The investigators

THIRTEEN

If he saw it at all, Mr. Ronald R. Ketcham paid little attention to the black GMC Suburban truck parked near the elevator in the basement garage of his garden apartment building on Overbrook Avenue.

The truck was inconspicuous, and intended to be that way. It was painted black, and all but the windshield and front-seat windows had been painted over. There were no signs on its doors or sides indicating its ownership or purpose; it was classified as a "Not For Hire" vehicle, and none were required by law.

The inconspicuous Suburban was normally used to carry the remains of the recently deceased from their place of death-usually a hospital, but sometimes from the Medical Examiner's office, if the deceased had died at home, or for some other reason was subject to an official autopsy-to a funeral home.

Larger undertaking establishments often had their own discreet vehicles for the purpose of collecting bodies and bringing them to their places of business, as they had their own fleets of hearses, flower cars, and limousines to carry the dear departed, his/her floral tributes, and his/her mourners to his/her final resting place. But many-perhaps most-of Philadelphia's smaller funeral homes had found it good business to take advantage of the corpse pickup service and delivery service offered by Classic Livery, Inc., which owned the Suburban Mr. Ketcham did not notice as he drove his Buick into his garage.

Even the larger undertaking establishments, when business was good, often used one of the four black Suburbans Classic Livery had made available to the trade, as they similarly availed themselves of hearses, flower cars, and limousines from Classic Livery's fleet when their own equipment was not sufficient to meet the demands of that particular day's service to the deceased and bereaved.

Classic Livery, Inc., also owned the black Lincoln sedan parked among the rows of cars in the basement garage of Ketcham's garden apartment, and the four men in it-who had been waiting for Ketcham for two hours before the shit-ass finally showed up-were longtime employees of Classic Livery.

Ketcham parked his Buick coupe in the place reserved for it, got out, reached in and took his briefcase from the rear seat, and walked toward the elevator.

As Ketcham did so, everyone in the Lincoln sedan except the driver got out, and the driver of the remains-transporting Suburban started his engine.

The three men from the Lincoln reached the door to the elevator at about the time Ketcham reached it. One of them, a well-dressed thirty-five-year-old of Sicilian ancestry, smiled at Ketcham and waved him into the open elevator door. When Ketcham had entered the elevator, the three men got into it with him.

The elevator door closed.

The driver of the black Suburban drove to the door of the elevator and backed up to it. The doors were opened from the inside.

The elevator door opened again not quite a full minute later. Ketcham, the upper part of his body now concealed in an overcoat, and staggering, as if he had been subjected to some sort of blow to the head, emerged from the elevator, supported by two of the three men who had entered the elevator with him.

Ketcham was assisted into the Suburban, and one of the three men from the Lincoln got in with him. Ketcham was dragged toward the front of the Suburban-all but the front seat, of course, had been removed, so there would be room for a cadaver-where he lay upon his stomach. The doors were closed.

The other two men walked unhurriedly back to the Lincoln and got in. When the black Suburban drove away from the elevator door toward the entrance of the garage, the Lincoln followed it.

"What the hell's going on here?" Ketcham asked, his voice somewhat muffled by the overcoat over his head and shoulders.

The man who had opened the doors from the inside, and was now half sitting on a small ledge in the side of the Suburban, kicked him in the face.

"Shut your fucking face," he said.

He then proceeded to wrap two-inch-wide white surgical-or perhaps "morticians and embalmers"-white gauze around Ketcham's neck, in such a manner that the overcoat would not become dislodged.

Next, he used the tape to bind Ketcham's wrists together, and then his ankles.

Approximately five minutes later, Ketcham, who sounded close to tears, said one word: "Please…"

This earned him two sharp kicks, one in the ear from the man in the front, and a second in the buttocks, delivered by the man who had smiled at him as he had entered the elevator and who had gotten into the Suburban with him.

Ketcham said nothing else during the rest of the journey, which took approximately forty minutes, and neither did either of the two men with him in the rear of the remains-transporting Suburban.

Ketcham tried to recognize, and make sense of, the sounds and noises he heard during the trip. From the frequent stops and starts, and the sounds of automobiles accelerating and shifting gears, Ketcham deduced they were in traffic somewhere.

