But, he’d decided, even if she was not aware of what had happened, he really had no idea of what he could say to her right now. She had stated her case beyond question. And he simply did not want to think about it, let alone attempt talking about it. The whole thing was still too fresh—and left a gnawing ache in his stomach at least as painful as the damn bullet wound.
—
The overhead signage for Exit 7 to I-476 North came into view as he was thinking about how Mason Morgan had called into question John Tyler Austin’s character, particularly describing him as a con artist.
It’ll be interesting what that background folder on Austin has in it. And if any of it matches what we come up with.
Payne signaled to change lanes, then glanced over his right shoulder and finally found an opening and merged and made the exit.
His phone rang and he saw his private-number caller ID pop up on the multifunction screen in the dash. It announced that it was the bursar’s office at Temple University.
Wonder how they got my number?
But apparently someone at Temple has put two and two together.
He tapped the on-screen prompt, sending the caller into voice mail.
Within the last month, after learning that he was going to become a father, Payne had quietly established academic scholarships in the name of his biological father, Sergeant John F. X. Moffitt, and his uncle, Captain Richard C. “Dutch” Moffitt.
The scholarships were made available to members in the Philadelphia Police Explorer Cadets Program, a coed, career-oriented arm of the Boy Scouts of America, who were studying criminal justice at La Salle University and, a couple miles south, at Temple University and Community College of Philadelphia.
The scholarships were fairly modest—he planned to add to them over time—but, depending on the school, they covered the cost of one or more courses.
Matt wanted no recognition for their creation and funding. Having taken the surname of Payne certainly aided that. Matt, of course, had never known his father, and a selfless Brewster Payne had adopted him, then reared him as his own. Accordingly, when the topic came up, Matt invariably became somewhat emotional, and would say that he had the great honor of having two fathers.
Matt’s motive for the scholarships had been to help those wanting to serve the public. But perhaps more important personally, it had been to please, in some small way, Mother Moffitt, his sharply opinionated Irish-Catholic grandmother.
Still, being realistic, he deeply doubted the latter would ever happen. He knew that good ol’ Gertrude had never gotten over her daughter-in-law’s remarrying after her son Jack had been killed in the line of duty and then—what Mother Moffitt really considered a mortal sin and told anyone she could get to listen—changing her grandson Matty’s surname and then bringing him up as an Episcopalian.
Once her mind’s made up, Payne thought, damn-near nothing can sway that tough old Irish broad.
Maybe that’s where I acquired such a fine quality . . .
—
After turning off Interstate 476 at Exit 3, he eased the stick shift of the Porsche into third gear and then, after the vehicle bled off sufficient speed, down into second.
Payne, long before getting his first 911 as a college graduation gift, and then cutting hot laps on a track with a professional race driver in the passenger seat coaching him, had heard the old-school argument about whether it was better to slow a vehicle equipped with a manual transmission by a smooth combination of downshifting and braking or by utilizing the brakes alone.
Replacing worn-out brake pads certainly was cheaper than replacing clutches. But he didn’t give a damn. He knew that the 911 really responded with the downshifts, especially in tight, fast turns, which was why professional drivers employed both braking and downshifting.
And he admitted that he also liked how it sounded.
The exhaust made as nice a deep powerful note during downshifts as when he ran up through the gears, pushing the tachometer toward redline, which he was doing now as he headed down U.S. 1, which forever had been called the Baltimore Pike, toward Media.
A mile later, he downshifted and braked again to make a left onto Pennsylvania Route 252. And, finally, after a couple miles on that narrow two-lane, also known as Providence Road, he entered the small Philadelphia suburb of Wallingford.
While somewhat close to the Main Line, Wallingford technically was not part of the well-known upper-crust area, which derived its name in the nineteenth century from the Pennsylvania Railroad Main Line. That rail line, now long gone, had connected the towns incorporating the sprawling country estates that belonged to Philly’s wealthiest families.
The present-day median income of Main Line residents was the same as that of residents of Beverly Hills, California. Similarly, sociologists would categorize those who lived in Wallingford as upper middle income, upper income, and wealthy, living in separate dwellings, some of which were very old, with many of the newer ones designed to look that way. Wallingford also had its own post office and railroad station and Free Library.
The residences were set well back from Providence Road. The two-lane macadam was lined closely with tall, overgrown pine trees that, while beautiful, made for blind driveways. And with the entrance to the Payne property coming up on the right, Matt, out of long-established habit, first hit his turn signal and checked mirrors for traffic—he couldn’t count the many times he almost had been rear-ended by someone flying up on his bumper—and only then downshifted and applied the brakes.
He made the turn without incident. And after following the winding, crushed-stone drive through the four-acre property, the house came into view.
The property had been in the Payne family for more than two centuries. Brewster Cortland Payne II, Esquire, had raised his family, now grown and gone, in the large, rambling structure. What had been the original house, built of fieldstone before the Revolution, was now the kitchen and the sewing room. Additions and modifications had been made over the many years. While the result could fit no specific architectural category, it was comfortable, even luxurious.
