"Dad already knows," Amy said. "I called him and told him."
"That was smart!" Matt snapped.
"I wanted Dad to know before Mother," Amy said, unrepentant. "Matt, do you want me to give you something…"
"I've got it, thanks," he said, picking up his glass. Then he looked around at all of them. "Doesn't anyone but me care that the whole article is bullshit?"
"You've undergone a severe emotional trauma," Amy said.
"Tell me about it," Matt said. "But we were-I was-talking about bullshit."
"I can give you something to help you deal with it," Amy persisted. " Liquor won't help."
"That's what you think," Matt said. "Youare talking about the bullshit?"
"I'm talking about the shock you've suffered," Amy said.
"I'm talking about bullshit," Matt said. "I damned near killed that peroxide-blond woman," Matt said. "I didn't know she existed until I heard her screaming. I shot that sonofabitch because he tried to run me over. I was not the calm, heroic police officer. I was a terrified and enraged child who had a gun."
"I don't know what you're talking about," she said.
"You're right, Amy," Matt said. "I am not cut out to be a cop."
"You don't want to make a decision like that right now, Matty," Dennis Coughlin said.
"Nobody's listening to me," Matt said. "If there is one thing I learned from this is that I am not my father's-my blood father'sson."
"Matty!" Dennis Coughlin said.
"I was afraid out there," Matt said. "Terrified.And insane."
"That's perfectly understandable under the circumstances," Dennis Coughlin said.
"I almost killed that woman!" Matt said, angrily. "Doesn't anybody understand that?"
"You didn't," Wohl said. "You didn't. You kept her alive."
"Did you know I fell asleep on the job tonight?"
"No."
"Did Washington tell you I fainted when I saw the Woodham body?"
"So what?" Wohl asked.
"Matty," Dennis Coughlin said. "Listen to me."
Matt looked at him.
"I admit, Mickey and the mayor laid it on a little thick," Coughlin said. "That it was, excuse me, Amy, bullshit. But so was the story in theLedger. So you're not a hero. But neither is the Police Department as incompetent as Arthur J. Nelson wants the people to think it is. What he's trying to do to us has nothing to do with the truth about the Police. That's pretty rotten. So the bottom line here is you took this critter down. He's not going to rape or murder anyone else. A lot of single young women around town are going to get to sleep tonight. That's all we try to do on the cops, Matty, try to fix things so people can sleep at night. And if they read in the newspapers that we' re all stupid, or on the take, or just can't be trusted… Am I getting through to you?"
"I don't know," Matt said.
"And as far as your father-your blood father, as you call him- is concerned. He was my best friend. And I know he would be proud of you. I am. You were scared, but you did what had to be done. And there's something else about your father, Matty. They have his picture and his badge hanging in the lobby of the Roundhouse. He's a hero, an officer who got killed in the line of duty. But-I was his best friend, so I can say this-he didn't do his duty. He let that critter kill him. And before we caught him, he killed three civilians. You didn't let this critter kill you. That psychopath isn't going to get to hurt somebody else. In my book that makes you a better cop than your father. That's the bottom line, Matty. Protecting the public. You think about that."
Matt looked at Coughlin for a moment, then at Wohl, who nodded at him, and then at his sister.
"Matt," Amy said. "Maybe you shouldn't be a cop. But now is not the time for you to make that decision."
"Jesus!" Matt said. "From you?"
There was a knock at the door. Wohl went to it and pulled it open.
Charley McFadden was standing there, a brown bag in his hand.
"What do you want, McFadden?" Wohl asked.
"It's all right, Peter," Chief Coughlin said, "I sent for him."
"I came as quick as I could," McFadden said. "I figured he could use a drink. I didn't know if he had any, so I brung some."
"Come on in, McFadden," Dennis Coughlin said. "We were all just leaving." He looked Amy Payne in the eye. "Officer McFadden, Amy, is the man who was about to apprehend Gerald Vincent Gallagher when he fell beneath the train wheels."
"I wondered who he was," Amy said.
"He's a friend of mine, Amy, all right?" Matt snapped.
"No offense meant," Amy said. She looked at Chief Inspector Coughlin.
"I think you're right, Uncle Denny," she said. "You don't mind if I call you that, do you?"
"I'm flattered, darling."
"You take care of him, Mr. McFadden," Amy said.
"Yeah, sure," Charley McFadden said. "Don't worry about it."
EPILOGUE
Walton Williams was detained three weeks later by officers of the Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization as he attempted to reenter the United States after a vacation in France. He was taken into custody despite the somewhat hysterical protestations of his traveling companion, one Stephen Peebles, that Mr. Williams had not been out of his sight for the past five weeks and could not possibly be the burglar of the home Mr. Peebles shared with his sister.
Following the night Captain David Pekach visited Miss Martha Peebles at her home to assure her that the police were doing everything possible to protect her property from further burglaries, none were ever reported.
When Staff Inspector Peter Wohl reported this happy fact to Chief Inspector Dennis V. Coughlin, he added, with a knowing smile, that this might have something to do with the fact that Captain Pekach and Miss Peebles seemed to have developed a friendship. He said he had heard from an impeccable source, specifically, Lieutenant Bob McGrory of the New Jersey State Police, that Captain Pekach and Miss Peebles had been seen strolling down the Boardwalk in Atlantic City, holding hands, simply enthralled by each other.
Chief Inspector Coughlin smiled back, just as knowingly.
"People who live in glass houses, Peter, my boy, should not toss rocks. I have it from an impeccable source, specifically His Honor the Mayor, that a certain Staff Inspector was seen walking hand in hand down Peacock Alley in the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York, toward the elevators, with a certain female physician, neither of whom were registered there under their own names."
Matthew Payne did not resign from the Police Department.