“No. What did he think?”
“He thought I was a call girl.”
“Don’t be silly.”
“I’m not being silly. He as much as accused me in the elevator. And why not? Who else would be going to a bachelor apartment at this hour?”
“A friend,” Matt said.
“God, I’m sorry I ever got started on this!”
“I’m not.”
“I meant it, Matt, when I said I’m here as a friend.”
“Absolutely. I know that.”
She met his eyes, and then quickly averted hers.
“Do you know how to warm up a hamburger?” Matt asked. “I put the coffee in a pot, and we can heat that. But the hamburgers are cold.”
“You put the meat patty in a frying pan,” Amanda said. “You have a frying pan?” He nodded. “And—you said french fries?” Matt nodded again. “You put french fries in the oven.”
“I’ve got one of those, too,” Matt said.
“Good,” she said. “Show me.”
“I’m glad you came,” Matt said. “Thank you.”
“Just as long as you understand why I came,” she said. “OK?”
“Absolutely. I told you that.”
She went in the kitchen. He turned the oven on and handed her a frying pan.
When she bent over to put the french fries in the oven, he looked down her blouse and told himself he was really a sonofabitch.
When she stood up, he could tell by the look in her eyes that she knew he had looked down her blouse.
He backed two steps away from her and smiled uneasily.
“If anybody finds out I came here,” Amanda said, “they wouldn’t understand.”
“Nobody will ever find out,” Matt said. He held up three fingers in the Boy Scout salute. “Scout’s Honor.”
“Oh, God,” Amanda groaned.
“Bad joke,” he said. “Sorry.”
“And they would, of course, be right,” Amanda said. “Oh, hell! ‘In for a penny’—oh, God!—‘in for a pound.’”
“Excuse me?”
“You know what my reaction was when I heard Penny was dead?”
“What?”
“Thank God. She was going to suck Matt dry and ruin his life.” She looked intently at his face, then moaned. “Oh, God, I shouldn’t have told you!”
“Isn’t that why you came here, to tell me that? Amanda, that’s really—decent—of you. And it really took balls.”
“Balls?” she parroted, gently mocking.
“It took courage,” he corrected himself. “But you’re not the only one who felt that way. Penny…Penny apparently did not enjoy the universal approval of my friends. Half a dozen people told me exactly, or paraphrased, what you just did.”
“That’s not why I came,” Amanda said. “I wanted to be with you.”
“You’re a good friend,” Matt said.
She met his eyes, then looked away, and then met them again.
“Maybe that, too,” Amanda said softly.
“Jesus, Amanda.”
“Does that come as such a surprise? Am I making as much of a fool of myself as I think I am?”
He reached out and touched her cheek with his fingers.
She moved her head away and looked to the side.
“For God’s sake, don’t feel sorry for me,” she said.
“What I’m doing is wondering what would happen if I tried to put my arms around you.”
She turned her face to look at him. She looked into his eyes for a long moment.
“Why don’t you try it and find out?” Amanda asked.
SEVENTEEN
Matt Payne rolled over in bed, grabbed the telephone on the bedside table, and snarled, “Hello.”
“Good morning,” Amanda Spencer said, a chuckle in her voice. “Somehow I thought you’d be in a better mood than you sound like.”Still half asleep, Matt turned and looked in confusion at where he expected Amanda to be, lying beside him. He was obviously alone in his bed.
“Where are you?”
“Thirtieth Street Station,” she said.
“Why?”
“You have to come here to get on a train.”
“Jesus H. Christ!”
“I have a job, Matt.”
“Call in and tell them you were run over by a truck.”
“It was something like that, wasn’t it? How do you feel this morning?”
“Right now, desolate.”
She chuckled again.
“Don’t call me, Matt. I’ll call you.”
“Did I do something wrong?”
“This is what I think they call the cold, cruel light of day,” Amanda said. “I need some time to think.”
“Second thoughts, you mean? Morning-after regrets?”
