The Investigators Part 76

"I'm sure that you do, inasmuch as you are calling me at my home-and on my unlisted number-at seven forty-five in the morning."

"Believe me, it is."

"You wouldn't care to tell me what it is that's so important?"

"I would rather do that when we meet."

"And where, and when, Mr. Coughlin, do you suggest that we meet?"

"If this would be agreeable to you, I was thinking of the restaurant in the Hotel Warwick. I thought we could talk over breakfast."

"You mean, right now?"

"I believe that it would be in our mutual interest, Mr. Savarese, if we met as soon as possible."

"But you're not willing to tell me why you think it would be so?"

"I think it would be better if we talked privately."

"And would you be alone, Mr. Coughlin?"

"I will have Inspector Wohl with me, but the conversation I hope we can have will be just between us. It's a rather delicate matter."

"Inspector Wohl is a splendid police officer, as, indeed, was his father. What I think would be possible, Mr. Coughlin, is that I would come to the Warwick accompanied by my chauffeur, Mr. Pietro Ca.s.sandro. He and Inspector Wohl could have their breakfast together, and see that you and I are not disturbed while we are enjoying ours."

"That would be perfectly satisfactory to me, Mr. Savarese."

"Perhaps this might be a good omen, Mr. Coughlin," Savarese said. "But Pietro just walked in the door. Shall we say in thirty minutes? Would that be convenient for you?"

"Yes, it would. Thirty minutes it is. I look forward to seeing you, Mr. Savarese."

"Good-bye, Mr. Coughlin."

Coughlin hung the phone up and turned to look at the other people in his office. In addition to Inspector Peter Wohl, they were Jerry Carlucci, mayor of the City of Philadelphia; Chief Inspector Matt Lowenstein; Lieutenant Jack Fellows, the mayor's bodyguard; and Frank F. Young, a.s.sistant Special Agent in Charge (Criminal Affairs) of the Philadelphia office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Young had absolutely nothing to do with what was going on, but when Walter Davis had announced, at six-thirty-to everybody's initial relief-that he had things pending in the office that just could not be put off, and would have to leave, he finished the announcement by saying not to worry, he would call Frank Young and have him come to Special Operations to see what help he could be.

Coughlin could not think of any credible reason to suggest that all Young would do would be in the way. There was no question in his mind that Young's presence would be primarily to make sure the FBI didn't get left out of anything that would accrue to the interest of the FBI.

"Thirty minutes," Coughlin announced. "Peter gets to have breakfast with Pietro."

"I can hardly wait," Wohl said.

"You really think this is necessary, Denny?" the mayor asked.

"I don't want Prasko killed before we get the Five Squad to trial," Coughlin said.

"We'd really look bad, Jerry," Lowenstein said, coming to his aid, "if somebody stuck a knife in Prasko in the Detention Center."

The mayor threw up his hands, admitting he could not counter that argument.

"Frank," Coughlin said, turning to the FBI official, "we don't want to spook Savarese. Could you, without making many waves, see if you could keep the FBI-or, for that matter, any other feds-away from the Warwick from now until, say, nine-thirty?"

"FBI. No problem. I'll get right on that. Have you got any idea what other agency might be interested in Savarese?"

Coughlin saw Wohl's eyes roll before he answered for Coughlin.

"Frank, if Savarese sees anybody who looks like a cop, or a fed, doing anything at the Warwick, he will think they're interested in him. Whether or not they are. The safest thing to do is keep everybody with any kind of a badge away from the Warwick for an hour or so."

"Well, I understand that, certainly," Young said, a little lamely. "I'll call around."

"I'll put the word out that n.o.body is to go near the Warwick," Matt Lowenstein said. "Which will probably have the result that every cop in Philadelphia will show up to see what's going on."

"What are we waiting for now?" Mayor Carlucci asked.

"To hear from Matt Payne in Harrisburg," Wohl said. "To see if he's got anything on Calhoun or not."

"I've been thinking about that," the mayor said.

"We should hear something in fifteen or twenty minutes, Mr. Mayor," Peter said.

"A lot can happen in fifteen or twenty minutes," Carlucci said. "Why don't you do it now, Peter?"

"Mr. Mayor, we gave that a lot of thought. And we decided-"

"You're a good cop, Peter. And I love you. But the last time I looked, I was mayor of Philadelphia. Arrest the b.a.s.t.a.r.ds!"

"Yes, sir," Wohl said.

Detective Matt Payne looked at his watch when there was a knock at the door. It was 7:59.

He opened the door. Lieutenant Paul Deitrich was standing there.

"Good morning, sir," Matt said. "Please come in."

Deitrich nodded but didn't say anything.

"Lieutenant, these are Detectives McFadden and Martinez," Matt said, making the introductions. "Charley, Jesus, this is Lieutenant Deitrich."

Deitrich nodded, just perceptibly, then looked at Matt for an explanation for the two detectives.

"They've got a warrant for Calhoun," Matt said.

"We got lucky," McFadden said. "Somebody dumped the answer in our lap."

"I got lucky here, too," Deitrich said. "I remembered that if you really want to find something out, ask the cop on the beat."

"Our guy was a retired detective, who smelled something rotten."

Deitrich looked at Matt.

"I know one of the guys who work that area pretty well," Deitrich said. "I went to see him. He told me-without me having to tell him why I was asking-that Mrs. Worner lives at 218 Maple. Her yard backs up against 223 Elm, which is where-"

"Vincent T. Holmes, Calhoun's uncle, lives," Matt furnished.

