Investigators

by W. E. B Griffin

  “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 identified 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,” Deitric
h 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.”

  THIRTEEN

  Matt was in the shower when the telephone rang, and walked, dripping, to the telephone, wondering both who was calling him and why he had bothered to wrap a towel around his waist when he was alone in the suite.

  “Hello?”

  “It took you long enough to answer the phone,” Peter Wohl said.

  “There’s no phone in the shower,” Matt said.

  “Denny Coughlin suggested I call you,” Wohl began. “Actually, he suggested I talk to you when you checked in. According to Weisbach, you haven’t found time in your busy schedule to do that.”

  “I checked in with Jason Washington the minute I got to the hotel. What’s up? Some—”

  “Washington didn’t say anything to me,” Wohl said, just a shade defensively.