He searched his memory, very hard, in an attempt to guess who was doing this to him and why, but to no avail. The first thing that occurred to him, perhaps naturally, was that it had something to do with Mr. Amos J. Williams.

At first-Ketcham was understandably upset and not thinking too clearly, although the two lines of cocaine he had nasally ingested in the men's room of the Blue Rock Tavern on his way home gave him a feeling of euphoria about all things, including a sense that his mind was really firing on all twelve cylinders-that seemed the most logical inference to draw.

Williams-and his thugs-had been arrested at the Howard Johnson motel on Roosevelt Boulevard, and I wasn't. That damned well might have made him suspicious, maybe made him think I had set him up with the police. And his getting arrested had also caused him to lose the cocaine he had intended to sell me. Even if he had paid only half of what he was going to sell it to me for, that's still ten thousand dollars, and he would be very unhappy about losing that much money.

And if he has decided-he's not intelligent, obviously, so he's liable to decide anything-that I had something to do with his arrest, then this may be my punishment for that.

Unlikely. The first thing he would do-intelligent or not, he has a certain criminal cunning-would be to recoup his losses. At least the ten thousand he had invested, and possibly the entire twenty I had agreed to pay him. Once he had done that, he might well kill me. But what would be the purpose?

If it's money he wants, I'll promise to get it for him. Under these circumstances, I will be certainly motivated to find it somewhere.

But wait a minute! If this, whatever this is, has something to do with Amos Williams amp; Company, he would have sent his man Baby Brownlee. The people who are doing this to me are white men!

Could this be a case of mistaken identity?

For that matter, could I be hallucinating? This does feel like a bad dream. Am I going to wake up in just a minute?

Or could I really be hallucinating? I did a couple of lines… what, forty minutes ago? Was it bad stuff?

No. That was from my next-to-last packet of emergency supplies. I've been into it twenty, perhaps thirty, times without anything unpleasant happening.

Ketcham became aware that the sound of the vehicle's passageway over the roadway had changed. For one thing, he sensed that they were moving more slowly than they had been.

The vehicle stopped.

Ketcham heard the sound of the vehicle's door opening, and then it moved as if someone had gotten out.

He heard a metallic screech and decided, after a moment, that it was the sound of a door opening, and then changed that to suspect strongly that it was the sound a gate in a Cyclone fence-as those surrounding a tennis court-makes when being opened.

The vehicle moved a short distance forward. Ketcham heard the sound of the squeaking gate again. The vehicle tilted as if someone had gotten in the front seat. The door slammed shut and the vehicle drove off.

Ketcham sensed that they were no longer on a paved road, and confirmation of this came when the vehicle, moving slowly, encountered one hole in the road after another.

What are they doing? Taking me out in the woods someplace to kill me?

But if they wanted to kill me, they had ample opportunity in my garage.

If they're not going to kill me, then what? They must want something from me. What?

If this is a case of mistaken identity, which seems as likely an answer as anything else I've been able to come up with, then there will be the opportunity to clear things up, to let them know I'm not who they are looking for.

Or, even if it's not a case of mistaken identity, if they want something from me-maybe they know I'm a stockbroker, and think we keep large amounts of cash around the office. They're Italian, they could be the Mafia. That sounds like something the Mafia would do. And they might not know the only cash around the office is in the petty-cash box, and I don't even know of any negotiable instruments at all. Anyway, if they do want something from me, there will certainly be an opportunity to talk, to negotiate.

Those thoughts made Ketcham feel better.

After two or three minutes of lurching down what Ketcham was now convinced was an unpaved road, the vehicle moved onto a solid, flat, and thus presumably paved surface and stopped.

There was the sound of two doors being opened, the sense of shifting as if two persons had left the vehicle, and the doors slammed shut.

Then Ketcham heard the rear doors of the vehicle being opened.

"Cut that shit off his legs," a voice ordered.

There was a clicking sound, which Ketcham decided just might be the sound of a switchblade, and a sensation of sawing around his ankles. He felt the pressure that had been holding his ankles together go away.

