Chief Inspector Dennis V. Coughlin looked up from the mountain of paper on his desk and saw Michael J. O'Hara sitting on his secretary's desk.
"How long have you been out there, Mickey?" Coughlin called.
"You looked like you were busy," O'Hara said.
"I told him I'd let you know he was out here," Veronica Casey, Coughlin's secretary, said.
"Never too busy for you, Mickey," Coughlin said, motioning for O'Hara to come into his office.
"Oh, you silver-tongued Irishman, you," O'Hara said, and slumped into one of the two armchairs in the room. "What's going around here you don't want me to know about?"
"There's a long list of things like that," Coughlin said. "You have something specific in mind?"
"Actually, what I had in mind was that you and I should go somewhere and have a little sip of something. Maybe two sips. Maybe even, if you don't have something on, dinner. You got plans?"
"No," Coughlin said. He looked at his watch. "I didn't realize it was so late." He raised his voice. "Go home, Veronica!"
"You sure?"
"I'm sure. Put this stuff away, and we'll start again in the morning."
"Okay," she said, coming into the office and gathering up the papers on Coughlin's desk. "He skipped lunch," she said to O'Hara, "so eat first before you do a lot of sipping."
"Okay," O'Hara said. He waited until she had left the office, and then said, "She's in love with you. Why don't you marry her?"
"She has a husband, as you damned well know."
"What's that got to do with anything?"
"Go to hell, Mickey," Coughlin said, laughing. "But she's right. I didn't have any lunch. I need to put something in my stomach."
"Fish, fowl, or good red meat?"
"Clams and a lobster comes to mind," Coughlin said.
"Bookbinder's?"
"That's close," Mickey said.
"Too far to walk," Coughlin said. "Where's your car?"
"In the No Parking zone by the door," Mickey said. "I'll bring you back here, if you like."
Michael J. O'Hara's Buick was indeed parked in the area immediately outside the rear door of the police administration building, in an area bounded by signs reading "No Parking At Any Time."
The joke went that there were only two people in the City of Philadelphia who would not get a parking ticket no matter where they left their cars, one being the Hon. Jerome H. Carlucci, the mayor, and the other being Mickey O'Hara.
That wasn't exactly true, Coughlin thought as he got into O'Hara's car. But on the other hand, it was close. He himself didn't dare leave his car parked where Mickey had parked the Buick, confident he would not find a parking ticket stuck under his wiper blade when he returned for it.
Mickey enjoyed a special relationship with the Police Department of the City of Philadelphia shared by no other member of the press. Coughlin had often wondered why this was so, and had decided, finally, that while some of it was because he was a familiar sight at funerals, weddings, promotion parties, and meetings of the Emerald Society (and, for that matter, at gatherings of the German, black, and Jewish police social organizations as well), it was basically because he was trusted by everybody from the guy walking a beat to Jerry Carlucci.
He never broke a confidence, and he never published anything bad about a cop until he gave the cop a chance to tell his side of the story.
And while he did not fill his columns with puff pieces about the Philadelphia Police Department, he very often found space to make sure the public learned of some unusual act of kindness, or heroism, or dedication to duty of ordinary cops walking beats.
And that was probably, Denny Coughlin thought, because Mickey O'Hara, in his heart, thought of himself as a cop.
Not that Mickey ever forgot he was a journalist. Denny Coughlin had thought of Mickey as a personal friend for years, and he was sure the reverse was true. But he also understood that the reason Mickey had appeared at his office to offer to take him to dinner was less that they were friends than that Mickey had questions he hoped he could get Coughlin to answer.
The door chimes sounded, playing "Be It Ever So Humble, There's No Place Like Home."
"Who the fuck is that?" Inspector Peter Wohl wondered aloud, in annoyance that approached rage.
Amelia Alice Payne, M.D., who had been lying with her head on his chest, raised her head and looked down at him.
"Oh, my goodness! Are we going to have to wash our naughty little mouth out with soap?" she inquired.
"Sorry," Wohl said, genuinely contrite. "I was just thinking how nice it is to go to sleep with you like this. And then that goddamned chime!"
Amy was not sure whether he meant naked in each other's arms, or sexually sated, but in either case she agreed.
