Badge Of Honor: The Victim Part 23

"I've got to get a suit," Tiny said. "Mom said she put them in a cedar bag."

"Probably in your room," Foster Lewis, Sr., said. "Am I permitted to ask why you need a suit?''

"Certainly," Tiny said. He followed his father into the kitchen and took a china mug from a cabinet.

"Well?" Foster Lewis asked.

"Well, what? Oh, do you want to know why I need a suit?''

"I asked. Where were you when I asked?"

"You asked if you were permitted to ask, and I said, 'Certainly,' but you didn't actually ask."

"Wisea.s.s." His father chuckled. "There's a piece of cake in the refrigerator."

"Thank you," Tiny said, and helped himself to the cake.

"You know a Homicide-ex-Homicide-detective named Harris? Tony Harris?"

"Yeah. Not well. But he's supposed to be good."

"You are now looking, sir, at his official errand runner," Tiny said.

"What does that mean?"

"I suppose it means that if he says 'Go fetch,' I go fetch, happily wagging my tail."

"If you're being clever, stop it," his father said. "Tell me what's going on."

"Well, I was told to report to a Captain Sabara at Highway. When I got there, he wasn't, but Inspector Wohl called me into his office-"

"You saw him?" Foster Lewis, Sr., asked.

"Yeah. Nice guy. Sharp dude. Nice threads."

I was on the job, Lieutenant Foster H. Lewis thought, for two or three years before I ever saw an inspector up close.

"Go on."

"Well, he said that Harris has the Magnella job, and that he needed a second pair of hands. He said it would involve a lot of overtime, and if I had any problem with that to say so; he didn't want any complaints later. So I told him the more overtime the better, and I asked him what I would be doing. He said-that's where I got that-that if Harris said 'Go fetch,' I was to wag my tail and go fetch. He said the detail would last only until Harris got whoever shot Magnella, but it would be good experience for me."

"That's it?"

"Well, he gave me a speech about what not to do with the car-"

"What car?"

"A '71 Ford. Good shape."

"You have a Department car?"

"Yeah. Unmarked, naturally," Tiny said just a little smugly.

"My G.o.d!"

"What's wrong?"

Lieutenant Foster H. Lewis, Sr., thought, When I got out of the Academy, I was a.s.signed to the 26th District. A potbellied Polack sergeant named Grotski went out of his way to make it plain he didn't 't think there was any place in the Department for n.i.g.g.e.rs and then handed me over to Bromley T. Wesley, a South Carolina redneck who had come north to work in the shipyards during the Second World War and had joined the cops because he didn't want to go back home to Tobacco Road.

I walked a beat with Bromley for a year. When he went into a candy store for a c.o.ke or something, he made me wait outside. For six months he never used my name. I was either "Hey, You!" or worse, "Hey, Boy!" I was told that if I turned out okay, maybe after a year or so, I could work my way up to a wagon. The son of a b.i.t.c.h made it plain he thought all black people were born r.e.t.a.r.ded.

Bromley T. Wesley was an ignorant bigot with a sixth-grade education, but he was a cop. He knew the streets and he knew people, and he taught me about them. Between Wesley and what I learned on the wagon, when I went out in an RPC by myself for the first time I was a cop.

What the h.e.l.l is Peter Wohl thinking of, putting this rookie in civilian clothes instead of in a wagon, at least?

"Nothing, I suppose," Lieutenant Lewis said. "It's a little unusual, that's all. Eat your cake."

ELEVEN.

The normally open gate of the Detweiler estate in Chestnut Hill, like the gate at the Browne place in Merion, was now both closed and guarded by rent-a-cops.

When Matt pulled the nose of Penelope Detweiler's Mercedes against the gate, one of them, a burly man in a blue suit, came through a small gate within the gate and looked down at Matt.

"May I help you, sir?"

"We're returning Miss Detweiler's car," Matt said.

" 'We,' sir?"

"I'm a cop," Matt said, and jerked his thumb toward Jason Washington, who was following him in the unmarked Ford. "And so is he."

"You expected?"

"No."

"I'll have to call, sir."

"Tell them it's Matt Payne."

The rent-a-cop looked at him strangely and then said, "Matt Payne. Yes, sir."

He went back through the small gate, entered the gate house, and emerged a moment later to swing the left half of the double gate open. He waved Matt through.

H. Richard Detweiler, himself, answered the door. He had a drink in his hand.

"Boy, that was quick!" he said. "Come in, Matt."