Ketcham was dragged out of the Suburban and set on his feet. He felt a hand on each arm, as if there was a man on each side of him.

He was pushed into motion. Without quite knowing why, he sensed that he had entered some kind of a building. The sense grew stronger as he was guided down what he now believed to be a corridor, and confirmation came when he was stopped, and heard the sound of a door-a heavy metal door, he deduced. Where am I? In a factory? Or a garage? — being opened.

Ketcham was pushed through the door, led fifteen feet inside, and stopped.

"Cut his hands loose," the same voice ordered, and again there was the sort of slick clicking sound a switchblade knife made, and again the sawing sensation, this time at his wrists.

And then they were free.

"Without taking the coat off your head, take off your clothes," the same voice ordered.

"What?" Ketcham asked incredulously.

This earned him a blow in the face.

That wasn't a fist. That was something hard. A stick perhaps. Or perhaps a gun.

"Without taking the coat off your head, take off your clothes," the same voice repeated.

The one thing I cannot afford to do, Ketcham told himself, is lose control of myself. They want me to take off my clothes, very well, I will take off my clothes-meanwhile, waiting patiently, and carefully, for my opportunity.

With some difficulty, Ketcham removed the jacket of his dark blue, faintly striped blue suit. Without thinking what he was doing, he held the suit jacket out, as if waiting for someone to take it from him and hang it up.

A snicker made Ketcham realize that no one was going to take the jacket from him. He let it slip from his fingers.

Ketcham next removed his necktie, and tried to drop that on top of his suit jacket. Then he pushed his braces off his shoulders, loosened the snap and opened the fly of his trousers, and somewhat awkwardly removed his trousers, which he then attempted to drop atop his jacket, tie, and shirt.

"I won't be able to remove my undershirt," he began, trying to sound as polite and reasonable as possible.

Ketcham was then struck upon the face again, which caused him to lose his balance and fall backward onto the floor.

"What he means," a new voice said, "is that he can't get his undershirt off without taking the overcoat off his head."

"Fuck the undershirt, then," the first, now familiar voice replied. "Take off your shorts and your shoes and socks."

Ketcham complied. He was now naked save for the overcoat over his head and upper body, and his undershirt, sitting on the floor. The floor was cold.

From its consistency, Ketcham decided the cold floor was concrete, which tended to buttress his suspicion that he was in a garage, or a factory of some sort.

"Get up," the familiar voice ordered.

Ketcham complied.

"Hold your hands out in front of you, together," the familiar voice added.

Ketcham complied, and almost immediately felt his wrists again being tied together.

There was a short burst of derisive laughter.

"Christ, look at his cock," a third voice, previously unheard, said. "Angelina's Chihuahua's got a bigger cock."

There were chuckles of agreement.

"Shut your fucking mouth!" the familiar voice said.

I will remember that when this is over and I'm out of here, Ketcham decided with some satisfaction. One of these thugs has a wife, or girlfriend, named Angelina, who has a Chihuahua.

Then nothing happened, except for what Ketcham believed to be the sound of shuffling feet, and what could have been the sound of the door being closed.

It was cold wherever he was, and Ketcham felt himself start to shiver.

That should really please the thug who thinks my penis is funny, when he sees me standing here naked and shivering.

I will not lose control. I will wait until whatever is going to happen happens.

Five minutes later, very carefully, Ketcham uttered one word.

"Hello?"

There was no reply.

Thirty seconds after that, Ketcham spoke again:

"Hello? Is anyone there?"

There was no reply.

Obviously, there is no one here. If there was, and I was not supposed to have spoken, they would have hit me again.

Will someone be coming back?

What would they do to me if they came back and found that I had somehow been able to remove the overcoat over my head?

Two minutes after that, after having debated the question with himself carefully, Ketcham decided to attempt to remove the overcoat that covered his head and upper body.

Doing so was easier than he thought it would be. By maneuvering his shoulders while holding one side of the coat with his bound-together hands, he was able to get the coat off first one shoulder and then the other, and when that was done, he was able to untie the tape holding the coat around his neck.

But when Ketcham had removed the coat, he could see absolutely nothing. There was no light of any kind whatever in the room. He suddenly felt faint and dizzy, and dropped to his knees, and then moved to a sitting position. The floor under his buttocks was rough and cold.