She kissed his cheek, tenderly, and then, eyes mischievous, said innocently, "I wonder who the fuck it could possibly be?"
"What am I doing? Teaching you bad habits?" Peter asked, chuckling.
"Oh, yes," she said.
She pushed herself off him and got out of bed, then walked on tiptoes to peer out through the venetian blinds on the bedroom window.
There was enough light, somehow, for him to be able to see her clearly.
"My God, it's Uncle Denny!" Amy said.
What the hell does Denny Coughlin want this time of night?
"We had the foresight, you will recall," Peter said, chuckling, "to hide your car in my garage."
"You think he wants to come in?" Amy asked, very nervously.
On the one hand, Amy, you march in front of the feminist parade, waving the banner of modern womanhood and gender equality, and on the other, you act like a seventeen-year-old terrified at the idea Uncle Denny will suspect that you and I are engaged in carnal activity not sanctioned for the unmarried.
"No," Peter said. "I'm sure all he wants to do is stand outside the door."
He got out of bed.
"You just get back in bed and try not to sneeze," Peter said. "And I will try to get rid of him as quickly as I can."
"I'll have to get dressed," Amy said.
"Why bother?" Peter said as he put on his bathrobe. "If he comes in the bedroom, I don't think he'll believe you were in here helping me wash the windows. Maybe you could say you were making a house call, Doctor."
"Screw you, Peter," Amy said. "This is not funny!"
But she did get back into the bed and pulled the sheet up over her.
Peter turned the lights off, then left the bedroom, closing the door.
Then he turned and knocked on it.
"Morals squad!" he announced. "Open up!"
"You bastard!" Amy called, but she was chuckling.
Peter turned the lights on in the living room, walked to the door, and opened it.
Chief Inspector Dennis V. Coughlin-who, in the process of maintaining his friendly relationship with the widow of his pal Sergeant John F. X. Moffitt, had become so close to the Payne family that all the Payne kids had grown up thinking of him as Uncle Denny-stood at the door.
In a cloud of Old Bushmills fumes, Peter's nose immediately told him.
"I was in the neighborhood, Peter," Coughlin said, "and thought I would take a chance and see if you were still up."
Peter had just enough time to decide, Bullshit, twice. I don't think you were in the neighborhood, and even if you were, you got on the radio to get my location, and if you did that, you would have asked the operator to call me on the phone to see if I was up, when Coughlin added:
"That's bullshit. I wanted to see you. Radio said you were home. I'm sorry if I got you up. You got something going in there, I'll just go."
Does he suspect Amy is in here with me?
"Come on in. I was about to go to bed. We'll have a nightcap."
"You're sure?" Coughlin asked.
"Come on in," Peter repeated.
Coughlin followed him into the living room, sat down on Peter's white leather couch-a remnant, like several other pieces of very modern furniture in the apartment, of a long-dead and almost forgotten affair with an interior decorator-and reached for the telephone.
As Peter took ice, glasses, and a bottle of James Jamison Irish whiskey from the kitchen, he heard Coughlin on the telephone.
"Chief Coughlin," he announced, "at Inspector Wohl's house," and then hung up.
Peter set the whiskey, ice, and glasses on the coffee table in front of the couch and sat down in one of the matching white leather armchairs.
Coughlin reached for the whiskey, poured an inch into a glass, and took a sip.
"This is not the first I've had of these," he said, holding up the glass. "Mickey O'Hara came by the Roundhouse at six, and we went out and drank our dinner."
"There's an extra bed here," Peter said, "if you don't feel up to driving home."
And then he remembered that not only was Amy in his bed, where she could hear the conversation, but that the moment she heard what he had just said she would decide he was crazy or incredibly stupid. Or, probably, both.
If Denny Coughlin accepted the offer, there was no way he would not find out that Amy was here.
Coughlin ignored the offer.
"The trouble with Mickey is that he has a nose like a bird dog, and people tell him things they think he would like to know," Coughlin said. "And he thinks like a cop."
"He would have made a good cop," Peter agreed.
He poured whiskey in a glass and added ice.
