Payne chuckled.

Byrth grinned as he put the papers back on Harris’s desk.

“-but he wouldn’t admit it. He said he had something really interesting”-he nodded at the papers-“and said to drop by for coffee and he’d show it to me.”

Harris reached for the heavy china mug on his desk that had a representation of the Philadelphia Police Department logotype and gold lettering that read: DETECTIVE ANTHONY HARRIS-HOMICIDE DIVISION. He took a sip of his coffee.

“I really need to quit. I’ve been sucking this stuff down since five-thirty. Anyway, I swung by the store and grabbed a couple boxes of doughnuts and assorted muffins. Stanley’s in really bad health-on oxygen, thanks to a life of chain-smoking cigarettes-and doesn’t get out. So I figured he could use something fresh from the store.”

Payne gestured toward the commissary. “There’re some-”

“Yeah, that’s some of them. Stanley refused to keep all I brought to him. Said that the guys at the Roundhouse deserved them more.”

“So what did he show you?” Byrth said.

“It’s curious,” Harris said. “It may not mean anything. But-”

“ ‘Turn over the stone under the stone’ sayeth the Great Black Buddha,” Payne said, almost perfectly mimicking Jason Washington’s sonorous voice.

Harris knew Payne was not mocking Washington. But still his eyes darted across the room to Washington’s glass-walled office. It was empty.

Harris picked up the pages. “Stanley likes to add comments at the end of the newspaper articles.”

He flipped to the page that had the article on the shooting at the Temple University Hospital. He pointed to it.

Payne and Byrth looked and read:

ARMED MAN MURDERS BURN VICTIM BEFORE FLEEING HOSPITAL, FIRING AT POLICE

While police remain mum on details of the murder, witnesses claim gunman fired shots at man who shouted “Police!” while chasing gunman from hospital.

“Stanley likes to use as his screen name ‘Hung.Up.Badge.But.Not.Gun.’ Here’s what he posted in the comments section.”

Payne and Byrth then read it:

From Hung.Up.Badge.But.Not.Gun (2:56 p.m.):

I talked to an inside source, too, and was told that this was a hit job. Maybe not a professional one, but the burn victim (there?s more to that story that I cannot share) was targeted. So sad to see this happening in Philly. I?ll say it again: Shoot?em all and let the Good Lord sort?em out.

“Interesting perspective on shooting ’em all,” Byrth said. “Probably good thing he is retired.”

“So,” Payne said, “who’s his inside source?”

“Not for dissemination. No reason to get her in trouble just for talking shop with her uncle.”

It was clear by his expression that Payne was trying to figure out who Harris was talking about.

“ ‘Her’?” Payne repeated. “You mean that chunky female who was posted outside of Skipper’s ICU? Stephanie Polish-Something?”

Harris nodded. “Police Officer Stephanie Kowenski, age twenty-five.”

“That’s the one,” Payne said.

“She’s Stanley’s sister’s girl, and his pride and joy. She joined the department because he loved it so much.” Harris paused. “Remind you of anyone, Sergeant Payne?”

Payne made an expression that said he took Harris’s point.

“I guess sometimes there is something in our DNA that makes us hardwired to do this crazy job,” Payne said.

Then he looked at the printouts. “So, what’re we looking for here?”

He saw that someone had circled the time stamps at two different places on the page.

One was on the reader comment that followed Stanley Dowbrowski’s comment:

From Death.Before.Dishonor (3:20 p.m.):

What about “Thou Shalt Not Steal”??

The only sad thing about what happened is the gun didn?t empty all of its bullets into that pendejo! Skipper deserved every damn bullet!

Recommend [0] Click Here to Report Abuse “ ‘Skipper’?” Payne read aloud. “How the hell did he know it was Skipper? That’s not exactly a common name.”

“Clearly, there’s some significance to ‘steal,’” Byrth added.

Tony Harris shrugged. Then he pointed to the other time stamp that was circled.

They read that one:

Update (5:44 p.m.): According to the anonymous source inside the hospital, the patient who was shot to death was J. Warren Olde, Jr.

“Is the source there the girl, too?” Payne said.

“I don’t think so,” Harris said, “because she knows Stanley would never leak to reporters, and she follows his example.” He paused. “The interesting thing here is that the newspaper did not even mention the victim’s name until more than two hours after this guy, this Death.Before.Dishonor person, wrote what he or she wrote.”

Byrth offered, “ ‘ Death before dishonor’ is something the gangbangers stole from the old mafia types. It’s a badge of honor that they’ve bastardized, like everything else they’ve stolen. They get the phrase tattooed on them, usually in prison.”

Harris nodded, then went on: “When Stanley noticed that the poster had (a) mentioned Skipper and (b) mentioned him by name two hours before the paper reported the formal name and (c) then took into account the tone of the posting itself, he remembered something. He remembered that both the name Death.Before.Dishonor and the anger were familiar.”

Harris flipped the pages of the printout.

“And so he went back through the newspaper web pages, trying to find this article.”

He pointed to the printout of an article with the headline 2 DEAD AFTER METH LAB EXPLODES, BURNS PHILLY INN MOTEL.

“Here at the bottom”-he pointed-“Stanley posted this comment.”

Payne and Byrth read it:

From Hung.Up.Badge.But.Not.Gun (9:50 a.m.):

Amen to both of you, Indy1 amp; WWBFD. I spent enough time walking the beat to see everything at least once. And nothing is as insidious as what these drugs do to families of every walk of life. I say, Shoot?em all and let the Good Lord sort?em out.

Recommend [4] Click Here to Report Abuse “Really is a good thing he’s not wandering around with a gun and a badge anymore,” Byrth repeated.

Harris chuckled. “That’s just his sense of humor. Stanley’s not the type to go postal.”

Byrth snorted. “I remember when we had that rash of post office workers shooting their coworkers. Somebody said that it just wasn’t right for them to be shooting each other-dramatic pause-because it was only fair that their frustrated customers should get to do it.”

Harris and Payne chuckled.

“Anyway,” Harris then went on, “apparently that shoot-’em-all comment provoked the Death.Before.Dishonor person, because she or he posted a pretty raw comment.”

“About?”

“Stanley said it said pushers sold drugs because people wanted them. And it was no different than what got sold legally-booze, cigarettes.”

He paused and looked between Payne and Byrth.

Harris then said, “And this is where it gets interesting: Stanley said he seemed to recall that comment ended by suggesting that drug dealers clean up after their own.”

Payne was shaking his head.

Harris went on: “And ended with something along the lines of ‘We clean up the rats like those in the Philly Inn.’ ”

“Jesus!” Payne said. “It actually used the name?”

Harris shrugged. “I don’t know. And Stanley’s not sure. But there was no question that he meant that motel.”

He pointed to the printouts.

“The reason he doesn’t know is because that comment is gone. When Stanley clicked back, he found his comment, but the one from Death.Before.Dishonor, which had been immediately after his, was gone. And this one was next in line.”

Payne and Byrth read:

From HowYouseGuysDoin’ (9:22 a.m.):

And amen to that! I?ll provide the ammo! This nonsense has got to stop. The inmates are running the asylum!

Recommend [1] Click Here to Report Abuse “Stanley said that he guessed there were enough reports of the comment’s abusive language that the online editor at the paper pulled it off. That’s what I was trying to figure out when you guys came in; I was on the phone with different folks at the newspaper.”