"Yes, I have," Matthews said. "I'm one of your fans, McFadden. That was good work."

Charley looked uncomfortable.

"You want something in your coffee, or black?" he responded.

"Black for me, please."

"A little sugar for me, if you have it, please," Young said.

"You want some more, Matt? Hartzog?"

"Please," Matt said.

"Not now, thanks," Hartzog said.

"How do you feel, Matt?" Young asked.

"I feel all right."

"No pain in the leg?"

"Only when I forget and step on it."

"It'll take a while," Young said. "It could have been a lot worse.. 45, wasn't it?"

"Apparently a ricochet," Matt said.

Charley passed out the coffee.

"They must be taking this ILA threat pretty seriously," Young said. " Judging by the fact that you have two men on you."

"I'm off duty," McFadden said. "Hartzog came on at eight. Just one."

"Matt, is there somewhere we could have a word?" Young asked.

What the hell is this all about?

"We can go in my bedroom."

"Please," Young said, smiling. "You need any help?"

"No. I just move a little slowly."

He pushed himself out of the chair and, using a cane, made his way to his bedroom.

Young followed and closed the door after them.

"Nice apartment."

"It gets a little crowded with more than me in it."

Young smiled dutifully, then said, seriously, "Matt, I won't ask you if I can trust your discretion, but you didn't get this from me, all right?"

"All right."

"I heard yesterday that a charge has been brought that you have violated the civil rights of Charles David Stevens, and that Justice will ask us to conduct an investigation."

"What?"Matt asked, incredulously.

"It's becoming a fairly standard tactic. All it does as far as we're concerned-in cases like yours-is waste manpower. From their standpoint, the only thing I can imagine is that they hope the very charge will sow a seed of doubt in some potential juror's mind. If the FBI is investigating, the police, the police officer, must have done something wrong."

"Who brought the charges?" Matt asked, angrily.

"One of the civil rights groups, I don't remember which one. But it's more than safe to say that Armando C. Giacomo is behind it."

"What, exactly, am I being charged with?"

"Violating the civil rights of Stevens by taking his life unlawfully, or excessive force, something like that."

"That sonofabitch was trying to kill me when I shot him!"

"Don't get all excited. The investigation will bring all that out. There's also a story that they're going to take you before the Grand Jury. Is that right?"

Why don't I want to tell him?

"I've heard they are."

"Well, that may-more than likelywill- take the wind out of their sails. I can't imagine a Grand Jury returning a true bill under the circumstances. As I say, what I really think they're after is sowing that seed of doubt. Where there's smoke, there must be fire, so to speak."

"I will be Goddamned!"

"As well as I can, there's an ethical question here, of course, I will keep you advised. More specifically, when I hear something I think you ought to know, I'll have Matthews pass the word to you. He's one of the good guys."

"Jesus!" Matt said. "That's absolute bullshit! He tries to kill me. I defend myself, andI'm accused of violatinghis civil rights."

"It's a crazy world. But don't worry too much about it. Remember, you didn't do anything wrong."

"Yeah."

"Do you play chess?"

What the hell has that got to do with anything?

"Yes, I play chess."

"So does Matthews. That would give him an excuse to come here."

Why is he doing this?

"I very much appreciate your telling me this, Mr. Young."

"Frank, please. What the hell, we have different badges, but we're both cops, right?"

I really would like to believe that. I wonder why I don't?

Young looked at his watch.

"Gotta get moving," he said, and offered Matt his hand.

When Matt followed him back into the living room, Matthews was holding the Queen of a set of green jade chess pieces Matt had been given for his fifteenth birthday.

"Interesting set," Matthews said. "Do you play much?"

"Some."

"We'll have to have a game sometime."

"Anytime. I'll be here."

"I might surprise you, and just come knocking some night."

"I wish you would."

TWENTY-THREE

"How are you, Inspector?" Lieutenant Warren Lomax greeted Peter Wohl cheerfully, offering his hand. "What can we do for you?"

Lomax was a tall, quite skinny man in his early forties. He had been seriously injured years before in a high-speed chase accident as a Highway Patrol sergeant, and pensioned off.

After two years of retirement, he had (it was generally acknowledged with the help of then Commissioner Carlucci) managed to get back on the job on limited duty. He'd gone to work in the Forensics Laboratory as sort of the chief clerk. There, he had become fascinated with what he saw and what the lab did, actually gone back to school at night to study chemistry and electronics and whatever else he thought would be useful, and gradually become an expert in what was called "scientific crime detection."

Three years before he had managed to get himself off limited duty, taken and passed the lieutenant's exam, and now the Forensics Lab was his.

Wohl thought, as he always did, that Lomax looked like a sick man (he remembered him as a robust Highway sergeant), felt sorry for him, and then wondered why: Lomax obviously didn't feel sorry for himself, and was obviously as happy as a pig in mud doing what he was doing.

"How are you, Warren?" Wohl said, and handed him the cassette tape from Matt Payne's answering machine with his free hand.

"What's this?" Lomax asked.

"The tape from Officer Matt Payne's answering machine. Payne told me that Chief Coughlin wanted to run them through here. And as I had to come here to face an irate mayor anyhow, I brought it along."

"Christ, Carlucci even called me, wanting to know if I had heard anything about the-what is it-the Islamic Liberation Army."

"Had you?"

"The first I ever heard of them was in the newspapers. Who the hell are they, anyway?"

"I wish I knew," Wohl said. "You come up with anything on Payne's car?"

Lomax turned and walked stiffly, reminding Wohl that the accident had crushed his hip, to a desk and came back with a manila folder.

"My vast experience in forensics leads me to believe a. that the same instrument was used to slice his tires and fuck up his paint job, and b. that said instrument was a pretty high quality collapsible knife, probably with a six-inch blade."

"How did you reach these conclusions, Dr. Lomax? And what is a collapsible knife?"

"Aswitchblade," Lomax said, "is like a regular penknife, the blade folds into the handle, except that it's spring loaded, so that when you push the button, it springs open. Acollapsible knife is one where the blade slides in and out of the handle. Some are spring loaded, and some you have to push. You follow me?"

Wohl nodded.

"Okay. Switchblades aren't much good for stabbing tires, particularly high-quality tires like the Pirelli's on Payne's car. They're slashing instruments. The blades are thin. You try to stab something, like the walls of tires, the blade tends to snap. Payne's tires were stabbed, more than slashed. The contour of the penetration, the holes, shows that the blade was pretty thick on the dull side. A lot of switchblades are just thin pieces of steel sharpened onboth sides. Hence, a collapsible knife of pretty good quality. Six inches long or so because there's generally a proportion between blade width and length. The same instrument because we found particles of tire rubber in the scratches in the paint. And, for the hell of it, the size and depth of the scratches indicates a blade shape, the point shape, confirming what I said before."