"After he fed me about four of these," Coughlin said, "he asked me whose birthday party it was we were all at at the Rittenhouse Club."
"We meaning you, me, Matt, and the FBI?"
Coughlin nodded.
"What did you tell him?"
"I told him that Matty had had a little run-in with a couple of FBI agents, and you and I were pouring oil on some troubled waters."
"Did he buy it?"
"He said he was naturally curious why a couple of FBI agents who don't even work in Philadelphia were following Matty around in the first place."
"He knew they had been following him? God, he does find things out, doesn't he?" Wohl said.
"Including some things that you and I didn't know," Coughlin said. "Like when those two FBI agents were waiting in the Special Operations parking lot to see if Matty was coming out, a Highway Patrol sergeant-Nick DeBenedito-thought they looked suspicious and went and tapped on their car window and asked them who they were."
Coughlin smiled, and Wohl laughed.
"It's not funny, Peter," Coughlin said. "And it gets worse. The FBI guys showed Nick their identification, and told him they were on the job, surveilling the guy driving the Porsche, and did Nick know what he was doing inside. Nick asked why did they want to know, and they told him it was none of his business. So Nick goes inside, tells the duty officer, who calls the FBI duty officer and asks him what a couple of FBI agents, one of them named Jernigan, are doing parked in the Special Operations parking lot, and the FBI duty officer says he doesn't have an agent named Jernigan. So Nick and the duty officer go back to the parking lot, and the FBI guys are gone. Then they go see Matt, who's working upstairs, and ask him what's going on, and Matt tells them not to worry about it, the FBI thinks he's a kidnapper they're looking for."
"Oh, God!" Wohl said, laughing. "So within thirty minutes, it's all over Special Operations. The FBI with egg on its face again."
"That's funny, I admit. But what's not funny is, of course, that somebody couldn't wait to tell Mickey, and he put that and us being in the Rittenhouse Club together and came up with the idea that something's going on he doesn't know about, and the way to find out is to ask me."
"What did you tell him?"
"I told him I didn't feel free to tell him until I'd first checked with you."
What do you call that? Passing the buck?
"So he's going to come see me?" Wohl asked. "First thing in the morning, no doubt?"
"Probably, since he didn't beat me here," Coughlin said, smiling. He held up his whiskey glass. "I told you, we mostly drank our dinner. I don't like to make decisions when I do that. I figured telling Mickey he'd have to ask you would give us time to think how much we're going to tell him. We're going to have to tell him something."
Wohl didn't reply.
"So I decided to come here," Coughlin said. "And on the way I had a couple of other unpleasant thoughts."
"Oh?"
"Do me a favor, Peter, and don't decide before you think it over that this is the whiskey talking."
"I wouldn't do that, Chief," Peter said.
"Yes, you would. I would too, if you showed up at my place at this hour of the night with half a bag on."
Their eyes met for a moment, and then Coughlin went on.
"I'm worried about Matty," he said. "I'm sorry I went along with this 'cooperation' with the FBI business."
"I don't think you had much choice."
"I could have said no, and then gotten to Jerry Carlucci before Walter Davis did and told him why I said no."
"What would you have told him?"
"That these animal activists are really dangerous people, and that Matt's not experienced enough to deal with them."
"As I understood it, he isn't going to deal with them. Just see if he can, by getting close to the Reynolds woman, positively locate them for the FBI. And the FBI will deal with them."
"Did you see what was in his eyes when I gave him that order?" Coughlin asked. "And I made that order as clear as I could."
"I remember. What about his eyes?"
"There was a little moving sign in them. Like that sign in Times Square. You know what it said?"
Wohl shook his head again.
"Yeah, right. Say what you want, old man, but give me half a chance, and I'm going to put the arm on these people, make the FBI look stupid, and get to be the youngest sergeant in the Philadelphia Police Department. Just like Peter Wohl."
Wohl was torn between wanting to smile at the image, and a sick feeling that Coughlin was right.
"Chief, for one thing, Matt knows an order when he hears one."
"Ha!" Coughlin snorted.
"And he's both smart and getting to be a pretty good cop. He won't do anything stupid."
