Read The Hearing for Free Online Page B

the question is, do you want to go ahead? And if you do, I really think the wise move would be to consider”—he paused—“refining your position slightly.”
    Her mouth twisted in distaste. “No.”
    He almost said, “Well, that was a delightful exchange of ideas.” But the words that came out were, “No what? You don’t want to go ahead?”
    “No. I don’t want to quit. I’ve worked hard for this position, for the people’s trust. I am the absolutely best person for district attorney. And let’s not forget that I’m running the office the way it should be run.”
    Torrey brought a hand to his mouth to hide the grimace. That old “should” again. Pratt’s vision was at least entirely, self-righteously consistent, he thought: never mind the way things actually were. Pratt had a vision of a better world, and the people who didn’t share it were stupid, damned, ignorant, venal, criminal, clueless or all of the above. Therefore, they didn’t count. But her adviser had to try to get Pratt at least to realize that their votes did. “Okay,” he said. “Then maybe it’s just a question of perception.”
    Pratt’s bright eyes sparked. She liked this direction. “Of what?”
    “That you’re soft on crime.”
    The spark turned dark. “That’s rubbish. I hate crime. Why do you think I ran for the job in the first place? It’s criminals—the people—that I don’t hate. I try to understand them, see what happened, how they got—”
    He brought some more pressure to her forearm. “Sharron. Perception, okay?”
    A show of reluctance, then she nodded. “Go on.”
    “The killing of Elaine Wager by this vagrant.”
    “That is so horrible. I loved Elaine, Gabe.”
    “Everybody loved Elaine, Sharron. That’s my point. Here’s a much-loved, well-known community figure, daughter of a popular ex-senator, and African-American to boot. She is brutally murdered by a homeless white man for a few coins in her purse. Are you seeing where I’m going with this?”
    To his satisfied surprise, he saw that his idea had clicked with Sharron.
    “And one other thing,” he said.
    “What’s that?”
    “If you don’t mind, I’d like to try the case myself.”
    This did bring a clearly visible reaction, almost a start. “But I need . . .” She slowed herself down. “Why would you want to do that, Gabe?”
    Torrey had stopped chewing his nuts. He put down his glass, met Sharron’s eyes. “When she first came up . . .”
    “This is Elaine?”
    He nodded. “When Chris Locke was D.A.”
    Her mouth tightened. In private, Sharron referred to Locke’s administration as “the Neanderthal years.” Since her own election, she had purged the office of all but a very few of Locke’s old prosecutors, and it was no secret that this was part of the reason that now her office couldn’t seem to convict anyone. She’d had to let them go for their political incorrectness, to say nothing of the general culture of incorrigibility. Locke had been black but he’d hired, in Pratt’s view, far too many white males who’d adopted a macho “win at all costs” mentality that had infected the office—getting convictions, sure, but at what cost?
    Sharron’s own motto was: “There’s more to being a prosecutor than getting convictions.” To which the Locke crowd tended to respond, “Oh yeah? Like what?”
    So any mention of Chris Locke and his administration put Sharron Pratt on the defensive, and it was immediately apparent that she was on it now, the fingers of her right hand thrumming uneasily on the bar.
    Torrey carefully reached over and covered her hand with his. “Elaine was having an affair with Locke.”
    “With the D.A.? While she worked for him? How much younger was she than he was? God, that man!”
    Torrey suppressed his desire to point out to his boss that the two of them—he and Sharron—were in precisely the same relationship that Elaine and Locke had enjoyed. There would be no point—Sharron would