"Sir?"

"I just this second got off the phone with Czernick," Detweiler said. "Penny was worried about her car, so I called him and asked about it, and he said he'd have it sent out here."

"I think we probably were on our way when you called him, Mr. Detweiler," Matt said. "Mr. Detweiler, this is Detective Washington."

"I was just talking about you too," Detweiler said, offering Washington his hand. "Thad Czernick told me you're the best detective in the Department."

"Far be it from me to question the commissioner's judgment," Washington said. "How do you do, Mr. Detweiler?"

Detweiler chuckled. "Oh, about as well as any father would be after just seeing a daughter who looks like the star of a horror movie."

"We saw Miss Detweiler earlier this morning," Washington said.

"So she said. That was kind of you, Matt. And you, too, Mr. Washington."

"I think you'll be surprised to see how quickly that discoloration goes away, Mr. Detweiler," Washington said.

"I hope," Detweiler said. "I needed a drink when I got back here. I'd offer you one, but I know-"

"That would be very nice, thank you," Washington said.

"Oh, you can take a drink on duty?" Detweiler asked. "Fine. I always feel depraved drinking alone. Let's go in the bar.''

He led them to a small room off the kitchen.

"This is supposed to be the serving pantry," he said, motioning them to take stools set against a narrow counter under and above the gla.s.s-fronted cupboards. The cupboards held canned goods, and there was an array of bottles on the counter.

''I'm not exactly sure what a butler's pantry is supposed to be for," Detweiler went on, reaching for a bottle of gin. "My grandfather copied this place from a house in England, so it came with a butler's pantry. Anyway, what we serve here is liquor. Help yourself.''

"Matt, if you would splash a little of that Johnny Walker Black in a gla.s.s, and a little water, and one ice cube?" Washington said.

"You sound like a man who appreciates good Scotch and knows how to drink it," Detweiler said.

"I try," Washington said.

Matt made two drinks to Washington's specifications, handed him one, and raised his own.

"To Penny's recovery," he said.

"Hear, hear," Washington said.

"Penny," Detweiler said, his voice breaking. "G.o.dd.a.m.n whoever did that to her!''

"I'm sure He will," Washington said, "but we would like to get our licks in on him before he gets to the Pearly Gates."

Detweiler looked at him, smiling.

"Good thinking," he said.

The telephone on the counter buzzed; one of the four lights on it lit up. Detweiler made no move to answer it.

"Have you found out anything, Mr. Washington? What's going on?"

"Well, frankly, Mr. Detweiler, we don't have much to go on. The theory I'm working under is that Miss Detweiler was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time-"

"Is there another theory? Theories?"

"Well, I've been doing this long enough to know the hazards of reaching premature conclusions-" Washington said.

"G.o.dd.a.m.n," Detweiler said, angrily grabbing for the phone, which had continued to buzz, "we keep six in help here, and whenever the phone rings, they all disappear." He put the handset to his ear and snarled, "Yes?"

There was a pause.

"This is d.i.c.k Detweiler, Commissioner. I wish I could get people as efficient as yours. No sooner had I put down the phone than Matt Payne and Detective Washington drove up with my daughter's car. I'm impressed with the service."

There was an inaudible reply to this, then Detweiler said, "Thank you very much, Commissioner." He extended the phone to Washington. "He wants to talk to you."

"Yes, sir."

"Watch yourself out there, Washington. And when you leave, call me and let me know how it went."

The phone went dead in Washington's ear.

"Yes, of course, Commissioner," Washington said after a pause that sounded longer than it was. "Thank you very much, sir. Good-bye, sir."

He handed the telephone to Detweiler.

"The commissioner asked me to impress upon you, Mr. Detweiler, that the Department is doing everything humanly possible to get to the bottom of this, to find whoever did this to your daughter. He said that I was to regard this case as my first priority."

"Thank you," Detweiler said. "That's very good of him."

"We were talking, a moment ago, about other theories," Washington said. "I think one of the possibilities we should consider is robbery.''

"Robbery?"

Washington nodded.

"Ranging from a simple, that is to say, unplanned, mugging, some thug lurking in the parking garage for whoever might come his way to someone who knew about the dinner party in the Union League-"

"How would someone know about that?" Detweiler said, interrupting.

"I'm sure it was in the society columns of the newspapers," Washington went on. "That might explain the shotgun."