"He's too smart for his own good, he thinks he's a much better cop than he really is, and what would you call crawling around on that ledge on the Bellvue-Stratford twelve stories above South Broad Street? That wasn't stupid? "
"That was stupid," Wohl admitted.
"And how would you categorize his using a boosted passkey to go into the Reynolds girl's room in the hotel? The behavior of a seasoned, responsible police officer?"
Wohl didn't reply.
"Not to mention taking the FBI on a wild-goose chase in North Philly?"
"Well, under the circumstances, I might have done that myself," Wohl said. "But I see your point."
"There's a lot of his father in Matty," Coughlin said. It took Wohl a moment to understand Coughlin was not talking about Brewster Cortland Payne. "Jack Moffitt would still be walking around if he had called for the backup he knew he was supposed to have before he answered that silent alarm and got himself shot. And Dutch Moffitt would still be alive, too, if he hadn't tried to live up to his reputation as supercop."
"Chief," Wohl said, "I'm sure Matt has thought about what happened to his uncle Dutch and his father. And learned from it."
"You don't believe that for a second, Peter," Coughlin said. "When did he think about it? Before or after he climbed out on that twelfth-floor ledge? And if Chenowith or any of the other lunatics show up in Harrisburg, you think he's going to think about what happened to Dutch and his father? Or try to put the arm on him-or all of them?"
Wohl shrugged and didn't reply for a moment.
"Well, what do you think we should do?" he asked finally.
"How's he going to check in?"
"Twice a day. With either Mike Weisbach or Jason Washington, or Weisbach's sergeant, Sandow. Or whenever-if-he finds something."
"Take the call yourself. Have a word with him. He just might listen to you. He thinks you walk on water."
"I'd already planned to do that," Peter said.
Coughlin met Wohl's eyes. He looked for a moment as if he was going to say something else, but changed his mind. He picked up his glass and drained it.
"I'll let you go to bed," he said. "Thanks for the drink."
"Anytime, Chief. You know that," Wohl said.
"If I interrupted anything," Coughlin said, nodding toward the closed door of Peter's bedroom, "I'm sorry."
Jesus Christ, is he psychic? Or did Amy cough or something and I didn't hear her and he did? Or did he take one look at my face and read on it the symptoms of the just-well-laid man?
"You didn't interrupt anything, Chief," Wohl replied.
"Good," Coughlin said.
He reached for the telephone and dialed a number.
"Chief Coughlin en route from Inspector Wohl's house to my place," he said, and hung up.
Then he walked to the door. He put out his hand to Wohl.
"A strong word when you talk to our Matty, Peter."
"As strong as I can make it," Wohl said.
Coughlin nodded, then opened the door. Peter watched to make sure he made it safely down the stairway, then went inside the apartment, locked the door, and went into his bedroom.
"I gather he's gone?" Amy said. "He didn't accept your gracious invitation to spend the night?"
"Sorry about that," Peter said. "He's gone. How much did you hear?"
"Everything," she said.
"He's very fond of Matt," Wohl said. "And he had a couple of drinks."
"I hardly know where to ask you to start," Amy said. "Why don't we start with the twelfth-floor ledge of the Bellvue-Stratford? That sounds very interesting."
"It wasn't as bad as it sounds, Amy. That ledge was two feet wide. And I really read the riot act to him when I heard about it."
"Two feet wide and twelve stories off the ground, right? Let's have it, Peter."
"You read in the papers where a Vice Squad lieutenant was taking money from a call girl madam?"
Amy nodded.
"A lot of it took place in the Bellvue. Matt was on the surveillance detail. They put a microphone on a hotel-room window with a suction cup. The cup fell off. Matt went out on the ledge and put it back in place."
"He risked his life so you could arrest a call girl madam?"
"We were really after the police officers involved. And don't get mad at me, Amy. I didn't tell him to do it. And I ate his ass out when I found out about it."
Amy snorted.
Peter started to take his bathrobe off.
"Just hold it right there," Amy said. "This isn't pick-it -up-where-we-left-it-when-we-were-so-rudely-interrupted time. Who are these people Denny Coughlin is afraid Matt will try to arrest by himself?"
"I can't get into that," Wohl said. "I'm sorry."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Amy flared, parroting, " 'I can't get into that'?"