Ketcham raised his wrists to his mouth, and with some difficulty, using his teeth, he managed to untie the tape binding his wrists together. That done, he groped for the overcoat, found it, and put it on. It was too small for him; he could button only a few of the buttons, and the cuffs were six inches off his wrists.

Ketcham then went back on his hands and knees and began looking for the clothing he had been forced to remove and had dropped onto the floor.

It was not where he remembered having dropped it, and Ketcham decided that he had become disoriented when he had felt faint and dizzy, and decided he would have to search for it methodically.

Ketcham crawled on his hands and knees until he encountered a wall. Then he moved along the wall hoping the find a door, or something else. He didn't, but eventually he found a corner. He moved from the corner to the next, and estimated that the room was about fifteen feet in that dimension. Then he followed that wall until the next corner, and the next. Along that wall, to one end of it, he encountered a door.

He stood up then and ran his hands over the door. He found a hole, which presumably had at one time held a doorknob. Ketcham put his index finger in the hole and felt around, but encountered nothing. Next Ketcham ran his hands over the concrete on both sides of the door. His fingers encountered a square box, a shielded cable running to it, and then, on the box itself, two toggle switches.

Ketcham closed his eyes so that he would not be blinded by any sudden light. He threw both switches several times, but there was no light.

Walking erect now, Ketcham proceeded along the wall until he came to the corner from which he had started. Then he made another circumnavigation of the room, walking erect and rubbing his hands in slow wide arcs over the cold rough concrete. Midway down one wall, he encountered another shielded cable, and followed it to a plug box near the floor. There was a similar arrangement on the next wall.

Ketcham realized that while he was, literally speaking, still totally in the dark, he was no longer in complete ignorance of his surroundings. He was in a room he estimated to be probably fifteen feet by twelve. There was one door, no handle, and electrical circuits that were dead-or alive. Someone could have removed the bulbs from the light fixture-fixtures; there were two switches-they controlled.

There were no windows, which meant that he was more than likely in some kind of basement.

But they didn't lead me down any stairs, and the truck or station wagon, or whatever that was, didn't descend an incline; I would have sensed that if it had.

So where the hell am I?

Where are the people who brought me here?

Why did they bring me here?

What happens next?

Ketcham began to shiver again.

Where the hell are my clothes?

Ketcham dropped to his knees and began a methodical search of the room, rubbing his hand over the concrete in wide arcs. His confidence that it would be just a matter of time until he found his clothing took a long time dying, but eventually, after twenty passes, he gave up.

Ketcham rested his back against the wall.

His fingertips, and the palms of his hands, and his knees were raw from the concrete.

And I have to take a leak!

Jesus, what do I do about that?

Ketcham got to his feet and moved along the wall until he came to a corner.

I will piss here. This corner will be the toilet.

What the hell am I going to have to do when I have to take a crap?

Ketcham held the too-small overcoat out of the way and voided his bladder. Moments after he had begun to do so, he felt warm urine on his bare feet. He spread his legs as far apart as he could until he finished.

Fuck it, I'd rather get beaten up than put up with any more of this shit!

Ketcham made his way to the door and shouted "Help" and "Hello" and beat on the door with his fists, which caused the door to resound like a bell.

No one responded.

Ketcham made his way to the corner opposite from the toilet, and rested his back against the wall, and started to weep in the darkness.

The parking lot of the country club was nearly full, and Matt lost sight of Susan's Porsche while finding a place to park the Plymouth. After three minutes of wandering around the parking lot, he found the car, but not Susan.

"Thank you ever so much for waiting for me," he muttered, and headed for the brightly lit entrance to the club-house.

He found Susan in the center of the large entrance foyer, talking to a man whose dress and manner made Matt guess-correctly, it turned out-that he was the steward, or manager.

"Good evening," Matt said, smiling.

"Matt, this is Mr. Witherington, the manager."

"Claude Witherington," the man said as he put out his hand to Matt. Then he was unable to resist making the correction: "Executive Manager, actually. Welcome to River View, Mr. Payne. We hope you'll enjoy our facilities. "

"Thank you very much," Matt said.

