“Hmmmm,” Matt said thoughtfully. “Yes, that is essentially what I said.”
“You’re kidding, right?”
“No,” Matt said. “I was not speaking in jest.”
“I’m getting out of here,” Sonny said. “And just for the hell of it, wiseass, you can’t search me without a reason, and even if you did, you wouldn’t find a thing on me.”
“You’re not going anywhere, Sonny,” McFadden said, and his voice was no longer pleasant. “Until I tell you you can.”
“I’ll bet, Charles,” Matt said, “that if I was to show that young man with the red hair my badge, and ask if he would be kind enough to open his bag for me…” He interrupted himself, jumped to his feet, and walked quickly to the redhead.
“I want you to put that bag on that table,” he said, showing him his badge. “In sight. And I want you to sit in that booth with your hands flat on the table until I tell you to move. You understand me?”
The redhead followed Matt’s pointing, to the last booth in the line.
“Am I busted?” the redhead asked, very nervously.
“If you mean arrested,’ not yet. And perhaps that can be avoided. It depends on Mr. Boyle.”
He waited until the redhead had done what he had ordered him to do, then walked back to the booth and sat down.
“Excuse me, Detective McFadden,” he said politely. “Please continue.”
“So you bust him, so what?” Sonny said.
“I hope that won’t be necessary,” Matt said. “But in that unhappy happenstance, you would lose the morning’s receipts. That would provide sufficient justification, I would think, Mr. Boyle, for Special Operations to assign whatever police personnel proved to be necessary to save the innocent citizens of this area from gambling czars such as yourself. And I think there is a good possibility that after we have his mother and his parish priest talk to that young man in Central Lockup, he might be willing, to save his soul from eternal damnation, ninety days in prison, and the first entry on his criminal record, to tell us who had given him his present employment, and precisely where and with whom he plied his trade.”
“Speaking of which,” Charley McFadden said. “The minute the word gets out that the cops have your receipts, you’re going to have a lot of winners, Sonny. They’re not too smart, but they’re smart enough to know if they claim they won, you’re either going to have to have a receipt proving they didn’t, or pay off. That could be very expensive, Sonny.”
“Interesting thought, Detective McFadden,” Matt said.
“Thank you, Detective Payne”
Sonny, now visibly nervous, looked between Matt and Charley.
“OK, McFadden,” Sonny said. “What do you want?”
“Now that we have you in the right frame of mind, Mr. Boyle,” Matt said, “Detective McFadden wishes to probe your presumably extensive knowledge of Philadelphia’s criminal community.”
“Huh?”
“Tell us about Frankie Foley, Sonny,” Charley said.
Oh, shit! I didn’t even think about him. What the fuck has Foley done now? Christ, did he hit the Narcotics cop?
“Never heard of him,” Sonny said.
“Think hard,” Charley said. Sonny shrugged helplessly.
“Never heard of him, Charley,” Sonny said. “I swear to God!”
“You were apparently wrong, Charles,” Matt said. “Mr. Boyle will not be cooperative. Mr. Boyle, you are under arrest for violating the laws of the City of Philadelphia and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania vis-à-vis gambling and participating in an organized gambling enterprise. You have the right to an attorney…”
“Jesus Christ, Charley!” Sonny said. “Now wait a minute.”
“Remember who he is now, Sonny?” Charley asked.
“…and if you cannot afford an attorney,” Matt went on, “one will be appointed for you.” He paused. “I don’t seem to have my handcuffs, Charles. Might I borrow yours?”
“Charley, can we talk? Private?” Sonny asked.
“I have other things on my agenda, Mr. Boyle. I don’t have time to waste on you,” Matt said.
“Matt, Sonny and I go back a long way,” Charley said. “Be a good guy. Give me a minute alone with him.”
Matt gave this some thought. He looked impatiently at his wristwatch.
“Very well,” Matt said. “I will have a word with his accomplice.”
