Danny the Judge replaced the telephone in its cradle and looked at Detective Cronin.
“Okay, Harry. Tell me how you’re really on the job.”
“I think it would be best if you came with me, Lieutenant,” Cronin said.
Danny the Judge rose from behind his desk—it was rumored that when he was seated behind the desk, his feet did not quite reach the floor—and followed Harry Cronin down to the parking lot and to Harry’s Chevrolet.
In the backseat was a man wearing a too-small overcoat and handcuffs.
And what looked like nothing else.
Danny the Judge looked closer to confirm the nothing else.
“Who’s this?”
“You have absolutely no reason to hold me against my will,” the man wearing handcuffs and a too-small overcoat said without much conviction in his voice.
“His name is Ketcham, Ronald R.”
“Really? Didn’t you think that the Locate, Do Not Detain meant ‘Do Not Detain’?”
“Sir?” Cronin asked. It was the first he’d heard of the Locate, Do Not Detain.
“Where’re Mr. Ketcham’s clothes?”
“I left them back there,” Harry said.
“Where’s ‘there,’ Harry?” Danny the Judge asked, a tone of impatience entering his voice.
“In the NIKE site,” Harry said. “I found this guy, wearing nothing but the overcoat, locked up in one room, and his clothes in another.”
“In the NIKE site? What the hell were you doing in the NIKE site?”
“I had a gut feeling that there was something wrong in there,” Harry said. “So I went and had a look, and there he was.”
Danny the Judge looked at Mr. Ketcham.
“Mr. Ketcham, what were you doing in the NIKE site?”
“I’m not going to say a word until I have a chance to consult with my attorney.”
“Yes, sir,” Danny the Judge said and turned to Harry. “You left his clothes there?”
“Yes, sir. I went through them until I found his wallet. But I thought . . .”
“We’ll be with you in just a minute, Mr. Ketcham,” Danny the Judge said and closed the door of Harry’s Chevrolet.
He signaled Harry to follow him back into the building.
“You know, Harry, right, that we have no authority inside that fence? It’s federal property?”
“Yes, sir.”
They entered the building, and Lieutenant Justice signaled to the trainee behind the glass window to open the door.
“Wait,” he said to Harry, then went through the door, where he removed the clipboard from its peg and read the Locate, Do Not Detain on Ketcham, Ronald R. again.
He first thought he should call his brother-in-law the deputy commissioner. There was no question that what he had in his hands was shortly going to come to the attention of the upper echelons of the Philadelphia Police Department.
But the Locate, Do Not Detain—more than a little unusually—specifically ordered that ChInsp. Coughlin, Insp. Wohl and/or Sgt. Washington be notified immediately.
It had been Lieutenant Justice’s experience that one got one’s ass a little less deep in a crack if one followed one’s orders to the letter, rather than doing what seemed like the logical thing to do.
He turned to the sergeant on duty.
“You know what kind of a car Cronin drives?”
“Yes, sir.”
“There’s a man in the backseat. Get him out of there. Put him, alone, in a detention cell. A clean detention cell. Take the cuffs off him and get him a couple of blankets. Don’t talk to him, and don’t let him near a telephone.”
“Yes, sir.”
Taking the Locate, Do Not Detain with him, Danny the Judge left the office and motioned for Detective Cronin to follow him up the stairs.
He took a copy of the Philadelphia Daily News from the sergeant’s desk, handed it to Cronin, and ushered him into the captain’s office.
“Read the newspaper, Harry,” he ordered. “And stay in here. And don’t talk to anybody.”
“Yes, sir,” Detective Cronin said. By now he had come to deeply regret having taken a look around the NIKE site.
Danny the Judge went back to the lieutenant’s office, consulted the Locate, Do Not Detain, and dialed a number.
“Dan Justice at South, Chief,” he said. “I hope I didn’t wake you up?”
“How are you, Danny? How’s Margaret?” Chief Inspector Dennis V. Coughlin replied.
“Just fine, Chief. About that Locate, Do Not Detain on a man named Ketcham?”