“I said I need some time to think. But no regrets.”
“Me either,” he said.
He was now fully awake. He picked his watch up from the bedside table. It was ten past eight.
“You could have said something,” he said, somewhat petulantly.
“I’m saying it now,” Amanda said. “I have a job, I have to go to work, and I need some time to think.”
“Damn!”
“If it makes you feel any better, I didn’t really want to leave. But it was the sensible thing to do.”
“Screw sensible.”
“Have you got any morning-after regrets?”
“I’m still in shock, but no regrets.”
“We both got a little carried away last night.”
“Anything wrong with that?”
“That’s what I want to think about,” Amanda said. “I’ll call you, Matt. Don’t call me.”
The phone went dead in his ear.
“Damn!”
“Push the damned button, Matt,” Inspector Peter Wohl said into the microphone beside Detective Payne’s doorbell. “The Wachenhut guy told me he knows you’re up there.”A moment later the solenoid buzzed, and Wohl pushed the door open and started up the narrow flight of stairs.
“I didn’t know who it was,” Matt said from the head of the stairs. He was wearing khaki trousers, a gray, battered University of Pennsylvania sweatshirt, and was obviously fresh from the shower.
He looks more than a little sleepy, Peter thought. Probably still feeling the pill Amy gave him.
“How are you doing?”
“I was just about to go out and get some breakfast.”
“Not necessary,” Wohl said, handing him a large kraft paper bag. “Never let it be said that I do not take care of my underlings.”
Matt sniffed it.
“Smells great. What is it?”
“Western omelet, bagels, orange juice, and coffee.”
“Thank you, Peter,” Matt said.
“I expected to find you still in bed,” Wohl said.
“Huh?”
“Amy said that the pill she gave you…” Wohl stopped. He had followed Matt into the kitchen and seen the stack of Forms 75-49. “What’s this?”
“75-49s on the Inferno job,” Matt said. “Milham told me to read them.”
“When did you see Milham?”
“Last night. Early this morning. I went over there—”
“You didn’t take Amy’s pill?” Wohl asked, but it was a statement rather than a question.
“No, I didn’t,” Matt confessed. “I had a couple of drinks here, decided going to the FOP was a good idea, started out for there, changed my mind, and went to Homicide.”
“Why?” Wohl asked, a tone of exasperation in his voice.
“At the time it seemed like a good idea,” Matt said.
Wohl reached into his jacket pocket and came out with an interoffice memorandum. He handed it to Matt.
“One of the reasons I came here was to show you this. I guess you’ve seen it.”
Matt glanced at it.
“Yeah. Milham had a copy.”
“Lowenstein sent me one,” Wohl said, taking the memorandum back and then crumpling it in his f
ist. He looked around, remembered the garbage can was under the sink, and went to it and dropped the memorandum in it.
“For some reason, I’m not sore at you,” Wohl said. “I think I should be.”
“I didn’t want that damned pill,” Matt said.
“That, I understand. But you shouldn’t have gone to Homicide until I sent you.”
“Sorry,” Matt said.
“Oh, hell, I’d have probably done the same thing myself,” Wohl said. “Unwrap the omelets.”
“Lieutenant Natali was very nice to me,” Matt said.
“Natali’s a nice fellow,” Wohl said. “Where’s your cups? I hate coffee in a paper cup.”
“In the cabinet.”
“Are you really all right? Amy thinks you’re still in what she calls a condition called ‘grief shock.’”
“Amy’s a nice girl,” Matt said, gently mocking. “But what I’m in is a condition called ‘Oh, what a sonofabitch you are, Matt Payne.’”
“I told you, what Penny did to herself wasn’t your fault.”
“Somebody came to see me last night,” Matt said. “To comfort me in my condition of grief shock.”
“Somebody, I gather from the tone of your voice, female. And?”
“She comforted me,” Matt said.
Wohl looked at him to make sure he had correctly interpreted what he had said.
“Who?”
“I don’t think I want to tell you.”