"After Mr. Reynolds called," Witherington said, "I had your guest card made out." He handed it to Matt.

"Thank you," Matt said.

"This is a no-cash club," Witherington said. "I thought I should mention that."

"How am I going to pay?"

"Have you a home club?"

"I belong to Merion, in Philadelphia, if that's what you mean."

"Splendid. Merion, of course, is on our reciprocal list. Actually, had I known that, I wouldn't have had to issue a guest card at all. In any event, all you will have to do is sign the chit, and if you think of it, add 'Merion, Philadelphia. ' "

"Actually, I think it's in Merion," Matt said. "What should I do, write 'Merion, Merion'?"

Susan Reynolds shook her head, but there was the flicker of a smile on her lips. Mr. Witherington looked distressed, but after a moment smiled happily.

"You just sign your name, Mr. Payne, and I'll handle it from there. You'll be billed through your club."

"You're very kind, thank you very much."

"Not at all," Witherington said. "Enjoy, enjoy!"

He walked off.

Susan put out her hand.

"Good night, Matt."

"Good night?"

"Good night."

"That wasn't our deal, fair maiden. Our deal was that I help you deceive your parents-and that was difficult for me; they're nice people-and in return you keep me from being overwhelmed by loneliness here in the provinces. I kept up my end of the deal, and I expect the same from you."

"Matt, if you go into the bar, and hold your left hand up so that people can see you don't have a wedding ring, a half dozen-what did you say, 'fair maidens'?-will fall over themselves to get at you."

"I know, that happens to me all the time. But I'm not that sort of boy. I don't let myself get picked up by strange young ladies. And I don't kiss on the first date. Besides, if you went home now, so soon, your daddy and mommy might get the idea our romance is on the rocks."

"We don't have a romance."

"You wouldn't want to break your mommy's heart, would you? From the way she was looking at me, she's already making up the guest list for our marriage."

"That's not true!"

" 'The truth is a shattered mirror strewn in myriad bits, and each believes his little bit the whole to own,' " Matt quoted, and when Susan gave him an incredulous look, added, "That's from the Kasidah of Haji Abu el Yezdi-in my judgment, one of the wiser Persian philosophers."

"You're unbelievable!"

"So my mother tells me," Matt said.

"What do you want to do?"

"Let's go in the bar and have a couple of quick stiff ones," Matt said. " 'Candy is dandy, but liquor is quicker.' I believe Mr. Ogden Nash said that."

Susan shook her head again. "One drink," she said.

"Three. We can then compromise on two."

Without replying, she walked toward what turned out to be the bar. It was a large, dark, and comfortable room, with a bar along one paneled wall, and tables with red leather-cushioned captain's chairs scattered around the room.

Matt did not miss the eight or ten attractive young women in the room, sitting in groups of two or three at tables and at the bar.

Maybe I should have let her get away. I think the odds to make out in here look pretty good. My chances with Susie range from lousy to zip.

Not that I would, anyway. Could, anyway. Peter was right about that.

I will not, Boy Scout's honor, make that mistake.

A waiter appeared as soon as they sat down.

"Good evening, Miss Reynolds," he said.

"What do you drink, Matt?" Susan asked. "Let your imagination run loose. Da-my father will expect me to make this my treat."

"Daddy's going to pay?" Matt asked.

"That's what I said."

"Would you bring us the wine list, please?" Matt said.

"The wine list?" Susan asked incredulously.

"It's a list of the available fermented grape juices," Matt said seriously, "generally stapled into some kind of artificial leather folder."

"Miss Reynolds?" the waiter asked in confusion.

"Go get the wine list," Matt ordered. "If the lady's going to welsh on her offer to spring for the booze, I'll pay for it myself."

"Get the wine list, please," Susan said.

"Yes, ma'am."

Susan looked at him.

"I don't think your insanity comes naturally," she said. "I suspect you actually think you're amusing, and really work on your crazy-man routine."

"I'm disappointed that you can see through me so easily, " Matt said. "But now that you know my darkest secrets, are you going to tell me yours, to even the playing field?"

