“Where are you going?”
“From now on,” Charley called, “I think we should keep that door locked.”
Matt glanced at his mother. She looked very sad. When she sensed his eyes on her, she smiled.
“He really is large, isn’t he?”
Jesus Martinez came back to the apartment almost an hour later, as Matt’s mother was cleaning up the kitchen.
“They don’t make that model anymore,” he said. “I have been in every electronics store in Center City trying to find these.”
He held up three tape cassettes.
The telephone had rung twice more while they had been eating. They hadn’t answered it.
It rang again almost immediately after Matt had installed a new tape.
“What are we supposed to do?” McFadden asked. “Answer it? Or let the machine answer it?”
“Let the machine do it,” Martinez said. “I think the chief wants the recording.”
With the machine reconnected, it was possible to hear the caller’s message.
It was a variation of the previous calls, no more scatologically obscene than the others, but enough, because of Patricia Payne—whom McFadden thought of as Matt’s Mother—to cause McFadden to blush with embarrassment and his face to tighten in anger.
“I can rig that thing so we don’t have to listen to that crap—sorry, Mrs. Payne,” he said.
“That might be a good idea,” she said. “But I’m leaving anyway, if that’s what’s bothering you.”
“I’d like to get my hands on that guy,” McFadden said.
“So would I,” she said. “But don’t you see, Charley, that’s what they’re trying to do, make us angry?”
“They’re succeeding,” Charley said.
She put her hat and coat on, and then went and stood before Matt, who was sprawled in an overstuffed leather armchair, his bad leg resting on a pillow sitting on the matching ottoman.
“After I leave, maybe you can get Charley to hang your art work,” she said.
“What?” Matt asked, and then understood. “Oh, that. How did it get here?”
“Your dad and I brought it from the hospital,” she said.
“Thank you.”
“Now, there’s plenty of food there for breakfast and sandwiches, and I’ll bring more when I come tomorrow. But for dinner, your father called the Rittenhouse Club, and they’ll bring you anything you want to eat.”
“I don’t like Rittenhouse Club food in the Rittenhouse Club,” Matt said. “Why should I have them haul it over here?” He saw the hurt look in her eyes and added, “I’m in a lousy mood, sorry, Mother.”
“Are you in pain?”
He shook his head no.
“They do a very nice mixed grill, and you like their London broil, I know you do, and besides, beggars can’t be choosers.” She leaned over and kissed him.
“Ignore him,” Patricia Payne said to Charley and Jesus. “Make him feed you.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Charley said. “I will.”
When he came back up the stairs after locking the door after her, McFadden asked, “What art work is she talking about?”
“There’s a great big picture of a naked woman in his bedroom,” Jesus said.
“No shit?”
“It was a gift from Mrs. Washington,” Matt said. “Mrs. Washington and I think of it as a splendid example of Victorian art.”
“I gotta see this,” Charley said, and went into the bedroom.
He returned carrying the oil painting.
“Over the fireplace, right?”
“Why not?” Charley said.
McFadden went to the fireplace, leaned the picture against it, and then took something from the mantelpiece. He walked to Matt with a snub-nosed revolver in the palm of each hand.
“Maybe you’d better keep these—one of them, anyway—with you. What are you doing with two?”
“One of them belongs to Wohl. He loaned it to me in the hospital. The shooting team took mine away from me. I just got it back.”
McFadden sniffed the barrel of one of the revolvers and then the other.
“This must be yours,” he said. “I’ll clean it for you, if you have the stuff. Otherwise, you’ll fuck up the barrel.”
“There’s cleaning stuff in one of the drawers in the kitchen,” Matt said.
“You got any bullets? There’s none in this.”
“Cartridges, Charley. Bullets are the little lead things that come out the end. There’s a box with the cleaning stuff.”
“Fuck you, clean your own pistol,” Charley said, laid both pistols beside the answering machine, and returned to the oil painting. He picked it up and held it in place over the fireplace, turning his head for approval.
“Great,” Matt said.
“What are you going to do when your mother comes back?”
“Mother will modestly avert her eyes,” Matt said.
“You got a brick nail?”
“What’s a brick nail?”
“A nail you can drive in bricks. You can’t do that with regular nails, asshole, they bend.”
“No.”
There was a knock at the door at the foot of the stairs.
Jesus erupted from his chair and went to the closet and took the shotgun from it.
“It’s probably Wohl or Washington,” Matt said.
“Who’s there?” Jesus called.
“Telephone company.”
Jesus went down the stairs. In a moment, he returned, followed by two telephone company technicians, one of whom was visibly curious and made more than a little uncomfortable by Jesus’s shotgun.
“Where do you want your phone?” one of them asked.
“One here and one in the bedroom, please,” Matt said.
“Is something going on around here?” the other one asked, curiosity having overwhelmed him.
“Like what?” Charley asked.
“Hey, you’re the cop who shot the Liberation Army guy, aren’t you?” the first one asked.
“Just put the goddamn phone in,” Jesus snapped.
“What the hell is wrong with you? I just asked, is all.”
It took forty-five minutes to install the two telephones. The installers refused a drink, but accepted Matt’s offer of coffee.
