That ruled out transferring his prosecutorial skills to civilian practice.

But it did not rule out a career in criminal law. While ordinary criminal lawyers, dealing as they generally do with the lower strata of society, seldom make large amounts of money, extraordinary criminal lawyers sometimes do. And they increase their earning potential as the socioeconomic cla.s.s of their clientele rises. An attorney representing someone accused of embezzling two hundred thousand dollars from a bank can expect to be compensated for his services more generously than if he defended someone accused of stealing that much money from the same bank at the point of a gun.

When J. Dunlop Mawson, who had made it subtly if quickly plain that he liked to be addressed as "Colonel," heard that Brewster Payne had had a falling-out with his father over his having married a Roman Catholic cop's widow with a baby, a girl who had been a typist for the firm, he thought he saw in him the perfect partner.

First of all, of course, Brewster Payne II was a good lawyer, and he had acquired seven years' experience with a law firm that was good as well as prestigious. And he was also Episcopal Academy and Princeton, Rose Tree Hunt Club and the Merion Country Club-without question a member of the Philadelphia Establishment.

Brewster Payne II was not a fool. He knew exactly what Jack Mawson wanted from him. And he had no desire whatever to practice criminal law. But Mawson's arguments made sense. Times had changed. Perfectly respectable people were getting divorced. And the division of the property of the affluent that went with a divorce was worthy, in direct ratio to the value and complexity of the property involved, of the talents of a skilled trust and estate lawyer. He would handle the crooks, Jack Mawson told Brewster Payne, and Payne would handle the cuckolded.

Payne added one nonnegotiable caveat: Jack could handle anything from embezzlers to ax murderers, so long as they were, so to speak, amateurs. There would be no connection, however indirect, with Organized Crime. If they were to become partners, Payne would have to have the privilege of client rejection, and they had better write that down, so there would be no possibility of misunderstanding, down the pike.

Five months after Mawson & Payne opened offices for the practice of law in the First National Bank Building, across from the Bellevue-Stratford Hotel and the Union League on South Broad Street, Patricia Stevens Payne found herself with child.

Brew Payne, ever the lawyer, first asked if she was sure, and when she said there was no question, nodded his head as if she had just given him the time of day.

"Well, then," he said, "we'll have to do something about Matthew."

"I don't know what you mean, honey," Patricia said, uneasily.

"I'd planned to bring it up before," he said. "But there hasn't seemed to be the right moment. I don't at all like the notion of his growing up with any question in his mind of not being one of us. What I would like to do, if you're agreeable, is enter a plea for adoption. And if you're agreeable, Patricia, to enter the appropriate pleas in your behalf with regard to Amelia and Foster.''

When she didn't immediately respond, Brewster Payne misunderstood her silence for reluctance.

"Well, please don't say no with any finality now," he said. "I'm afraid you're going to have to face the fact that both Amy and Foster do think of you as their mother."

"Brewster," Patricia said, finding her voice, "sometimes you're a d.a.m.ned fool."

"So I have been told," he said. "As recently as this afternoon, by the colonel."

"But you are warm and kind and I love you very much," she said.

"I hear that sort of thing rather less than the other," he said. "I take it you're agreeable?"

"Why did Jack Mawson say you were a d.a.m.ned fool?"

"I told him I thought we should decline a certain client," he said. "You haven't answered my question."

"Would you like a sworn deposition? aNow comes Patricia Payne who being duly sworn states that the only thing she loves more than her unborn child, and her husband's children, and her son, is her husband'?"

"A simple yes will suffice," Brew Payne said, and put his arms around her. "Thank you very much."

That was her sin, which had made her a G.o.dless wh.o.r.e, in the eyes of Gertrude Moffitt: marrying outside the church, living in sin, bearing Brewster's child, and allowing that good man to give his name and his love to a fatherless boy.

Patricia was worried about her son. There had been, over the past two or three weeks, something wrong. Brewster sensed it too, and suggested that Matt was suffering from the Bee Syndrome, which was rampant among young men Matt's age. Matt was driven, Brewster said, to spread pollen, and sometimes there just was not an adequate number, or even one, Philadelphia blossom on which to spread it.