"It's a highly confidential underway investigation."
"And you never talk about highly confidential underway investigations to the bimbo you're banging, right?"
"Is that what you think you are to me? Some bimbo I'm banging?"
"Don't try to change the subject, Peter," Amy said.
"And what am I to you, Amy?" Wohl heard himself asking, wondering where the sudden rage had come from. "A convenient stud? Once or twice a month, when the hormones get active, call the stud and ask if you can come over?"
"How did we get on this subject?" she asked uncomfortably. "Is that what you really think?"
"I don't know what to think," he said.
Amy exhaled audibly.
She met his eyes.
"What do you want me to say? That I think I'm in love with you?"
"If that were the truth, that would be a nice start."
"My patients, I am forced to conclude, are not the only ones who try to avoid facing the truth."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"In this case, the truth I seem to have been avoiding facing is that I am in love with you."
Peter didn't reply.
"No response to that?" Amy asked after a long moment.
"You're so matter-of-fact about it," he said.
"There's something wrong with that?" Amy asked.
Peter shook his head, "no."
"I'll tell you what happens now," Amy said. "If it's the truth, it would be a nice start if you said, 'I love you, too, Amy.' "
"I love you, too, Amy."
"Okay, step two. Now you can take off your robe and come to bed, and after we do what people in love do, step three, you tell me all about this highly confidential underway investigation you've got my little brother involved in."
"Can I suggest step one-A?"
"Suggest."
"I have a bottle of champagne in the refrigerator I've been saving for a suitable occasion."
"Very good. Go get it. Perhaps this love affair of ours isn't going to be as hopeless as logic tells me it's going to be."
"You think it's hopeless?"
"We'll have to wait and find out, won't we, Peter?"
He left the bedroom to fetch the champagne. As he was standing by the sink, unwrapping the wire around the cork, Amy came out of the bedroom and went to him and wrapped her arms around him from the back.
"It's true," she said, almost whispering. "When I saw you walking out of the bedroom, I suddenly realized, My God, I really do love that man."
It took Matt Payne ten minutes to get through the system set in place to protect Harrisburg's chief of police from unnecessary intrusions on his time by the public and to his second-floor office in the police headquarters building, but once he got that far, he found that his passage had been greased.
"The chief's on the phone, Detective Payne," his pleasant secretary greeted him with a smile, "but he's been expecting you. Can I get you a Coke or a cup of coffee?"
"Coffee would be nice. Thank you."
She was pouring the coffee when the red light indicating the chief's line was busy went out, and she stopped pouring the coffee and picked up one of the phones on her desk.
"Detective Payne just came in," she announced.
A moment later the door to the chief's office opened and a stocky, ruddy-faced man in uniform came through it, his hand extended, and a smile on his face.
"Sorry to keep you waiting," the chief said. "The damned phone. You know how it is. Agnes take care of you all right?"
"Yes, sir," Matt said, as he took the Chief's hand and nodded toward the coffee machine.
"Pour one of those for me and bring them in, will you, Agnes?"
"Yes, sir."
"Come on in, Payne, and we'll see what we can do to make things a little easier for you."
"Thank you, sir," Matt said.
A highly polished nameplate on the chief's desk identi fied him as A. J. Mueller. At each end of the plate was a deer's foot, and there were two deer's heads hanging from the walls. One wall was covered with photographs, about half of them showing the chief shaking hands with other policemen and what looked like politicians-one showed the chief shaking hands with the governor and another with the Hon. Jerome H. Carlucci-and the rest showing the chief, in hunting clothes, beaming, holding up the heads of deer he'd apparently shot.
A glass-doored cabinet held an array of marksmanship-mostly pistol-trophies and four different target pistols with which he had presumably won the trophies.
"I hope you didn't check into a hotel yet?" Chief Mueller asked, motioning for Matt to sit in one of the armchairs facing his highly polished desk.
"No, sir. I came directly here."
"Good. I called the Penn-Harris-that's the best in town-and got you a special rate."
"That was very kind of you, sir," Matt said.
