W E B Griffin - Badge of Honor 04 - The Witness

by The Witness(lit)

  "I think the press release is bullshit," Lowenstein said. "I think it's intended to scare Monahan."

  "He the witness? Will it?" Carlucci asked.

  "He's the only one with any balls," Lowenstein said. "And no. I don't think he'll scare."

  "But we can forget the others, right? So we'd better hope this one doesn't scare. Or get himself killed."

  "I haven't given up on the other witnesses," Lowenstein said. "Washington hasn't talked to them yet. I mean really talked to them."

  "Don't hold your breath," Carlucci said.

  "It seems to me," Commissioner Czernick said, "that our first priority is the protection of Mr. Monahan."

  The mayor looked at him and shook his head.

  "You figured that out all by yourself, did you?" he asked.

  Then he closed his briefcase and stood up.

  There is a price, Wohl thought, for being appointed police commissioner.

  Commissioner Czernick waited until the mayor had left the conference room. Then, his face still showing signs of the flush that had come to it when Carlucci had humiliated him, he pointed at Lowenstein and Wohl.

  "That's the last time either one of you will pull something like that harebrained scheme you pulled this morning without coming to me and getting my permission. The last time. Am I making myself clear?"

  "Yes, sir," Wohl said.

  "Whatever you say, Commissioner," Lowenstein said.

  "And I want Highway in on the protection of Mr. Monahan, Wohl. We can't take any chances with him."

  "Yes, sir."

  Commissioner Czernick looked sternly at each man, and then marched out of his conference room.

  "Remember that, Peter," Coughlin said. "No more hare-brained schemes are to be pulled without the commissioner's permission."

  "Jesus," Wohl said, and then laughed, "I thought that's what he said."

  "Well, it made him happy," Lowenstein said. "It gave him a chance to give an order all by himself."

  "Two orders," Coughlin replied. "You heard what he told Peter. He wants Highway in on protecting Monahan."

  "That's the exception proving the rule. That makes sense."

  "I'm not so sure," Wohl said.

  "Now you're not making sense," Lowenstein said.

  "The first priority, agreeing with the commissioner, is to protect the Monahans. The second priority is to make the Monahans feel protected. I decided the best way I could do that, during the day, when Mr. Monahan's at work, is with two plainclothes officers in an unmarked car. A blue-and-white sit-ting in front of Goldblatt's all day would give people the im-pression we're afraid of the ILA-" He interrupted himself. "That's dangerous. Did you hear what I said?"

  "I heard," Lowenstein said.

  "I called these scumbags the ILA. I don't want to get in the habit of doing that."

  "No, we don't," Coughlin agreed.

  "There is another car, a blue-and-white, with uniformed officers, at his house," Wohl went on. "There will be one there, twenty-four hours a day, from now on. That will reassure Mrs. Monahan, and if an associate of these felons should happen to ride by the Monahan house, they will see the blue-and-white."

  "Okay," Lowenstein said. "I see your reasoning. So what are you going to do?"

  "Obey the order he gave me," Wohl said. "Have a Highway car meet Washington and the unmarked car at Goldblatt's and go with them when they bring Mr. Monahan here to the Round-house. Unless I heard the commissioner incorrectly, he only said he wanted 'Highway in on protecting Mr. Monahan.'"

  "You're devious, Peter. Maybe you will get to be commis-sioner one day."

  "I'm doing the job the best way I can see to do it," Wohl said.

  "I think you're doing it right," Coughlin said.

  "We won that encounter in there, Peter," Lowenstein said. "I think Czernick expected both of us to be drawn and quar-tered. I think Czernick is disappointed. So watch out for him."

  "Yeah," Wohl said.

  "I'd appreciate being kept up-to-date on what's happening," Coughlin said.

  "I'll have Washington call you after the lineup. Lineups."

  "Lineups. Lineups, for Christ's sake," Lowenstein said, chuckling. He touched Wohl's arm, nodded at Coughlin, and walked out of the room.

  "I appreciate your concern for Matt, Peter," Coughlin said.

  "Don't be silly."

  "Well, I do," Coughlin said, and then he left.

  Wohl started to follow him, but as he passed through the commissioner's office, the commissioner's secretary asked him how Matt was doing, and he stopped to give her a report.

  In the elevator on the way to the lobby, he remembered that he had promised Matt to have a word with his father. He stopped at the counter, asked for a phone book, and called Mawson, Payne, Stockton, McAdoo & Lester.

  Brewster C. Payne gave him the impression he had expected him to call. He asked where Wohl was, and then suggested they have a drink in the Union League Club.

  "Thank you, I can use one," Peter said.

  "I think we can both use several," Payne said. "I'll see you there in a few minutes."

