"How the hell are you, Peter?"
"Frankie, say hello to Walter Davis and Matt Payne," Wohl said. "This is Frankie Perri."
Frankie gave them a callused ham of a hand.
"Matt works for me," Wohl went on. "Walter runs the FBI. He said he'd never met a Mob guy, so I said I could fix that and brought him here."
"He's kidding, I hope you know," Frankie said.
"Yes, of course," Davis said uncomfortably.
"With a name like Frankie Perri, the FBI figures you have to be in the Mafia," Wohl said.
"Kiss my ass, Peter," Frankie Perri said, punching Wohl affectionately on the arm. "I'm going to burn your goddamn veal."
He put out his hand to Davis, and nodded at Matt.
"Nice to meet you, Mr. Davis. Come back. Both of you."
"Thank you," Davis said, and then when he was gone, he said, "What do you call that, Peter, community relations?"
"What's on your mind, Walter?"
"The government is going to try Clifford Wallis and Delmore Travis for murder/kidnapping under the Lindbergh Act."
"Who?" Matt Payne asked.
Wohl glanced at him, a flicker of annoyance in his eyes.
"New Jersey's got them," Wohl said, "with a lot of evidence, on a murder one. They might plea bargain that down to manslaughter one, but no further. That's good for twenty-to-life, anyway. Why?"
"They violated federal law, Peter."
"Come on."
"Let us say there is considerable interest in this case rather high up in the Justice Department."
"You mean that Arthur Nelson wants them prosecuted," Wohl said.
Davis, who had been sitting back in his chair with his left hand against his cheek, moved the hand momentarily away from his face, a tacit agreement with Wohl's statement.
"Why?" Wohl asked, visibly thinking aloud.
"People get paroled on a state twenty-to-life conviction after what, seven years?" Davis said.
"And he wants to make sure they do more than seven years for the murder of his son. You got enough to try them?"
"We have enough for a Grand Jury indictment."
"That's not what I asked."
"I grant, it's pretty circumstantial," Davis said. "That's why I'm turning to you for help, Peter."
"Would you think me cynical to suspect that someone's leaning on you about this, Walter?"
"Yes," Davis said, smiling. "But they called me to Washington yesterday, and both of the telephone calls that delayed this little luncheon of ours concerned this case."
The waitress with the beehive hairdo delivered three large plates with sliced tomatoes and onions just about covering them.
When she had gone, Wohl took a forkful, chewed it slowly, and then asked, "So how can I help, Walter? More than the established, official routine for cooperation with the FBI would be helpful?"
"I need what you have as soon as I can get it, and I want everything you have, not just what a normal request for information would produce."
The waitress delivered three round water glasses, now scarred nearly gray by a thousand trips through the dishwasher. She half filled them, from a battered stainless-steel water pitcher, with a red liquid.
"Frankie said his grandfather made it over in Jersey," the waitress said.
Wohl picked up his glass, then stood up, called "Frankie," and, when he had his attention, called "Salud!" and then sat down again.
Walter Davis, thinking,Oh, God, homemade Dago Red! took a swallow. It was surprisingly good.
"You're almost certainly drinking an alcoholic beverage on which the applicable federal tax has not been paid," Wohl said. "Does that bother you?"
"Not a damned bit, to tell you the truth," Davis said. He stood up, called "Frankie" and then "Salud!" and then sat down, looking at Wohl, obviously pleased with himself.
Wohl chuckled, then looked at Matt Payne.
"Matt, when we get back to the office, round up everything in my files on the Nelson murder case. Make a copy of everything. Then go to Homicide and do the same thing. Then find Detective Harris and photocopy everything he has. Have it ready for me in the morning."
"Yes, sir," Matt Payne said.
"I'll take a look at it, see if anything is missing, and then you can take it to the FBI. Soon enough for you, Walter?"
"Thank you, Peter. 'Harris,' you said, was the detective on the job? Any chance that I could talk to him?"
"You, or one of your people?"
"Actually, I was thinking of one of my people."
"Tony Harris is the exception to the rule that most detectives really would rather be FBI agents, Walter. I don't think that would be very productive."
"I thought everybody loved us," Davis said.
"We all do. Isn't that so, Officer Payne?"
"Yes, sir. We all love the FBI."
The waitress with the beehive hairdo delivered their meal.
The veal was, Walter Davis was willing to admit, better than the veal in Ristorante Alfredo. And the homemade Chianti was nicer than some of the dry red wine he'd had at twenty-five dollars a bottle in Ristorante Alfredo.
But he knew that neither the quality of the food nor its considerably cheaper than Ristorante Alfredo prices were the reasons Peter Wohl had brought him here for lunch.
SIX
Under the special agent in charge (the "SAC") of the Philadelphia Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation were three divisions, Criminal Affairs, Counterintelligence, and Administration. Each division was under an assistant agent in charge, called an "A-SAC."
It was SAC Davis's custom to hold two daily Senior Staff Conferences, called "SSCs, each business day, one first thing in the morning, and the other at four P.M. Participation at the SSCs was limited to the SAC and the three A-SACs. The conferences were informal. No stenographic record was made of them, except when the SAC could not be present, and one of the A-SACs was standing in for him. The SAC naturally wanted to know what he had missed, so a steno was called in to make a written record.
If one of the A-SACs could not make a SSC, one of his assistants, customarily, but not always, the most senior special agent in that division, would be appointed to stand in for him.
This was very common. The A-SACs were busy men, and it was often inconvenient for them to make both daily SSCs, although they generally tried to make at least one of them, and took especial pains not to miss two days' SSCs in a row.
But it was a rare thing for SAC Davis to find, as he did when he returned to his office from lunch with Staff Inspector Wohl and Officer Payne, all three A-SACs waiting outside his office for the afternoon SSC.
He was pleased. In addition to whatever else would be discussed, he intended to discuss the upcoming trials of Clifford Wallis and Delmore Travis. The political aspects were mind-boggling. Washington was going to be breathing down his neck on this one, and not only the senior hierarchy of the FBI, joining which was one of SAC Davis's most fond dreams, but the higher-highest-echelons of the Department of Justice.
If he handled this well, it would reflect well upon him. If he dropped the ball (or someone he was responsible for dropped it), there would be no chance whatever that he would be transferred to Washington and named a deputy inspector. And from what he had seen of the situation, there was a saber-toothed tiger behind every filing cabinet, just waiting to leap and bite off somebody's ass.
This sort of a case was the sort of thing one should discuss with the A-SACs personally, not with one of their subordinates. With all three of the A-SACs present at this SSC, it would not be necessary to call a special SSC.
Davis waited until he had heard all the reports of what was going on in the Criminal, Administrative, and Counterintelligence Divisions, and made the few decisions necessary before getting into what he was now thinking of as the " Wallis/Travis Sticky Ball of Wax."