"Well, not only does Walter Davis speak highly of you, but-maybe I shouldn't tell you this-an old friend of mine, Chief Augie Wohl, called and said he heard you were coming out here, that you were not only a pretty good cop but a friend of his, and he'd be grateful if I'd do what I could for you."
"That was very nice of Chief Wohl, sir."
"I'm a little curious how come you know Chief Wohl. To look at you, I'd guess-no offense-Augie retired when you were in grammar school."
"I work for Chief Wohl's son, sir. Inspector Peter Wohl."
"Peter's an inspector? God, I remember him in short pants. Really. We had a convention of the National Association of Chiefs of Police in Atlantic City. I'd just made chief, and it was my first convention. Anyway, Augie brought Peter along. In a cop suit. He was a cute little kid, serious as all get-out."
Matt was unable to restrain a smile at a mental image of a cute little kid named Peter Wohl dressed up in a cop suit.
"Yes, sir. He commands the Special Operations Division. "
Agnes delivered the coffee and left, leaving the door ajar. Chief Mueller got up from his desk, walked to the door, and closed it.
"Does Chief Wohl know about this-what do we call it?-'cooperative effort' you're doing with Walter Davis? "
"I don't know, sir. I don't think so, but Inspector Wohl may have told him."
"He didn't mention it on the phone, so we'll presume he doesn't know. Okay?"
"Yes, sir."
"That means on this police force I'll be the only one to know. It's been my experience, generally, that when more than one person knows something, you can forget about it being a secret."
"Yes, sir."
Mueller walked back to his desk, opened the drawer, took out a business card, wrote something on it, and handed it to Matt.
"In case you have to get in touch with me in a hurry," he said. "The first number is my unlisted number at home, and the second is the number of the officer in charge of the radio room. They always know where I am."
"Thank you, sir."
"It might be a good idea if you called in here at least once a day. The third number on there is Agnes's private line. If I have any messages for you-you get the idea."
"Yes, sir. I'll check in with Agnes at least once a day."
"Now, before I call Deitrich in here, let's make sure we have all our balls lined up in a straight line. Officially, what you're doing here is looking for dirty money the Vice Squad lieutenant may have stashed up here. Is that about it?"
"Yes, sir."
"Are you really going to do that, or is that just for public consumption?"
"I'm going to be doing that, sir."
"I guess I don't have to tell you that if he does have money, or anything else, hidden up here it doesn't have his name on it?"
"No, sir. I have a list of names of people who might be cooperating with him."
Chief Mueller nodded.
"I hope you find something," Mueller said. "It rubs me the wrong way when crime pays. Especially when the bad guy used to wear a badge."
"I'm sure that's the reason Inspector Wohl sent me up here, sir," Matt said.
"And then this cooperation with Walter and the FBI just came along?"
"That's about it, sir."
"Well, I hope that works, too. For the same reason. It also rubs me the wrong way when people who've killed people just thumb their noses at the rest of us. And get away with it."
"Yes, sir."
"If you need anything, Payne, to help you along, all you have to do is ask."
"Thank you very much, sir."
Mueller went back to his office door and opened it.
"See if Lieutenant Deitrich's got a minute, will you, please, Agnes?" he ordered, and then turned to Matt. "Deitrich, a good man, heads up our White Collar Crime Division. He can get you into the banks."
Deitrich, a very large, nearly bald man in his forties, came into Mueller's office two minutes later.
"Paul, say hello to Detective Matt Payne of the Philadelphia Police Department," Chief Mueller said.
Deitrich examined Matt carefully before putting out his enormous hand.
"How are you?" he said.
His handshake was surprisingly gentle.
"You remember reading in the papers about that dirty Vice lieutenant-what was his name, Payne?"
"Meyer, sir," Matt furnished.
Deitrich nodded his head, confirming Matt's snap decision that Lieutenant Deitrich was a man who didn't say very much.
"The Philadelphia Police Department thinks that ex-Lieutenant Meyer may have some money and/or some property hidden up here," Mueller went on. "And sent Payne up to see if he can find it."
Deitrich nodded again.
"That's a righteous job so far as I'm concerned, so I have offered him our full support."
Deitrich nodded again.
"And Detective Payne comes with a first-class recommendation from a mutual friend of ours. You getting the picture, Paul?"