Brewster was probably right-he usually was-but Patricia wasn't sure. From what she had reliably heard about what took place on the University of Pennsylvania campus, and particularly along Fraternity Row, there was a large garden of flowering blossoms just waiting to be pollinated. Matt could be in love, of course, with some girl immune to his charms, which would explain a good deal about his behavior, but Patricia had a gut feeling that it was something else.

And whatever was bothering him, the murder of his uncle Dutch was going to make things worse.

The traffic into Philadelphia was heavy, and it took Patricia Payne longer than thirty minutes to get into town, and then when she got to the University of Pennsylvania campus, there was a tie-up on Walnut Street by the Delta Phi Omicron house, an old and stately brownstone mansion. A car had broken down, against the curb, forcing the cars in the other lane to merge with those in the inner; they were backed up for two blocks, waiting their turn.

And then she drew close and saw that the car blocking the outside lane, directly in front of the fraternity house, was a black Oldsmobile. There was an extra radio antenna, a short one, mounted on the inside shelf by the rear window. It was Denny Coughlin's car.

When you are a chief inspector of the Philadelphia Police Department, Patricia Payne thought wryly, you park any place you d.a.m.ned well please.

She pulled in behind the Oldsmobile, slid across the seat, and got out the pa.s.senger side. Denny was already out of the Oldsmobile, and another man got out of the driver's side and stepped onto the sidewalk.

She kissed Denny, noticing both that he was picking up some girth, and that he still apparently bought his cologne depending on what was cheapest when he walked into Walgreen's Drugstore.

"By G.o.d, you're a good-looking woman," Denny said. "Patty, you remember Sergeant Tom Lenihan?"

"Yes, of course," Pat said. "How are you, Sergeant?"

"Tom, you think you remember how to direct traffic?" Coughlin said, pointing at the backed-up cars.

"Yes, sir," Lenihan said.

"We won't be long in here," Coughlin said, and took Pat's arm in his large hand and walked her up the steep, wide stone stairs to the fraternity house.

"Can I help you?" a young man asked, when they had pushed open the heavy oak door with frosted gla.s.s inserts and were in the foyer of the building.

"I'm Mrs. Payne," Pat said. "I'm looking for my son."

The young man went to the foot of the curving staircase.

"Mr. Payne, sir," he called. "You have visitors, sir. It's your mommy!"

Denny Coughlin gave him a frosty glance.

Matthew Mark Payne appeared a moment later at the head of the stairs. He was a tall, lithe young man, with dark, thick hair. He was twenty-one, and he would graduate next month, and follow his father into the marines. He had taken the Platoon Leader's Course, and was going to be a distinguished graduate, which meant that he could have a regular marine commission, if he wanted it, and another of Patricia Payne's worries was that he would take it.

His eyes were dark and intelligent, and they flashed between his mother and Coughlin. Then he started down the stairs, not smiling. He was wearing gray flannel slacks, a b.u.t.ton-down collared blue shirt, open, and a light gray sweater.

Coughlin turned his back to him, and said, softly. "He's a ringer for Johnny, isn't he?"

"And as hardheaded," Pat Payne said.

Matt Payne kissed his mother without embarra.s.sment, and offered his hand to Coughlin.

"Uncle Denny," he said. "What's all this? Has something happened? Is it Dad?"

"It's your uncle d.i.c.k," Patricia Payne told her son, watching his face carefully. "Dutch is dead, Matt."

"What happened?" he asked, tightly.

"He walked up on a holdup," Denny Coughlin said. "He was shot."

"Oh, s.h.i.t!" Matt Payne said. His lips worked, and then he put his arms around his mother.

I don't know, she thought, whether he's seeking comfort or trying to give it.

"G.o.dd.a.m.n it," Matt said, letting his mother go.

"I'm sorry, son," Denny Coughlin said.

"Did they get who did it?" Matt asked. Now, Coughlin saw, he was angry.

"Dutch put the one who shot him down," Coughlin said. "The other one got away. They'll find him, Matt."

"Did he kill the one who shot him?" Matt asked.

"Yes," Coughlin said. "It was a woman, Matt, a girl."

"Jesus!"

"We're going to see your aunt Jean," Patricia Payne said. "I thought you might want to come along."

"Let me get a coat and tie," he said, and then, "Jesus! The kids!"

