Men In Blue boh-1

by W. E. B Griffin

  Her function, she had once told her husband, was to serve as sort of a traffic cop, offering, and barring, entrance to the attention, either in person or on the phone, of her bosses. Their time was valuable, and it was her job to see that it was not wasted.

  She was very good at her job, and although it was a secret between them, she brought home more money than did her husband, who worked for the Prudential Insurance Company.

  When she came to work, at her ritual time of 8:45, fifteen minutes before the business day actually began, she was surprised to see the colonel's office door open. Colonel J. Dunlop Mawson rarely appeared before ten, or ten-thirty. She went into his office. He wasn't there, but there was evidence that he had been.

  There were cigarettes in his ashtray; two cardboard coffee containers from the machine way down the hall by the typists' pool; and crumpled paper in his wastebasket. The colonel's leather-framed doodle pad was covered with triangles, stars, a setting sun, and a multidigit telephone number Mrs. Craig recognized from the prefix to be one in London, England.

  Mrs. Craig retrieved the crumpled paper from the wastebasket, unfolded it, and read it. There were names on it:Louise Button, Lt. DelRaye, Insp. Wohl (Wall?), and, underlined,Stanford Fortner Wells III. There was an address,6 Stockton Place, and several telephone numbers, none of which Mrs. Craig recognized. And then she remembered that Stanford Fortner Wells III had something to do with newspapers; what, exactly, she couldn't recall.

  She dumped the contents of the ashtray in the waste-basket, added the cardboard coffee containers, and then carried it outside and dumped it in her own wastebasket. Then she went to the smaller office where her assistants worked and started the coffee machine. That was for her. She liked a cup of coffee to begin the day, and sometimes Mr. Payne came in wanting a cup.

  Colonel J. Dunlop Mawson came in the office at ten past nine, smiled at her, and asked if Mr. Payne was in.

  "Not yet, any minute," she said.

  "Let me know the minute he does, will you please? And could you get me a cup of coffee?"

  He went in his office, and as she went to fetch the coffee, she saw him go to the window of his office that gave a view of Market Street down to the river and stand, with his hands on his hips, as if he was mad at something, looking out.

  Brewster Cortland Payne II came into her office as she was carrying a cup of coffee, with two envelopes of saccharin and a spoon on the saucer across it to the colonel's office.

  "Good morning," Brewster Payne said, with a nod and a smile. He was a tall and thin, almost skinny, man wearing a single-breasted vested gray suit, a subdued necktie, and black shoes. Yet there was something, an air of authority and wisdom, Mrs. Craig knew, that made people look at him in a crowd. He looked, she thought, like what a successful attorney should look like. Sometimes, especially when she was annoyed with him, the colonel didn't look that way to her.

  "Good morning," she said. "He asked me to let him know the minute you came in." Brewster Payne's face registered amused surprise.

  "Do you think he is annoyed that I'm a little late?" he asked, and added: "I would be grateful for some coffee myself."

  "Here," Mrs. Craig said, handing him the cup and saucer. "Tell him I' m getting his."

  When she delivered the coffee, Brewster Payne was sprawled on the colonel's red leather couch, his long legs stretched out in front of him, balancing his coffee on his stomach. The colonel was standing beside his desk. When she handed him the coffee, he gave her an absent smile and set it down on the desk.

  Mrs. Craig left, closing the door after her. There was someone new in the outer office.

  "Hello, Matt," she said. She liked Matt Payne, thought that he was a really handsome, and more important,nice young man. She liked the way he smiled.

  "Good morning, Mrs. Craig," he said, and then blurted: "Is there any chance I could see him this morning? He doesn't expect me, but…"

  "He's in with the colonel," she said. "I don't know how long they'll be."

  "I think this was a bad idea," Matt said.

  "Don't be silly. Sit down, I'll get you some coffee."

  "You're sure?"

  "Positive."

  He was enormously relieved, Mrs. Craig saw, and was glad that she had insisted that he stay, even though it would delay the morning's schedule by fifteen minutes or more. Fifteen minutes, plus however long the colonel and Mr. Payne were in the colonel's office.

