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“No problem,” Charley said. “We—Hay-zus and me—have an unmarked car downstairs. We’ll take Matt in that. The rest of you can ride with Jack in his G-man wagon.”

“That should work,” Lari Matsi said.

And I will bet twenty dollars to a doughnut that when the convoy gets under way, Lari will be in the front seat of same with J. Edgar Hoover, Junior, both of them wondering how they can get rid of Amy and Margaret.

Oh, what the hell. There’s always Helene.

Staff Inspector Peter F. Wohl left his office at Bustleton and Bowler Streets a few minutes after half past five.

On the way to his apartment in the 800 block of Norwood Street in Chestnut Hill, Wohl decided that tonight was a good opportunity to give the Jag a little exercise. He hadn’t had it out of the garage since the lousy weather had started.

Among its many not-so-charming idiosyncrasies, the Jag frequently expressed its annoyance at being ignored for more than forty-eight hours at a time by absolutely refusing to start when the person privileged to have the responsibility for its care and feeding finally came to take it out.

Driving it back and forth to Martha Peebles’s house—plus maybe a run past Monahan’s house on the way home, just to check—would be just long enough a trip to give it a good warm-up, get the oil circulating, and get the flat spots out of the tires.

He thought again that if there was only room to safely park a car like the Jag at Bustleton and Bowler, he could drive it to work every other day or so. He made a mental note to tell Payne, when he came back on duty, and could devote some attention to the “new” school building at F

rankford and Castor, to make sure that, as a prerogative of his exalted rank and position, the commanding officer of Special Operations have reserved for him a parking place that was at once convenient and would provide a certain protection against getting its fenders dinged.

When he reached the garages behind the mansion he put his city-owned car in the garage, and then took a shovel and started to clear the ice and snow away from the doors of the Jag’s garage. He finally got the doors open, but it was even more difficult than he thought it would be. The snow had melted and frozen into ice and thawed and refrozen. He had, he thought, actually chiseled his way through the ice into the garage, rather than shoveled his way through the snow.

He got behind the wheel and put the key in the ignition. To his delighted surprise, the engine caught immediately. It ran a little roughly, but it ran. It would not, as he had worst-scenario predicted, refuse to start until he had run the battery down and then recharged it.

“Good girl,” he said.

He sat there, running the engine just above idle until the engine temperature gauge needle finally moved off the peg. He shut the engine off, opened the hood and checked the oil and brake fluid, looked at the tires, and then closed the doors, locked them, and went up the stairs at the end of the building to his apartment.

He showered and shaved, put on a glen plaid suit, and wondered—he had little experience in this sort of thing—if he was expected to bring a gift to the affair, and if so, what?

To hell with it.

He put on his overcoat, which had a collar of some unidentified fur, and a green felt snap-brim hat.

There were no messages on his answering machine, which surprised him. He called Special Operations and told the lieutenant on duty that he would be at the residence of Miss Martha Peebles in Chestnut Hill from fifteen minutes from now until he advised differently.

Then he went down and got back in the Jaguar. It started immediately. All was right with the world, he told himself, until he glanced at his watch and saw that he was not due at Glengarry Lane for almost an hour.

What the hell, I’ll check on the people sitting on Monahan now, instead of later.

When he reached the neighborhood, he drove slowly east on Bridge Street, looking up Sylvester Street at the intersection. There was an unmarked car parked at the curb. He could see the heads of two men in the car, one of them wearing a regular uniform cap, the other what he thought of as a Renfrew of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police cap.

He turned left into the alley behind the row of houses of which, he now remembered. Mr. and Mrs. Albert J. Monahan occupied the sixth from this corner.

He had gone perhaps fifty yards into the alley when a uniformed officer stepped into it and, somewhat warily, Wohl thought approvingly, motioned for him to stop.

Wohl braked and rolled down the window.

“Good evening, sir,” the cop began, and then recognized him. “Oh, it’s you, Inspector.”

“This way to the North Pole, right?” Wohl said, and offered his hand through the window. The cop laughed dutifully.

“Aside from frostbite, how’s things going?” Wohl asked with a smile.

“Quiet as a tomb, Inspector.”

An unfortunate choice of words, but I take your point.

“I guess everybody but cops are smart enough to stay inside, huh?”