He pulled the bedside tray away from the bed, read what she had written, and then wrote, "Witnessed by Officer Matthew Payne, Badge 3676, Special Operations Division," and the time and date.
And now what?
"Penny, as I said before, someone will be back, probably Detective Washington and a stenographer, and they will take a full statement."
"All right," she said obligingly.
"And I have to go now, to get things rolling."
"All right. Come and see me again, Matt."
He smiled at her and left the room.
Dr. Dotson, the rent-a-cop, and two hospital private security men in policelike uniforms were coming down the corridor.
"I don't know who you think you are, Matt," Dotson said furiously, "or what you think you're doing, but you have absolutely no right to go in Penny's room without my permission and that of the Detweilers."
"I'm finished, Dr. Dotson," Matt said.
"See that he leaves the hospital. He is not to be let back in," Dotson said. "And don't you think, Matt, that this is the end of this."
NINETEEN
"Inspector Wohl's office, Captain Sabara," Sabara said, answering one of the telephones on Wohl's desk.
"This is Commissioner Czernick, Sabara. Let me talk to Wohl."
"Commissioner, I'm sorry, the inspector's not here at the moment. May I take a message? Or have him get back to you?"
"Where is he?"
"Sir, I'm afraid I don't know. We expect him to check in momentarily."
"Yeah, well, he doesn't answer his radio, and you don't know where he is, right?"
"No, sir. I'm afraid I don't know where he is at this moment."
"Have him call me the moment you see him," Commissioner Czernick said, and hung up.
"I wonder what that's all about," Sabara said to Captain David Pekach as he put the phone in its cradle. "That was Czernick, and he's obviously pissed about something. You don't know where the boss is?"
"The last I heard, he was on his way to the mayor's office."
"I felt like a fool, having to tell Czernick I don't know where he is."
"What's Czernick pissed about?"
"I don't know, but he's pissed. Really pissed."
Pekach got up from his upholstered chair and went to the Operations sergeant.
"Have you got any idea where Inspector Wohl might be?"
"Right at this moment he's on his way to see the commissioner," the sergeant said.
"How do you know that?"
"It was on the radio. There was a call for W-William One, and the inspector answered and they told him to report to the commissioner right away, and he acknowledged."
"Thank you," Pekach said. He went back in the office and told Sabara what he had learned.
****
Staff Inspector Peter Wohl arrived at Special Operations an hour and five minutes later. He found Officer Matthew W. Payne waiting for him in the corridor outside the Operations office.
"I'd like to see you right away, sir," Matt said.
"Have you called Captain Duffy?"
"No, sir. Something came up," Matt said, and picked up the manila envelope containing the photographs.
"So I understand," Wohl said. "Come in the office."
Sabara and Pekach got to their feet as Wohl entered his office.
"We've been trying to reach you, Inspec-" Sabara said.
"I had my radio turned off," Wohl interrupted.
"The commissioner wants you to call him right away."
"How long ago was that?"
"About an hour ago, sir," Pekach said. He looked at his watch. "An hour and five minutes ago."
"I've seen him since then," Wohl said. "I just came from the Roundhouse." He turned to look at Payne. "We were discussing you, Officer Payne, the commissioner and I. Or rather the commissioner was discussing you, and I just sat there looking like a goddamn fool."
Pekach and Sabara started for the door.
"Stay. You might as well hear this," Wohl said. "I understand you have been at Hahneman Hospital. Is that so?"
"Yes, sir," Matt said.
"I seem to recall having told you to come here and call Captain Duffy for me."
"Yes, sir, you did."
"Did anyone else tell you to go to Hahneman Hospital?"
"Inspector," Matt said, handing him the photograph on which Penelope Detweiler had written her statement. "Would you please look at this?"
"Did anyone tell you to go to Hahneman Hospital?" Wohl repeated icily.
"Those two guys weren't from the FBI," Matt said.
"Answer me," Wohl said.
"No, sir."
"Then why thehell did you go to Hahneman Hospital?"
"Sir, would you please look at the back of the picture?"
