“Fuck you!”
“With the additional warning to never say that to me again, the conversation is closed, Detective Lassiter,” Matt said. “Now, where do you live?”
“Take me to City Hall. I’ll take a taxi.”
“Commissioner Coughlin ordered me to take you home. Answer the question, Detective Lassiter.”
“The 100 Block of Orchard Lane,” she said, icily, after a moment. “It’s east of the North Philadelphia Airport. Take I-95, and get-”
“I know where the North Philadelphia airport is.”
Matt put the Porsche in gear and backed away from the curb.
“Take the next left, onto Knight’s Road,” Olivia said, as they were headed down Woodhaven Road.
It was the first thing either of them had said since leaving Liberties.
Matt wordlessly made the turn.
Two minutes later, Olivia said, pointing across the median, 'Orchard’s over there. You can make a U-turn at the stoplight. ”
Matt saw that the stoplight at the intersection of Knight’s Road and Red Lion Road was green and that a Dodge Caravan, headed his way on the other side of the median, was the only traffic. It had just passed the stoplight.
He touched the brake, flicked the turn signal lever, downshifted, and prepared to make the U-turn at the intersection, after the Caravan.
A Pontiac Grand Am came out of nowhere down Red Lion, ran the red light, flashed past the nose of the Porsche, and then slammed into the side of the Dodge Caravan.
Slammed hard into it. There was the sound of tearing metal as the Dodge was knocked, mostly sideward, across the street, coming to rest at an angle against the curb.
“That sonofabitch ran the light!” Matt said.
He braked sharply, stopped, turned on his flashers, and opened his door.
“Call Radio,” he ordered, handing his cellular to Olivia.
The driver’s door of the Grand Am opened and the driver got out. He was a young, tall, white male.
“You stupid sonofabitch!” Matt muttered.
“This is Detective Lassiter, badge 582. We are at Red Lion and Knights Road. We have a vehicular accident, auto-auto. Possible injuries, start in Fire Rescue, and a sector car.”
There was a moment’s hesitation, then Olivia added, “No. We are not involved.”
Thank God! Matt thought. Neither one of us could pass a Breathalyzer test right now.
The young, tall, white male looked first at the Caravan and then at the Porsche stopped on Knight’s Road with its warning flashers blinking. Then he sort of shrugged and took off at a lope down Orchard Lane.
“Check on the people in the van,” Matt ordered, and jumped out of the Porsche and ran after the young, tall, white male.
Now it’s leaving the scene of an accident, you dumb sonofabitch!
And that Grand Am is probably stolen.
“Stop!” he shouted. “I am a police officer.”
The young, tall, white male kept running. Matt saw him turn off the street into a driveway.
When Matt reached the lawn of the next house, he cut across it diagonally and at a full run encountered with his foot a wire supporting an ornamental tree on the lawn.
He flew through the air and landed flat on the concrete driveway. He felt his face scrape against the concrete, and a stinging in both hands where they had struck the concrete.
He shook his head and got to his knees.
The young, tall, white male was running around the side of a garage.
Matt ran after him.
When he turned the corner of the garage, he saw the young, tall, white male about to top a five-foot hurricane fence.
“Stop, police officer!” Matt shouted.
The young, tall, white male looked right at him and then dropped to the ground on the far side of the fence.
“I’m going to get you, you sonofabitch!” Matt shouted, and ran toward the fence.
It was his intention to leap the fence gracefully by vaulting over it with the use of his left hand on the parallel pipe at the top of the fence.
Two problems arose. First, the parallel pipe at the top of the fence was perhaps an inch below the top of the fence itself. Second, the uppermost joints of the twisted wire of the fence were above it. One of them penetrated the heel of Matt’s hand, which he had planned to use for leverage.
This caused (a) Matt’s passage over the fence to be considerably less graceful than he intended; (b) a puncture wound in the heel of Matt’s hand; and (c) Matt’s trousers to be torn from just below the knee almost to the cuff as they became ensnared in the twisted wire at the top of the fence.
“Sonofabitch!” Matt cried, and got to his feet.
He saw that he was between two lines of hurricane fence running behind the houses. The young, tall, white male was running between them. Matt ran after him.
At the end of the parallel lines of hurricane fence there were a dozen garbage cans. The young, tall, white male leapt nimbly over the first two cans, but then his foot slipped between two of them and he sprawled onto the ground amid toppled garbage cans.
Matt, breathing heavily, shoved the garbage cans to one side, then fell to his knees beside the young, tall, white male and pulled his arm behind his back. Then he put his knee on the small of the young, tall, white male’s back.
He tried to catch his breath. He became aware that blood was dripping from his chin onto the white sweatshirt of the young, tall, white male.
He heard the wail of a siren, and then the wail of a second siren.
Matt felt the small of his own back for his handcuffs.
I left the fucking things in the goddamn car!
“You gonna let me up now?” the young, tall, white male asked.
“Shut your fucking mouth!”
The sound of one of the sirens died, and then the other. After what seemed like two and a half years, Matt saw the beam of a sweeping flashlight.
“Over here!” he tried to shout, which told him he had not fully recovered his breath.
The flashlight beam came closer.
“My God, what happened to you?” Detective Lassiter asked.
“You got cuffs?”
Detective Lassiter sort of squatted on the ground, put her small flashlight in her mouth, opened her purse, and took from it a set of handcuffs.
She moved to place the handcuffs on the wrist Matt was holding. The young, tall, white male, realizing what was happening, resisted. Before he was adequately restrained again, Detective Lassiter’s flashlight had been knocked from her mouth and had fallen to the ground, in such a position that it shone directly on the junction of her legs, which, covered with pale blue panties, was now, due to the displacement of her skirt, fully exposed.
He heard the sound of a third siren dying.
“Thanks,” Sergeant Payne said.
“Happy to be of help,” Detective Lassiter said.
“Put your foot on his neck,” Sergeant Payne ordered.
Detective Lassiter complied, and Sergeant Payne got to his feet.
“You’re bleeding,” Detective Lassiter said.
“My, aren’t we observant?” Matt said, and took a handkerchief from his pocket and mopped at his face.
Matt started to pull the young, tall, white man to his feet.
“Keeping in mind that there is nothing I would rather do right now than rub your face in the garbage, get up and behave,” Matt said.
