"I'm going to need another one of these," Wohl said to her.
She nodded and left. Wohl took a sip, then another, then looked at Olsen.
"It would seem he has nice friends, our Corporal Lanza," Wohl said.
"Yeah, doesn't he?" Olsen replied. "So I took this to Chief Marchessi…"
"Right," Wohl said.
"Peter, I didn't mention to him that Framm and Pillare lost Lanza. He's… Framm is, this is not the first time he's lost somebody…and he's already on the chief's shit list."
If Olsen is covering for Framm, he has his reasons, and it's not because Framm's a nice guy.
"He wasn't lost, that's all that counts," Wohl said.
"Thank you," Olsen said. "The chief asked what you thought of all this, and I told him you were unavailable…At this point in time, Mike Sabara was still stonewalling me."
"Good for him," Wohl said.
"So the chief said that what we should do is bring the airline security people in on this. You remember Dickie Lowell?"
"Sure."
Before my time, Wohl thought. But I remember him. H. Dickinson Lowell had been one of the first, if not the first, black staff inspectors. And then he made inspector. Well, dammit, 1 am not the first staff inspector to have the gall to try to get myself promoted.
"Well, they had him running the Headquarters Division in the Detective Bureau and he didn't like it, all the paperwork, so he took retirement. He's chief of security for Eastern at the airport. More important, he and Marchessi are old pals."
"He was a good cop, as I recall," Wohl said.
"Marchessi called him, and explained the situation. Lowell is going to have his people keep an eye on Lanza, and he told Marchessi he has some friends, other airlines security, that he can go to. He will not go to the feds, which is important to Marchessi…"
"And me," Wohl interjected.
"…but he will call Marchessi or me if Lanza does something suspicious. And we'll keep sitting on Lanza when he's not on the job."
"Good," Wohl said. "Very good."
"And then the chief told me to find you and bring you in on this and see if it's all right with you, or if you had anything, a suggestion, or what."
Wohl didn't reply for a moment, then he said, "There's only two loose ends that I can think of. This woman, Schermer, you said?"
Olsen nodded.
"I'd like to know if she was the woman Payne saw with Lanza in the Poconos. And then there's Martinez. I don't want him to go off halfcocked and screw anything up."
"The chief said maybe I should mention Martinez to you."
The waitress appeared with their ham and eggs.
Wohl looked at his plate, and then stood up.
"I think I know how to kill two birds with one stone," he said, and walked to a pay telephone.
Five minutes later he was back.
"That didn't work," he said.
"What didn't work?"
"I called the Schoolhouse. I was going to tell Payne to find Martinez, and bring him here. Payne could have told us whether that was the woman Lanza had with him in the Poconos, and we both could have impressed on both of them that neither of them are to get anywhere near Lanza until we finish this."
"What happened?"
"Payne is in New Jersey with the Secret Service, they may have a lead on the guy who wants to blow up the Vice President, and when I called Martinez, his mother told me he's got the flu, and called in sick."
"You've got Payne working on the screwball?" Olsen asked, surprised.
"Mike sent him," Wohl said. "When I have him shot in the morning, I'll have them pick up the body and shoot him again."
He looked at Olsen.
"And my eggs are probably cold. I think this is going to be one of those days."
At five minutes past one, Marion Claude Wheatley left his room in the Divine Lorraine Hotel, rode the elevator to the lobby, left his key at the desk, and walked out onto North Broad Street.
He turned north, walked three blocks, and then crossed the street. There he waited for a bus, rode it downtown into Center City, got off, and walked to Suburban Station. He went downstairs, picked up a Pennsylvania Railroad Timetable from a rack, and went back out to the street.
He flagged a cab and had himself driven to the airport, giving American Airlines as his destination. Inside the airport, he went to a fast-food restaurant and had a hot dog with sauerkraut and mustard and a medium root beer.
When he was finished, he went to the locker where he had left his things earlier, picked them up, and went to the taxi stand.
He gave the driver an address on Ridge Avenue, and when he got there, carried his luggage into a small office building until he was sure the cab had driven away.
Then he went back to the Divine Lorraine Hotel, sorted everything out on the bed, repacked everything, and put it in the closet. The closet had a key, which he thought was fortuitous, and he removed it and put it in his pocket.
Then he sat down at the desk and looked at the Bible again, and re-read the passage the Lord had directed him to. He could by now practically recite Haggai 2:17 by heart, but he was no closer to understanding what "17. I smote you with blasting and with mildew and with hail in all the labours of your hands; yet ye turned not to me, saith the Lord" meant than he had been when the Lord had first directed his attention to it.
Marion decided the only thing to do was pray.
He knelt by the bed, and with the Bible before him, he prayed for understanding.
When Inspector Wohl walked into his office, a few minutes after two, it was immediately apparent to Captain Mike Sabara that he had a hair up his ass about something, and Sabara wondered if he had done the wrong thing in sending Matt Payne off with the man from the Secret Service.
"Do you have any word from Payne, Mike?" Wohl asked.
"No, sir."
"When he gets back, let me know," Wohl said, and went into his office and closed the door.
Twenty minutes later, Officer O'Mara put his head in Wohl's door and said that Mr. Larkin was here, and could the inspector see him?
"Ask him to come in," Wohl said, "and if Payne is out there, don't let him get away."
"Yes, sir," Officer O'Mara replied crisply, and then promptly misinterpreted his instructions. Detective Payne, at Officer O'Mara's bidding, followed Supervisory Special Agent Larkin into Inspector Wohl's office.
"Well, Peter," Larkin asked as they shook hands, "how did the promotion ceremony go?"
Does everybody in Philadelphia know I've been promoted? And what the hell is Matt doing in here?
"I did all right until the Commissioner kissed me."
He stopped.
I'll show Payne the photograph and then throw him out.
"Yes, sir?"
"Excuse me, Charley. This won't take a minute," Wohl said, and handed Matt the photograph. "You ever see this woman before?"
Matt looked at it.
"That's the girl Lanza had in the Poconos."
"Okay. Call Captain Olsen in Internal Affairs and tell him that," Wohl ordered.
"Right now?"
"Right now," Wohl said sharply.
"Peter," Larkin said. "Excuse me, but is that as important as our lunatic?"
No, of course it isn't. I am just having one of my goddamned bad days. What the hell is the matter with me?
"No, of course not," Wohl said. "Sorry. Payne, that will wait."
"Yes, sir."
"I'm reasonably sure, Peter, that we know where our man has been," Larkin said. "But we don't have an idea who he is, or where."
"What happened in New Jersey?"
"A deputy sheriff came across a piece of steel that showed evidence of having been involved in a high-explosive detonation," Larkin said. "Actually, he ran over it. Anyway, an ATF guy out of Atlantic City ran it down, and they called us. What we found, in a garbage dump in the middle of the Pine Barrens, were half a dozen railroad station, airline terminal, bus station rental lockers that had been, recently, blown up. The ATF expert said he was almost sure it was Composition C-4, and that it was set up with GI detonators. This guy knows his way around explosives."