The Witness boh-4

by W. E. B Griffin

  The flattery,he decided, after looking at Washington's face,had not gone wide of the mark.

  "If you and Inspector Wohl could find the time," he went on, having made that decision, "I'd like you to come help me deal with the press. I asked the ladies and gentlemen of the press to be at the office at nine."

  "I'll beg off, thank you just the same," Washington said. "I want a good look at the others."

  "Peter?"

  "No, thank you. I live by the rule never to talk to the press unless I have to. And anyway, I want to go back to Frankford Hospital. The officer who was shot works for me."

  "I'm going up there too," Washington said. "When I'm finished here."

  "Tragic, tragic," Stillwell said. "Thank God, he's alive."

  "Yes," Washington said.

  "Would you call my office, Sergeant, when you're finished? I'd really like to hear your assessment of these people."

  "Certainly."

  Farnsworth Stillwell offered Wohl and Washington his hand.

  "Thank you very much for letting me share this with you," he said. " It's been a-aneducation. I've never been in here before."

  "This is where it happens, Mr. Stillwell," Washington said.

  Stillwell rode the elevator down to the main lobby and started for the parking lot, but as he reached the door, he had a second thought, one he immediately recognized to be a first-rate idea.

  He turned and went to the desk, asked permission of the sergeant to use the telephone, and dialed his office number.

  "When the press arrives," he ordered. "Give them my apologies, and tell them I have gone to Frankford Hospital to visit the police officer who was shot this morning. I feel I have that duty. Tell them that too. And tell them if they come to the hospital, I'll meet with them there."

  When he hung up, he had another idea, even better, and pulled the telephone to him again and dialed his home.

  "Darling," he said when his wife answered, "I'm glad I caught you. Something has come up. I'm going to Frankford Hospital, to visit with the cop who got himself shot this morning-"

  "What are you talking about?"

  "-I'll tell you all about it in the car. I want you there with me. The press will be there."

  There was twenty seconds of silence.

  "Darling, this is important to me," he said firmly. "I'll be waiting outside for you in fifteen minutes."

  He hung up thinking, somewhat petulantly, If she really wants to be the governor's wife, she damned well had better learn that there is no free lunch, that certain things are going to be required of her.

  ****

  "Mother," Officer Matt Payne said, "why don't you get out of here? I' m all right, and there's nothing you can do for me here."

  Patricia and Brewster C. Payne had been in the Recovery Room when Matt was taken there from the surgical suite. It was strictly against hospital policy, but the chairman of the board of trustees of Frankford Hospital entrusted his legal affairs to Mawson, Payne, Stockton, McAdoo amp; Lester. A telephone call to him had resulted not only in a telephone call to the senior staff physician, but the physical presence of that gentleman himself, three minutes later, to make sure that whatever Brewster Payne thought the hospital should do for his son was being done.

  Aside from access to the Recovery Room, the only request Brewster Payne had made was that Matt be given a private room, something the senior staff physician had already decided to provide to spare some other patient from the horde of people who had come to the hospital to see Matt Payne.

  The mayor, the police commissioner, two chief inspectors, and their respective entourages, plus a number of less senior police officers, plus representatives of the print and electronic media had begun to descend on the hospital at about the same time screaming sirens on two Highway Patrol cars had announced the arrival of the Payne family.

  While the press could be required to wait in the main lobby, the others immediately made it plain they would wait right where they were, overflowing the small waiting room on the surgical floor, until Officer Payne was out of surgery and his condition known.

  And when that had come to pass-the removal of a bullet from the calf musculature was a fairly simple procedure, routinely handled by surgical residents half a dozen times on any given weekend-and Young Payne was taken to the Recovery Room, the Hospital Security Staff was unable to deter the mayor's driver from carrying out his assigned mission-"Go down and bring the press up here. They'll want a picture of me with Payne when he wakes up."

  The senior staff physician was able to delay the picture taking until the staff had put Young Payne in a private room, and after the mayor had taken the necessary steps to keep the public aware that their mayor, in his never-ceasing efforts to rid the streets of Philadelphia of crime, was never far from the action, he left, and so did perhaps half of the people who had arrived at about the time he had.

