those situations where she worked while he went to medical school, and then he graduated and they just didn't get along. I guess she was pretty unhappy about it at the time.'
'Did you figure in that?'
She let herself pout, which struck Hardy as somewhat affected. An act. Jennifer Witt was not easy to figure out.
Freeman prodded. 'So Larry's ex-wife, what was her name?'
'Molly.'
'And, I ask again, were you in the picture when she and Larry broke up?'
'Well, they were already having problems.'
Which answered that.
'Did you mention Molly to the police?'
'No. I told you, she wouldn't have-'
'Just covering bases, Jennifer.' Freeman jotted something on his pad, and Hardy came and sat back down. 'Anybody else who didn't care for Larry? What about Tom?' Jennifer's hot-tempered younger brother had left an impression.
Again, that near jump, that blink, sitting up as though Freeman had slapped her. 'What about Tom? How do you know about Tom?'
Freeman ignored the reaction. 'What about him and Larry?'
She shrugged. 'Larry and I never saw Tom a lot. He's got such a chip on his shoulder.'
'Over money?'
'I don't know what it is exactly. Jealous of Larry, maybe.'
At Freeman's look, she hastened to correct herself. 'No, not that kind of jealous. Really, what do you think I am?'
Freeman leaned forward again. 'I don't know, Jennifer, that's what I'm trying to figure out. You tell me how Tom was jealous. Jealous enough to kill Larry?'
The acting, if it was, suddenly stopped, and so did the fidgeting. 'Tom is mad at his life, I think. He didn't have money, didn't go to college. He feels like he doesn't have a chance and never did, but that doesn't mean-'
'Like your father?'
'I guess that's what Tom's afraid of, that he'll wind up like Dad. Except my dad never wanted as much. Also, it was a lot easier to get a house in those days, even if you were blue collar, and the house was enough for Dad. But I think Tom saw it as… as a sort of prison. I did, too, in a way, but I got out.'
'What does he do? Tom?'
'I don't think he does anything regularly. I know he drives a forklift sometimes. Does construction. Whatever he can find, I guess.'
'And he resented Larry, and you, for having money?'
'We didn't have that much, but I suppose yes. And me for not having worked for it.'
'But now you do?'
'What?'
'Have money. A good deal of money.'
She bit her lip, perhaps not understanding Freeman's implication? Perhaps understanding it all too well?
'What's that got to do with Tom?'
'Maybe he tried to borrow some and Larry wouldn't go for it. If Larry's gone, he's got a better chance, getting some from his sister alone.'
She shook her head. 'No.'
Freeman made another note. Hardy decided he'd better check some alibis. Maybe Glitsky could poke around, too – Abe often said that going behind the department's back was just what was needed to spice up the otherwise routine life of the homicide investigator.
Freeman covered Jennifer's manicured hands with his own gnarled ones. 'You know,' he said, 'I'm kinder and gentler than any prosecuting attorney will be. These aren't even the hard questions, Jennifer. These are in your favor. The prosecutor's won't be.'
She half-turned, stretching the jumpsuit against her body, showing a fine profile. She smiled thinly – was she trying for effect? 'That's really good to know,' she said. 'I can't wait for the hard ones.'
'Okay.' Freeman's hands came away and his smile was not friendly. 'Since you can't wait, how about this? Were you having an affair?'
Jennifer's shock seemed a near-caricature. 'What? When? With who?'
'Whenever. With anybody.'
She drilled Freeman with direct-eye contact. 'No. Of course not. Absolutely not.'
'When?'
'When what?'
'When weren't you having an affair?'
But they had already done this. Jennifer withered the old lawyer with another look. 'When did you stop beating your dog, right?'
Freeman, matter-of-fact. 'Sometimes it works.'
She lifted her coffee cup and drained it, grimacing at the cold dregs. 'Sometimes it doesn't, Mr. Freeman.'
Again Hardy found himself wishing she hadn't said something. Was she, perhaps unintentionally, telling them that if it had worked they would have gotten the truth? Or that she simply saw how the game was played and was telling the truth anyway?
Freeman began arranging his papers, putting them into the folder. 'Well,' he said, 'I think we've got enough to get started. Let's digest this and meet again tomorrow.'
'What time?' she asked.
Freeman shrugged. 'At your convenience, Jennifer.'
Now the fear showed through… of being left alone, of the ordeal facing her. 'Early then, okay?'
Freeman gave her shoulder a pat. 'Crack of dawn,' he said.
7
At seven o'clock Hardy was nursing a Guinness, waiting for Frannie to arrive by cab at the Little Shamrock, the bar at 9^th and Lincoln that he and Moses McGuire, his brother-in-law, owned. Wednesday, by sacred tradition, was the Hardy's date night.
Before Hardy had returned to the practice of law he had been the Shamrock's daytime bartender for a decade. Before that, he had been a you red hot with the District Attorney's office, married to a judge's daughter, starting out a family – Hardy and Jane Fowler and their boy Michael.
Michael was not supposed to be able to stand up at five months, so neither Jane nor Hardy paid close attention to whether or not the sides of the crib were pulled all the way or only halfway up. That oversight took the boy from them. He did manage to climb over the railing and fall onto his head. The fall killed him.
After Michael's death, Hardy's world gradually fell apart, within and without. Now, remarried to Frannie and with two new kids, he didn't feel like he was trying to recapture what he'd had – that was gone for good – but there was hope again, a future. A meaning? That wasn't Hardy's style, but not may days passed that he didn't reflect on how empty his life used to be, and how now it wasn't.
It wasn't clear to him where this fit into the professional turnaround he had taken in the last year, but there was some kind of a visceral bond that, he figured, had to be related. A year ago, for the first time in his life, he had found himself taking the defense side of a murder case because he'd become convinced that the defendant was innocent.
Several factors played into his hands during that trial – an inexperienced judge gave him unusual latitude in his arguments; an over-ambitious prosecutor brought a case that was not really locked up; Hardy, himself, had been