“Nice kind of girl, or the other?”
“Very nice kind of girl.”
“Good for you,” Wohl said. “But I don’t think I’d tell Amy.”
“I’ve been trying to wallow in guilt, but I don’t seem to be able to.”
“What’s in it for the girl?”
“I just think she was being nice. Maybe a little more.”
“The one from New York? Amanda, something like that?”
“Jesus Christ!”
“I saw her looking at you at Martha Peebles’s.”
“I didn’t see her at Martha Peebles’s.”
“I repeat, good for you, Matt. Don’t wallow in guilt.”
The door buzzer sounded.
Matt looked surprised.
“Detective McFadden, I’ll bet,” Wohl said. “Here to comfort you in your condition of grief shock, with firm orders to keep you off the sauce.”
“You really do take care of me, don’t you?” Matt asked.
“Somebody has to, or the first thing you know, you’re crawling around on a ledge like an orangutan.”
“Thank you, Peter,” Matt said, pushing the button to open the door, and walked to the head of the stairs.
It was, instead of Detective McFadden, Detective Milham.
“You’re up, I hope?” Milham asked. “I know I said ten…”
“Having breakfast. Come on up.”
“I’ve got somebody with me. Is that all right?”
“Sure.”
Milham took a step backward and a woman Matt had never seen before, but who he intuited was the Widow Kellog, appeared in the doorway and started up the stairs.
“I know we’re intruding,” she said as she reached Matt.
“Not at all.”
“I’m Helene Kellog,” she said.
“Matt Payne,” Matt said. “How do you do? Come on in.”
He led her to the kitchen.
“Mrs. Kellog, this is Inspector Wohl.”
“Oh, God,” Helene said.
“How do you do, Mrs. Kellog?” Wohl said politely, standing up.
Milham appeared.
It’s a toss-up, Matt thought, which of them looks unhappier at finding Wohl up here.
“Hello, Wally,” Wohl said. “How are you?”
“Wally, we should leave,” Helene said.
“Not on my account, I hope,” Wohl said.
“Inspector—” Milham began, and then stopped. Wohl looked at him curiously. “Inspector, Mrs. Kellog got a death threat last night.”
“Damn you, Wally,” Helene said.
“Did you really?” Wohl asked. “Please sit down, Mrs. Kellog. Let me get you a cup of coffee.”
“I don’t mean to be rude, but…”
“Helene, honey, we just can’t pretend it didn’t happen.”
“Please, sit down,” Wohl repeated.
She reluctantly did so.
“Mrs. Kellog, you’re with friends,” Wohl said.
The door buzzer sounded again. Helene glanced toward the stairway with fright in her eyes.
“That has to be McFadden,” Wohl said. “You want to let him in, Matt?”
It was McFadden, laden with a kraft paper bag.
“I stopped by McDonald’s and got some Egg Mc-Muffins,” he said, handing Matt the bag as he reached the top of the stairs. “I thought maybe you hadn’t eaten.”
“I really want to go,” Helene said, getting up from the table.
“Who’s that?” McFadden asked.
“Charley, this is Mrs. Helene Ke1log,” Wohl said. “Mrs. Kellog, this is Detective McFadden.”
“Please, Wally,” Helene said.
“I’m going to have to be firm about this,” Wohl said. “If you’ve had a death threat, I want to know about it. If you won’t tell me about it, Mrs. Kellog, Wally will have to.”
“I knew we shouldn’t have come here,” Helene said, but, with resignation, she sat back down.
“At least we have enough food,” Wohl said. “Have you had any breakfast, Mrs. Kellog?”
“No,” she said softly.
“Have an Egg McMuffin and a cup of coffee,” Wohl said. “Wally will tell me what’s happened, and then you can fill in any blanks.”
Milham looked as if he was torn between regret that he had to tell Wohl and relief.
“Helene called me at the Roundhouse last night,” he said. “She told me there had been a telephone call.”
“Where was she?”