  "You'll need pajamas," Patricia Payne said to her son. "And your toilet things-"

  "I won't be in here long," Matt said. "You don't know that," Patricia Payne said, and looked at her daughter, Amelia.

  "I don't know how long they're going to keep him, Mother," she replied. "But I'll find out. I'll call you at home and let you know. And I'll go by his apartment and get him what he needs. I have to come back out here anyway. You and Dad go on home."

  "I suppose he should rest," Patricia Payne gave in. She leaned over her son and kissed him. "Do what they tell you to do, for once."

  "Yes, ma'am," Matt said.

  "If you need anything, Matt," Brewster Payne said, "I'm as close as that phone."

  "Thank you, Dad. I don't think I'll need anything."

  "I'll call as soon as I have a chance to go home, change, and get to the office."

  "Go on, you two, get out of here," Amelia Payne said. They left.

  "Thank you," Matt said when the door had closed.

  "Don't look so pleased with yourself, you sonofabitch," Amy Payne snapped. "I did that for them, not you."

  "Wow!"

  "Youbastard! Are you trying to drive Mother crazy, or what?" She dipped into an extra large purse, came out with a copy of theBulletin and threw it at him. "I hope she doesn't see that!"

  The front page showed Matt, bloody-faced, holding his gun on Charles D. Stevens.

  "Hey, I didn't do this on purpose. That bastard was shooting at me."

  "That bastard died thirty minutes ago. You can carve another notch on your gun, Jesse James."

  "He died?" Matt asked, wanting confirmation.

  "I didn't think Mother needed to know that."

  She looked at him. Their eyes met.

  "How do you feel about that?" she asked.

  "I'm not about to wallow in remorse, if that's what you're hoping. He was trying to kill me."

  "And almost did. Do you have any idea how lucky you are? Have you ever seen what a.45-caliber bullet does to tissue?"

  "I just found out."

  "No, you didn't. The bullet that hit you had lost most of its energy bouncing off a wall."

  "Amy, I wasn't trying to be hero. This just happened. I can't understand why you're sore at me."

  "Because, youass, of what you're doing to Mother. When are you going to come to your senses, for her sake, if nothing else?"

  Matt was not given time to form a reply. The door opened, and a nurse put her head in.

  "Are you a family member?"

  "I'm Dr. Payne," Amy replied, not at all pleasantly. "What do you want?"

  "Mr. Payne's grandmother and aunt are here, Doctor. They'd like to see him."

  "Let them come in, I'm leaving."

  The nurse pushed the door open. A stout, somewhat florid-faced woman in her sixties, her gray hair done up in a bun, followed by a blond woman in her late thirties came into he room.

  "Hello, Mother Moffitt," Amy Payne said. "Jeannie."

  "Hello, Amy," the younger woman replied.

  The older woman flashed Amy a cold look, nodded, and said, "Miss Payne."
<
br />   "It'sDr. Payne, Mrs. Moffitt," Amy said, and walked out of the room.

  "Hello, Grandma," Matt said.

  "Your grandfather, your father, and your Uncle Richard would be proud of you, darling," Gertrude Moffitt said emotionally, walking to the bed and grasping his hand.

  "Hello, Aunt Jeannie," Matt said.

  "I'm just sorry you didn't kill the man who did this to you," Mother Moffitt said.

  "I apparently did," Matt said. "They told me he died half an hour ago."

  "Then I hope he burns in hell."

  "Mother Moffitt!" Jeannie Moffitt protested. "For God's sake."

  "I have lost two sons to the scum of this city. I have no compassion in my heart for them, and neither should you."

  "I'm just grateful Matt's not more seriously injured," Jeannie said.

  "Chief Coughlin called and told me," Mother Moffitt said. "Your mother apparently couldn't be bothered."

  "She was upset, for God's sake!" Jeannie Moffitt protested. "You, of all people, should understand that."

  "No matter what trials and pain God has sent me, I take pride in always having done my duty."

