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The CIs were paid for tips that, it was hoped, led to arrests. Money was also made available to them for street purchases of, for example, drugs and firearms—and even of, say, the renting of a row house needed for an undercover operation. Because these funds over time could run into the tens of thousands of dollars, procedures had to be followed to ensure that the police officers kept a distinct arm’s length from the informants.

There’s more than the usual BS going on with this, Payne thought, taking another sip of coffee.

Why wouldn’t McCrory’s CI just tell them what the other guy knew about the drive-by?

And why does this guy say he needs to see me?

He slipped the phone into his pants pocket. His Colt Officer’s Model .45 ACP, snapped into a black leather shoulder holster, hung under his left

bicep, and his shield—Badge Number 471, which had been his father’s—was midway down his striped necktie, hanging in its black leather holder from a chromed bead chain looped around the button-down collar of his stiffly starched white shirt.

The Colt did not technically meet Philadelphia Police Department regulations. When Payne had begun carrying the semiautomatic, during a stint with Special Operations, .38 caliber revolvers were still the department-issued sidearm. Payne disliked wheel guns in general and .38s in particular. He argued that the smaller caliber did not have the stopping power of a .45 bullet and that the Officer’s Model carried more of the powerful rounds and could be reloaded more quickly.

Because of the nature of Special Operations cases—especially its undercover work; Payne made the point that the blued steel .38 caliber revolver screamed “Cop!”—the department had made an allowance for him.

After Payne left SO, if anyone asked about the .45, he waved the allowance at them, arguing that his Colt had been grandfathered. That particularly annoyed those who—wrongly—believed it was another case of his connections getting him preferential treatment.

But what really annoyed them even more was that Payne had then appeared vindicated in his assessment of the underpowered .38 when the department was given approval by the city council to issue Glock 9-millimeter semiautomatics as the standard sidearm. Officers who passed muster on the department’s shooting range with a .40 caliber Glock were given the option of carrying one—if the officers paid for the optional weapon with their own funds.

The magazines of the Glocks held three times as many rounds as the revolvers they replaced, and put the police officers on more or less equal footing with the bad guys, who (a) were not subject to the whims of the city hall politicians who had been against replacing the .38s and thus (b) had long been packing the more powerful semiautos.

Once again Payne had bent the rules to his needs—and once again had not only gotten away with it, but proved that he thought ahead of the conventional curve.

Payne wasn’t sure which pissed off his detractors more. But he really didn’t give a damn. He was right. And he knew it. And he wasn’t going to risk his life because of some outdated bureaucratic rule.

The CI said that his guy likes that “Wyatt Earp shoots dudes”? Payne thought. That it gives me “street cred”?

He shook his head.

My bet: the bastard’s blowing smoke.

But it’s a lead. Maybe another to nowhere. But for now a lead.

Be wary of wrestling with a pig, Matty ol’ boy. You can get very dirty—and the pig likes it.

It was Payne’s opinion that confidential informants were a pain in the ass and, with rare exceptions, tended to be more trouble than they were worth.

But, reluctantly, he also considered them a necessary evil.

They knew the streets and they knew what the players were up to . . . and sometimes they even told the damn truth. Not the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help them God. The bastards were dirty themselves—the threat of doing time often was the leverage used to get them to act as CIs—and always working an angle, one beyond getting cash payments and other considerations.

Payne knew that some off-the-books information was better than nothing. Because nothing was all that most witnesses wanted to give cops. Getting them to answer any questions—truthfully or not—was next to impossible.

The reason for that wasn’t just that the citizens didn’t have enough faith in the police; it was more that if they talked to cops they feared retaliation from the neighborhood thugs. They knew there really was no way that the cops could protect them from that, and thus it was safer just to keep their mouths shut and not risk being accused of dropping a dime on anyone.

Unfortunately, they really don’t trust cops.

And the reality is the best we can do is deter crime. Because, unless we somehow develop some lead, nabbing a bad guy before he actually commits a crime is practically impossible.

We nab him before he does his next one.

Or next ones, plural.

If we nab him and if the charges stick . . . CIs or not.

The faint chanting from the sidewalk directly below seemed to be getting louder. He took a sip of coffee as he looked down again.

The chants sounded like “Stop Killadelphia! No more murder, no more pain!” And if one were to only hear their chanting, it made perfect sense to believe that that indeed was their message.