A real estate saleswoman had once remarked that “the Payne place just looked like old, old money.”
Yet it was not ostentatious—there was no tennis court and no swimming pool, as the Payne family used those facilities at the Rose Tree Hunt Club, where they also rode.
They did have a tennis court at the Cape May summerhouse on the southern tip of the Jersey Shore, as well as a dock that eventually would hold Brewster Payne’s Final Tort VI, a Viking sportfisherman yacht that Matt was planning on eventually ferrying up from the Florida Keys.
Approaching the house, Payne saw two late-model GMC Yukon XLs, parked short of what a century before had been a stable and now was a four-car garage.
Both enormous SUVs originally had been purchased new by their father. The newest one, looking as if it had just come off the showroom floor, was still his. The two-year-old model, which also had been in pristine condition when Brewster had given it to his daughter, now was somewhat battered. It had been parked at an odd angle, its right tires up on the grass alongside the cobblestoned parking area.
Dr. Amelia A. Payne’s inability to conduct a motor vehicle over the roads of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania without at least grazing, on average once a week, other motor vehicles, street signs, and, on one memorable occasion, a fire hydrant, was legendary. Brewster had hoped that the big truck would keep Amy alive.
Matt shook his head—and parked his Porsche at the farthest possible spot away from her vehicle.
[ THREE ]
After crossing the big patio of old red brick and entering the house through a back door, he could hear his sister and mother talking in the kitchen. He found them both holding large coffee mugs and standing at opposite ends of a four-foot-square butcher-block island loaded with the makings for hoagie sandwiches.
She was trim and youthful, with the fair skin of the Irish, and looked to be in her early forties when, in fact, she was a decade older. In recent years, she had changed her luxuriant head of reddish brown hair to blonde.
Matt quickly walked to the island and, after she raised her cheek, gave her a kiss. At the same time, he reached down and took a slice of salami from the butcher block. He folded it, then stuffed it in his mouth, while waving in an exaggerated fashion at his sister.
“I wasn’t sure you’d find time in your busy schedule for us,” Amy said. “Clearly, you couldn’t find the time to shave.”
“Don’t start, you two,” Patricia Payne protested. “You’re starting to sound like Mother Moffitt.”
Amy Payne, petite and intense and approaching thirty, while not a pretty girl, was rather naturally attractive. She kept her brown hair snipped short, not for purposes of beauty but because it was easier to care for that way.
She was unusually intelligent, having shortly after turning age twenty-two had a psychiatric residency under the mentorship of Dr. Aaron Stein, head of the school of psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania and former president of the American Psychiatric Association. Many strongly suspected that Dr. Stein, who was short and plump and in his fifties—Brewster Payne described him as looking like a beardless Santa Claus—was responsible for Dr. Payne’s current professorship at UPenn.
“So, Sigmund,” Matt replied, after swallowing the cold cut, “did you actually park your truck out there or give up and desert it?”
Dr. Payne gave him the finger.
Their mother pretended not to notice that, instead asking, “How’s your wound healing, honey? Does it still hurt?”
“Only when I breathe.”
“That’s not funny,” Amy said. “You could be dead.”
“I just learned,” Matt said, “that having dodged the Grim Reaper, I pissed off more than a few guys waiting on the promotion list. They thought that with the demise of the Wyatt Earp of the Main Line, there suddenly was about to be a sergeant’s slot opening.”
“And that’s really not funny, Matt,” his mother snapped.
Matt avoided her eyes and reached in the refrigerator. He came out with a bottle of Newcastle Nut Brown Ale.
“It’s a little early for that, isn’t it?” Amy said.
He held the bottle so that the lip of the cap was on the edge of the stainless steel counter. He then bumped the cap with the heel of his hand, catching it as it flew up off the neck.
“For medicinal purposes, Doc,” Matt said, smiled, then raised it toward her in a mock toast before taking a big swallow.
“Amy said she saw you on the early-morning news,” Patricia Payne said. “What was that all about?”
“Nothing good. But it’s why I needed to see Amy.”
“So, let’s hear it,” Amy said.
“Okay. I’ll try to keep this brief. Yesterday, as I was pulling into The Rittenhouse to see about leasing a unit that just came on the market . . .”
—
When he had finished five minutes later, Patricia Payne said, softly, “How absolutely horrible! Such a beautiful woman. And, from what I’ve heard, I mean that inside and out.”
“Well,” Matt said, “I cannot disagree with that. Everyone seems to say she meant well. Even her brother concedes it. But, apparently, the inside of her head had some real problems. Her brother said she fought mental demons forever. All the trips to rehab turned out to be little more than Band-Aids.”
He looked at Amy. She was refilling her coffee mug.
“So, Sigmund, what do you make of it?”
“Interesting that you bring up Freud,” Amy then said. “Erik Erikson, a well-regarded psychoanalyst, credits Freud for having said that for a person to have a healthy mental being, to be happy, there must be lieben und arbeiten—to love and to work.”
