Pushing sixty, Drysdale still looked like he could put on a uniform and be right at home on the ballfield. Before turning to law he had been a star for USC and then played three years of pro ball, including forty-two games as a utility infielder in 1964 for the San Francisco Giants. A framed newspaper article on the wall of his office was headlined ‘Drysdale No Relation to Dodger Don,’ which was an important point to make in a town that hated the Bums. Don Drysdale, the Dodger pitcher, had a last name in common with Art, but no genes.

Art had been with the D.A.’s office for over thirty years. At one time or another he’d been in charge of Misdemeanors, Vice, White Collar and Homicide, and now served as a kind of minister without portfolio, unofficially doing much of the work that the citizens elected Christopher Locke to do.

Drysdale himself wasn’t the District Attorney because his pragmatic view of life was out of sync with the political structure in San Francisco. He did not favor affirmative action in the District Attorney’s office, and he had once been foolish enough to make the point to a group of reporters and editors who had been doing profiles on potential candidates for public office.

“If you were elected D.A.-”

“But I’m not running for D.A., or anything else.”

The early denial being part of every campaign, that didn’t slow anybody down. “If you were the D.A., what percentage of new hires would be-substitute one-gay, black, Hispanic, female?”

Drysdale’s answer, now famous in the lore of the city, was “If they could do the job, I’d hire chimpanzees. If they can’t, they’re worthless to me.”

Of course, the media played this to mean that Drysdale thought women, gays, and other minorities of all stripes were worthless. He had followed his aphorism with the more balanced statement that some jobs-airline pilot, brain surgeon, prosecuting attorney-ought to be filled by qualified candidates, not by quota, but San Francisco reporters know news when they hear it, and calling chimpanzees smarter than minorities was good copy, even if that wasn’t what he said, much less meant.