“You found him?”
“Yes, sir. I just put him in a detention cell downstairs.”
“It said ‘do not detain,’ Danny,” Coughlin said.
“Chief, I think it might be a good idea if you came down here.”
“What happened, Danny?”
“A detective—Harry Cronin—found him wearing nothing but an overcoat in one of the NIKE sites.”
“They’re federal property,” Coughlin said. “Wearing nothing but an overcoat, you said?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You notify anybody? The feds?”
“No, sir. This is my first call.”
“Don’t call anybody else. No. Call Inspector Wohl and Sergeant Washington—you have their numbers—put the arm out for them, if necessary, and ask them to meet me there as soon as they can get there.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And I mean, don’t call anybody else, Danny. And don’t let Mr. Ketcham call anybody until I get there.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And don’t let the detective—Cronin?—”
“Yes, sir.”
“—talk to anybody, or get away.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Inspector Wohl,” Peter said to the telephone, aware that despite his best intentions, he had not been able to answer the official telephone beside his bed soon enough to prevent Amelia A. Payne, M.D., who was sleeping with her head on his chest, from waking.
“Dan Justice, sir, at South Detectives.”
“How are you, Danny?” Wohl replied. “What’s up?” Amy pushed herself off him, sat up, and looked down at him. Inspector Wohl was not sure whether it was in annoyance or simple female curiosity.
“We located Ketcham, Ronald R., sir,” Danny the Judge said.
“Great! Where is he?”
“In the detention cell downstairs, Inspector.”
“Danny, that was a Locate, Do Not Detain!”
“Yes, sir,” Danny the Judge admitted, sounding a little sheepish. “Inspector, I just talked to Chief Coughlin. He told me to put the arm out for you and Sergeant Washington, and to tell you to meet him here.”
“Okay. Where was Ketcham, Dan?”
“One of our detectives—Harry Cronin—found him in a deserted NIKE site. Wearing nothing but an overcoat.”
“Let me have that again?”
“Harry Cronin found him in one of the NIKE sites. His clothing was in one room, and he was locked up in another.”
“I’ll be damned,” Peter said. “You talk to Washington yet?”
“He’s next, sir.”
“Tell him I’ll be in my car in three minutes, and to give me a call if he wants me to pick him up; it’s on my way.”
“Yes, sir.”
Wohl replaced the telephone in its cradle and sat up.
“Tell me why you’ll be damned, Peter,” Amy said.
“Go back to sleep, honey. I’ve got to go to South Detectives.”
“Who is Ronald . . . What was that? ‘Ketcham’?”
“Oh, Jesus, honey!”
“The way you said that, I really want to know.”
“The missing boyfriend,” Peter said.
“Cynthia Longwood’s boyfriend?”
Wohl nodded.
“He’s been arrested? What for?”
“Honey, it’s sort of complicated,” Peter said as he swung his feet out of bed and stood up.
“I want
to know, Peter. I have a right.”
“The minute there’s anything I can tell you, I will. I promise,” Wohl said as he took linen from a chest of drawers and ripped open the paper wrapped around a stack of laundered shirts.
“You’re going to see him?” Amy asked, and before he could reply, added: “I’m going with you.”
“No, you’re not,” Wohl said firmly. “Honey, as soon as I have anything for you, I’ll tell you.”
One corner of her mind was impressed with the rapidity with which he was changing from a naked man—a naked lover—into a fully dressed police officer.
Is that what married life would be like with him? The phone rings in the middle of the night, he throws on his clothes like a quick-change artist, and he goes out to return who the hell knows when?
“Peter, I want to go with you. You wouldn’t even know about him—how did you get his name, by the way?—if it wasn’t for me.”
“Amy, please don’t push me on this,” Peter said.
She didn’t reply. She pushed herself up so that her back rested on the headboard, folded her arms under her breasts, and watched as he tied his necktie without using a mirror.
He went into his bedside table for his revolver, slipped it into a waist holster, and leaned down to kiss her.
“If I can’t get back here, I’ll call you,” he said.
