The Second Chair

Hardy chortled- short, dry, mirthless. "Uh huh. And I've got this bridge… I'd think that you, Wes, of all people, might harbor a little skepticism about that issue." A few years before, in a highly-publicized murder trial, Farrell had made his reputation as a defense attorney by getting an acquittal for his best friend who, as it turned out, and unbeknownst to his lawyer, had been guilty as hell. "I should also think," Hardy went on, "that instead of this show of unseemly envy, you would pause to admire the finesse with which your friend and partner has mastered the fine art of fattening the firm's account, and hence your own, without having to resort to the tedium of hourly billing."

Farrell threw a dart. "I'm constantly in a state of high awe."

Hardy nodded. "There you go."

Someone knocked and his door opened. Amy Wu stood for a moment in the doorway, all but gaping. "Partners with darts," she said.

"Now you know why Phyllis guards the door," Hardy said.

"I waited until she took a break."

Farrell threw. "Bull's-eye."

Both Hardy and Wu turned. The dart was nowhere near the center of the board. "Made you look," Farrell said.

"You guys are weird, you know that?" Wu looked at Hardy. "I don't know if you're still interested in these things, sir, but I've got a question about a case. You know, the law?"

"I've heard of it," Hardy said. "Can Wes stay and listen?"

Wu cast a baleful eye at Farrell. "If he can spare the time."

"Can't," Farrell said. "Duty calls. Well, whispers." He threw his last dart and headed for the door.

Hardy closed up his dart closet and went around behind his desk. He stole a glance at Wu as he passed her. She projected at least the illusion of efficient competence, but he wasn't fooled. Wu's performance had slipped since her father's death. She'd also missed a lot of work, really an unconscionable amount for someone in her position. But he believed she'd make it up by the end of the year. She was having a hard time, and understandably.

All in all, Hardy felt that it was much preferable, and far easier, to pretend that all was well when that's what it looked like. And Wu certainly still looked the part of hotshot young associate- she wore her hair short and cropped around her ears; her always-crisp business attire couldn't be faulted. Besides, with an IQ of around one fifty, Wu could be firing on only half of her cylinders and still blow away a great deal of the competition. Or so Hardy chose to believe.

Certainly he didn't want to inquire too pointedly about her personal life. That was neither his job nor his inclination. But he was her boss, and at the very least he should be awake to nuances that might affect her performance.

The real problem, he knew, was that he was having some nuances himself. He'd be damned if he was going to think about those much, either, but Wu had missed another day of work on Friday- if she kept her absences at anything like this rate much longer, she would have some difficulty making the firm's a

"Yes, sir."

"Well, before we get to that, can I ask you a bit of a personal one?"

Her face closed up. "Of course."

"How are you holding up?"

"Fine," she answered automatically.

"I noticed you were out on Friday."

"I saw a client in the afternoon. The case I wanted to ask you about, in fact."

"Ah." He scratched at his desk. "I just thought that if you wanted some time off, you could ask and get it, you know. Even an extended leave if you felt you needed it. Sometimes that's a better idea than taking a day at a time, piecemeal."

"I'm fine. Really."

"Okay. I'm not meaning to pry. Just making the offer. The firm places a high value on you and your work, and if you feel like you'd be more productive after a bit of a break, we'd be happy to give you one, that's all."

"I don't think I need that. I'm just working through some stuff, sir." She tried a game smile. "Getting used to the new world order."

"Okay, but if it gets tough and you change your mind, you can come in here. Anytime."

"Thank you." Wu half turned her head to the door behind her. "But maybe you could mention that to Phyllis first, just in case."

A ghost of a smile played around Hardy's mouth. "You said you got by her this time?"

"Yes. But I cheated and watched from my office until she left her post and went to the bathroom."

Hardy nodded, his smile genuine now. "You know," he said, "when David was still with us, sometimes I used to do that, too. I'd be hiding on the stairs just out of sight and wait for Phyllis to get up off her phones, then I'd zip across the lobby and get inside David's lair before she could stop me. She hated it. It was great. But I must say," he went on, "since then I've gotten some appreciation of why he kept her around, in spite of that slightly witchlike quality. The gatekeeping does serve a purpose. Me, I'm trying to emulate how David did things. Keep an open door."

"But he didn't keep an open door."

"Exactly. Except when he did." Hardy came forward and linked his hands in front of him on the desk. "He always said that if it was important enough to make me figure out how to get around Phyllis, it was important enough for him."

It was a challenge and a question, and Wu nodded. "Seventeen-year-old kid up for double murder. How's that?"

"If that's the case you wanted to ask me about, I'd say it's good enough." Hardy sat back, his own face tightening down. "Tell me about it."

Wu settled into her leather chair and gave him the short version.

When she finished, Hardy didn't move for a while; then he brought himself up to his desk, ready for business. "You say the teacher was with this girl? How old was he?"

"Forty."

"Forty," Hardy said. "And Laura?"

"Sixteen."

"What a lovely world. And they picked up your client- Andrew?- when?"

"Last Friday."

Hardy nodded. "So nobody's rushing to judgment. Homicide must have worked the case pretty well."

"Looks like." Wu hesitated. "Also, and you might find this interesting, Andrew Bartlett's stepfather is Hal North."

"Is he now?" Hardy, no stranger to the power players in the city, nodded with approval. "So where are you now?"

"Well, I've talked to Boscacci. They've got a witness who picked Andrew out of a lineup. No question, first try. Beyond that, Andrew's on the record with half a dozen lies, plus he stole his father's gun- a nine-millimeter automatic, which in this case is bad luck. Oh, and they found a casing in the car. Andrew's car."

"Okay, and the boy's story?"

"He didn't do it. He didn't even realize he was being considered a suspect until the police came and put the cuffs on him. He liked Mooney. He loved Laura."

When she mentioned the alibi, Hardy asked immediately, without inflection, "Anybody see him while he was taking this walk?"

"No sign of it."

"What does he say?"

Wu shifted in her chair. "Well, I haven't talked to him yet, gotten his story."

Hardy cocked his head. "You haven't talked to him yet? It's been, what, four days?"

"I've been going over the discovery, sir, talking with the parents, and negotiating with Allan Boscacci. I've met Andrew before. I defended him for a joyride a couple of years ago, and didn't see any immediate need to go and introduce myself again."

"Okay," Hardy said. "Sorry to jump." But the fact remained that, in his opinion, Wu had slipped again. One of the fundamentals was that you went and talked to the client.

But Wu seemed oblivious. "Anyway, the point is that Boscacci wouldn't have arrested Andrew if his alibi held up. And it doesn't. The eyewitness."

"All right. But if they just hired you on Friday, who'd Andrew have with him all the times when he talked to the homicide guys since February?"