And then it was his turn to look down at Penny in her coffin.

She looks as if she’s asleep, he thought, which is the effect the cosmetic technologist at the undertaker’s was struggling to achieve.

And then, like a wall falling on him, and without warning, his chest contracted painfully, a wailing moan saying “Oh, shit!” in a voice he recognized as his own came out of it, and his chest began to heave with sobs.

He next became aware that someone was pulling him away from the casket, where his right hand was caressing the cool, unmoving flesh of Penny’s cheeks, and then that the someone was Chad, gently saying, “Come on, ol’ buddy. Just come along with us,” and then that Daffy’s swollen belly was pressing against him as they led him out of the sitting room past those next in line, and that, when he looked at her, tears were running down her cheeks, cutting courses through her pancake makeup.

“Inspector Wohl,” Peter answered his telephone.

“The funeral’s over,” Amy said.

“I was hoping you’d call. How did it go?”

“Matt has a way with words. When we got here, he said it was ‘intimate friends, and the morbidly curious, with a soupcon of social climbers thrown in for good measure.’”

“How did he handle it?”

“He broke down when he saw her in the casket. Really broke down. Chad Nesbitt and his very pregnant wife had to practically carry him out of the room.”

There was a moment’s silence before Wohl said:

“You said last night you expected something like that to happen.”

“That was a clinical opinion; professionally, I’m relieved. It’s the first step, acceptance, in managing grief. Personally, he’s my little brother. It was awful. I felt so damned sorry for him.”

“How’s he now? Where is he now?”

“Oh, now he’s got his stiff upper lip back in place. He and Chad are into the booze. There’s quite a post-interment party going on out here.”

“You want me to send someone out there and get him? I sent Tiny Lewis to sit on him, but…”

“I know,” Amy said. “What I was hoping to hear was you volunteering to come out here and get the both of us.”

“It was bad for you?”

“As we were coming back here from the cemetery-I thought Grace Detweiler might need me, so I rode with them-I caught her looking at me as if she had just realized that if I had done my job, Penny would still be here.”

“That could be an overactive imagination.”

“I don’t think so. I got the same look here in the house when I was getting a tranquilizer out of my purse for her. She’s decided-seeing how Matt collapsed completely probably had a lot to do with it-that he’s still an irresponsible boy, who can’t be blamed. She needs somebody to blame. I make a fine candidate to be the real villain, because I really didn’t help Penny at all.”

There was a moment’s silence, and then Wohl said, “I’m on my way, Amy,” and the line went dead in her ear.

“It’s a good thing I know you’re a doctor,” Inspector Peter Wohl said to Dr. Amelia Payne as they came off the elevator into the lobby of the Delaware Valley Cancer Society Building on Rittenhouse Square.

“Meaning what?”

“The folklore among us laypersons is don’t mix booze and pills.”

“That’s a good general rule of thumb,” Amy said. “What I gave Matt is what we doctor persons prescribe as a sedative when the patient person has been soaking up cognac like a sponge. It is my professional opinion that that patient person will be out like a light for the next twelve to eighteen hours without side effects. Any other questions, layperson?”

Wohl smiled at her.

“How about dinner tonight?”

“Absolutely not.”

“I guess that makes breakfast tomorrow out of the question.”

“I didn’t say that,” Amy said. “I said no dinner. I have to make my rounds, and then there’s a very sick young woman I want to spend some time with. But I didn’t say anything about breakfast, or, for that matter, a midnight supper with candles and wine, being out of any question.”

“My place or yours, doctor person?”

She didn’t reply directly.

“We left my car at the Detweilers’s.”

“Give me the keys. I’ll have someone run me out there, and I’ll drop it by-where? The hospital? Your place?”

“Wouldn’t it be easier if you took it to your place? When I leave the hospital, I’ll catch a cab out there. It’ll probably be after eleven.”

“Done,” he said, putting his hand out for the keys.

“You’re headed for the hospital now?” he asked. She nodded. “You want a ride?”

“Where are you going?”

“Wherever you need to go is right on my way.”

“I’ll catch a cab,” she said.

“You’re sure?”

She nodded.

Their eyes met, and held. Somewhat hesitantly, Wohl moved his face closer to hers.

“Don’t push me, Peter,” Amy said, and then moved her face closer to his and kissed him on the lips.

Then she quickly walked away from him, out the door and onto Rittenhouse Square. He started to follow her, then changed his mind.

He went to the receptionist’s desk and asked to use her telephone.

“Of course,” she said with a smile that suggested she did not find him unattractive.

He smiled at her and dialed a number from memory.

“Inspector Wohl,” he said as he watched Amy get into a cab. “Anything for me?”

“Chief Lowenstein’s been trying to reach you all afternoon, sir,” the tour lieutenant reported.

“Anything else?”

“No, sir.”

“I’ll call Chief Lowenstein and get back to you.”

“Yes, sir.”

Wohl broke the connection with his finger and dialed Chief Lowenstein’s private number.

“Lowenstein.”

“Peter Wohl, Chief.”

“Where are you, Peter?”

“Center City. Rittenhouse Square.”

“With Matt Payne?”

“I just left him.”

“How is he?”

“His sister gave him a pill she said will knock him out until tomorrow.”

“I really feel sorry for him,” Lowenstein said, and then immediately added: “I need to talk to you, Peter.”

“I’m available for you anytime, Chief.”

“Why don’t you let me buy you a drink at the bar in the Warwick?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Ten minutes, Peter,” Lowenstein said. “Thank you.”

FIFTEEN

Chief Inspector of Detectives Matthew Lowenstein was sitting, with an eight-inch black cigar in his mouth, on a stool at the street end of the bar in the Warwick Hotel when Inspector Peter Wohl got there.

“Sorry to keep you waiting, Chief.”

“What will you have, Peter?” Lowenstein asked, ignoring the apology.

“I would like a triple scotch, but what I’d better have is a beer,” Wohl said.

“Bad day for you?” Lowenstein asked, chuckling, and got the bartender’s attention. “Give this nice young man one of these. A single.”

“Thank you,” Peter said.

“I turned in my papers this morning,” he said. “You hear about that?”

Wohl nodded.

“Carlucci came out to the house and made me a deal to stay.”

Wohl’s face was as devoid of expression as he could make it.

“The deal,” Lowenstein said, “is that I have his word that you will bring me in on anything interesting his personal detective squad, now called Ethical Affairs Unit, comes up with, and I get to define the term ‘interesting.’ You have any problem with that, Peter?”

“I had a problem with keeping you out of the Cazerra investigation. That wasn’t my idea, Chief.”

“So Carlucci told me. I asked you, do you have any problems with the new arrangement?”

“None at all.”

“Tell me what interesting things you have heard today, Peter.”

“How about yesterday, Chief?”

“Start with yesterday.”

“I had lunch with Armando C. Giacomo, Esquire, at the Rittenhouse Club. Weisbach and I did. Mr. Paulo Cassandro really doesn’t want to go to jail. As a public-spirited citizen, he is willing to testify against Cazerra in exchange for immunity from prosecution.”