₁₃

At a little after nine the next morning, the extended Glitsky family was sitting in bright sunshine at one of the six outdoor tables on the sidewalk in front of Leo's Beans & Leaves, a thirty-year-old family-run tea and coffee shop/delicatessen at the highest point of Fillmore Street, just before it fell precipitously down to the Marina. Abe and Treya were splitting a smoked salmon quiche, drinking tea, while Rachel was happily consumed with negotiating a toasted bagel and some slices of lox from the knee of her grandfather Nat.

Who was trying to lecture his son. "Abraham, listen to what you say yourself, and you have your answer. You are the deputy chief of inspectors. This Cuneo putz is an inspector, which puts him under you. Am I right?"

"Technically."

Nat was closing in on eighty years old, but his mind was sharp enough that already this morning he had com

pleted the Sunday New York Times crossword puzzle. He gave Treya a conspiratorial glance. "So 'technically' he gives me." Then, to Abe. "What's to be technical about? Take him off the case."

"How am I supposed to do that, Dad?"

"What, this is a mystery? You've got rank and the mayor on your side. You just do it."

"And why? Because I don't like him?"

A shrug. "There's worse reasons, I can tell you. If all else fails…"

Treya jumped in to her husband's defense. "But Abe can't do it without cause, Nat," she said. "He'd have to bring charges of obstruction or even of insubordination against him…"

"Or the sex stuff. How about that?"

"That, too," she said, "if he had any proof."

"Although since our witness-or should I now say suspect?-declined to file a complaint," Glitsky put in, "proof is not forthcoming." He took a bite of quiche and washed it down. "Anyway, even saying that I do show cause and try to get him busted off the case, he'll just grieve it with the P. O.A."-the policemen's union-"and probably win, seeing that it was his case to begin with and I'm the interloper. That's how the union's going to see it, I guarantee. Here's a good cop minding his own business, doing his job according to the book, and suddenly the brass shows up, no doubt going political…" He shrugged. "You see where this is going."

"But it makes no sense," Nat said.

"Okay," Treya said, "and your point is?"

"That was my point. It's all backwards."

"Dad, you've got to catch up with the times. Making sense is a low-priority item. The city's got way more important things to worry about than making sense."

Nat came back at his son. "So you're saying you've got to work with him? Cuneo."

"No, not really. I've tried that. He seems to have rejected it."

"So what's that leave? You quit the case?" "Can't do that either."

"So?"

"So I play his game."

"Which is?"

"Ignore the other guy. I go about my business. I gather evidence, pursue leads. I investigate. Maybe find something he missed."

"I wouldn't be surprised," Treya said, "if he's missing the boat entirely."

Glitsky drank tea and nodded. "That would be sweet and wouldn't shock me either. But he obviously got a warrant pulled, so he got enough to convince a judge. In any event, he's in a hurry to cut me out, moving fast and maybe loose, and the evidence might not back him up.

"As far as I know, he's not even aware of Tow/Hold or Hanover's other business. Or even the other family members. There's just a lot out there and Cuneo's only looking at one part of it, and one that just more or less fell into his hands on top of that. Usually, it doesn't work that way."

It was Glitsky's first time in the mayor's private residence, an East Coast-style four-story brownstone a few blocks down from the crest of Nob Hill, in the neighborhood of Grace Cathedral, the Fairmont and Mark Hopkins hotels.

He'd called Kathy West and asked if he could drop by for a few minutes, so she was expecting him and answered the door herself. She wore a light yellow no-nonsense blouse and a skirt of stylish brown tweed and low heels, and Glitsky had the impression that she was planning to go out shortly to another of the endless appearances that seemed to make up her life. After greeting him cordially, she led him through the house and outside to a nice-sized garden and patio of red brick, with a circular table and umbrella, a small fountain bubbling up out of a well-tended flower bed, a hot tub and a large, built-in barbecue. Surrounding homes, the same height as the mayor's, lent to the place a refined feeling of privacy, while a corridor through the adjacent backyards let the sunshine in.

The mayor took a chair at the table and motioned for Glitsky to do the same, which he'd barely accomplished before she flashed a professional smile and began. "I must say, Abe, I was surprised and impressed to get your call on a Sunday morning. You're not taking a day of rest?"

"Well, some things have come up." He started in with Cuneo, with Catherine Hanover's allegation of his sexual harassment, the search warrant. When he finished, West came forward in her crisp manner, her legs crossed, her hands tightly clasped in her lap. "Why wouldn't this woman file a complaint? Do you think he did harass her?"

"I have no way of knowing. He's been known to hit on witnesses in other cases, but that's not necessarily proof of anything in this one."

She cocked her head to one side. "It isn't?"

"Unfortunately, technically, legally, no."

"That's funny. A history like that seems somewhat… persuasive to me."

Glitsky allowed a ghost of a smile. "Well, the Hanover woman isn't pursuing it, so it's a nonissue. My concern, and what I wanted to talk to you about, is that I don't step on his investigation if he is in fact on to something."

"And how would you do that?"

"A dozen ways, really. Closing in on a suspect is kind of a carefully orchestrated ballet, and I don't want to spook his witnesses if he's already got them talking."

"So basically, what you're saying is he's cutting you out?"

He nodded. "Of course I could make a stink, pull rank, all that nonsense. But all that would do is stop the investigation." Now Glitsky shrugged. "It's entirely possible he's got her, and she did it, which is what you wanted. My question is: How hard do you want me to push to stay in?"

West frowned, scratched at the fabric of her skirt. "I'd just like to be sure," she said.

Glitsky moved his chair slightly, into the shade of the umbrella, then sat back in a casual attitude, which was nothing like how he felt. It was time to call the mayor's bluff. "Do you want to tell me why again? The real reason."

Her chin came up. She blinked rapidly three or four times. "What do you mean?"

He held her gaze. "I think you know what I mean." He used her name on purpose. "Kathy."

She looked away, staring into some empty space over his shoulder. "No, I don't. Really, I don't."

"Okay, maybe I can help you." Glitsky spoke quietly, his face locked down. "You're afraid that Paul Hanover might have been a warning to you. And if he was, you don't want to misconstrue it."

She sat stock still for a long moment, then some tension went out of her. She almost seemed to smile. "Frank Batiste was right," she said, "you are good." She drew in a breath. "It started just after I got elected, with Harlan." She didn't have to explain to Glitsky whom she meant. Harlan Fisk was her nephew, an overweight, often jovial, supremely political animal who'd worked for a time as an inspector under Glitsky in homicide, and who now was one of the city's eleven supervisors.

"Harlan's connected to this?"

"No. Not directly, anyway. But when Tow/Hold saw how the wind was blowing with me, they offered him a job. Security director."