  Wohl started to push the telephone back to the corporal on duty, and then changed his mind and dialed Dave Pekach's number and explained why a Highway car was going to have to be at Goldblatt's.

  ***

  Lari Matsi came into Matt Payne's, carrying a small tray with a tiny paper cup on it.

  "How's it going?" she asked.

  "I'm watching The Dating Game on the boob tube. That tell you anything?"

  "Maybe you have more culture than I've been giving you credit for," she said. "Anyway, take this and in five minutes you won't care what's on TV."

  "I don't need that, thank you."

  "It's not a suggestion. It's on orders."

  "I still don't want it," he said.

  She was standing by the side of the bed. She looked down at it, and grew serious.

  "I don't think you're supposed to have that in here."

  He followed her eyes, and saw that she was looking at the revolver Wohl had given him, its butt peeking out from a fold in the thin cotton blanket.

  He took the revolver and put it inside the box of Kleenex on the bedside table.

  "Okay?" he asked.

  "No. Not okay. You want to tell me what's going on here?"

  "Like what? I'm a cop. Cops have guns."

  "They moved you in here, and your name is not Matthews, which is the name on the door."

  "I don't suppose you'd believe that I'm really a rock-and-roll star trying to avoid my fans?"

  "Do they really think somebody's going to try to-do some-thing to you?"

  "No. But better safe than sorry."

  "I suppose this is supposed to be exciting," she said. "But what I really feel is that I don't like it at all."

  "I'm sorry you saw the gun," he said. "Can we drop it there?"

  "You don't want the Demerol because it will make you drowsy, right?"

  He met her eyes, but didn't reply.

  "This was going to be your last one, anyway," Lari said. "I could get you some aspirin, if you want."

  "Please."

  "Are you in pain?"

  "No."

  "If anybody asks, you took it, okay?" she asked. "It would be easier that way."

  She went to the bathroom, and in a moment, with a mighty roar, the toilet flushed.

  "Thank you," he said when she came out.

  "I'll get the aspirin," she said, and went out.

  She came back in a minute with a small tin of Bayer aspirin.

  "These are mine," she said. "You didn't get them from me. Okay?"

  "Thank you."

  "There's a security guard at the nurse's station, I guess you know. He's giving everybody who gets off the elevator the once-over. "

  "No, I didn't."

  "In the morning, they're going to send you a physical ther-apist, to show you how to use crutches," she said. "When she tells you the more you use your leg, the more quickly it will
feel better, trust her."

  "Okay."

  "I'll see you around, maybe, sometime."

  "Not in the morning?"

  "No. I won't be coming back here. I'm only filling in."

  "I'd really like to see you around, no maybe, sometime. Could I call you?"

  "There's a rule against that."

  "You don't know what I have in mind, so how can there be a rule against that?"

  "I mean, giving your phone number to a patient."

  "I'm not just any old patient. I'm Margaret's Prince Charming's buddy. And, anyway, don't you ever do something you're not supposed to?"

  "Not very often," she said, "and something tells me this is one of the times I should follow the rules."

  She walked out of the room.

  Matt watched the door close slowly after her.

  "Damn!" he said aloud.

  The door swung open again.

  "My father is the only Henry Matsi in the phone book," Lari announced, "but I should tell you I'm hardly ever home."

  Then she was gone again.

  "Henry Matsi, Henry Matsi, Henry Matsi, Henry Matsi," Matt said aloud, to engrave it in his memory.

  A minute or so later the door opened again, but it was not Lari. A chubby, determinedly cheerful woman bearing a tray announced, "Here's our supper."

  "What are we having?"

  "A nice piece of chicken," she said. "Primarily."

  She took the gray cover off a plate with a flourish.

  "And steamed veggies."

  "Wow!" Matt said enthusiastically, "And what do you sup-pose that gray stuff in the cup is?"

  "Custard."

  "I was afraid of that."

  Five minutes later, as he was trying to scrape the custard off his teeth and the roof of his mouth with his tongue, the door opened again.

  A familiar face, to which Matt could not instantly attach a name, appeared.

  "Feel up to a couple of visitors?"

  "Sure, come on in."

  Walter Davis, special agent in charge, Philadelphia Office, FBI, came into the room, trailed by A-SAC (Criminal Affairs) Frank Young.

  "We won't stay long, but we wanted to come by and see if there was anything we could do for you," Davis said as Matt finally realized who they were.

  You could tell me you just arrested the guy who wants to get me for shooting Charles D. Stevens. That would be nice.

  What the hell are they doing here? What do they want?