Wohl turned it over and read it.
"You're a regular little Sherlock Holmes, aren't you?" Wohl said. He handed the photograph to Sabara, who examined it with Pekach leaning over his shoulder.
"She positively identifies that man as the guy who shot her and DeZego."
"And now all we have to do is find this guy, bring him in front of a jury, convict his ass, send him off to the electric chair, and Special Operations generally and Officer Matthew Payne specifically will come across as supercops, and to the cheers of the crowd we will skip happily off into the sunset, is that what you're thinking?"
"Sir," Matt said doggedly, "she positively identified that man as the man who shot her."
"You did have a chance to buy uniforms before you came out here to Special Operations, I hope?"
"Yes, sir. I've got my uniforms."
"Good. You're going to need them. By verbal direction of the police commissioner, written confirmation to follow, Officer Payne, you are reassigned to the 12^th District, effective immediately. I doubt very much if you will be assigned plain clothes duties. You are also officially advised that a complaint, making several allegations against you involving your visit to Miss Detweiler at Hahneman Hospital today, has been made by a Dr. Dotson and officials of Hahneman Hospital. It has been referred to Internal Affairs for investigation. No doubt shortly you will be hearing from them."
"Peter, for chrissake, you're not listening to me!" Matt said. " She positively identified the shooter!"
"It's Inspector Wohl to you, Officer Payne," Wohl said.
"Sorry," Matt said.
"Matt, for chrissake!" Wohl said exasperatedly. "Let me explain all this to you. One, the chances of us catching these two, or either one of them, range from slim to none. On the way out here I stopped at Organized Crime and Intelligence. Neither of them are known by sight to anyone in Organized Crime or Intelligence-"
"You knew they weren't FBI guys?" Matt blurted, surprised.
"I have the word of the Special Agent in Charge about that," Wohl said. "They are not FBI agents. I have a gut feeling they are Mob hit men. Good ones. Imported, God only knows why, to blow DeZego away. Professionals, so to speak. We don't know where they came from. We can't charge them with murder or anything-unlawful flight or anything else, on the basis of some photographs that show them standing on a street."
"Penelope Detweiler swore that one of them is the guy who shot her and DeZego."
"Let's talk about Miss Detweiler," Wohl said. "She is a known user of narcotics, for one thing, and for another, she is Miss Penelope Detweiler, whose father's lawyers-your father, for example-will counsel her. They will advise her- and they probably should, I'm a little fuzzy about the ethics here-on the problems inherent in bringing these two scumbags before a grand jury for an indictment, much less before a jury. If I were her lawyer, I would advise her to tell the grand jury that she's really a little confused about what actually happened that day."
"Why would a lawyer tell her that?" Matt asked softly.
"Because, again presuming we can find these two, which I doubt, and presuming we could get an indictment-it isn't really true that any district attorney who can spell his own name can get an indictment anytim
e he wants to-and get him before a jury, then your friend Miss Detweiler would be subject to cross-examination. It would come out that she is addicted to certain narcotics, which would discredit her testimony, and it would come out that she was, tactfully phrased, romantically involved with Mr. DeZego. The press would have a certain interest in this trial. If I were her lawyer, I would suggest to her that testifying would be quite a strain on her and on her family."
"Oh, shit," Matt said. "I really fucked this up, didn't I?"
"Yeah, and good intentions don't count," Wohl said. "What counts, I'm afraid, is that Commissioner Czernick believes, more than likely correctly, that H. Richard Detweiler is going to be furious when he hears about your little escapade and is going to make his displeasure known to the mayor. When the mayor calls him, the commissioner will now be able to say that he's taken care of the matter. You have been relieved out here and assigned to duties appropriate to your experience. In other words, in a district, in uniform, and more than likely in a wagon."
"Oh, Christ, I'm sorry."
"So am I, Matt," Wohl said gently. "But what you did was stupid. For what it's worth, you probably should have gone to a district like anybody else fresh from the Academy."
"Hell, I'll just resign," Matt said.
"You think you're too good to ride around in a wagon?" Wohl asked.