Deitrich nodded.

"You're talking about the lady who works in the bank, right?" Martinez asked.

Deitrich nodded again.

"Holmes's wife died two years ago, of cancer," Deitrich went on. "About the time Mrs. Worner finally gave up and put her husband away."

"Excuse me?" Matt asked.

"He got hurt bad in Korea," Deitrich said. "Lost one leg above the knee and the foot on the other leg. She married him anyway. He got a one-hundred percent disability pension. They weren't hurting for money. But he couldn't work, and he got into the sauce pretty bad. I guess he was in pain a lot, and he just sort of went downhill until she couldn't handle him anymore. The last time he got arrested for drunken driving, the judge gave him the choice of going into the VA hospital or two years in jail. He went to the VA hospital."

"And enter the friendly neighbor, right?" McFadden said.

Deitrich nodded again.

"She's Catholic, so she won't divorce her husband. Maybe she wouldn't marry Holmes anyway. He's not a real catch. He works for Pennsylvania Power and Light as a lineman, and he doesn't look much like Paul Newman. But anyway, she sneaks over to his house at night, or he over to hers, fooling n.o.body in the neighborhood, of course, but everybody feels sorry for them-mostly for her-and n.o.body says anything."

"s.h.i.+t!" McFadden said.

"So there's your connection, Payne," Deitrich said. "What do you want to do about it?"

"The question is, what did she do?" Matt asked.

"You know f.u.c.king well what she did, Payne," Martinez said. "She conspired with Calhoun to hide whatever those Five Squad sc.u.mbags wanted to hide in a safe-deposit box. That makes her an accessory after the fact."

"First of all, we don't know if anything connected to Five Squad is in that safe-deposit box-"

"We will, the minute we go into the box."

"Which box, Jesus?" Matt said, patiently. "When we go to the judge for a search warrant, he's going to want to know what box we have cause to believe there is something in. He's not going to give us a warrant to go in every box in the bank."

"Maybe Calhoun will have the key on him when we arrest him, Matt," McFadden said.

"And maybe he won't," Matt said. "Maybe the uncle keeps the key for him."

"And maybe," Deitrich chimed in, "the key never leaves the bank."

"Excuse me?" Matt said again.

"You're working on the idea that there is a box in there rented under a phony name," Deitrich said. "What I'm thinking is maybe Mrs. Worner, who is in charge of the whole operation, is just letting your man use a box that's not not rented. Who would know? He goes in, she gives him the key, and that's the end of it. No record, of course." rented. Who would know? He goes in, she gives him the key, and that's the end of it. No record, of course."

"That makes a lot of sense," Matt said.

"Have we got enough to arrest the uncle on?" McFadden asked.

"After we get in the box, presuming we find something in the box, then maybe. Right now, no."

"It's eight o'clock," Martinez said. "Wohl is waiting to hear from you whether or not we can tie Calhoun to anything in the box."

"I have an idea," Matt said. "Let's scare everybody."

"What the f.u.c.k does that mean?" Martinez asked.

"We go along, right now, when the Harrisburg cops go to Uncle Vincent's house to arrest Calhoun. We don't do it quietly. We make sure Mrs. Worner sees the police cars at Uncle Vincent's house. Following good police procedure, the Harrisburg cops send a couple of uniforms to make sure Calhoun doesn't get out the back door. Looking out her kitchen window, she'll see that. Charley and I will also be at the back door. She'll see us. Calhoun is taken off."

"So?" Martinez asked.

"Nothing else happens. Except that a police car stays at the curb in front of Uncle Vincent's. So Uncle Vincent, already worried about Calhoun getting hauled off, has two options. He can either pretend he has no idea what's going on-which I don't think he'll want to do-or he can go to work as usual. In which case the police car follows him. The last thing I think he'll do is try to get in touch with Mrs. Worner, which he can't do in person, with the cops watching. And I don't think he'd try to use the telephone, because he'd be afraid it was tapped. So he goes to work. And sees that he's being followed by the cops."

"What is this s.h.i.+t, Payne?" Martinez asked.

"Then Mrs. Worner has one of two options. Well, maybe three. She could run, but I don't think that's going to happen. She either goes to work as usual, or she stays home. If she stays home, we go to see her. If she goes to work, she is called into her boss's office, where there are two policemen, the same two she saw standing outside Uncle Vincent's place. We then tell her we know all about the safe-deposit box, and if she cooperates with us, it will go easier on her-you know that routine."

"That's pure bulls.h.i.+t!" Martinez said. "Hotshot here has been watching too much TV."

"I don't know, Matt," McFadden said. "It might work, but there's a lot of ifs."

"What I'm going to do," Martinez announced angrily, "is go down to police headquarters here, get a couple of local uniforms to back me up, go arrest Calhoun, and then call Wohl and tell him we have Calhoun and probably don't have anything with the safe-deposit box."

"No, you're not," Matt said. "We're going to do it my way."

"Who the f.u.c.k do you think you are, hotshot?"

"I was a.s.signed to this case first," Matt said. "That makes it mine."

"Oh, f.u.c.k you, hotshot," Martinez said, and walked to the telephone.

"Who are you calling?" Matt asked.

"Who the f.u.c.k do you think? Wohl. We'll settle this s.h.i.+t right now!"

"Put the phone down, Jesus," Charley said, choosing sides.

"Let him go, Charley," Matt said.

"Put the phone down, Jesus," McFadden repeated, walking up to Martinez.

Literally quivering with rage, Detective Martinez looked up at Detective McFadden.