On the one hand, Amy, you march in front of the feminist parade, waving the banner of modern womanhood and gender equality, and on the other, you act like a seventeen-year-old terrified at the idea Uncle Denny will suspect that you and I are engaged in carnal activity not sanctioned for the unmarried.
“No,” Peter said. “I’m sure all he wants to do is stand outside the door.”
He got out of bed.
“You just get back in bed and try not to sneeze,” Peter said. “And I will try to get rid of him as quickly as I can.”
“I’ll have to get dressed,” Amy said.
“Why bother?” Peter said as he put on his bathrobe. “If he comes in the bedroom, I don’t think he’ll believe you were in here helping me wash the windows. Maybe you could say you were making a house call, Doctor.”
“Screw you, Peter,” Amy said. “This is not funny!”
But she did get back into the bed and pulled the sheet up over her.
Peter turned the lights off, then left the bedroom, closing the door.
Then he turned and knocked on it.
“Morals squad!” he announced. “Open up!”
“You bastard!” Amy called, but she was chuckling.
Peter turned the lights on in the living room, walked to the door, and opened it.
Chief Inspector Dennis V. Coughlin—who, in the process of maintaining his friendly relationship with the widow of his pal Sergeant John F. X. Moffitt, had become so close to the Payne family that all the Payne kids had grown up thinking of him as Uncle Denny—stood at the door.
In a cloud of Old Bushmills fumes, Peter’s nose immediately told him.
“I was in the neighborhood, Peter,” Coughlin said, “and thought I would take a chance and see if you were still up.”
Peter had just enough time to decide, Bullshit, twice. I don’t think you were in the neighborhood, and even if you were, you got on the radio to get my location, and if you did that, you would have asked the operator to call me on the phone to see if I was up, when Coughlin added:
“That’s bullshit. I wanted to see you. Radio said you were home. I’m sorry if I got you up. You got something going in there, I’ll just go.”
Does he suspect Amy is in here with me?
“Come on in. I was about to go to bed. We’ll have a nightcap.”
“You’re sure?” Coughlin asked.
“Come on in,” Peter repeated.
Coughlin followed him into the living room, sat down on Peter’s white leather couch—a remnant, like several other pieces of very modern furniture in the apartment, of a long-dead and almost forgotten affair with an interior decorator—and reached for the telephone.
As Peter took ice, glasses, and a bottle of James Jamison Irish whiskey from the kitchen, he heard Coughlin on the telephone.
“Chief Coughlin,” he announced, “at Inspector Wohl’s house,” and then hung up.
Peter set the whiskey, ice, and glasses on the coffee table in front of the couch and sat down in one of the matching white leather armchairs.
Coughlin reached for the whiskey, poured an inch into a glass, and took a sip.
“This is not the first I’ve had of these,” he said, holding up the glass. “Mickey O’Hara came by the Roundhouse at six, and we went out and drank our dinner.”
“There’s an extra bed here,” Peter said, “if you don’t feel up to driving home.”
And then he remembered that not only was Amy in his bed, where she could hear the conversation, but that the moment she heard what he had just said she would decide he was crazy or incredibly stupid. Or, probably, both.