“I seem to recall he also said, ‘Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.’”
“Bipolar is very real,” Amy, ignoring that crack, went on. “And, tragically, it is quite common. How much do you want to hear?”
“Whatever you got, Doc,” he said, rolling his hand in a gesture for her to go on.
She sipped her coffee, clearly in thought, then nodded.
“What’s known as mania,” she began, “defines the disorder, and the mildest level is hypomania. Those with it tend to have lots of energy. They excite easily. Yet it can also make them highly productive. As the level of mental illness gets worse, the behavior becomes impulsive. Bad decisions are made. They’re erratic. They don’t sleep. When it gets really bad, they can become psychotic—their world is distorted.”
“Jesus,” Matt said, then took a swig of his beer.
“It’s not pretty,” Amy said. “There is no consensus on how many types exist, but there are three main subtypes, and another one that is a catchall for everyone not fitting the first three. Then there are other mental components that can complicate a bipolar description, from schizophrenia to borderline personality disorder.”
“I heard Morgan say that the lithium helped—when Camilla Rose actually took her meds.”
“A mood stabilizer is needed, and lithium has been found to be most effective. Depending on the severity of the symptoms, an antipsychotic drug can be used—for example, to help severe behavior problems.”
She paused to sip her coffee, then went on. “The real problem is that despite how effectively we can diagnose the condition and create a treatment using a combination of psychotherapy and medication, the patient often chooses not to follow through.”
“Like Camilla Rose,” Matt said. “They stop taking their meds and skip their support group meetings. And self-medicate?”
“Yeah,” she said, nodding. “And what’s referred to as the true mania, a step worse than hypomania, can run for about a week, or even months. It simply varies from person to person. It’s a kind of euphoria, during which they’re prone to substance abuse. They speak quickly, their thoughts race, they focus really heavily on goals, and they engage in hypersexuality and other types of high-risk behavior . . .”
Payne, sipping his beer, felt his throat close involuntarily. He coughed, and a small amount of beer sprayed from his lips.
I’ll be damned! Is that why she was trying to seduce me?
Amy stopped and shook her head.
“And,” she then went on, “sometimes they attempt suicide.”
“Camilla Rose didn’t seem depressed, Amy,” he said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “Now that you describe it, I saw the mania. But no sadness.”
“Matt, people mask the disease. They spend their whole lives knowing they’re different. They’re self-conscious about it. So they are very practiced at masking it, hiding it, from others. They also tend to gravitate to one another; there’s a real comfort being among their own kind.”
Which, Matt thought, if he’s also got it, maybe would explain her having Austin around?
“At higher levels,” Amy said, “they become delusional.”
“As in, they believe the green meemies are coming for them?”
“Yeah. And not only believe it but think they see it. They sometimes hallucinate. It’s terrifying for them. Then after the manic episode comes the depressive episode.”
“The mood swing,” Matt said, making it a question.
“Yeah. And that’s pretty much the layman’s version. It’s a treatable disease, but one of the biggest challenges is that the meds reduce the highs and lows to a mild middle ground. I’ve had plenty of patients say they don’t like the ‘dull’ feeling and would rather deal with the lows—meaning, self-medicate—but especially the highs.”
Matt nodded.
“I can see that,” he said, then took a swig of beer. “Cheer
s to self-medicating.”
Amy made a sour face.
“There’s a lot more,” she said, “but I already see your eyes are starting to glaze over.”
Amy then motioned toward him with her coffee mug.
“How about we talk about you now?” she said.
“Amy,” Patricia Payne said, softly.
“And what about me?” Matt said, his tone defensive. “Do you ever take a break from constantly analyzing people?”
“If you have this burning desire to stay a cop,” Amy said, “why don’t you figure out a position where you are not getting shot at?”
“That’s not the way it works, Siggie. And you should know that. You have to work your way up the line, spending time in grade and taking the exam for a higher slot that may—or may not—be open.” He paused, glared at her for a moment, then added, “Take Jason Washington. After the results of the sergeants exam, the lieutenants and captains results were released. Jason was at the top—not just in the top five but number one for captain. But there are no openings. Zero. So he just waits until some captain retires or gets—”
“Don’t say it, wiseass,” Amy interrupted.
“Promoted was what I was going to say,” Matt finished. “White shirts at that level generally don’t take bullets unless it’s from a jealous lover or the lover’s angry husband. Anyway, if nothing opens in two years, the whole process starts anew, beginning with retaking the exam. Rinse and repeat. And wait.”
“You would think they would create an opening for Jason,” Patricia Payne said, thoughtfully. “Such a brilliant man. But—”
“But there’s no money, Mom,” Matt put in. “The city council keeps cutting the department’s budget.”
“But as I was going to say before being so very rudely interrupted by my son . . .”
“Sorry,” Matt said, shrugging.
“. . . I would suggest that it’s also as much about politics as it is about money. At least, that’s what Denny and Jack would always say.”
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