"No," Matt said, "not at all. That's what I expected to do when I got out of the Academy. Denny Coughlin made sure I understood what to expect. I mean, under these circumstances. I have fucked up by the numbers, and they'll know that at the 12^th. I think it would be best all around, that's all, if I just folded my tent and silently stole away."
"Today's Thursday," Wohl said. "I'll call the captain of the 12^th and tell him you will either report for duty on Monday or resign by then. Think it over, over the weekend."
"You don't think I should resign?"
"I don't think you should resign right now, today," Wohl said. "I think you would have made a pretty good cop. I think you were given too great an opportunity to fuck up. But you did fuck up, and you're going to have to make your mind up whether or not you want to take your lumps." Matt looked at him.
"That's all, Officer Payne," Wohl said. "You can go." When Payne had left and closed the door behind him, Wohl went to his coffee machine and poured himself a cup of coffee.
"Fuck it," he said suddenly, angrily. He opened a filing cabinet drawer and took out a bottle of bourbon and liberally laced the coffee with it.
"If anybody wants any of that, help yourself," he said.
"Inspector," Captain Sabara said, "I didn't want to open my mouth, but a lot of what happened just now went right over my head."
Wohl looked at him as if confused.
"Oh, that's right," he said. "You guys don't know about the FBI agents, do you?"
Both shook their heads.
He told them.
"So what Payne was really doing at Hahneman Hospital was less playing at detective than trying to get my chestnuts out of the fire," he concluded. "The poor bastard waited for me out there, in that pathetic innocence, really thinking that now that he had solved this shooting, it would get me off the hook for making an ass of myself with the FBI."
"Shit," Pekach said.
"If I was him, I'd quit," Wohl said. "But if he doesn't, I'll-I don't know how-try to get the word around the 12^th that he's really a good kid."
"I know Harry Feldman over there," Sabara said.
"He's the captain?"
"Yeah. I'll have a word with him," Sabara said.
"Thanks. Not surprising me at all, it seems to have turned out that Payne's new boss hates my ass. Do you think Czernick knew that?"
"I know a couple of guys in the 12^th," Pekach said. "I'll talk to them."
"What do you think is going to happen about the FBI?" Sabara asked.
"If Duffy doesn't know about the photographs yet, or of me going down there out of channels, he will shortly," Wohl said. "And from there, how long will it take him to walk down the corridor from his office to Czernick's?"
"Give Czernick Dolan," Sabara said. "That wasn't your fault."
"I might have done the same thing," Wohl said. "Those two looked like your standard, neatly dressed, shiny-shoes 'Look at me, Ma, I'm a G-man' FBI agents, just begging for the needle. I won't give Czernick Dolan. What he did was dumb, but not dumb enough to lose his pension over it, and that's what Czernick's reaction would be. Anyway, all Czernick is interested in doing is covering his ass in front of the mayor. I'm on his list now, so just let him add the photographs to everything else I've done wrong or shown a lack of judgment doing."
"Dolan won't do anything like that again, Peter," Pekach said.
"You're not defending the son of a bitch, Dave, are you?" Sabara asked.
"I should have added 'when I'm through with him,' " Pekach said.
"Well, what's done is done," Sabara said. "Let's go get some lunch."
"I've got to meet someone for lunch," Pekach said.
"Is that what they call a nooner, Dave?" Wohl asked mischievously. Then he saw the look on Pekach's face. "Sorry, I shouldn't have said that."
Pekach's face showed the apology was inadequate.
"What that is, Dave," Wohl said, "is a combination of a bad day and a bad case of jealousy. But I was out of line, and I'm sorry."
"I already forgot it," Pekach said. Both his face and his tone of voice made it clear that was far short of the truth.
"I'll buy lunch," Captain Mike Sabara said, "providing it doesn't go over two ninety-five."
Wohl chuckled. "Thanks, Mike, I really hate to pass that up, but I've got plans too. Maybe it would be a good idea if you hung around here until either Dave or I get back."