He got up and walked to the booth where Pat O’Hallihan sat with his hands obediently on the table.
“I don’t like your friend, Charley,” Sonny said.
“I don’t think he likes you, either. Too bad for you. He’s a mean sonofabitch sometimes. You don’t know who he is?”
Sonny shook his head.
“He’s the guy who popped the Northwest Serial Rapist in the head. Blew his brains out.”
“No shit, that’s him?”
“That’s him.”
“Charley, you’re going to get me killed,” Sonny said. “I’m not shitting you.”
“How am I going to get you killed?”
“Frankie Foley’s a hit man for the mob. If he finds out I’ve been talking to you, I’m a dead man.”
“An Irish hit man for the mob? Come on, Sonny.”
“I’m telling you. He does hits they don’t want to do themselves.”
Sonny looked over at Pat O’Hallihan. Matt Payne had the zipper bag open and was searching through its contents.
“How do you know?” Charley asked.
“I know. I know. Trust me.”
“‘How do you know?’ I asked.”
“He…uh, Jesus, Charley, you’re going to get me killed.”
“Think about it, Sonny,” Charley said. “When the word gets out that two cops were in here asking you about Frankie Foley, and then hauled you off, Frankie’s going to think you told on him anyway.”
Sonny Boyle felt sick to his stomach.
“He’s come to me a couple times and told me he needed alibis. Usually right after somebody hit one of the Guineas.”
“Lately?”
“I ain’t seen him, I swear to God, in a month.”
“Where does he usually hang out?”
“Meagan’s Bar.”
“He’s in the deep shit now, Sonny.”
“You think he hit the narc?”
“You tell me, Sonny.”
“I ain’t heard nothing, Charley, I swear to God.”
“Payne wants to lock you up, Sonny. You’re going to have to do better than that.”
“Christ, I don’t know any more than I told you. And that’s enough to get me killed. Those Dagos don’t fuck around.”
“You’re going to have to do better than that,” Charley repeated.
“I can ask around,” Sonny said. “I hear things sometimes.”
“I’ll bet you do,” Charley said.
“I swear to God, if I hear anything, I’ll call you.”
“I believe you, Sonny,” Charley said. “But I don’t know about Payne. He wants this guy. He’ll do anything to get him.”
“You lock me up, all you get is what I already told you,” Sonny argued. “Let me ask around, Charley. It makes sense.”
Charley considered that for a moment.
“I’ll try, Sonny,” he said. “I don’t know…”
“Talk to him, Charley. I’ll make it worth your while.”
Charley shrugged and walked over to the booth where Matt was now counting thick, rubber-band-bound stacks of one-dollar bills.
Matt got up and walked with Charley to a corner of the room. Charley began to talk to him. Sonny did not think Payne looked at all happy with what Charley was saying.
But finally, after flashing Sonny Boyle a look of utter contempt, he shrugged and walked out of the restaurant. Charley went back to Boyle’s booth.
“That took some doing,” he said. “My ass is now on the line. Don’t fuck with me about this, Sonny. If that mean sonofabitch comes down on me, I’ll really come down on
you. You understand?”
“Charley, I understand. The first thing I hear—”
“And you better hear something, and soon,” Charley interrupted. He laid a calling card on the table, took out a pen, and wrote another number on it. “My home phone is on there. The one I wrote is Special Operations. Call me there, not at Northwest Detectives.”
“You’re in Special Operations now?”
“I expect to hear from you soon, Sonny,” Charley said, and walked out of the restaurant.
Sonny looked out the window and watched him get into a new Ford unmarked car and drive away.
He walked over to where Pat O’Hallihan sat.
“Jesus Christ, what was that all about?” Pat asked.
“Don’t worry about it,” Sonny said. “Charley McFadden and I are old pals. We were in the same class at Bishop Neuman High School.”
“What about the one with me?”
“You were in pretty fancy company. That was Payne. You remember when a detective shot that sicko in the Northwest who was carving up women?”