  ****

  Louise Dutton came out of the bathroom wearing Peter's bathrobe. It hung loosely on her but even in the dim light, he could see the imprint of her nipples. He thought she looked incredibly appealing.

  She walked across the bedroom to the bed, looked down at Peter a moment, and then sat down on the bed.

  "Well," she said. "Look who woke up."

  "I wasn't asleep, Delilah," he said. "I watched you get out of bed."

  "Delilah?"

  "I never really thought she rendered Samson helpless by giving him ahaircut," Peter said. "That was the edited-for-children version."

  "You Samson"-she chuckled-"me Delilah?"

  "And as soon as I get my strength back, I'll tear the temple down," Peter said. "Actually, what I have to do is face the dragon in his lair."

  "Now I'm the dragon? The dragon lady?"

  "I was referring to Chief Inspector Matt Lowenstein, our beloved chief of detectives," Wohl said. He reached to his right, away from her, and took his wristwatch from the bedside table. He glanced at it, strapped it on, and said, "I've got to see how the Nelson investigation is going, and then go see Arthur J. Nelson. I'm late now."

  "Then why aren't you out of bed, getting dressed?" she asked.

  He held his arms out, and she came into them. He kissed the top of her head.

  She purred, "Nice."

  "I wasn't sure you would like me to do that," he said, her face against his chest.

  "Why not?"

  "It'safter, " Peter said. "Women have been known to regret a moment of passion."

  "I was afraid when I came back in here, you would be all dressed and ready to leave," she said. "Because it'safter."

  He laughed, and pulled his head back so that he could look at her face.

  "Wham, bam, thank you, ma'am?" he asked.

  "You're the type, Peter," she said.

  "You like this better?"

  "Much better," she said.

  "Blow in my ear, and the world is yours," he said.

  She giggled and kissed his chest.

  "There's no small voice of reason in the back of your mind sending up an alarm?" she asked." 'What am I getting myself into with this crazy lady?' "

  "What the small voice of reason is asking is, 'What happens when she realizes what she's done? The TV Lady and the Cop?' "

  "That would seem to suggest there was more for you in what happened than one more notch on your gun." Louise said.

  "If I wasn't afraid it would trigger one of your smartass replies, I would tell you it's never been that way for me before," Peter said.

  She pushed herself into a sitting position and looked down at him.

  "For me, either," she said. "I mean, really, I had to ask you."

  "Oh, come on," he said.

  "Yes, I did," she said. "And that suggests the possibility that I'm queer for cops. What do they call those pathetic little girls who chase the bands around?'Groupies'? Maybe I'm a cop groupie."

  "This is what I was afraid of," Peter said. "That you would start thinking."

  "Why shouldn't I think?"

  "Because if you do, sure as Christ made little apples, you'll come up with some good excuse to cut it off between us."

  "Maybe that would be best, in the long run," she said.

  "Not for me, it wouldn't," he said.

  " 'He said, with finality,' " Louise said. "Why do you say that, Peter? So… With such finality?"

  "I told you before, it was never that way for me. before," Peter said.

  "You don't think that might be becau
se you saw a friend of yours slumped dead against the wall of a diner yesterday afternoon? That sort of thing would tend, I would suppose, to excite the emotions. Or that I might be at a high emotional peak myself? I was there, too, not to mention poor little Jerome?"

  "I don't give a damn what caused it, all I know is how I feel about what happened," Peter said. "I gather this is not what they call a reciprocal emotion?"

  "I didn't say that," Louise said quickly. "Jesus Christ, Peter, I didn't know you existed this time yesterday!" she said. "What do you expect from me?"

  He shrugged.

  She looked into his eyes for a long moment. "So where does that leave us? Where do we go from here?"

  "How would you react to a suggestion that it's a little warm in here, and you would probably be more comfortable if you took the robe off?"

  "I was hoping you would ask," she said.

  ****

  "Where the hell have you been?" Leonard Cohen demanded of Louise Dutton when she walked into the WCBL-TV newsroom. "I called all over, looking for you."

  "I was a little upset, Leonard," Louise said. "I can't imagine why. I mean, why should something unimportant like walking into a room and finding someone you knew and liked hacked up like… I can't think of a metaphor- hacked up?"

