"Thank you, Denny," Brewster Cortland Payne II had said.
When Matt drove the Bug into the parking garage beneath the Delaware Valley Cancer Building (and the buildings to the right and left of it) he found that someone was in his reserved parking spot. Ordinarily, this would have caused him to use foul language, but he recognized the Cadillac Fleetwood. He knew it was registered to Brewster C. Payne, Providence Road, Wallingford.
When he had moved into the apartment, his father had told him that he had reserved two parking spaces in the underground garage for the resident of the attic apartment, primarily as a token of his affection, of course, and only incidentally because it would also provide a parking space for his mother, or other family members, when they had business around Rittenhouse Square.
Until three weeks before it had never posed a problem, because Matt had kept only one car in the garage. Not the battered twelveyear-old Volkswagen Beetle he was now driving, but a glistening, yearold, silver Porsche 911. It had been his graduation present from his father. From the time he had been given the Porsche, the Bug-which had also been a present from his father, six years before, when he had gotten his driver's license-had sat, rotted actually, in the garage in Wallingford. He had for some reason been reluctant to sell it.
Three weeks before, as he sat taking his promotion physical, he had realized that not selling it had been one of the few wise decisions he had made in his lifetime.
One of the dumber things he had ever done, when assigned to Special Operations out of the Police Academy, was to drive to work in the Porsche. It had immediately identified him as the rich kid from the Main Line who was playing at being a cop. He would not make that same mistake when reporting to East Detectives as a rookie detective.
The battery had been dead, understandably, when he rode out to Wallingford with his father to claim the car, but once he'd put the charger on it, it had jumped to life. He'd changed the oil, replaced two tires, and the Bug was ready to provide sensible, appropriate transportation for him back and forth to work.
The Porsche was sitting in the parking spot closest to the elevator, beside the Cadillac, which meant that he had no place to park the Bug, since his mother had chosen to exercise her right to the "extra" parking space. He was sure it was his mother, because his father commuted to Philadelphia by train.
There were several empty parking spaces, and after a moment's indecision, he pulled the Bug into the one reserved for the executive director. With a little bit of luck, Matt reasoned, that gentleman would have exercised his right to quit for the day whenever he wanted to, and would no longer require his space.
He walked up the stairs to the first floor, however, found the rent-a-cop, and handed him the keys to the Bug.
"I had to park my Bug in the executive director's slot; my mother' s in mine."
"Yourfather" the rent-a-cop said. He was a retired police officer. "He said if I saw you, to tell you he wants to see you. He'll be in the Rittenhouse Club until six. I stuck a note under your door."
"Thank you," Matt said.
"I'll take care of the car, don't worry about it. I think he's gone for the day."
"Thank you," Matt said, and got on the elevator and rode up to the third floor, wondering what was going on. He had a premonition, not that the sky was falling in, but that something was about to happen that he was not going to like.
He unlocked the door to the stairway, opened it, and picked up the envelope on the floor.
4:20 P.M.
Matt:
If this comes to hand after six, when I will have left the Rittenhouse, please call me at home no matter what the hour. This is rather important.
Dad.
He jammed the note in his pocket and went up the stairs. The red light on his answering machine was blinking. There were two messages. The first was from someone who wished to sell him burglar bars at a special, one-time reduced rate, and the second was a familiar voice:
"I tried to call you at work, but you had already left. Your dad and I are going to have a drink in the Rittenhouse Club. You need to be there. If you don't get this until after six, call him or me when you finally do."
The caller had not identified himself. Chief Inspector Dennis V. Coughlin did not like to waste words, and he correctly assumed that his voice would be recognized.
And, Matt thought, there had been something in his voice suggesting there was something wrong in a new detective having gone off shift at the called-for time.
What the hell is going on?
Matt picked up the telephone and dialed a number from memory.
"Yeah?" Detective Charley McFadden was not about to win an award for telephone courtesy.
"This is Sears Roebuck. We're running a sale on previously owned wedding gowns."
Detective McFadden was not amused. "Hi, Matt, what's up?"
"I don't know, but I'm not going to be able to meet you at six. You going to be home later?"
"How much later?"
"Maybe six-thirty, quarter to seven?"
"Call me at McGee's. I'll probably still be there."
"Sorry, Charley."
"Yeah, well, what the hell. We'll see what happens. Maybe I'll get lucky without you."
Matt hung up, looked at his watch, and then quickly left his apartment.
Matt walked up the stairs of the Rittenhouse Club, pushed open the heavy door, and went into the foyer. He looked up at the board behind the porter's counter, on which the names of all the members were listed, together with a sliding indicator that told whether or not they were in the club.
"Your father's in the lounge, Mr. Payne," the porter said to him.
"Thank you," Matt said.
Brewster Cortland Payne II, a tall, angular, distinguished-looking man who was actually far wittier than his appearance suggested, saw him the moment he entered the lounge and raised his hand. Chief Inspector Dennis V. Coughlin, a heavyset, ruddy-faced man in a wellfitting pin-striped suit, turned to look, and then smiled. They were sitting in rather small leather-upholstered armchairs between which sat a small table. There were squat whiskey glasses, small glass water pitchers, a silver bowl full of mixed nuts, and a battered, but wellshined, brass ashtray with a box of wooden matches in a holder on it on the table.
"Good," Brewster Payne said, smiling and rising from his chair to touch Matt softly and affectionately on the arm. "We caught you."
"Dad. Uncle Denny."
"Matty, I tried to call you at East Detectives," Coughlin said, sitting back down. "You had already gone."
"I left at fiveafter four, Uncle Denny. The City got their full measure of my flesh for their day's pay."
An elderly waiter in a white jacket appeared.
"Denny's drinking Irish and the power of suggestion got to me," Brewster Payne said. "But have what you'd like."
"Irish is fine with me."
"All around, please, Philip," Brewster Payne said.
I have just had a premonition: I am not going to like whatever is going to happen. Whatever this is all about, it is not "let's call Good Ol' Matt and buy him a drink at the Rittenhouse Club."
THREE
"Are we celebrating something, or is this boys' night out?" Matt asked.
Coughlin chuckled.
"Well, more or less, we're celebrating something," Brewster Payne said. "Penny's coming home."
"Is she really?" Matt said, and the moment the words were out of his mouth, he realized that not only had he been making noise, rather than responding, but that his disinterest had not only been apparent to his father, but had annoyed him, perhaps hurt him, as well.