"Would it crush you even more if I told you I wouldn't give you my phone number, much less tell you my darkest secrets?"

"I already have your phone number," Matt said.

"Unfortunately," she said.

"When did you first realize you were falling in love with me? At Daffy's?"

"Oh, how I wish I had never seen you at Daffy's!"

"Then it must have been when some primeval force, stronger than both of us, brought you to my hotel-room door."

"Do you ever stop?"

"Not when I'm on a roll."

The waiter laid a wine list in front of Matt.

Matt looked at Susan.

"You never saw one of these before?" he asked innocently. "They're quite common in Philadelphia."

"Jesus Christ!"

"What's your pleasure, Susan?" Matt asked.

"Whatever you like," she replied.

Matt looked at the waiter.

"Have they got any Camembert in the kitchen? Or Roquefort?"

"I'm sure there's Roquefort, sir. I'm not sure about the other."

"Okay. Well, ask, and bring us one or the other, preferably both. And some crackers, and of course a cheese knife, and a bottle of this Turgeson Napa Valley cabernet sauvignon. And a couple of glasses, of course."

"Yes, sir."

"We just had dinner," Susan said when the waiter had gone.

"But-you were so anxious to be alone with me-no dessert."

"I was anxious to get you out of the house as soon as possible."

"Isn't that what I just said?"

"Before you said something you shouldn't have."

"Not fair, fair maiden. I held up my side of the bargain. "

After a moment, she said, "You're right. You did. Thank you."

"You're welcome," Matt said. "That brings me to the other 'thank-you' you owe me."

"For what?"

"For talking that Harrisburg uniform out of giving you a ticket for going sixty-five in a forty-mile-per-hour zone, thereby offending the peace and dignity of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania."

"Is that what you call them, 'uniforms'?"

Matt cupped his hand behind his ear, signaling he was waiting to hear 'thank you.' "

She smiled.

"Okay, thank you. Now answer the question."

"Yes."

"Isn't that a little condescending?"

"Not at all. It's simply an identifying term."

"I have trouble picturing you in a policeman's uniform. "

"I'm dashing. Within a two-mile circle, girlish hearts flutter," Matt said, and then added, "Actually, I've hardly worn my uniform."

"How's that?"

"I went, right out of the Academy, to a plainclothes job."

"How did you arrange that?"

"It was arranged for me. My father has friends in high places, one of whom believed-with my father-at the time that I would quickly come to my senses, resign from the cops, and go to law school. My father's friend, he's a chief inspector, arranged for me to be assigned as the administrative assistant-sort of a secretary in pants-to Inspector Peter Wohl. The idea was that in this manner, until I came to my senses, I would not get myself hurt."

"But you didn't resign. Why not? Why are you a cop in the first place?"

"Why are you a social worker? That doesn't look like much fun to me, and I would be surprised if the pay's any better."

"I'm doing something important."

"The police are important. Try to imagine life without us."

"I don't have to shoot people," Susan said.

Shooting people is a no-no, right? But blowing them up-or at least aiding and abetting those who do-is OK, right?

"I only shoot people who are trying to shoot me," Matt said. "Or run me over with a truck."

"Is that what happened?"

"That's what happened."

"Did it bother you to have taken someone's life?"

Be careful what you say here, Matthew. Think before you open your mouth. I think the answer here is going to be important.

"Well, did it?" Susan asked, somewhat impatiently.

"I got psychiatric advice," Matt said.

"You went to a shrink?"

"My big sister is a shrink. She came to me."

"And?"

The waiter appeared with the wine and a plate holding crackers and a triangular lump of Roquefort cheese. While the waiter opened the bottle, Matt put cheese on half a dozen crackers.

He sipped the wine, nodded his approval, waited for the waiter to pour into first Susan's glass and then his own, then popped one of the crackers into his mouth and immediately took a sip of wine.

"What are you doing?" she asked in clear disapproval.

She had to wait until he had finished chewing for his reply.

"Don't tell me you never saw anyone do that before?"

"I never saw anyone do that before," she said. "It's gross!"

"But it tastes so good," he said. "Don't knock it until you've tried it."

"No, thank you."

"Oh, go on, take a chance. Live dangerously. Escape your mundane social worker's life."