“That was him?”
“That was him.”
“What was this all about?”
“Nothing. Don’t worry about it. Everything’s under control. Now, order me a cup of coffee. I got to make a telephone call.”
“Right.”
Sonny Boyle went to the pay phone by the door to the men’s room and called Frankie Foley’s house. Frankie’s mother said he was at work, and gave him the number of the warehouse at Wanamaker’s where Frankie worked.
It took some time to get Frankie on the phone—his boss obviously didn’t like him getting personal calls at work—but finally he came on the line and Sonny told him that two Special Operations detectives were asking questions about him, that one of the detectives was a real hotshot, the cop that shot the Northwest Serial Rapist in the head, and that they seemed to think Frankie had something to do with the Narcotics cop who got himself hit.
He assured Frankie that of course he hadn’t told them a fucking thing.
EIGHTEEN
The radio went off as Matt Payne and Charley McFadden headed north on South Broad Street.
“William Fourteen.”“That’s me,” Matt said.
Charley looked around, found the microphone on its hook under the dash, and picked it up.
“Fourteen,” he said.
“What’s your location?”
“South Broad, near City Hall.”
“Meet the Inspector at the schoolhouse.”
“En route,” Charley said, and replaced the microphone. “Well, at least we know where to go,” he said.
“I hope we did the right thing,” Matt said. “I’ll bet your ol’ buddy was on the phone before we turned the corner, telling Foley we were asking about him.”
“Hey,” Charley said, his tone making it clear he thought it was a naive observation. “What’s the difference? Bad guys think there’s a cop behind every tree.”
Fifteen minutes later, he gave Matt a smug glance when the same question and answer was paraphrased by Inspector Wohl and Sergeant Washington.
“Is this going to cause a problem?” Wohl asked. “Foley will know now we’re interested in him.”
“Malefactors,” Washington intoned solemnly, “in my experience, see the menacing forces of exposure and punishment lurking behind every bush. Often this causes them to do foolish things.”
Wohl chuckled.
“I do see a jurisdictional problem,” Washington went on. “On one hand, we are interested in Mr. Foley’s possible involvement with the Inferno job, which would put him in Wally Milham’s basket. On the other, Mr. Boyle suggested Mr. Foley has something to do with Officer Kellog’s murder, which would fall into Joe D’Amata’s zone of interest. Or possibly mine, if I am to follow allegations of corruption in the Narcotics Five Squad.”
Wohl smiled again.
“Going along with your ‘menacing forces of exposure and punishment’ theory, Jason, it seems to me that you are the most menacing of all.”
“I will interpret that as a compliment,” Washington said.
“You and Matt were in on the Inferno job from the beginning. So why don’t you two go see Mr. Atchison first? Right now, McFadden can go see Joe D’Amata and tell him what Mr. Boyle has had to say, and that I suggest it might be helpful if you were there when he speaks with Mr. Foley.”
Washington nodded.
“And then McFadden can go to see Milham at Matt’s apartment—”
“Where I devoutly hope he is having at least a modicum of success in trying to convince the Widow Kellog that she should not regard me as menacing,” Washington interrupted. “And tell me what she knows about Five Squad.”
“—and tell him what McFadden’s friend has told us about Mr. Foley,” Wohl continued. “That will also place Charley at Matt’s apartment, where he can work out the sitting-on-Mrs. Kellog schedule with Martinez and Tiny Lewis.”
“A masterful display of organizational genius,” Washington said.
“And meanwhile, I’ll bring Inspector Weisbach in on all this. Any questions?”
McFadden held up his hand.
“How do I get from here to Matt’s place, Inspector?”
“Take the car Matt’s driving.”
“If I went with him, and met Jason…where are we going to see Atchison?”
“In the beast’s lair,” Washington said. “At his home.”
“I could pick up my car at the apartment, if I went with Charley.”
“Meet me at the Media police station,” Washington said. “Where I will be stroking the locals.”