Again the massive head bobbed once.
"And, for the obvious reasons, he wants to do this as quietly as possible," Mueller said.
"I told him, for openers, that you can get him into the banks," Mueller went on, "and-I just thought of this-you have friends in the county courthouse if he wants to check property transfers."
"When do you want to start?" Deitrich asked.
"How about tomorrow morning?" Chief Mueller answered for him. "Get him a chance to get settled in his hotel. The Penn-Harris."
The massive head bobbed.
"I'll make some calls this afternoon," Deitrich said.
"Thank you."
"You'll be moving around," Mueller said. "What kind of a car are you driving?"
"A Plymouth."
"Yours, or the department's?"
"An unmarked car."
"What year? Does it have official plates?"
"A new one," Matt said. "Blue. Regular civilian plates."
"They must like you in Philadelphia," Deitrich said. "Before you leave, get me the plate numbers. I'll have the word put out that a suspicious, not-one-of-ours unmarked car is to be left alone."
"Thank you."
Deitrich wordlessly took a business card from his wallet and handed it to Matt.
"Thank you," Matt repeated.
"Nine o'clock?" Deitrich asked.
"Nine's fine with me."
Deitrich looked at Mueller to see if there was anything else.
"Thank you, Paul," Mueller said.
Deitrich nodded first at Mueller and then at Matt and then sort of shuffled out of the room.
Mueller waited until he was out of earshot, then said, "Paul doesn't say much. When he does, listen."
"Yes, sir."
"Why don't you let me welcome you to Harrisburg with a home-cooked dinner?" Mueller asked.
"That's very kind, sir. But could I take a rain check?"
Mueller looked at Matt, his bushy eyebrows raised. Then he nodded.
"I hope she's pretty," Mueller said.
"She is," Matt said.
Mueller put out his hand. The meeting was over.
"I meant what I said about if you need anything, anytime, you have my numbers."
"Thank you, sir," Matt said, "for everything."
The Penn-Harris hotel provided Detective Payne with a small suite on the sixth floor at what Matt guessed was half the regular price. There was a bedroom with three windows-through which he could see the state capitol building-furnished with a double bed, a small desk, a television set, and two armchairs. The sitting room held a couch, a coffee table, two armchairs, and another television set.
While he was unpacking, he opened what he thought was a closet door and found that it was a kitchenette complete to a small refrigerator. To his pleased surprise, the refrigerator held a half-dozen bottles of beer, a large bottle of Coke, and a bottle of soda water.
He decided this was probably due more to Chief Mueller's wish to do something nice for a friend of Chief Inspector (Retired) Augustus Wohl than to routine hotel hospitality, particularly for someone in a cut-rate room.
Matt finished unpacking, then took a bottle of beer from the refrigerator, settled himself on the sitting-room couch with his feet up on the coffee table, and reached for the telephone.
Jason Washington's deep, vibrant voice came over the line.
"Special Operations Investigations. Sergeant Washington. "
"Detective Payne, Sergeant Washington, and how are you on this warm and pleasant afternoon?"
"How good of you to call. We were all wondering when you were going to find the time."
"I just got here," Matt protested, and then asked, "Did something come up?"
"I have had three telephone calls from Special Agent Matthews asking if we had heard from you. Weren't you supposed to liaise with him, Matthew?"
"I'm not sure I know what that means," Matt said. "Anyway, I don't have anything to tell him. I just got here."
"So you said. And how were you received by our brothers of the Harrisburg police?"
"By the chief. Nice guy. He said Chief Wohl had called him."
"That's interesting."
"Yeah, I thought so. Anyway, Chief Mueller set me up with their White Collar Crimes guy, a lieutenant named Deitrich, who's going to get me into both the banks and the hall of records in the courthouse."
"Where are you, Matthew?"
"Six twelve in the Penn-Harris," Matt said. He took a close look at the telephone and read the number to Washington.
"I will share that with Special Agent Matthews," Washington said. "Is there anything else, in particular anything concerning your-what shall I say, 'social life in romantic Harrisburg'-that you would like me to tell him?"
"I haven't called her. I will when I get off the phone with you. And that one telephone call may be, probably will be, the end of that."