  "It was a story, Lou," Cohen said.

  She glared at him, her eyebrows raised in contempt, her eyes icy.

  "It was pretty bad, huh?" he said, backing down.

  "Yes, it was."

  "What I would like to do, Lou," he said, "is open the news at six by having Barton interview you. Nothing formal, you understand; he would just turn to you and say something like, 'Mr. Nelson lived in your apartment building, didn't he, Louise?' and then you would come back with, 'Yes, and I found the body.' "

  "Fuck you, Leonard," Louise said.

  He just looked at her.

  "For Christ's sake," she said. "The address has been in the papers

  …"

  "And so has your name," he countered.

  "I've seen the papers," she said. "There must be ten Louise Duttons in the phone book, and none of the papers I saw made the connection between me and here. If it is made, every creepy-crawly in Philadelphia, including, probably, the animals who killed that poor little man, will come out of the woodwork looking for me."

  "Why should that bother you? Aren't you under police protection?"

  "What does that mean?"

  "Just what it sounded like. I called the Homicide guy, DelRaye, Lieutenant DelRaye, when I couldn't find you, and he said that I would have to talk to Inspector Wohl, that Wohl was 'taking care of you.' "

  "I am not under police protection," she said, evenly. "I'll tell you what I will do, Leonard. I'll look at what you have on tape, and if there's anything there that makes it worthwhile, I'll do a voice-over. But I am not going to chat pleasantly with Barton Ellison about it on camera."

  "Okay," Leonard Cohen replied. "Thank you ever so much. Your dedication to journalism touches me deeply. Who's Wohl?"

  "He's a cop. He's a friend of mine. He's a nice guy," Louise said.

  "He's the youngest staff inspector in the police department," Cohen said. "He was also the youngest captain. His father is a retired chief inspector, which may or may not have had something to do with his being the youngest captain and staff inspector. What he usually does is investigate corruption in high places. He put the head of the plumber's local, two fairly important Mafiosi, and the director of the Housing Authority in the pokey just before you came to town."

  She looked at him, her eyebrows raised again.

  "Very bright young man," Cohen went on. "He normally doesn't schmooze people. I'm sure, you being a professional journalist and all, that you have considered the police department may have a reason for assigning an attractive young bachelor to schmooze you."

  "You find him attractive, Leonard, is that what you're saying?" Louise asked innocently. "I'll have to tell him."

  His lips tightened momentarily, but he didn't back off.

  "You're going to see him again, huh?"

  "Oh, God, Leonard, I hope so," Louise said. "He's absolutely marvelous in the sack!" She waited until his eyes widened. "Put that in your file, too, why don't you?" she added, and then walked away.

  TEN

  Colonel J. Dunlop Mawson was sitting on the sill of a wall of windows that provided a view of lower Market Street, the Delaware River and the bridge to New Jersey.

  "So, I went down to Homicide," he said, nearing the end of his story, "and finally got to meet Miss Wells, also known as Dutton."

  "Where had she been?" Brewster Payne asked. Mawson had aroused his curiosity. Through the entire recital of having been given a runaround by the police, and the gory details of the brutal murder of Jerome Nelson, he had not been able to guess why Mawson was telling it all to him.

  "She wouldn't tell me," Mawson said. "She's a very feisty young woman, Brewster. I think she was on the edge of telling me to butt out."

  "How extraordinary," Payne said, dryly, "that she would even consider refusing the services of 'Philadelphia's most distinguished practitioner of criminal law.'"

  "I knew damned well I made a mistake telling you that," Mawson said. "Now I'll never hear the end of it."

  "Probably not," Payne agreed.

  "I have an interesting theory," Mawson said, "that she spent the night with the cop."

  "Miss Dutton? And which cop would that be, Mawson?" Payne asked.

  "Inspector Wohl," Mawson said. "He took her away from the apartment, and then he brought her in in the morning."

  "I thought, for a moment, that you were suggesting there was something romantic, or whatever, between them," Payne said.

  "That's exactly what I'm suggesting," Mawson said. "He's not what comes to mind when you say 'cop.' Or 'inspector.' For one thing he's young, and very bright, and well dressed…polished if you take my meaning."