The kiss she gave him was considerably less enthusiastic than the previous kiss had been.
And then he was gone.
She didn’t move for several minutes, during which time she heard the sound of his car door opening and closing, the sound of his engine starting, and then of the car driving away.
Then she reached for the telephone book on the shelf under the bedside table, started to thumb through it, and realized there was probably a quicker way to get the information she needed, plus directions on how to get there.
She dialed the telephone.
“Police radio.”
“Could you give me the address of South Detectives, please?”
“Is there some way I can help you, ma’am?” the female voice countered.
“This is Dr. Payne, of University Hospital,” Amy said. “I just got a call asking me to meet Chief Inspector Coughlin at South Detectives. I need to know where it is and the best way to get there?”
“You’re at University Hospital, Doctor? Could you give me the number?”
“I’m at the residence of Inspector Wohl,” Amy said. “The number here is . . .”
The police radio operator decided the call was legitimate. She had, within the past five minutes, received calls from both Chief Inspector Coughlin and Inspector Wohl announcing they were en route to South Detectives, and she knew the number the caller had given was that of the official residence telephone of Inspector Wohl.
She gave Dr. Payne what was in her opinion the quickest way to get from the 800 Block of Norwood Street in Chestnut Hill to South Detectives at this hour of the morning.
“Do you want me to tell Chief Coughlin you’re on your way, Doctor?”
“That won’t be necessary,” Amy said. “He knows I’ll get there as soon as I can. Thank you very much.”
Amy hung up and got out of bed and started to get dressed.
The police radio operator opened her microphone.
“Isaac Three.”
“Go ahead.”
“Chief, I just spoke with Dr. Payne. She’s en route to South Detectives.”
“Give me that again?”
“Dr. Payne is en route to South Detectives.”
“Okay. Thank you,” Chief Coughlin said and dropped the microphone on the seat of his car. And added, “Oh, shit!”
Sergeant Leonard Moskowitz of South Detectives had figured that he owed Mickey O’Hara a big one since the previous December, when Mickey had arranged for a photograph of his eldest son, Stanley, at his bar mitzvah at Temple Israel to be prominently displayed in the society section of the Bulletin.
This might not entirely repay Mickey for his kindness, but it would be at least a down payment.
“O’Hara,” Mickey answered his telephone somewhat sleepily.
“Lenny Moskowitz. I didn’t call you.”
“What didn’t you say when you didn’t call me?”
“I don’t know what the hell this is all about, Mickey, but I thought you might be interested.”
“In what?”
“About an hour ago, Harry Cronin, who went off at midnight, brought a citizen in here wearing nothing but an overcoat. Danny the Judge put him in a detention cell, and Harry in the captain’s office. Then he called Denny Coughlin, Inspector Wohl of Special Operations, and Jason Washington of Homicide.”
Jason doesn’t work in Homicide anymore. I’m surprised Moskowitz doesn’t know that.
“And?”
“They’re all here. Plus some guy, a heavy hitter, from the FBI. And a lady doctor.”
“Has the guy in the overcoat got a name, Lenny?”
“Ketcham, Ronald.”
“Nice not to talk to you, Lenny. I owe you a big one.”
“I figure I still owe you,” Sergeant Moskowitz said and hung up.
On being advised by Lieutenant Daniel Justice that Mr. Michael J. O’Hara of the Bulletin was in the building and desired a minute or two of his time, Chief Inspector Dennis V. Coughlin left the small room equipped with a one-way mirror adjacent to the interview room and went to speak to him.
“We’re going to have to stop meeting this way, Mickey,” he greeted him. “People will start to talk.”
“Ah, Denny, you silver-tongued devil, you!”
“I’d love to know who tipped you to this. He would be on Last Out for the rest of his life, walking a beat in North Philly.” Last Out was the midnight-to-eight shift.
“What do you mean, ‘who tipped me’? I was on my way home, Denny, for some well deserved rest, when what do I hear on the radio? You’re coming here. Peter Wohl is coming here. So I figured, what the hell, I’d come down here, we’d all have a cup of coffee, chew the rag a little—”
“Chew the rag a little about what, for example?”