  Jeannie Moffitt shook her head, and she and Matt exchanged a smile.

  "So, how are you, Matty?" she asked.

  "Aside from that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?"

  Jeannie Moffitt laughed.

  "What was that? I don't understand that," Mother Moffitt said.

  "A little joke, Grandma," Matt said.

  The nurse stuck her head through the door again.

  "I'm afraid you'll have to leave now," she said.

  "I just got here," Mother Moffitt said indignantly.

  "Doctor's orders," the nurse said, and walked to the side of Matt's bed. "Mr. Payne needs rest."

  "Officer Payne,thank you," Mother Moffitt said.

  "Do you need anything, Matty?" Jeannie asked.

  "Not a thing, thank you."

  "I'll come back, of course, if Jeannie can find the time to bring me," Mother Moffitt said.

  "Of course, I will. You know that."

  "It's a terrible thing when the only time I get to see him is in a hospital bed with a bullet in him," Mother Moffitt said.

  She bent and kissed his cheek and marched out of the room. The nurse went to the door and turned and smiled.

  "Dr. Payne said to tell you, you owe her one," she said.

  "Thank both of you," Matt said.

  "There's some other people out here to see you. You feel up to it?"

  "Who?"

  "A Highway Patrolman, some kind of a big-shot cop named Coughlin, and a man from the district attorney's office. And his wife."

  "The district attorney?"

  "I think he saidassistant. And his wife. I can run them off."

  "No. I'm all right. Isn't this thing supposed to hurt?"

  "It will. When it starts to hurt, ring for a nurse."

  "I'm also hungry. Can I get something to eat?"

  "I can probably arrange for something," she said. "So you want to see them?"

  "Please."

  Chief Inspector Dennis V. Coughlin, Officer Charles McFadden, and Assistant District Attorney and Mrs. Farnsworth Stillwell filed into the room.

  "Hey, Charley," Matt said. "Uncle Denny."

  "I'm Farnsworth Stillwell, Officer Payne," the assistant district attorney said, walking up to the bed with his hand extended, "and this is Mrs. Stillwell."

  "How do you do?" Matt said politely. He had previously had the pleasure of making Mrs. Stillwell's acquaintance. He not only knew her Christian name, but a number of other intimate details about her.

  Her name was Helene, and the last time he had seen her, she was putting her clothing back on in his apartment, whence they had gone from the Delaware Valley Cancer Society's cocktail party.

  "Hello," Helene said. "I'm a little vague about the protocol here. Is it permitted to say I'm so sorry you've been shot?"

  "This is my first time too," Matt said. "I'm a little fuzzy about the protocol myself."

  She walked to the bed and offered him her hand.

  "I'm sorry you've been shot."

  "Thank you. So am I," Matt said.

  "Are you all right?"

  "Just fine."

  "We're all sorry you've-this has happened," Farnsworth Stillwell said. "And I must tell you, I feel to some degree responsible."

  "Nonsense," Denny Coughlin said. "No one is responsible except the man who pulled the trigger."

  "I'm sorry we didn't bring you anything," Helene Stillwell said. "But I didn't know who you were, what you would be like, and at this time of the morning-"

  "It was good of you to come," Matt said.

  Helene finally took her hand back.

  "We wanted you to know that we were concerned," Stillwell said, " concerned and grateful."

  "I think we should let Officer Payne get some rest, darling," Helene said.

  "There are some members of the press outside who would like to have our picture together," Farnsworth Stillwell said. "Would you feel up to that?"

  Matt looked at Denny Coughlin, who shrugged and then nodded his head.

  "Sure," Matt said.

  A photographer came into the room. He asked if the bed could be cranked up, and when it had, he suggested that Mr. Stillwell get on one side of him, and Mrs. Stillwell on the other. When they had done so, he suggested that they get closer to Matt. "It feels a little awkward, but the picture comes out better."

  When they had moved into the desired positions, they had to swap sides, so that Assistant District Attorney Stillwell and Officer Payne could shake hands. Mrs. Stillwell, in order to get closer, put her arm behind Officer Payne's shoulders, a position that pressed her breast against his arm, and for a moment allowed her fingers to caress the back of his neck.