She looked very dubious and did not reply. Matt popped another Roquefort-on-cracker into his mouth, added some of the wine, chewed, and smiled with pleasure.

Curiosity got the better of her. She shrugged and reached for one of the crackers and then the wine. She took a tentative chew, then smiled. When she had finished, she confessed, "That's good."

"And you didn't want to have a couple of snorts with me. You would never have learned that-something you can use for the rest of your days-from good ol' Whatsisname. "

Her eyes showed she didn't like that.

"You were telling me what your sister the shrink told you," she said.

"You really want to know?"

"Yeah," Susan said thoughtfully. "I suppose I do."

"She said that I should remember that what I did was an act of self-preservation, rather than an act of willful violence. And that self-preservation is one of the basic subconscious urges, right up there with sexual desire, over which man has very little control."

I just made that up. I must be getting to be a pretty good liar. Or, more kindly, actor. When Amy came to me in her Sigmund Freud role after I shot the late Mr. Warren K. Fletcher in the back of his head, I told her to butt out.

And Susie seems to be swallowing it whole.

"And, of course, in that case, the act of homicide had an undeniably desirable social by-product."

"And what does that mean?"

"When he tried to run me over he had a naked housewife tied up with lamp cord under a tarpaulin in the back of his truck."

"Come on!" Susan said, almost scornfully.

Matt held up his right hand, pinky and thumb touching, the others extended. "Boy Scout's honor," he said. "And there was no moral question in that woman's mind whether or not I should have shot him. He had been telling her all the interesting things he was going to do to her just as soon as they got out of town."

"In other words, so far as you're concerned, it's morally permissible to take human life under certain circumstances-for a greater good?"

Matt bit off the answer that started to form on his lips, and instead said, "Have another cracker, Susan."

"We're changing the subject, are we? What happened, did you run out of sardonic witticisms?"

Yeah, for some reason I sensed that it was time to change the subject. I have no idea how, but I knew that line of conversation was dangerous.

"I guess so. You can go home to Mommy and Daddy, Susan. I don't like the conversation anymore."

Her face colored, and for a moment Matt thought she was about to push herself out of her chair and march out of the room.

But she didn't.

"Sorry, I–I just never had a chance to ask…"

" 'How does it feel to kill somebody?' " Matt furnished, not very pleasantly.

She nodded.

"I'm sorry, Matt."

Why don't you ask your pal Chenowith? Wouldn't you say that blowing up eleven innocent people would make him more of an expert?

Jesus, she didn't! She has never talked to Chenowith about what he did! How do I know that? I don't know how I know, but I know.

"What was it? Feminine curiosity?" Matt asked.

"I said I was sorry."

"Like I said, have another cracker," Matt said, and made her another one.

She took it, put it in her mouth and added wine, and chewed. And smiled.

"That is good."

"I'm surprised your father doesn't do it. He takes his food seriously."

"What you really said was 'Go home, Susan,' " she said.

"I can't believe I said something like that," Matt said. "Not when we still have half a bottle of wine and two pounds of cheese."

She smiled.

"I'm sorry I said that," Matt said. "I apologize. I really don't want you to go home."

"I'm going to have to. I have to go to work tomorrow. And so do you."

"Have another cracker," he said, and made her another one.

She took it.

"I learned something about you tonight I didn't know," she said. "That may have had something to do with my uncontrolled curiosity."

"Like what?"

Susan looked into his eyes. "I never connected you with Penny before," she said.

"I don't recall mentioning Penny," Matt said. "Oh, that's right. You're another product of Bennington, aren't you?"

"We were friends," Susan said.

"How did you come to connect me with Penny?"

"This is awkward," Susan said.

"Go ahead. If we're going to spend the rest of our lives together, we should have no secrets from each other."

She smiled at him again.

"Oddly enough, I seem to like you better when you're playing the fool," she said.

"Thank you very much," Matt said.

"When I went to get my car from the garage? And my mother came to the garage?"

Matt nodded.

"Mommy told you?"

"Mommy said I should be especially nice to you because of your tragic loss," Susan said. "So I naturally asked, 'What tragic loss?' "

"Okay. So are you going to be nice to me?"

