“Jack Moffitt would still be walking around if he had called for the backup he knew he was supposed to have before he answered that silent alarm and got himself shot. And Dutch Moffitt would still be alive, too, if he hadn’t tried to live up to his reputation as supercop.”
“Chief,” Wohl said, “I’m sure Matt has thought about what happened to his uncle Dutch and his father. And learned from it.”
“You don’t believe that for a second, Peter,” Coughlin said. “When did he think about it? Before or after he climbed out on that twelfth-floor ledge? And if Chenowith or any of the other lunatics show up in Harrisburg, you think he’s going to think about what happened to Dutch and his father? Or try to put the arm on him—or all of them?”
Wohl shrugged and didn’t reply for a moment.
“Well, what do you think we should do?” he asked finally.
“How’s he going to check in?”
“Twice a day. With either Mike Weisbach or Jason Washington, or Weisbach’s sergeant, Sandow. Or whenever—if—he finds something.”
“Take the call yourself. Have a word with him. He just might listen to you. He thinks you walk on water.”
“I’d already planned to do that,” Peter said.
Coughlin met Wohl’s eyes. He looked for a moment as if he was going to say something else, but changed his mind. He picked up his glass and drained it.
“I’ll let you go to bed,” he said. “Thanks for the drink.”
“Anytime, Chief. You know that,” Wohl said.
“If I interrupted anything,” Coughlin said, nodding toward the closed door of Peter’s bedroom, “I’m sorry.”
Jesus Christ, is he psychic? Or did Amy cough or something and I didn’t hear her and he did? Or did he take one look at my face and read on it the symptoms of the just-well-laid man?
“You didn’t interrupt anything, Chief,” Wohl replied.
“Good,” Coughlin said.
He reached for the telephone and dialed a number.
“Chief Coughlin en route from Inspector Wohl’s house to my place,” he said, and hung up.
Then he walked to the door. He put out his hand to Wohl.
“A strong word when you talk to our Matty, Peter.”
“As strong as I can make it,” Wohl said.
Coughlin nodded, then opened the door. Peter watched to make sure he made it safely down the stairway, then went inside the apartment, locked the door, and went into his bedroom.
“I gather he’s gone?” Amy said. “He didn’t accept your gracious invitation to spend the night?”
“Sorry about that,” Peter said. “He’s gone. How much did you hear?”
“Everything,” she said.
“He’s very fond of Matt,” Wohl said. “And he had a couple of drinks.”
“I hardly know where to ask you to start,” Amy said. “Why don’t we start with the twelfth-floor ledge of the Bellvue-Stratford? That sounds very interesting.”
“It wasn’t as bad as it sounds, Amy. That ledge was two feet wide. And I really read the riot act to him when I heard about it.”
“Two feet wide and twelve stories off the ground, right? Let’s have it, Peter.”
“You read in the papers where a Vice Squad lieutenant was taking money from a call girl madam?”
Amy nodded.
“A lot of it took place in the Bellvue. Matt was on the surveillance detail. They put a microphone on a hotel-room window with a suction cup. The cup fell off. Matt went out on the ledge and put it back in place.”
“He risked his life so you could arrest a call girl madam?”
“We were really after the police officers involved. And don’t get mad at me, Amy. I didn’t tell him to do it. And I ate his ass out when I found out about it.”
Amy snorted.
Peter started to take his bathrobe off.
“Just hold it right there,” Amy said. “This isn’t pick-it-up-where-we-left-it-when-we-were-so-rudely-interrup ted time. Who are these people Denny Coughlin is afraid Matt will try to arrest by himself?”
“I can’t get into that,” Wohl said. “I’m sorry.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Amy flared, parrot ing, “ ‘I can’t get into that’?”
“It’s a highly confidential underway investigation.”
“And you never talk about highly confidential underway investigations to the bimbo you’re banging, right?”
“Is that what you think you are to me? Some bimbo I’m banging?”
“Don’t try to change the subject, Peter,” Amy said.
“And what am I to you, Amy?” Wohl heard himself asking, wondering where the sudden rage had come from. “A convenient stud? Once or twice a month, when the hormones get active, call the stud and ask if you can come over?”
“How did we get on this subject?” she asked uncomfortably. “Is that what you really think?”