"I heard he keeled over at his desk."

"Something like that. You knew him?"

"We've met. But, then, you must already know that. It's why you're here?"

Hardcastle nodded.

Upton seemed thoughtful, but perfectly at ease. "As I said, I'm extensively involved in philanthropy. I've donated a great deal of money to the university, and the school of law in particular. This dean of theirs—"

"Thomas?"

"The very same—he likes to send his people around, to hobnob with the big donors. Professor Hawksworth was my 'handler'." Upton made a little face. "He wasn't all that good at it—the hobnobbing part. I'd told him once that I'd understand if he was too busy to make the visits—it was once every few months, but he was quite dutiful." Upton grinned impishly. "I even made him shoot skeet the last time he was here."

"Huh?" Hardcastle straightened suddenly. He glanced toward the window and his gaze hardened. To the left, near what looked like a glorified garden shed, was a skeet trap.

"Here," Hardcastle said, "that Sunday?"

"He was better at it than I'd thought he'd be, but I don't think he enjoyed himself much. Like I said, dutiful. Skeet should never be dutiful."

Hardcastle clung to one last hope. "Do you remember what he was wearing?"

Upton looked at him oddly, then furrowed his brow. "A jacket—that tweed thing of his. I don't think I've ever seen him in anything else."

"You're sure?"

Upton cocked his head again. "Yes, fairly sure. I could check with the staff."

"No," Hardcastle said, "that's okay." He hesitated, then went on. "Was there anything unusual that day—did Hawksworth seem nervous or agitated?"

Upton thought about that for a moment and then said, "No—no more so than usual. He even managed to hit a pigeon or two. I wish I could be more help."

"You've already done enough," Hardcastle said, and then he sighed wearily and added, "You may need to make a statement to the police."

"I'll be glad to."

The butler had returned with the coffee, on a massive tray that contained, in addition, a meal's worth of finger food, but Hardcastle had entirely lost his appetite. He rose and made his excuses.

"You won't reconsider another try for public office?" Upton said wistfully.

"I think I've got my hands full right now." Hardcastle nodded as he turned for the door.

00000

He thought about it most of the way home. If he hadn't gone and turned over one too many rocks—the damn gunpowder residue couldn't hurt Hawksworth; the man was dead. But any alternate explanation for how it got on the professor's sleeve would leave Randy Powers's murder glaringly unsolved.

And if he hadn't gone off to see Upton, if he hadn't heard that Hawksworth had used a shotgun only two days before his death—and most likely while wearing the very same jacket that had been sent off to the lab. What had McCormick called it—"his uniform"? If he'd just left well enough alone, that unfortunate alternative explanation might never have come to light.

I thought you believed in the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

But not these messy half-truths. Not when revealing them would put an innocent man back in the cross-hairs of the legal system.

He hadn't come any closer to making up his mind by the time he'd pulled into the driveway. He pulled up short; there was a cerise glow to the place as the late afternoon summer sun cut through the trees. He realized he'd been parked there in the drive for more than a couple of minutes when a sharp whistle yanked him from his pondering.

"Hey, you zoning out or something?"

It was McCormick, who'd obviously been back for a while and had shucked his khaki's and blue button-down collar for a pair of jeans and a tee. He had the lawnmower out and had apparently been heading down the drive.

"Nah," Hardcastle grumbled, "just admiring the view."

McCormick glanced over his shoulder. "Yeah, it's nice. Where've you been?"

This is where the lying would start, if there was going to be any. Hardcastle took a breath and said, "Had an appointment with Clement Upton. He wants me to run for mayor."

McCormick gave him a narrow look. "You're not falling for that crap again, I hope."

"I said no."

McCormick's eyes went a little wider. "Really, no kidding, he asked you?"

Hardcastle nodded. "And he says J.J. Norcross ripped him off for a couple mil—that's easy enough to check, I suppose."

McCormick looked crestfallen. "Guess that knocks him off the co-conspirators list, huh?" He brightened, just slightly. "Ask me how my afternoon went."

"Better than mine, I hope."

"Well, I have it from the horse's mouth that I passed civil procedure. I believe the term 'surprising grasp of the arcane' came up. That's good, isn't it?"

"That sounds like Kolper."

"Yup, and he threw in the keys to the office and all the free toner cartridges we wanted, me and Perillo. He's the friend of the friend of the friend—Kolper's law clerk."

"And . . .?"

"I've got six months of Hawksworth's appointments and his address book—it's a copy. They're on your desk."

Hardcastle smiled thinly. "Just copies, and with the stated permission of the current occupant of the office?"

"More or less. Go in there and figure it out. I need to stretch my legs. I've been hunched over a printer all afternoon."

He wheeled the mower away. Hardcastle sat for a moment more, trying to decide if he'd lied yet and finally deciding that he was still in the gray zone, somewhere just this side of a sin of omission. He'd settle for that, for now anyway. He put the truck back in gear and headed for the house.

McCormick maneuvered the machine up over the curb and through a break in the bushes. He leaned over and pulled the starter cord. The motor sputtered and then roared to life. It was simple, mindless work. He had at least an hour of light left, and he intended to spend it not thinking about whatever it was that had made Dean Thomas a happy man today.

Hardcastle had adjourned to the den. It was a sheaf of papers: names and dates and times in sometimes dim dot matrix. He took out a pad and pen and started checking them off as he transferred them to his new list. He'd call Frank later; he'd already made up his mind about that. He'd have to tell McCormick, too. He half-hoped before he did either of those things, he'd have something promising to work with from all this—an alternative to the guy who was mowing his lawn.

He looked up, realizing he'd lost a lot of light. He was well back into the early spring and his pencil needed sharpening. The steady racket of the mower was farther away. McCormick must be nearly done, off in the further reaches of the yard.

The judge got up, feeling stiff, and looked out into the gloaming, where he could just make out the lighter patch of McCormick's shirt moving past the clumps of trees. "He oughta finish it tomorrow," he muttered.

He headed for the door, intending to say the same thing out loud, and had just put his hand on the knob when he heard the gun go off.

It was unmistakable, a shotgun, and some part of Hardcastle's mind registered the fact that he shouldn't fling the door open—backlit by the hallway light and facing out into God knows what—but that was exactly what he did. He was on the porch and down the steps before he even realized that he was unarmed, but even that didn't divert him when he saw the white patch now sprawled in gloom, next to the silent, shadowy shape of the mower.

"McCormick!"

To Be Continued