“It’s cold as a bitch out there,” one said.
When they were gone, Martinez said, “That’s not going to work.”
“What’s not going to work?”
“Having people knock on the door, and we ask who is it, and then go down and open the door.”
“Why not?” Charley asked.
“What we need is an intercom,” Jesus said. “They ring the bell, we ask the intercom who’s there. I saw one in the store where I bought the tapes.”
“Who would put it in?” Charley asked.
“I would.”
“Do you really think it’s necessary?” Matt said. “More to the point, do you think that anybody’s really going to try to come up here?”
“They threw the firebomb at Monahan,” Charley said.
“Jesus,” Matt said.
“Save your money, if you want to,” Jesus said. “They cost twenty-four ninety-five.”
“You can install it?” Matt asked.
“You got a screwdriver, a drill, and a staple machine, I can install it.”
“I think I’ve got a screwdriver, but I don’t have a drill or a staple machine.”
“You don’t have a drill?” McFadden asked, surprised.
“No.”
“How about a hammer? You’re going to need a hammer for the brick nails.”
“No hammer, either.”
“Hay-zus can get a hammer and the brick nails and the drill and the staple machine when he gets the intercom,” Charley said.
“Don’t forget the screwdriver,” Matt said, and shifted on the couch and took out his wallet.
“What the fuck, Payne, if they don’t kill you, it’ll come in handy later,” Jesus said
as he took three twenties. “If you’ve got some broad up here, and some other broad comes to see you, you could tell her you’re busy on the intercom.”
“I could also just not answer her knock,” Matt said.
“You want the intercom or not? You’re not doing me any favors.”
“I want the intercom, Hay-zus, thank you.”
Martinez returned in a little over half an hour, his arms full of kraft paper bags.
“Goddamn sidewalks are all ice,” he said. “I almost busted my ass, twice.”
“How would you like to be walking a foot beat in this weather?” McFadden asked.
“How about standing at Broad and Vine in a white cap, directing traffic?” Martinez said as he put the packages on the coffee table.
In one of the bags was a Philadelphia Daily News. He tossed it on Matt’s lap.
“In case you don’t know where you are,” he said. “This is an ‘undisclosed location.’”
“What?”
“You’re on the front page,” Jesus said.
Matt unfolded the newspaper. There was a photograph of him being carried to Coughlin’s car at Frankford Hospital. Beneath it was the caption:
* * *
COP UNDER DEATH THREAT-As heavily armed police stand by, Officer Matthew M. Payne, whose life has been threatened by the Islamic Liberation Army is carried from Frankford Hospital to a police car that took him to an undisclosed location. Payne was wounded in the gun battle in which he shot to death ILA member Abu Ben Mohammed. (See ILA)
* * *
Charley leaned over Matt’s shoulder and read the caption.
“Well, the bastards got what they wanted, didn’t they?” he asked. “The front page of the News, and we sure look like we’re scared of them.”
“I don’t know about you being scared, white boy,” Matt heard himself say, “but we are.”
McFadden looked al him curiously, and after a moment said seriously, “You’ll be all right, buddy. You can lake that to the bank.”
There was a moment’s awkward silence, which Jesus finally broke.
“The first thing you have to decide is where you want this end of the intercom.”
“How about on the kitchen wall?”
“Why not?”
Matt was impressed with the skill with which Jesus installed the intercom. He seemed to know exactly what he was doing. It reminded him of Charley’s mechanical drawing skill, and that made him consider his own practical ineptitude.
Matthew Mark Payne, B.A., Cum Laude, University of Pennsylvania, you don’t have one salable skill, something you could find a paying job doing, except being a cop, and, truth to tell, you ain’t too good at that.
By half past five, the intercom was installed and tested.
“Anybody else getting hungry?” Matt asked as Jesus—workmanlike, Matt thought—neatly coiled the leftover wire and put the tools back in their boxes.
“I could eat something,” Jesus said.
“I’m going to finish hanging your naked lady picture,” Charley said, “and then leave. I’m going to have supper with Margaret. I’ll be back at midnight and relieve Hay-zus.”
“Bring her back here, and her friend Lari too, and we’ll send out for food.”
“No,” Charley said. “For one thing, I wouldn’t bring a nice girl like her anyplace where there’s a naked lady hanging on the wall.”
“You’re kidding!”
“Her uncle and aunt are feeding us,” Charley said. “We have to go there.”
“Don’t break your ass on the way to the subway,” Jesus said.
“You don’t have your car, do you?” Matt asked, and, when Charley shook his head, asked, “where is it, Bustleton and Bowler?”
“Yeah.”
“Why don’t you leave it there and take the Porsche?”
“I don’t know, Matt. I’d hate to tear it up.”
“You can’t leave a Porsche sit,” Matt said. “And I damned sure can’t drive it. Where’d you put the keys?”
“Jesus, I forgot!” Charley said, and pulled them from his trouser pocket.
“Take the car. Just try to keep it under a hundred and ten.”
“Well, okay,” Charley said, trying and failing to give the impression he would drive the Porsche only as a favor to Matt.
