The Investigators (Badge of Honor 7)

Aside from tearing the pocket of his suit jacket on a protruding limb, he made it through the woods to the house, got a good look at it—it was an ancient, run-down, fieldstone farmhouse with diapers and underwear drying on a line on the narrow front porch; and an old Ford station wagon and a battered Volkswagen parked next to it—saw that it would not only be fairly easy to surround without being detected but that the woods would offer all the cover the FBI would need, and made it back to the road with plenty of time to spare before Susan, on schedule, came down the road.

He jumped in the car and she drove off.

“I think I hate you,” Susan said. “God, that was stupid!”

“Nothing happened. I saw what I had to see, and everything’s all right.”

“You’re as bad as Bryan,” she said, on the edge of hysterics. “He’s playing revolutionary, and you’re playing heroic policeman.”

“There’s a difference, Susan,” he said, and he fought back the wave of anger he felt growing inside him. “I am a policeman, not a heroic one, but a policeman. I don’t know if your fucking friend is a revolutionary or not, but he kills people, and my job is to put the son of a bitch away.”

“I don’t want you to die!” she said.

“Look for a telephone,” he said. “It’s time to call Jack Matthews.”

TWENTY-SIX

At six-thirty—fifteen minutes earlier than Matt had told him to be there—Special Agent John J. Matthews of the FBI walked into the paneled bar of the Doylestown Inn, across the street from the Bucks County courthouse, and saw Detective Matthew Payne sitting at the bar nursing what was probably a scotch and water. Beside him, looking better in the flesh than in the photographs he had seen of her, was Miss Susan Reynolds, a known associate of the Chenowith Group.

He walked to them and tapped Detective Payne on the back.

“Hello, Matt,” he said. “What’s going on?”

Matt turned on the swiveled bar stool, smiled, and touched Matthews on the shoulder.

“You’re early, buddy. I thought you might be. Tell me right now if you’re alone.”

“You said come alone, I came alone.”

“Good boy! Susan, this is Jack. Jack, Susan.”

“Hello,” Susan said, torn between curiosity and not wanting to look at the FBI agent.

“How do you do, Miss Reynolds?” Matthews said stiffly.

“I think your reputation has preceded you, honey,” Matt said. “Jack knows who you are.”

“Matt, what the hell is going on?” Matthews asked.

“What are you drinking, Jack?” Matt said.

“Nothing, thank you. What I want, Matt, is to know what’s going on.”

“Have a drink, Jack,” Matt said, and waved for the bartender. “Another of these, please, for this gentleman,” he said.

“Goddamn it, I don’t want a drink!”

The bartender shrugged and walked away.

“Okay,” Matt said. “Let me pay for these, and we’ll go someplace where we can talk.”

He looked at the cash register tab on the bar, then reached in his pocket and peeled two bills from a wad of currency and laid them on the bar. He picked up his drink and drained it.

Matthews saw that Reynolds’s glass was still full.

“Where’s your car, Jack?” Matt asked.

“Out in back.”