"Around," Wohl said. "Around."
"Come on, Peter!" Washington said.
"You made your point, Jason. Leave it," Wohl said. He bumped hips with Matt, signaling he wanted to get up, then picked up the envelope with the photographs. When Matt was standing in the aisle, Wohl dropped money on the table and started to walk away. Then he turned. " Good job, Jason, coming up with the photographs. Thank you."
"Just don't do something with them that will make me regret it," Washington said.
"I told you to leave it, Jason!" Wohl said, icily furious. Then he walked out of the Oak Lane Diner and got in his car. Neither Jason Washington nor Matt Payne was surprised to see him head back downtown rather than toward Bustleton and Bowler. The Philadelphia office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation was downtown.
"Until a moment ago," Washington said, "there was an element of humor in this. Now it's not at all funny."
"So he tells the FBI what he thinks of them. So what?"
Washington looked at him, as if surprised that Matt could ask such a stupid question.
"I really don't understand," Matt said.
"The FBI doesn't like criticism," he explained. "Especially in a case like this, where it's justified. So instead of admitting they acted like horses' asses, they will come up with a good reason why they didn't happen to mention to us that they had men on DeZego. 'A continuing investigation' is one phrase they use; 'classified national security matters' is another one. And they go to Commissioner Czernick and say, 'We thought we had an agreement that whenever one of your people wants something from us, he would go through Captain Duffy's Office of Extradepartmental Affairs. Your man Wohl was just in here making all kinds of wild accusations and behaving in a most unprofessional manner."'
"But they were wrong," Matt protested.
"We don't like to admit it, but we need the FBI, use it a lot. The NCIC is an FBI operation. They have the best forensic laboratories in the world. They sometimes tip us off to things. They pass out spaces at the FBI Academy. You get an FBI expert to testify in court, the jury believes him if he announces the moon is made of green cheese. The bottom line is that we need them as much, maybe more, than they need us. For another example, the FBI was 'consulted' before we got the federal grant to set up Special Operations. If they had said-even suggested-that we wouldn't use the money wisely, we wouldn't have gotten it. So we try to maintain the best possible relationship with the FBI."
"And Wohl doesn't know that?"
"Wohl's angry. He has every right to be. He doesn't get that way very often, but when he does-"
"Shit," Matt said.
"Let's just hope he cools off a little before he storms through the door and tells the SAC what he thinks of him and the other assholes," Washington said.
"The what?"
"SAC, special agent in charge," Washington explained, translating. "There are also AACs, three of them, which stands for assistant agent in charge. But as pissed as Peter is, he's going to see the head man, not one of the underlings."
He slid off the seat and stood up.
"If you hear anything, let me know, and vice versa," he said.
"If that goddamn Dolan hadn't gotten clever-"
"Don't be too hard on him," Washington said. "I think one of the reasons Peter Wohl is so angry is that he knows that if he had a chance to take pictures of a couple of FBI clowns on a surveillance, he would have mailed them to their office too. I've pulled their chain once or twice myself. There's something in their anointed-by-theAlmighty demeanor that brings that sort of thing out in most cops."
He smiled at Matt and then walked out of the diner. Matt got in the Porsche and turned right onto North Broad Street.
A minute or two later he glanced at the passenger seat and saw that he still had the two envelopes with duplicate sets of photographs Washington had given him in City Hall.
He felt sure that the order to "give one to Chief Lowenstein and the other to Chief Coughlin" Washington had given him was intended only to unnerve Sergeant Dolan.
Since the pictures were of two goddamn FBI agents, they really had no value at all.
A moment later he had a second thought:Or did they?
Two blocks farther up North Broad Street, in violation of the Motor Vehicle Code of the City of Philadelphia, Officer Matthew Payne dropped the Porsche 911 into second gear, pushed the accelerator to the floor, and made a U-turn, narrowly averting a collision with a United Parcel truck, whose driver shook his fist at him and made an obscene comment.
"May I help you, sir?" the receptionist in the FBI office asked.
"I'd like to see Mr. Davis, please," Peter Wohl said.
"May I ask in connection with what, sir?"
"I'd rather discuss that with Mr. Davis," Wohl said. "I'm Inspector Wohl of the Philadelphia Police."
"One moment, sir. I'll see if Special Agent Davis is free."
She pushed a button on her state-of-the-art office telephone switching system, spoke softly into it, and then announced, "I'm sorry, sir, but Special Agent Davis is in conference. Can anyone else help you? Perhaps one of the assistant special agents in charge?"
"No, I don't think so. Were you speaking with Mr. Davis or his secretary?"
She did not elect to respond verbally to that presumptuous question; she just smiled benignly at him.
"Please get Mr. Davis on the line and tell him that Inspector Wohl is out here and needs to see him immediately," Peter said.
She pushed another button.
"I'm sorry to bother you, sir, but there's a Philadelphia policeman out here, a gentleman named Wohl, who insists that he has to see you." She listened a moment and then said, "Yes, sir."
Then she smiled at Peter Wohl.
"Someone will come for you shortly. Won't you have a seat? May I get you a cup of coffee?"
"Thank you," Peter said. "No coffee, thank you just the same."
He sat down on a couch in front of a coffee table on which was a glossy brochure with a four-color illustration of the seal of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the legend, YOUR FBI in silver lettering. He did not pick it up, thinking that he knew all he wanted to know about the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Ten minutes later a door opened and a neatly dressed young man who did not look unlike Officer Matthew W. Payne came out, walked over to him, smiled, and offered his hand.
"I'm Special Agent Foster, Inspector. Special Agent in Charge Davis will see you now. If you'll come with me?"
Wohl followed him down a corridor lined with frosted glass walls toward the corner of the building. There waited another female, obviously Davis's secretary.
"Oh, I'm so sorry, Inspector," she said. "Washington's on the line. I'm afraid it will be another minute or two. Can I offer you coffee?"
"No thank you," Peter said.
There was another couch and another coffee table. On this one was a four-color brochure with a photograph of a building on it and the legend, THE J. EDGAR HOOVER FBI BUILDING. Wohl didn't pick this one up to pass the time, either.
Five minutes later Wohl saw Davis's secretary pick up the receiver, listen, and then replace it.
"Special Agent Davis will see you now, Inspector," she said, then walked to Davis's door and held it open for him.
The FBI provided Special Agent in Charge Walter Davis, as the man in charge of its Philadelphia office, with all the accoutrements of a senior federal bureaucrat. There was a large, glistening desk with matching credenza and a high-backed chair upholstered in dark red leather. There was a carpet on the floor; another couch and coffee table; a wall full of photographs and plaques; and a large FBI seal. There were two flags against the curtains. It was a corner office with a nice view.
Walter Davis was a tall, well-built man in his forties. His gray hair was impeccably barbered, and he wore a faint gray plaid suit, a stiffly starched white shirt, a rep-striped necktie, and highly polished black wing-tip shoes.