"And how is that?"
"You were there when I told Davis that her eyes glazed over when I told her I was a cop."
"If at first you don't succeed, to coin a phrase. You might try inflaming her natural maternal instincts, and get her to take pity on a lonely boy banished to the provinces far from home and loved ones."
Matt chuckled.
"If you were she, would you be eager to establish a close relationship with a cop?"
"That might well depend on the cop," Washington said. "Think positively, Matthew."
"I'll let you know what happens."
"Would a report at, say, eight-thirty in the morning be too much to ask? I would so hate to disappoint Agent Matthews should he call about then, as I'm sure he will."
"I'll call you in the morning," Matt said.
"I will wait in breathless anticipation," Washington said, and hung up.
Matt took the telephone number for the Reynolds home Daffy had given him from his wallet, read it aloud three times in an attempt to memorize it, and then dialed it. As the phone was ringing, he looked at the scrap of paper in his hand, decided this was not the time to rely on memory tricks-even one provided by Jason Washington-and put it back in his wallet.
"The Reynolds residence," a male voice announced.
Jesus, they have a butler!
Why does that surprise me? Dad said her father was an "extraordinarily successful" businessman, and that's Dad-speak for really loaded/stinking rich.
"Miss Reynolds, please. Miss Susan Reynolds. My name is Matthew Payne."
"One moment, please, sir."
It was a long moment, long enough to give Matt time to form a mental image of Susan being told that a Mr. Matthew Payne was on the line, taking a moment to wonder who Matt Payne was, to remember, Oh, that cop at Daffy's! and then to tell the butler she was not at home and would never be home to Mr. Payne.
"Hello?" a female voice chirped.
"Susan?"
That doesn't sound like her.
"No," the female voice said, coyly. "This is not Susan. This is Susan's mother. And who is this, please?"
"My name is Payne, Mrs. Reynolds. Matthew Payne. I met Susan at Daffy… Daphne Nesbitt's-"
"I thought that's what Wilson said!" Mrs. Reynolds cried happily. "You're that wicked young man who kept Susan out all night!"
Christ, she's an airhead. In the mold of Daffy's mother, Chad's mother, Penny's mother. What is that, the curse of the moneyed class? Or maybe it's the Bennington Curse. The pretty young girls grow up and turn into airheads. Or otherwise go mad. Like those who believe in being kind to dumb animals by blowing buildings up. Or at least aid and abet those who think that way.
"I think you have the wrong man, Mrs. Reynolds."
"Oh, no, I don't, Matthew Payne. Daphne Browne-now she's Daphne Nesbitt, isn't she?-told me all about you! You're a wicked boy! Didn't you even think that we would be worried sick about her! Shame on you!"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Well, she's not at home. I mean, she's really not at home. She's at work."
"I'd like to call her there, at work, if that would be possible."
"That's not possible, I'm afraid. They don't like her to take personal calls at work. Could I give her a message?"
"What I was hoping to do was ask her to have dinner with me."
"When?"
"I thought perhaps tonight, if she didn't have previous plans."
"In Philadelphia?" she asked incredulously.
"No. Not in Philadelphia. Here. Harrisburg."
"You're in Harrisburg?"
"Yes, ma'am. On business."
"I really thought for a minute that you wanted to have dinner tonight with Susan in Philadelphia."
"No, ma'am. I'm here. And I thought she might be willing to have dinner with me."
"Well, I'll tell you what," Mrs. Reynolds said, and there was a long pause. "You come here and you can have dinner with Susan's daddy and me. And, of course, Susan. "
"I wouldn't want to impose," Matt said.
"Not at all," she said. "And I want to get a look at you, and give you a piece of my mind. You will come to supper, and that's that."
"In that case, thank you."
"You may change your mind about that after Susan's daddy lets you know what he thinks about you keeping Susan out all night."
"Yes, ma'am."
"We eat at seven-thirty sharp when we're at home. Is that convenient?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Do you know where we are?"
"No, ma'am. Just that you're in Camp Hill."
"I'll give you directions. They're not as complicated as they sound. Have you a pencil?"
"Yes, ma'am."