The Investigators (Badge of Honor 7)

And: We are no longer Daddy Dear and Daughter Darling. That was The Doctor putting A Nosy Lawyer in his place.

“Her grandfather is in my office,” Payne said.

“Wait a minute,” Amy said. “Now I remember the name. Cynthia Longwood. A Bala Cynwyd maiden who had a traumatic experience with her boyfriend. I told Aaron, sorry, no, I have a lapful of really sick people. How did you get involved in this? Is her grandfather a client?”

“No. He’s not. Her grandfather is Vincenzo Savarese.”

“The gangster?”

“That has been alleged.”

“Is this important to you, Daddy?”

“I don’t really know how to answer that. He came here—Armando Giacomo brought him—which must have been difficult for both of them, and appealed to me as a father. I thought the decent thing to do was call you.”

“Where is she?”

“University Hospital.”

“Okay, I’ll see her,” Amy said simply.

“Thank you.”

“It would be dishonest of me to say ‘you’re welcome, ’ ” Amy said. “What this is is pure curiosity. I wonder why Aaron didn’t tell me who she was?”

“I don’t think Dr. Stein knows who her grandfather is.”

“Got to run, Daddy,” Amy said, and the line went dead.

Payne returned to his office.

“I’ve just spoken to my daughter, Mr. Savarese,” he said. “She will see your granddaughter.”

Vincenzo Savarese rose slowly from the couch and walked to Payne. He put out his hand, and when Payne put out his, held it with both hands.

There are tears in his eyes!

“I am very much in your debt, Mr. Payne,” Savarese said.

“Not at all.”

“I am very much in your debt, Mr. Payne,” Savarese repeated. “And now I will not take any more of your valuable time.”

Savarese walked to Colonel J. Dunlop Mawson, politely shook his hand, and then walked out of the office.

“I owe you a big one, Brewster,” Armando C. Giacomo said softly, winked at Payne, and followed Savarese out.

Walter Davis, a tall, well-built, nearly handsome man in his middle forties, had, while taking luncheon at the Rittenhouse Club, what he considered to be a splendid idea. Actually, it was the second time he had the same idea, and now he wondered why he hadn’t followed up on it before.

Davis, who was the Special Agent in Charge of the Philadelphia Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, was not a voting member of the Rittenhouse Club. By virtue of his office, however, he enjoyed all the privileges of membership. Similar ex officio memberships were made available to certain other public servants—the mayor; the admiral commanding the Philadelphia Navy Yard; the police commissioner; the president of the University of Pennsylvania, et cetera—highly successful practitioners of their professions whom the membership felt would, had they been in the private sector, not only have been put up for membership but would have been able to afford it.

It was said that full membership in the Rittenhouse Club was something like Commodore Vanderbilt’s yacht: if you had to ask how much it cost, you couldn’t afford it.

Davis did not often use the Rittenhouse Club’s facilities, which included an Olympic-size swimming pool, a fully equipped gymnasium in addition to its bar, lounge, and dining facilities. For one thing, it was expensive. For another, Davis was a shade uneasy about taking anything for nothing.

He tried to limit his visits to those that, at least, had a connection with the FBI. A monthly luncheon with Police Commissioner Taddeus Czernich, for example, was usually on his schedule. There were exceptions, of course. When Mrs. Davis was climbing the walls about something, dinner in the elegance of the Rittenhouse Dining Room—the only room in the building where the gentle sex was welcome—did wonders to calm her down.