  "Perhaps they're friends," Payne said. "When he heard what had happened, he came to be a friend."

  "She doesn't look at him like he's a friend," Mawson insisted, "and unless Czernick is still playing games with me, he didn't even know her until yesterday. According to Czernick, he assigned him to the Wells/Dutton girl to make sure she was treated with the appropriate kid gloves for a TV anchorwoman."

  "I don't know where you're going, I'm afraid," Payne said.

  "Just file that away as a wild card," Mawson said. "Let me finish."

  "Please do," Payne said.

  "So, after she signed her statement, and she rode off into the sunrise with this Wohl fellow, I came here and put in a call to Wells in London. He wasn't there. But he left a message for me. Delivered with the snotty arrogance that only the English can manage. Mr. Wells is on board British Caledonian Airways Flight 419 to New York, and ' would be quite grateful if I could make myself available to him immee-jut-ly on his arrival at Philadelphia.' "

  "Philadelphia?" Payne asked, smiling. Mawson's mimicry of an upperclass British accent was quite good. "Does British Caledonian fly into here?"

  "No, they don't. I asked the snotty Englishman the same question. He said, he 'raw-ther doubted it. What Mr. Wells has done is shed-yule a helicopter to meet the British Caledonian air-crawft in New York, don' t you see? To take him from New York to Philadelphia.' "

  Payne set his coffee cup on the end table beside the couch.

  "You're really very good at that," he said, chuckling. "So you're going to meet him at the airport here?"

  Mawson hesitated, started to reply, and then stopped.

  "Okay," Brewster Payne said. "So that's the other question."

  "I don't like being summoned like an errand boy," Mawson said. "But on the other hand, Stanford Fortner Wells is Wells Newspapers, and there-"

  "Is a certain potential, for the future," Payne filled in for him. " If he had counsel in Philadelphia, he would have called them."

  "Exactly."

  "We could send one of our bright young men to the
airport with a limousine," Payne said, "to take Mr. Wells either here, to see you, or to a suite which we have reserved for him in the… what about the Warwick?… where you will attend him the moment your very busy schedule-shed-yule-permits."

  "Good show!" Mawson said. "Raw-ther! Quite! I knew I could count on you, old boy, in this sticky wicket."

  Payne chuckled.

  "You said 'the other question', Brewster," Mawson said.

  "What, if anything, you should say to Mr. Wells about where his daughter was when you couldn't find her, and more specifically, how much, if at all, of your suspicions regarding Inspector Wall-"

  "Wohl. Double-U Oh Aitch Ell," Mawson interrupted.

  "Wohl," Payne went on. "And his possibly lewd and carnal relationship with his daughter."

  "Okay. Tell me."

  "Nothing, if you're asking my advice."

  "I thought it might show how bright and clever we are to find that out so soon," Mawson said.

  "No father, Mawson, wants to hear from a stranger that his daughter is not as innocent as he would like to believe she is."

  Mawson laughed.

  "You're right, Brewster," he said. He walked to the door and opened it. "Irene, would you ask Mr. Fengler to come over, please? And tell him to clear his schedule for the rest of the day? And then reserve agood suite at the Warwick, billing to us, for Mr. Stanford Fortner Wells? And finally, call that limousine service and have them send one over, to park in our garage? And tell them I would be very grateful if it was clean, and not just back from a funeral?"

  "Yes, sir," she said, smiling.

  "Hello, Matt," Mawson said. "How are you?"

  "Morning, Colonel," Matt said. "I was hoping to see Dad."

  "Having just solved all the world's problems, he's available for yours," Mawson said, and turned to Brewster Payne. "Mart's waiting for you."

  "I'll be damned," Payne said, and got up from the couch. "I wonder what's on his mind?"

  He had, in fact, been expecting to see Matt, or at least to have him telephone. He had heard from Matt's mother how awkward it had been at the Moffitt home, and later at the funeral home, making the senseless death of Matt's uncle even more difficult for him. He had half expected Matt to come out to Wallingford last night, and, disappointed that he hadn't, had considered calling him. In the end he had decided that it would be best if Matt came to him, as he felt sure he would, in his own good time.