In fact, he was, although he hadn't been called to serve in years. He told that to the judge. 'But my plate's pretty full right now, your honor. And I've more than heard about Elaine's death. I'm representing the accused in that case. Cole Burgess.'

A dissatisfied grunt. 'So I can't use you. All right, what was your question?'

'Well, I'm afraid it's not too specific. I was curious because Elaine was involved in it. Wondered if it might somehow be related to anything I could use.'

'In your murder case?'

'Stranger things have happened, Judge. I thought you might be able to tell me a little about it. See if something might be worth pursuing.'

Thomasino gave it a beat. 'Well, all right. It isn't any secret.' He began. 'The fraud unit starts getting calls from insurance companies about a rash of similar accidents in the last six months – all Russian surnames, same doctor, same type of car, same lawyer for half of 'em. So I sign a warrant to pull the records, and Elaine's got to go along and supervise. Normally, you know, a piece of cake. Except if one of your colleagues is particularly uncooperative, won't give the special master any direction, won't even tell her where any of the files are. Says "Find ' em yourself. This whole investigation is bogus anyway." The belligerent son of a bitch.'

'What do you mean, one of my colleagues? Is this a friend of mine?'

'No. Sorry. I just mean it was another lawyer, not to lump you all together. Certainly not in this case.'

Hardy went with his hunch. 'You wouldn't be talking about Dash Logan, would you?'

'Maybe. With my apologies if he's a friend of yours.'

'He's not,' Hardy replied.

'No.' The judge sighed. 'Somehow I didn't think he would be.'

On his way down to the Hall, Hardy decided to stop by the Chronicle's main office and see if Jeff Elliot was in, a virtual certainty at this time of the morning. He'd just gotten into the reporter's office and said hello when the building began to shake. Reflexively, Hardy backed up under the door, said, 'Earthquake. Get under a beam.'

Elliot was in his wheelchair. He kept his hands on his keyboard, cast an amused, tolerant look across the room. 'OK, sure, I'm on it.'

The shaking – really no more than a quick minor jolt -passed. Hardy stayed under his beam, and Jeff held out his hands as though feeling for raindrops. 'Two on the Richter,' he said. 'I don't move till we get to six.' He indicated a chair on the other side of his desk. 'You can stay in the doorway if you want, but it might be five years before another good shake. You'll get pretty bored. The seat's more comfy.'

Hardy waited another moment for the possible next temblor. When, after a few seconds, it didn't come, he moved forward. 'It's good to see a man with no fear of nature's wrath.'

Elliot glanced out into the city room, where the small quake had pretty much passed unnoticed. 'My computer didn't even blink, Diz. I'm not going to die in an earthquake, I promise you. Way less chance than lightning, and that's the rule in our house.'

'You have a rule about lightning in your house? Us,' Hardy said, sitting down, 'we just flat don't allow it.'

'No. Not lightning, getting killed by lightning.'

'You have a rule about getting killed by lightning?'

Jeff sat back, pulled his hands off his keyboard and rested his arms on the sides of his wheelchair. 'Actually, yes. Ridiculous as it may sound, we have a rule about not worrying about something unless it's more likely than getting killed by lightning.'

'I like it,' Hardy said. 'Let me guess – your girls are plagued by the occasional random fear?'

'Ha! Occasional. I'd pay large dollars for "occasional". It's everything.' He tried a smile to make light of it, but Hardy could see it was about as funny as his own daughter's constant fears, which was not at all. 'Everything, I swear to God,' Jeff repeated. 'Plane crashes, AIDS, the hantavirus, terrorists, zits, snakes, nuclear accidents, spiders, child molesters on every street corner, the dark – Lord, the dark! – walking home alone… everything.'

'You left out heart attacks,' Hardy said. 'The Beck's afraid of getting a heart attack now since Glitsky did.'

'Don't worry,' Jeff replied. 'If Nicole hears about that, it's on the list.'

'I tell the Beck that twelve year olds rarely die of heart attacks. She doesn't care. It could happen, couldn't it? And no warning. Abe didn't have any warning. I tell her Abe isn't twelve. Ask me if she cares. This until eleven thirty last night.' Hardy was leaning back, an ankle on his opposite knee. He dragged a hand across his eyes. 'Sometimes I think it must be us, always telling them to watch out for this, watch out for that, especially the girls. So this rule – how's it work exactly?' Whatever it was, if it worked, Hardy wanted to know about it.

This time Jeff got all the way to a smile. He scratched at his beard, perhaps embarrassed that it had come to this, but it had, damn it, it had. 'Well, we finally had to come up with some lowest threshold for paranoia that we could take seriously. I mean, there are legitimate fears she should worry about once in a while, I suppose. Right?'

'Right.'

'Although I doubt if either you or me or our wives ever had them. Maybe it's a new millennium thing.'

'Maybe,' Hardy agreed. 'Although I remember worrying during the Cuban missile crisis.'

'I hate to say it, Diz, but there were adults who worried then, too. And you know why?' He raised his voice. 'Because there was some real goddamn thing to worry about!'

'Or, as it turned out, not.'

'Exactly. So, anyway, we finally had to tell Nicole that whatever she was worried about had to be more likely than getting killed by lightning, which for some reason she's not afraid of. If it was less likely, we weren't going to talk about it, especially after lights out at night.'

'And what are the odds of that, dying by lightning strike?'

'Thirty-two thousand to one in a seventy-five year life-span, more or less.'

Hardy whistled, impressed. 'That's a good statistic.'

Jeff shrugged. 'It still leaves a hell of a lot to be afraid of – you'd be surprised – but at least it gets rid of death by earthquake, spiders, snakes, plane crash, atomic bomb blast. None of them make the cut. It's really helped, actually.'

'I'm bringing it home tonight,' Hardy said. 'It's a great concept.'

'It is,' Jeff agreed, 'but I don't believe that's why you're here and if it's about Cole, he's not my topic today.' He indicated his terminal screen, half filled with words. 'Gironde again. Due in two hours. I wish they'd invent a program to actually write the words.'

'I'm sure it's on the way,' Hardy said. 'So what's new at the airport, aside from that it's never going to be finished?'

Jeff looked at his screen, fixed something, came back to Hardy. 'The way it's going, Diz, they may never even start this last phase, given all the subs who supposedly didn't have their minority quotas on board. It's been seven months and everybody and their brother has had their personnel records subpoenaed. Gironde can't start work, will probably even lose the contract, and the DA hasn't brought one charge yet. Not one. Three subs have already gone under because they've lost the work. It just sucks.'

To Hardy, this was an old song. 'That's how Pratt works, Jeff. Make a big public stink, then drag on the follow-through. Are you on Gironde's side on this? I thought they were the bad guys.'

A shrug. 'All I know is that apparently fair and square they won the biggest contract this city's seen in ten years. Now everybody hates them. The supes are asking for another round of bids. And it's all based on Pratt's office deciding to very publicly look for minority hiring irregularities, which now, it's turning out, may not exist.' He made a face. 'It smells, Diz. It really smells.' He looked back at his terminal. 'And I've got to write it. So? Cole?'