'There is also a chance, a very slim one, that we can get some of the other witnesses to agree to testify. Washington's going to talk to them. And I'm sure that Stillwell will probably try too. If we can get more people to come forward-'
'Which is exactly what these scumbags are worried about, what they're trying to prevent,' Malone said, and then, really surprising Wohl, said bitterly, 'Shit!'
Then, having heard what he said, and seeing the look on Wohl's face, he explained.
'Second table from the headwaiter's table. My wife. Ex-wife.'
Wohl looked, saw a not-especially-attractive woman, facing in their direction, across a table from a man with long, silver-gray hair, and then turned to Malone.
'That the lawyer?'
'That's him.'
'What I think you should do, Jack,' Wohl said, 'is smile and act as if you're having a great time. I'm only sorry that I'm not a longlegged blonde with spectacular breastworks.'
Malone looked at him for a moment, and then picked up his glass.
'Whoopee!' he said, waving it around. 'Ain't we having fun!'
'What do you say, kiddo?' Mickey O'Hara asked as he stuck his head into Matt Payne's room. 'Feel up to a couple of visitors?'
'Come on in, Mickey,' Matt said. He had been watching an especially dull program on public television hoping that it would put him to sleep; it hadn't. He now knew more of the water problems of Los Angeles than he really wanted to know.
Mickey O'Hara and Eleanor Neal came into the room. O'Hara had a brown bag in his hand, and Eleanor carried a potted plant.
'I hope we're not intruding,' Eleanor said, 'but Mickey said it would be all right if I came, and I wanted to thank you for saving his life.'
'Matt, say hello to Eleanor Neal,' Mickey said.
'How do you do?' Matt said, a reflex response, and then: 'I didn't save his life.'
'Yeah, you did,' Mickey said. 'But for a moment, in the alley, I thought you had changed your mind.'
Matt had a sudden, very clear mental picture of the fear on Mickey's face and in his eyes, right after it had happened, when he had, startled by the flash from Mickey's camera, turned from the man he had shot and pointed his revolver at Mickey O'Hara.
'What does that mean?'
'Not important,' Mickey said. He pulled a bottle of John Jameson Irish whiskey from the brown paper bag. 'Down payment on what I owe you, Matt.'
'Hey, I didn't save your life, okay? You don't owe me a damned thing.'
Mickey ignored him. He bent over and took two paper cups from the bedside table, opened the bottle, poured whiskey in each cup, and then looked at Matt.
'You want it straight, or should I pour some water in it?'
'I'm not sure you should be giving him that,' Eleanor said.
'He's an Irishman,' Mickey said. 'It'll do him more good than whatever else they've been giving him in here.'
'Put a little water in it, please, Mickey,' Matt said.
Mickey poured water from the insulated water carafe into the paper cup and handed it to Matt.
'Here's to you, Matt,' he said, raising his glass.
'Cheers,' Matt said, and took a swallow.
Maybe the booze will make me sleepy, or at least take the edge off the pain in the goddamn leg.
And then: Does he really think I saved his life, or is that bullshit? Blarney.
'How do you feel, Matt?' Mickey asked.
'I'm all right,' Matt said. 'I get out of here tomorrow.'
'So soon?' Eleanor asked, surprised.
'Current medical wisdom is that the sooner they get you moving around, the better,' Matt said.
'You going home?' Mickey said.
'If by 'home,' you mean my apartment, yes, of course.'
'I was thinking of-where do your parents live, Wallingford?'
'My apartment.'
'You know getting in to see you is like getting to see the gold at Fort Knox?' Mickey asked. Matt nodded. 'So you know what these people have been up to?'
Matt nodded again.
'The Molotov cocktail, the press release, the second one? All of it?'
Matt nodded again.
'What do you think, Mickey?' he asked.
'I know a lot of black guys, and a lot of Muslims,' Mickey said. ' Ordinarily, I can get what I want to know out of at least a couple of them. So far, all I get is shrugs when I ask about the Islamic Liberation Army. That could mean they really don't know, or it could mean that they think I 'm just one more goddamn honky. I'd watch myself, if I were you.'
'I was thinking-with what they have on television, there's been a lot of time for that-about what the hell they're after.'
'And?'
'In the thirties, during the Depression, when Dillinger and Bonnie and Clyde were running around robbing banks, killing people, there was supposed to be some support for them; people thought they were Robin Hood.'
'From what I've heard about Bonnie, she was no Maid Marion,' Mickey said.
'What does that mean?' Eleanor asked.
'Not important,' Mickey said. 'For that matter, Clyde wasn't exactly Errol Flynn, either. What is it you're saying, Matty, that they're after public support?'
Matt nodded.
'A political agenda?'
'Why else the press releases?'
'That's pretty sophisticated thinking for a bunch of stickup guys who have to have somebody read the Exit sign to them.'
'Somebody wrote those press releases,' Matt argued. 'For their purpose-getting themselves in the newspapers and on TV-they were, by definition, effective. At least one of them can write. And plan things, like the gasoline bomb.'
'What do you mean, 'plan the gasoline bomb'? Anybody knows how to make one of those.That I would expect from these people.'
'When and where to throw it,' Matt said. 'They had to be watching Goldbatt's. One man, just standing around, would have been suspicious. So they had a half a dozen of them, plus of course the guy on the roof who threw it.'
O'Hara grunted.
'Unless, of course, Matty, they have somebody inside the cops, inside Special Operations, who just called them and told them when Washington was going to pick up Monahan.That suggests an operation run by people who know what they're doing.'
'You really think that's possible?' Matt asked, genuinely shocked. ' That they have somebody inside?'
O'Hara never got the chance to reply. The door opened again and Mr. and Mrs. Brewster C. Payne walked in.
'Hi!' Matt said.
'How are you, honey?' Patricia Payne asked.