“I’ll call out there if you like, Jason,” Wohl offered.
“Thank you, no. Lieutenant Swann and I are old friends,” Washington said. He got to his feet. “I am reluctant to say this, aware as I am of your already monumental egos, but you two done good.”
McFadden actually blushed.
“I ally myself with the comments of Sergeant Washington,” Wohl said. “Especially the part about your already monumental egos.”
Detective Matthew Payne had been inside the Media Police Headquarters before, the circumstances of which came to mind as he pulled the Porsche into a visitors’ parking slot outside the redbrick, vaguely Colonial-appearing building in the Philadelphia suburb.It had been during his last year at Episcopal Academy. He had been in the company of Mr. Chadwick Thomas Nesbitt IV and two females, all of them bound for the Rose Tree Hunt Club. One of the females had been Daffy Browne, he remembered, but he could not recall either the name or the face of the one he’d been with in the backseat of Mr. Chadwick Thomas Nesbitt III’s Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow.
He remembered only that he had finally managed to disengage the fastening of her brassiere only moments before a howling siren and flashing lights had announced the presence of the Media Police Department.
Chad was charged with going sixty-eight miles per hour in a forty-mile-per-hour zone; with operating a motor vehicle under the influence of alcohol; with operating a motor vehicle without a valid driver’s license in his possession; and operating a motor vehicle without the necessary registration documents therefore.
Chad didn’t have a driver’s license in his possession because it had been confiscated by his father to make the point that failing two of four Major Curriculum subjects in Mid-Year Examinations was not socially acceptable behavior. He didn’t have the registration for the Rolls because he was absolutely forbidden to get behind the wheel of the Rolls under any circumstances, not only while undergoing durance vile. He was driving the Rolls because his parents were spending the weekend in the Bahamas, and he thought they would never know.
Everyone in the Rolls had been charged with unlawful possession of alcoholic beverages by minors. The Rolls was parked on the side of the Baltimore Pike, and all four miscreants (the females sniffling in shame and humiliation) were hauled off to Media Police Headquarters and placed in a holding cell.
It had been necessar
y to telephone Brewster Cortland Payne II at five minutes to two in the morning. Mr. Payne had arrived at the police station a half hour later, arranged the appropriate bail for the females, and taken them home, leaving a greatly surprised Matt and Chad looking out from behind the holding cell bars.
Brewster Cortland Payne II had a day or two later informed Matt that he had decided spending the night in jail would have a more efficacious effect on Matt (and Chad) than anything he could think of to say at the time.
Matt got out of the Porsche and walked into Police Headquarters.
“Help you?” the sergeant behind the desk asked.
“I’m Detective Payne,” Matt said. “I’m supposed to meet Sergeant Washington in Lieutenant Swann’s office?”
“Down the corridor, third door on the right.”
Washington and Lieutenant Swann, a tall, thin man in his forties, were drinking coffee.
“How are you, Payne?” Lieutenant Swann said after Washington made the introduction. “I know your dad, I think. Providence Road, in Wallingford?”
“Yes, sir,” Matt said.
“Known him for years,” Lieutenant Swann said.
Is he laughing at me behind that straight face?
“Lieutenant Swann’s been telling me that Mr. Atchison is a model citizen,” Washington said. “An officer in the National Guard, among other things.”
“When we heard about what happened, we thought it was the way it was reported in the papers,” Swann said. “This is very interesting.”
“Strange things happen,” Washington said. “It may have been just the way it was reported in the papers.”
“But you don’t think so, do you, Jason?”
“I am not wholly convinced of his absolute innocence,” Washington said.
“You want me to go over there with you, Jason?”
“I’d rather keep this low-key, if you’ll go along,” Jason said. “Just drop in to ask him about Mr. Foley.”
“Whatever you want, Jason. I owe you a couple.”
“The reverse is true, Johnny,” Washington said. “I add this to a long list of courtesies to be repaid.”
The Murderers Page 36
