The Assassin

"Everything's fine. Aside from the fact that I lost my car and next year's salary at the craps tables."

There was a reply, and he chuckled and hung up.

"Why did you call your father?" Pe

"Because I thought he would be better able to deal with a collect call than yours," Matt Payne replied, then took her arm again. "There' s what I have been looking for."

He led her to a cocktail lounge and set her down at a tiny table in a relatively uncrowded part of the room.

A waitress almost immediately came to the table.

"Have you got any Tuborg?" Matt Payne asked.

The waitress nodded.

"Pe

"I think a 7UP, please."

"Sprite okay?"

"Yes, thank you," Pe

"As a matter of fact, I made so much money, I don't believe it."

"Really?"

He took the Flamingo's check for $3,700 from his pocket and showed it to her.

"My God!"

"And that's not all of it," he said.

"What were you playing?"

"Roulette."

"Roulette? What do you know about playing roulette?"

"Absolutely nothing, that's why I won," Matt said.

She smiled. The anger seemed to be gone. He had a policeman's cynical thought.Is she charming me?

"When did you get here?" Pe

"A little after ten yesterday morning."

"Then why didn't you come get me yesterday?"

"Because I was told to get you this morning," he said. "Mine not to reason why, et cetera, et cetera."

"So instead you went gambling."

"Right. I quit half an hour before the limousine came back for me." When he saw the look on her face, he went on solemnly, "Las Vegas never sleeps, you know. They don't even have clocks."

"I really wouldn't know. I didn't get to go to town."

He did not respond.

"You really gambled all night?" she asked.

"I took a couple of naps and a shower, but yes, I guess I did."

"Well, I'm glad you had fun."

"Thank you."

"You were the last person I expected to see," Pe

"You could have been knocked over with a fender, right?"

She smiled dutifully.

"What are you doing out here, Matt? I mean, why you?"

The waitress appeared with their drinks. Matt handed her a credit card and waited for her to leave before replying.

"My father called me up and asked me to have a drink at the Rittenhouse. When I got there, Chief Coughlin was with him…"

"That's the man you call 'Uncle De

"Right. My father told me it had been decided by your father and Amy that I was the obvious choice to come out here and bring you home. I told him that while the thought of being able to be of some small service to you naturally thrilled me, I would have to regretfully decline, as I had to work. Then De

"You're still a:" Pe

"No, Precious Pe

She smiled dutifully again.

He smiled back and took a healthy swallow of his beer.

Matt Payne felt nowhere near as bright and clever as he was trying to appear. As a matter of fact, he could recall few times in his twenty-two years when he had been more uncomfortable.

"Then congratulations, Matt," Pe

"Thank you, ma'am," he said.

"But that doesn't answer why you? Out here, I mean?"

"I think the idea, I thinkAmy's idea, is that I am the best person to be with you as you begin your passage back into the real world. Amy, I hope you know, is calling the shots."

"She's been coming out here," Pe

"Yeah, I know," Payne said. "For whatever the hell it's worth, Pe

That was the truth: Amelia Payne, M.D.,was a highly regarded psychiatrist.

"'The word on the street'?" Pe

"The consensus is," he corrected himself.

"I don't understand:" Pe

"Neither do I," he said, "but to coin a phrase, 'mine not to reason why, mine but to ride into the valley of the hustlers'…"

"Well, thanks anyway for coming out here, even if you didn't want to."

"Better me than Madame D, right?"

Matt Payne had been calling Grace (Mrs. H. Richard) Detweiler " Madame D" since he had been about twelve, primarily because he knew it greatly a

Pe

"Oh, God, I don't think I could have handled my mother out here."

"You better prepare yourself, she'll be at the airport."

"And then what?"

"Jesus Christ, Pe

"I've always liked your tact and charm, Matt," Pe

"You want one?"

"I'm asubstance abuser," Pe

"You're a…youwere a junkie, not a drunk."

"Alcohol is a drug," Pe

"So is aspirin," Matt said, and pushed his beer glass to her.

She met his eyes, and looked into them, and it was only with a good deal of effort that he could keep himself from looking away.

Then she picked up his glass and took a swallow.

"If you're going to start throwing things, or taking your clothes off, or whatever, try to give me a little notice, will you?" Matt said.

"Go to hell, Matt," Pe

"You were always a tough little girl, Pe

Did I mean that, or did I just say it to be kind?

"I wish I was sure you meant that," Pe

He shrugged, and then looked around for the waitress and, when he had caught her eye, signaled for another beer.

"On the way to the airplane, we're going to have to get you some Sen-Sen or something. I don't want Amy or your mother to smell booze on your breath."

"Did they tell you to make sure I didn't get…anything I wasn't supposed to have?"

"They knew I wouldn't give you, or let you get, anything to suck up your nose."

"Detective Payne, right?"

He nodded.

"And what did they say about talking to me about…about what happened?"

"About what, what happened?"

"You know what I mean," she said, somewhat snappishly. "Aboutwho I mean. Anthony."

The waitress delivered the beer.

"Get me the bill, please," Matt said.

Pe

"I loved him, Matt."

"Jesus Christ!" he said disgustedly.

"I'd hoped you would understand. I guess I should have known better."

"DeZego, Anthony J., 'Tony the Zee,'" Matt recited bitterly, " truck driver, soldier in the Savarese family. I'm not even sure that he had made his bones. And incidentally, loving husband and beloved father of three."

"You're a sonofabitch!"

"For Christ's sake, Pe

She glowered at him. He picked up his beer glass and as he drank from it met her eyes. After a moment she averted hers.

"I don't know what that means," she said softly, after a moment, " what you said about bones."

"In order to be a real mobster, you have to kill somebody," Matt said evenly. "They call it 'making your bones.

"In other words, you really think he was a gangster?"

"Mobster. There's a difference. He was a low-level mobster. We can't even find out why they hit him."