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Mr. Gerald North Atchison was sitting at a banquette, alone, studying the menu.
Jesus, why not? What did I expect? People have to eat. Going to a diner is what hungry people do.
He dropped off the wall and turned to fight his way back through the jungle.
You are a goddamn fool, Matthew Payne. The price of your Sherlock Holmes foolishness is your ripped jacket. Be grateful that the guys in the unmarked car didn’t see you.
But, Jesus, why did he come all the way here? He could have eaten a hell of a lot closer to his house than this—the Media Inn, for example.
He stood motionless for a second, then turned back to the diner and climbed up again.
Mr. Gerald North Atchison, smiling, was giving his order to a waitress whose hair was piled on top of her head.
What are you doing here, you sonofabitch?
He looked around the diner again.
Frankie Foley was sitting at the diner’s counter, the remnants of his meal pushed aside, drinking a cup of coffee, holding the cup in both hands.
“You want to climb down from there, sir, and tell us what you’re doing?”
Matt quickly looked over his shoulder. Too quickly. His right foot slipped and he fell backward onto one of the larger perennial thornbushes.
“Shit!” Matt said.
“Jesus!” o
ne of the detectives said, his tone indicating that the strange behavior of civilians still amazed him.
“I’m a Three Six Nine,” Matt said.
Both detectives, if that’s what they were, entered the thornbush jungle far enough to put their hands on Matt’s arm and shoulders and push him up out of the thornbush.
“I’m Detective Payne, of Special Operations,” Matt said. “Let me get out of here, and I’ll show you my identification.”
The two eyed him warily as he reached into his jacket for his identification.
The larger of the two took the leather folder, examined it and Matt critically, and finally handed it back.
“What the hell are you doing?” he asked.
“Right now, I need some help,” Matt said.
“It sure looks like you do,” the second of them said.
“There’s a man in there named Gerald North Atchison,” Matt said. “You hear about the double homicide at the Inferno?”
“I heard about it,” the larger one said.
“It was his wife and partner who were killed,” Matt said. “And there is another man in there, Frankie Foley, who we think is involved.”
“I thought you said you was Special Operations,” the larger detective said. “Isn’t that Homicide’s business?”
“I’m working the job,” Matt said. “I followed Atchison here from his house. I think he’s here to meet Foley. That would put a lot of things together.”
“What kind of help?” the larger one asked.
“I can’t go in there. They both know my face.”