Five minutes after Charley left, the intercom was first put to use.
“Let me in, Hay-zus,” Charley’s voice announced mechanically from the speaker in the kitchen. “It’s me.”
Jesus went down and unlocked the door and Charley followed him back up the stairs.
“Wouldn’t start?” Matt asked.
“The front tires are slashed,” McFadden announced. “And they got the hood and doors with a knife or something.”
“Jesus H. Christ!” Matt exploded.
“Did you look at the car when we came here?” Charley asked.
“No. Except to see that it was there. My mother’s car was there. You couldn’t see it clearly.”
“Shit!”
The bell rang.
Martinez went into the kitchen.
“Who’s there?”
“Peter Wohl.”
“Just a minute, Inspector.”
Wohl appeared at the head of the stairs carrying a large paper bag.
“I thought the patient might like a beer,” he said, and then, when he saw the look on Matt’s face, asked, “What’s going on?”
“Those fuckers slashed my tires and did a scratch job on my hood and doors,” Matt said. “Charley just found it that way.”
Wohl walked into the kitchen and started putting the beer into the refrigerator.
“You just found this out, McFadden?”
“Yes, sir. I went down to get the car, and I saw it was down in front.”
“And you didn’t see any damage to it when they brought Matt here?”
“No, sir.”
“We didn’t look,” Matt said.
“I just walked past it myself,” Wohl said, “and didn’t see anything out of the ordinary.”
Wohl came into the living room and picked up the telephone beside Matt. He dialed a number from memory.
“This is Inspector Wohl,” he announced. “Let me speak to the senior supervisor present.”
I wonder who he’s calling? Matt thought.
“Inspector Wohl, Lieutenant. We have a case of vehicular vandalism. The vehicle in question belongs to Officer Payne. I rather doubt we’ll be able to find the vandals, but I want a complete investigation, especially photographs. Even dust the damned car for fingerprints. We may get lucky. It’s in the parking lot under the Delaware Valley Cancer Society Building on Rittenhouse Square. Payne lives in the top-floor apartment. I’ll be here with him.”
He put the telephone down.
“Inspector, I’m supposed to meet my girl,” Charley said uncomfortably.
“Well, I guess that will have to wait, won’t it?” Wohl snapped. “Central Detectives are on their way. Obviously, they’ll want to talk to you.”
“Yes, sir.”
“No. Wait a minute,” Wohl said, exhaling audibly. “What exactly did you see, Charley, when you went down to the garage?”
“When I started to unlock the door, I saw the nose was down. So I looked at the tires. And then I saw what they did to the hood and doors with a knife or something.”
“You’re coming on at midnight, right?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I’ll tell the detectives what you told me,” Wohl said. “Go ahead, Charley. I didn’t mean to snap at you like that.”
That’s okay, sir.”
He hurried down the stairwell as if he was afraid Wohl would change his mind.
Wohl lost his temper, Matt thought. He was nearly as mad as I am about the car. No. That’s impossible. Nobody can be nearly as fucking outraged as I am.
“Inspector, I was about to send out for supper for Hay-zus and me,” Matt said. “Will you have something with us?”
; “No pizza.”
“Actually, I was thinking of either a London broil or a mixed grill. My father fixed it with the Rittenhouse Club.”
“In that case, Officer Payne, I gratefully accept your kind invitation.”
TWENTY-TWO
Lieutenant Foster H. Lewis, Sr., was of two minds concerning Officer Foster H. Lewis, Jr. On one hand, it was impossible to feel like anything but a proud father to see one’s son and namesake drive up to the house in an unmarked car, wearing a very nice looking blazer, gray flannel slacks, a starched white shirt and a regimentally striped necktie and know that Tiny had a more responsible job after having been on the job less than a year than he had had in his first five years on the job.
But there were two problems with that. The first being that he had hoped—and for a long time believed—that Tiny would spend his life as Foster H. Lewis, M.D. But that hadn’t come to pass. Tiny had been placed on Academic Probation by the Temple University Medical School and reacted to that by joining the cops.
And then the Honorable Jerry Carlucci had put his two cents in, in what Foster H. Lewis, Sr., believed to be an understandable, but no less contemptible, ploy to pick up a few more Afro-American voters. The mayor had told a large gathering at the Second Abyssinian Baptist Church that, as one more proof that he was determined to see that the Police Department afforded Afro-Americans equal opportunities within the Department, that he had recommended to Commissioner Czernich that Officer Foster H. Lewis, Jr., son of that outstanding Afro-American police Lieutenant, Foster H. Lewis, Jr., be assigned to Special Operations.
It was said that if The Mayor looked as if he might be about to fart, Commissioner Czernich instantly began to look for a dog to blame, and, in case he couldn’t find one, pursed his lips to apologize for breaking wind.
Lieutenant Lewis thought that Special Operations was a good idea, and he would have been proud and delighted to see Tiny assigned there after he’d done a couple of years in a district, working a van, walking a foot beat, riding around in an RFC, learning what being a cop was all about. Sending Tiny over there before he’d found all the little inspection stickers on his new uniform was really—unless, of course, you were interested in Afro-American votes—a lousy idea.
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