"What happened to her?"

"You don't know?" Matt asked. "She got some bad shit, stuck it in her vein, and 'So Long, Penelope Detweiler. ' "

"You sounded like a policeman just then."

"I am a policeman."

"I mean instead of her fiancй."

"We never got quite that far," Matt said. "Close, but not that far."

"But it hurt, right?"

"It was a tragedy. She had everything going for her-"

"Including you?" Susan interrupted.

"That was a possibility. But she couldn't leave it alone. The drugs, I mean. Her parents sent her to a place in Nevada, but it didn't work."

"How did she get started on it?"

"She started running around with a gangster named Anthony J. DeZego, also known as Tony the Zee. I have no idea how that happened-she was probably looking for a thrill. But I'm sure he's the bastard that got her hooked."

"And he's still around?"

"No, he's not. The mob, for reasons still unknown, blew him away. That's why Penny wasn't Daffy's maid of honor when she married Chad. Penny was with Tony the Zee when they hit him. Shotgun. When Chad and Daffy were married, Penny was in Hahnemann Hospital, full of number eight shot, wrapped up like a mummy. Mummy with a U; as in Egyptian."

"My God!"

"You didn't go to the wedding? It gave everybody something to talk about."

"I couldn't get away," Susan said.

"No, of course you weren't at the wedding. If you had been, I would have remembered."

She looked at him uncomfortably.

"This is all new to me."

"Daffy didn't tell you?"

"Daffy told me drugs were involved in Penny's death. I didn't pry."

They lapsed into silence. Finally, Susan stood up.

"I really have to go," she said.

Matt scrawled his name on the check.

"I'll walk you to your car."

"That's not necessary," Susan said. "Stick around. The hunting looks good."

"Not to me," Matt said.

"I told you, Matt, I'm just not interested."

"I remember," he said.

She shrugged.

They walked out of the club and to her Porsche.

She unlocked the car and stood by the open door and held her hand out. He took it.

"Drive slow. That uniform may have a quota of tickets to pass out."

"I will," she said. "And thank you for being a good guy at the house tonight."

"Good ol' Whatsisname would never know," Matt said.

"Know what?"

"If you gave me the briefest, most platonic possible kiss good night."

"I don't want to," Susan said. "Can't you get that into your head?"

"A teeny-weeny, absolutely innocent kiss that not even the Pope could object to, much less Mommy and Daddy."

"Oh, Jesus," she said, and moved her head very quickly and brushed his lips.

Then she stood back and they looked at each other in something close to amazement.

Jesus H. Christ! Matt wondered. What the hell was that? Lust at first touch?

Susan quickly crawled into the Porsche, slammed the door closed, started the engine, and drove quickly out of the parking lot without looking at Matt again.

Matt watched until the car disappeared from sight, exhaled audibly, and went looking for the unmarked Plymouth.

Mrs. Reynolds came into Susan's room as she was undressing.

"Did you have a good time?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact, we did. He taught me to put Roquefort on a cracker and then take a swallow of wine."

"Daddy used to do that," Mommy said.

"Did he really?"

"He seems to be a very nice young man," Mommy said.

"For a cop," Susan said.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing."

"At least he's working, and according to Mr. Emmons, very highly regarded in his chosen profession."

"And what else did Mr. Emmons have to report?"

"He's very comfortable. I mean, personally, now. And the Paynes are more than comfortable."

"Where do you think we should be married, Mommy?" Susan said.

"Don't be like that, Susie, you asked!"

"Sorry."

"Are you going to see more of him?"

"I'm afraid so."

"I think you like him."

"Good night, Mommy."

Mrs. Reynolds turned as she passed through Susan's door.

"Mary-Ellen Porter called," she said.

"Who?"

"Mary-Ellen Porter. She said you were together at Bennington. "

Since I never heard the name Mary-Ellen Porter until this moment, then it has to be either Jennie or Eloise.

"Oh, of course. Mary-Ellen. What did she want?"

"She said she would call you at work tomorrow. I told her they didn't like that, but she said she had to talk to you in the morning."

"I wonder what she wants?" Susan asked, more or less rhetorically.