“Sarah let me in.”

“I told her not to. What’s on your mind, Mr. Mayor?”

“I want to know what the hell this is all about.”

Lowenstein raised his eyes to look at the Mayor.

“OK,” he said. “What it’s all about is that you don’t need a chief of detectives you don’t trust.”

“Who said I don’t trust you? For God’s sake, we go back a long way together, twenty-five years, at least. Of course I trust you.”

“That’s why you’re running your own detective squad, right? And you didn’t tell me about it because you trust me? Bullshit, Jerry, you don’t trust me. My character or my professional competence.”

“That’s bullshit!”

“And I don’t have to take your bullshit, either. I’m not Taddeus Czernich. I’ve got my time on the job. I don’t need it, in other words.”

“What are you pissed off about? What happened at that goddamned party? Matt, for Christ’s sake, I was upset.”

“You were a pretty good cop, Jerry. Not as good as you think you were, but good. But that doesn’t mean that nobody else in the Department is as smart as you, or as honest. I’m as good a cop, probably better- I never nearly got thrown out of the Department or indicted-than you ever were. So let me put it another way. I’m sick of your bullshit, I don’t have to put up with it, and I don’t intend to. I’m out.”

“Come on, Matt!”

“I’m out,” Lowenstein repeated flatly. “Find somebody else to push around. Make Peter Wohl Chief of Detectives. You really already have.”

“So that’s it. You’re pissed because I gave Wohl Ethical Affairs?”

“That whole Ethical Affairs idea stinks. Internal Affairs, a part of the Detective Bureau, is supposed to find dirty cops. And by and large, they do a pretty good job of it.”

“Not this time, they didn’t,” the Mayor said.

“I was working on it. I was getting close.”

“There are political considerations,” the Mayor said.

“Yeah, political considerations,” Lowenstein said bitterly.

“Yeah, political considerations,” Carlucci said. “And don’t raise your nose at them. You better hope I get reelected, or you’re liable to have a mayor and a police commissioner you’d really have trouble with.”

“We don’t have a police commissioner now. We have a parrot.”

“That’s true,” the Mayor said. “But he takes a good picture, and he doesn’t give you any trouble. Admit it.”

“An original thought and a cold drink of water would kill the Polack,” Lowenstein said.

“But he doesn’t give you any trouble, does he, Matt?” the Mayor persisted.

“You give me the goddamned trouble. Gave me. Past tense. I’m out.”

“You can’t quit now.”

“Watch me.”

“The Department’s in trouble. Deep trouble. It needs you. I need you.”

“You mean you’re in trouble about getting yourself reelected.”

“If I don’t get reelected, then the Department will be in even worse trouble.”

“Has it ever occurred to you that maybe the Department wouldn’t be in trouble if you let the people who are supposed to run it actually run it?”

“You know I love the Department, Matt,” the Mayor said. “Everything I try to do is for the good of the Department.”

“Like I said, make Peter Wohl chief of detectives. He’s already investigating everything but recovered stolen vehicles. Jesus, you even sent the Payne kid in to spy on Homicide.”

“I sent the Payne kid over there to piss you off. I was already upset about these goddamned scumbags Cazerra and Meyer, and then you give me an argument about your detective who got caught screwing his wife’s sister, and whose current girlfriend is probably involved in shooting her husband.”

“That’s bullshit and you know it.”

“I wish I did know it.”

Lowenstein looked at the Mayor and then shook his head.

“That’s what Augie Wohl said. And Sarah said it, too. That you did that just to piss me off.”

“And it worked, didn’t it?” the Mayor said, pleased. “Better than I hoped.”

“You sonofabitch, Jerry,” Lowenstein said.

“Augie and Sarah are only partly right. Pissing you off wasn’t the only thing I had in mind.”

“What else?”

“I gave Ethical Affairs to Peter Wohl for political considerations, and even if you don’t like the phrase, I have to worry about it. Peter’s Mr. Clean in the public eye, the guy who put Judge Moses Findermann away. I needed something for the newspapers besides ‘Internal Affairs is conducting an investigation of these allegations.’ Christ, can’t you see that? The papers, especially the Ledger, are always crying ‘Police cover-up!’ If I said that Internal Affairs was now investigating something they should have found out themselves, what would that look like?”

Chief Lowenstein granted the point, somewhat unwillingly, with a shrug.

“What’s that got to do with Payne, sending him in to spy on Homicide?”

“Same principle. His picture has been all over the papers. Payne is the kind of cop the public wants. It’s like TV and the movies. A good-looking young cop kills the bad guys and doesn’t steal money.”

There was a faint suggestion of a smile on Lowenstein’s lips.

“So I figured if I send Payne to spend some time at Homicide (a) he can’t really do any harm over there and (b) if it turns out your man who can’t keep his dick in his pocket and/or the widow-and get pissed if you want, Matt, but that wouldn’t surprise me a bit if that’s the way it turns out-had something to do with Kellog getting himself shot, then what the papers have is another example of one of Mr. Clean’s hotshots cleaning up the Police Department.”

“I talked to Wally Milham, Jerry. I’ve seen enough killers and been around enough cops to know a killer and/or a lying cop when I see one. He didn’t do it.”

“Maybe he didn’t, but if she had something to do with it, and he’s been fucking her, which is now common knowledge, it’s the same thing. You talk to her?”

“No,” Lowenstein said.

“Maybe you should,” the Mayor said.

“You’re not listening to me. I’m going out. I’m going to move to some goddamned place at the shore and walk up and down the beach.”

“We haven’t even got around to talking about that.”

“There’s nothing to talk about.”

“You haven’t even heard my offer.”

“I don’t want to hear your goddamned offer.”

“How do you know until you hear it?”

“Jesus Christ, can’t you take no for an answer?”

“No. Not with you. Not when the Department needs you.”

The kitchen door swung open.

“I thought maybe you’d need some more coffee,” Sarah Lowenstein said a little nervously.

“You still got that stuff you bought to get rid of the rats?” Chief Lowenstein said. “Put two heaping tablespoons, three, in Jerry’s cup.”

“You two have been friends so long,” Sarah said. “It’s not right that you should fight.”

“Tell him, Sarah,” the Mayor said. “I am the spirit of reasonableness and conciliation.”

“Four tablespoons, honey,” Chief Lowenstein said.