"It's a b.i.t.c.h, all right," Coughlin said.

Matt turned and went up the stairway, taking the steps two at a time.

"He's a nice boy," Denny Coughlin said.

"He's about to go off to that d.a.m.ned war," Patricia Payne said.

"What would you rather, Patty? That he go to Canada and dodge the draft?"

"But as a marine. "

"I wouldn't worry about him; that boy can take care of himself," Coughlin said.

"Like Dutch, right? Like his father?"

"Come on, Patty," Coughlin said, and put his arm around her shoulder and hugged her.

"Oh, h.e.l.l, Denny," Patricia Payne said.

When Matt Payne came down the stairs, he was wearing a gray flannel suit.

Denny's right, Patricia Payne thought, he looks just like Johnny.

They went down the stairs. Matt got behind the wheel of the Mercury station wagon.

"It must be nice to be a cop," Matt said. "Park where you d.a.m.ned well please. A guy in the house stopped here last week, left the motor running, ran in to get some books. By the time he came out, the tow truck was hauling his car off. Cost him forty bucks for the tow truck, after he'd paid a twenty-five-dollar fine for double parking."

She looked at him, but didn't reply.

The Oldsmobile moved off.

"Here we go," Matt said, as he stepped on the accelerator. "Want to bet whether or not we break the speed limit?"

"I'm not in the mood for your wit, Matt," Patricia said.

"Just trying to brighten up an otherwise lousy afternoon," Matt said.

Sergeant Lenihan turned right onto North Thirty-third Street, cut over to North Thirty-fourth at Mantua, and led the Mercury past the Philadelphia Zoological Gardens; turned left again onto Girard for a block, and finally right onto the Schuylkill Expressway, which parallels the West Bank of the river. He drove fast, well over the posted speed limit, but not recklessly. Matt had no trouble keeping up with him. He glanced at the speedometer from time to time, but did not mention the speed to his mother.

When they crossed the Schuylkill on the Twin Bridges their pace slowed, but not much. Going past Fern Hill Park, Matt saw a police car parked off the road, watching traffic. And he saw the eyes of the policeman driving follow him as they zipped past. But the car didn't move.

Lenihan slowed the Oldsmobile then, to a precise forty-five miles an hour. They had to stop for the red light at Ninth Street, but for no others. The lights were supposed to be set, Matt recalled, for forty-five. That they didn't have to stop seemed to prove it.

"There it is," his mother said.

"There what is?"

"The Waikiki Diner," she replied. "That's where Denny said it happened."

He turned to look, but couldn't see what she was talking about.

Lenihan turned to the right at Pennypack Circle, onto Holme Avenue, and into the Torresdale section of Philadelphia.

There was a traffic jam, complete to a cop directing traffic, at the intersection of Academy Road and Outlook Avenue. The cop waved the Oldsmobile through, but then gestured vigorously for the Mercury to keep going down Academy.

Matt stopped and shook his head, and pointed down Outlook. The white-capped traffic cop walked up to the car. Matt lowered the window.

"Captain Moffitt was my uncle," Matt said.

"Sorry," the cop said, and waved him through.

There were more cars than Matt could easily count before the house overlooking the fenced-in fairway of the Torresdale Golf Course. Among them was His Honor the Mayor Jerry Carlucci's Cadillac limousine.

Matt saw that there was at least one TV camera crew set up on the golf course, on the other side of the fence that separated it from Outlook Avenue. And there were people with still cameras.

"Park the car, Tom, please," Chief Inspector Coughlin said to his aide, "and then come back and take care of their car, too."

He got out of the Oldsmobile and stood in the street, waiting for Matt and Patty to drive up.

Staff Inspector Peter Wohl walked up to him.

"Can't we run those f.u.c.king ghouls off, Peter?" Coughlin said, nodding toward the press behind the golf course fence.

"I wish we could, sir," Wohl said. "If you've got a minute, Chief?"

Matt stopped the Mercury at Coughlin's signal. Patty lowered the window, and Coughlin leaned down to it.

"Just leave the keys, Matt," he said. "Lenihan will park it, and then catch up with us." He opened Patty's door, and she got out. "I'll be with you in just a minute, dear. I gotta talk to a guy."