“At my mother’s,” Helene said. “I mean, I got the call at my mother’s. I called Wally from the Red Robin Diner.”
“And what exactly did your caller say?”
“He told me that unless I kept my mouth shut, I’d get the same thing that happened to Jerry,” Helene said.
“In just about those exact words?”
“He used dirty words,” she said.
“You didn’t happen to recognize the voice?” Wohl asked. She shook her head.
“I can certainly understand why you’re upset,” Wohl said.
“Upset? I’m scared to death. Not only for me. I’m afraid for my mother and father.”
“Well, I was about to say, you’re safe now. We’re friends, Mrs. Kellog. You think this call came from somebody on the Narcotics Five Squad?”
“Of course it did,” Helene snapped. “Who else? What I’d like to know…”
Wohl waited a moment for her to continue, and when she did not, he asked, gently: “What would you like to know?”
“Nothing, forget it.”
“She’d like to know how that damned Five Squad heard she’d talked to Washington,” Wally Milham said. “And so would I.”
“And so would I,” Wohl said. “We’ll find out. And until we do, until we get to the bottom of this, you won’t be alone, Mrs. Kellog. You’re living with your mother for the time being?”
“I was. Not now. I don’t want them involved in this.”
“So where will you be staying?”
“Helene stayed in a motel last night,” Milham said.
“That can get kind of expensive,” Wohl thought aloud. “Isn’t there some place you can stay?”
Helene and Wally looked at each other helplessly. “She could stay here,” Matt heard himself say. The others looked at him in what was more confusion than surprise. “My mother’s been on my back for me to stay with her for a couple of days.”
“I couldn’t do that,’ Helene said.
“I know it’s not much,” Matt said. “But if anybody was looking for you,
they wouldn’t look for you here. And there’s a rent-a-cop downstairs twenty-four hours a day. And it’s just going to sit here, empty.”
“Jesus, Payne,” Milham said. “That’s very nice of you, but…”
“Why not?” Matt said. “I mean, really, why not?”
“I told you you were among friends, Mrs. Kellog,” Wohl said. “I think it’s a good idea.”
“I just don’t know,” she said, and started to sniffle.
“I think you should, honey,” Milham said.
“OK. It’s settled,” Matt said.
“Thank you very much,” Helene said, formally. “Just for a few days.”
“Wally, you take her to get her things, and then come back here,” Wohl ordered.
“Right,” Milham said, and then, quickly, as if he was afraid she would change her mind, “Come on, honey. Let’s go.”
“If I’m not here when you get back, I’ll leave a key with the rent-a-cop,” Matt said.
Helene looked at him.
“Wally was right,” she said. “He said you were a very nice guy.”
When they had gone down the stairs, and heard the door close after them, Wohl said, “That was nice of you, Matt.”
“Christ, they can’t afford living in a motel,” Matt said.
“And won’t your mother be pleasantly surprised to have you at home?” Wohl asked drolly. He stood up and went to the telephone and dialed a number.
“Inspector Wohl for the Chief,” he said a moment later, and then: “Chief, I promised to let you know if anything interesting happened. The Widow Kellog got a death threat—specifically, ‘Keep your mouth shut, or you’ll get the same thing as your husband,’ or words to that effect embroidered with obscenity—last night.”
The outraged, familiar voice of Chief Inspector Lowenstein could be heard all over the kitchen: “I’ll be goddamned! Where is she?”
“With Detective Milham. He took her to fetch some clothing. Matt Payne offered her his apartment to stay in.”
“That really burns me up,” Lowenstein said, unnecessarily adding, “what happened to her. That was nice of Payne. What are you going to do about it?”
“I’m going, first of all, to have someone sit on her. Discreetly.”
“Your people?”
“My people, and since we’re going to have to do this around the clock, I’d like to borrow one of yours for as long as this lasts.”
“Who?”
“McFadden. He was here, at Payne’s apartment, when this came up.”
The Murderers Page 34