"You got it," Sabara said. "I'll send out for something. You want to tell me where you're going?"
"If you need me, put it on the radio," Wohl said. He looked at Dave Pekach. "If you're still sore, Dave, I'm still sorry."
"I just don't like people talking that way about her," Pekach blurted. "It's not like what everybody thinks."
"What everybody thinks, Dave, is that you have a nice girl," Wohl said. "If anybody thought different, you wouldn't get teased."
"That's right, Dave," Sabara agreed solemnly.
Pekach looked intently at each of them. He smiled, shrugged, and walked out of the room.
When he was out of earshot, Sabara said, "But you were right, that's what you call it, a nooner."
"Captain Sabara, for a Sunday school teacher, you're a dirty old man," Wohl said. "I should be back in an hour. If something important comes up, put it on the radio."
"Yes, sir," Sabara said.
****
Martha Peebles was on the lawn, armed with the largest hedge clippers Dave Pekach had ever seen-they looked like two of King Arthur's swords or something stuck together- when he drove into the drive. She waved it at him when she saw him.
He parked the car in the garage, where it wouldn't attract too much attention, and walked toward the house. She met him under the portico.
"Hello, Precious," she said. "What's the matter?"
"Nothing," he said. "What are you going to do with that thing?"
She pointed the clippers in the general direction of his crotch and opened and closed it. Both of his hands dropped to protect the area.
"Oh, come on," she said. "You know I wouldn't want to hurt that."
"I don't know," he said. "I hope not."
"Something is wrong," she said. "I can tell. Something happen at Bustleton and Bowler?"
"Nothing that anybody can do anything about," Pekach said.
"Well," she said, taking his arm. "You can tell me all about it over lunch. I made French onion soup. Made it. Not from one of those packet things. And a salad. With Roquefort dressing."
"Sounds good," he said.
"And there'snobody in the house," she said. "Which I just happen to mentionen passant and not to give you any ideas."
****
>
"I always wonder when I eat this stuff," Jason Washington said as he skillfully picked up a piece of Peking Beef with chopsticks and dipped it in a mixture of mustard and plum preserves, "if they really eat it in Peking, or whether it was invented here by some Chinaman who figured Americans will eat anything."
"It's good," Peter Wohl said.
"They use a lot of monosodium glutamate," Washington said. "To bring the taste out. It doesn't bother me, but it gets to Martha. She thought she was having a heart attack-angina pectoris."
"Really?"
"Pain in the pectoral muscles," Washington explained, and pointed to his pectorals.
"She went to the doctor and told him that whenever she had Chinese food, she had angina pectoris. He said, in that case, don't eat Chinese food. And then, when she calmed down, he told her that making diagnoses was his business, and about the monosodium glutamate."
"I didn't know that," Wohl said, "about monosodium glutamate."
In his good time, Wohl thought, Jason will get around to telling me what's on his mind. He didn't ask if I was free for lunch because he didn't want to eat Peking Beef alone.
"I feel really bad about Matt Payne," Washington said. "If I had any idea he was going to see that Detweiler girl, I would have stopped him."
So that's what's on his mind.
"I know that," Wohl said. "He went over there to help me."
"He thinks you're really something special," Washington said.
"He thinks you make Sherlock Holmes look like a mental retard," Wohl replied.
"If I was Matthew M. Payne and they put me back in uniform and in a 12^th District wagon or handed me a wrench and told me to go around and turn off fire hydrants, I would quit."
"I think he probably will."
"We need young cops like that, Peter," Washington said.
"So?"
"I have a few favors owed me," Washington said. "How sore would you be if I called them in?"
"You'd be wasting them," Wohl said. "Czernick decided the way to cover his ass was to jump on the kid before the mayor told him to. He knew that would piss off a lot of people. Denny Coughlin, for one. If Coughlin goes to the mayor, and I really hope he doesn't, it would make the mayor choose between him and Czernick. I'm not sure how that would go. And while I agree, I would hate to see Matt resign, and I wouldreally hate to see Denny Coughlin retire. I'd like to see Coughlin as commissioner."
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