  And then the flashbulb went off, Farnsworth Stillwell told Officer Payne that if he needed anything, anything at all, all he had to do was let him know, and they were gone.

  "I don't like that sonofabitch," Denny Coughlin said, "but I wouldn't be surprised if he really does get to be governor."

  "Really?" Matt asked.

  "So how are you, Matty?" Denny Coughlin asked.

  "Worried about my car," Matt said, looking at Charley.

  "I got it downstairs," Charley said. "Aside from no radio, doors, or seats, it's okay."

  "You'd better be kidding."

  "I got it downstairs, all in one piece. Inspector Wohl asked me to ask you where you want it."

  "In the garage under the apartment, please."

  "You got it. You need anything else?"

  "Can't think of anything."

  "I'll come see you when I get off. But I'd better get going now. Quinn's sitting in the car about to shit a brick."

  "Thanks, Charley," Matt said.

  Dennis V. Coughlin closed the door after McFadden, and then exhaled audibly. He walked to the bed and sat down on it.

  "Jesus, Matty, you gave us a scare. What the hell happened?"

  This is more than a godfather, more than my blood father's buddy, doing his duty, Matt suddenly realized. This man loves me.

  He remembered that his father, the other father, the only one he had ever known, Brewster C. Payne, had told him that he believed Dennis V. Coughlin had always been in love with his mother.

  "Lieutenant Suffern let us out of his car in the alley behind Stevens's house-"

  "You and O'Hara?"

  "Yeah. We were waiting for the ACT team and the sergeant to bring Stevens down so Mickey could get a picture. Then I heard a noise, a creaking noise, like wood breaking. I think now it was Stevens coming over a fence. Anyway, all of a sudden, there he was shooting at us."

  "He shot first?"

  "He shot first."

  "That makes it justifiable homicide. You're absolutely sure he shot first?"

  "Hey, I thought you were here to comfort me on my bed of pain, not interview me?"

  "Are you in pain?" Coughlin asked, concern and
possibly even a hint of pity-or maybe shame-in his voice.

  "No, Uncle Denny, I'm not," Matt said, and touched the older man's shoulder. After a moment, Coughlin's hand came up and covered his.

  "It'll probably start to hurt later, Matty," he said. "But they'll give you something for it. I'm sure."

  Their eyes met.

  Coughlin stood up.

  "I got to go. You need anything, you know how to reach me."

  FIFTEEN

  Amotherly, very large black woman wearing a badge identifying her as a licensed practical nurse delivered a fried egg on limp toast sandwich, a container of milk, and a Styrofoam cup of coffee.

  "Lunch is at eleven-thirty," she announced. "Unless you like beans and franks you won't be thrilled."

  "Thank you."

  "You know how to work the TV clicker?"

  She showed him, walked to the door to leave, and then turned.

  "I heard what happened," she said. "Good for you. Animals like that bum you shot are taking over the city."

  Matt found the controls for the bed, adjusted the back to his satisfaction, and turned on the television. Not surprising him at all, there was nothing on that he would watch if he were not in a hospital bed feeling lousy and with his leg wrapped up like that of an Egyptian mummy.

  If it were Saturday morning, he thought, at least I could watch the teenagers flopping their boobs around on that dance show on WCAU-TV.

  He settled for a quiz show, quickly deciding that the participants had been chosen not for their potential ability to call forth trivia but rather on their ability to jump up and down, shrieking with joy, when they were awarded a lifetime supply of acne medication.

  His calf began to feel prickly, as if it had fallen asleep, and it seemed to him he could feel blood pumping through it.

  The door opened and a handsome young man with long blond hair entered, bearing a floral display.

  "Where do you want this, buddy?"

  "On that dresser, I suppose."

  The handsome young man jerked the card free from the display and tossed it onto the bed and left.

  The card read, "Best Wishes for a Speedy Recovery. Fraternal Order of Police."

  Officer Payne was surprised at how much the gesture touched him.

  There was no question about it now, hecould feel the beating of his heart in his calf.