  ***

  Mr. Albert J. Monahan was talking with Mr. Phil Katz when Sergeant Jason Washington came through the door of Goldblatt & Sons Credit Furniture & Appliances, Inc., on South Street. Mr. Monahan smiled and seemed pleased to see Sergeant Washington. Mr. Katz did not.

  "Good evening," Washington said.

  "How are you, Detective Washington?" Mr. Monahan re-plied, pumping his hand.

  Mr. Katz nodded.

  "I guess you heard-" Washington began.

  "We heard," Katz said.

  "-we have the people who were here locked up," Washington continued. "And I hope Detective Pelosi called to tell you I was coming by?"

  "Yes, he did," Monahan said.

  "What I thought you meant," Katz said, "was, had we heard about what the Islamic Liberation Army had to say about people 'bearing false witness.'"

  "We really don't think they're an army, Mr. Katz."

  Katz snorted.

  "Do what you think you have to, Albert," Mr. Katz said, and walked away.

  "He's a married man, with kids," Al Monahan said, "I understand how he feels."

  "Are you about ready, Mr. Monahan?" Washington asked.

  "I've just got to get my coat and hat," Monahan replied. "And then I'll be with you."

  Washington watched him walk across the floor toward the rear of the store, and then went to the door and looked out.

  Things were exactly as he had set them up. He questioned whether it was really necessary, but Peter Wohl had told him to 'err on the side of caution' and Washington was willing to go along with his concern, not only because, obviously, Wohl was his commanding officer, but also because of all the police brass Washington knew well, Peter Wohl was among the least excitable. He did not, in other words, as Washington thought of it, run around in circles chasing his tail, in the manner of other supervisors of his acquaintance when they were faced with an out-of-the-ordinary situation.

  There were three cars parked in front of Goldblatt's. First was the Highway car, then Washington's unmarked car, and finally the unmarked car that carried the two plainclothes of-ficers.

  Both Highway cops, one of the plainclothesmen, and the 6th District beat cop were standing by the fender of Washington's car.

  "Okay," Mr. Monahan said in Washington's ear, startling him a little.

  Washington smiled at him, and led him to the door.

  When they stepped outside, one of the Highway cops and the plainclothesmen stepped beside Mr. Monahan. As Wash-ington got behind the wheel of his car, they walked Monahan between the Highway car and Washington's, and installed him in the front seat.

  The beat cop, as the Highway cop and the plainclothesmen got in their cars, stepped into the middle of the street and held up his hand, blocking traffic coming east on South Street, so that the three cars could pull away from the curb together.

  The Highway car in front of Washington had almost reached South 8th Street and had already turned on his turn signal when Washington saw something dropping out of the sky.

  He had just time to recognize it as a bottle, whiskey or ginger ale, that big, then as a bottle on fire, at the neck, when it hit the roof of the Highway car and then bounced off, unbro-ken, onto South Street, where it shattered.

  The Highway car slammed on his brakes, and Washington almost ran into him. As he jammed his hand on the horn, the unmarked car behind him slammed into his bumper.

  Washington signaled furiously for the Highway car to get moving. It began to move again the instant there was a sound like a blown-up paper bag being ruptured, and then a puff of orange flame.

  Those dirty rotten sonsofbitches!

  "Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!" Mr. Monahan said.

  Washington's hand found his microphone.

  "Keep moving!" he ordered. "The beat cop'll call it in. Go to the Roundhouse."

  Washington looked in his mirror. The unmarked car behind him was still moving, already through the puddle of burning gasoline.

  "What the hell was it, a fucking Molotov cocktail?" an incredulous voice, probably, Washington thought, one of the Highway guys, came over the radio.

  "Can you see, Mr. Monahan, if the car behind us is all right?" he asked.

  "It looks okay."

  Washington picked up the microphone again.

  "Okay. Everything's under control," he said.

  In a porcine rectum, he thought, everything's under control. What the hell is going on here? This is Philadelphia, not Sai-gon!

  SEVENTEEN

  The tall, trim, simply dressed woman who looked a good deal younger than her years stood for a moment in the door to the lounge of the Union League Club, running her eyes over the people in the room, now crowded with the after-work-before-catching-the-train crowd.

  Finally, with a small, triumphant smile, she pointed her fin-ger at a table across the room against the wall.

  "There," she announced to her companion.

  "I see them," he replied.

  She walked to the table, with her companion trailing behind her, and announced her presence by reaching down and pick-ing a squat whiskey glass up from the table.

  "I really hope this is not one of those times when you're drinking something chic," she said, taking a healthy swallow.

  Mr. Brewster Cortland Payne, who had just set the drink (his third) down after taking a first sip, looked up at his wife and, smiling, got to his feet.

  Patricia Payne sat down in one of the heavy wooden chairs.