“For example, why did you put the arm out for Mr. Ronald R. Ketcham?”
“Ronald R. Ketcham? I don’t seem to recall the name.”
“And why, if it was a Locate, Do Not Detain, did he wind up in a holding cell?”
“A holding cell?”
“Wearing nothing but an overcoat.”
“Mickey, you have your choice between me throwing you out of here myself, or agreeing to really sit on this one. And that may mean permanently sitting on it. Now and forever.”
“You got a deal, Denny.”
“I’ll fill you in later,” Coughlin said. “I don’t want to miss any of this.”
He waved O’Hara into the small room with the one-way mirror adjacent to the interview room. There Mr. O’Hara found Inspector Peter Wohl; Amelia Payne, M.D.; Mr. Walter Davis, Special Agent in Charge of the Philadelphia office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation; a well-dressed individual Mr. O’Hara correctly guessed was also in the employ of the FBI; and Lieutenant Daniel Justice.
Through the one-way mirror, he saw Sergeant Jason Washington and a distraught-looking man sitting in a chair wearing nothing but a blanket around his shoulders.
Mickey waved a cheerful hello.
The FBI agent Mickey didn’t recognize looked confused.
Mr. Davis of the FBI looked very uncomfortable, as did Danny the Judge.
Dr. Payne smiled at him absently, her attention devoted to what was going on on the other side of the mirror.
Inspector Wohl smiled in recognition and resignation.
Mickey helped himself to a cup of coffee, then sat down, backward, in a wooden chair and watched Sergeant Washington interviewing Mr. Ketcham.
TWENTY-ONE
“I could use another cup of coffee, Mr. Ketcham, how about you?” Sergeant Jason Washington inquired of Mr. Ronald R. Ketcham.
“W
hat I want is my clothes,” Ketcham replied.
“Well, I certainly understand that,” Washington said. “And they should be here by now. I’ll check. Cream and sugar?”
“Black, please,” Ketcham said.
Washington left the interview room, and closed the door after him. Ketcham, who had seen enough cops-and-robbers movies to suspect that he might be under observation by persons on the other side of the mirror, tried very hard to look righteously indignant, rather than uncomfortable.
Washington stuck his head into the room on the other side of the mirror, and motioned for everyone to come into the main office.
As Michael J. O’Hara passed through the door, Washington draped his massive arm around Mickey’s shoulders.
“You will understand, old friend,” Washington said “why my usual joy at seeing your smiling face is tempered by the circumstances.”
“How goes it, Jason?” Mickey O’Hara replied.
“Mickey, sit in there for a minute, will you?” Chief Inspector Coughlin said, indicating Captain Henry Quaire’s office. “Amy, you keep him company.”
Mr. O’Hara and Dr. Payne went into Quaire’s office. Chief Coughlin closed the door after them.
“You didn’t get much, did you, Sergeant Washington?” Mr. Walter Davis of the Federal Bureau of Investigation asked.
“If we are to believe Mr. Ketcham, which I find difficult to do,” Jason replied, “he was abducted, in what he believes to be a case of mistaken identity, from the garage of his home by persons unknown.”
Inspector Wohl chuckled.
“Letting your imagination soar, Jason, what do you think happened?”
“I would hazard a guess that Mr. Ketcham has no idea who transported him to the NIKE site, beyond a deep suspicion that it has something to do with his trafficking in controlled substances,” Washington said. “About which, of course, he is understandably reluctant to talk. That position, I would think, is buttressed by his being aware that he was not in possession of any narcotics at the time of his abduction.”
“Put it together for me, Jason,” Chief Coughlin said.
“I have several tentative theories,” Washington said. “We have these facts: Mr. Ketcham was involved with Miss Longwood. To what degree we do not know. There was a telephone call to Dr. Payne at the hospital—the language of which was not consistent with the vocabulary of the caller—which alleged . . .”
Investigators Page 42