W E B Griffin - Badge of Honor 03 - The Victim

by The Victim(lit)

  Tony Harris was good, too, he recognized-nearly, but not quite as good as he was. There were also some people in Intelligence, Organized Crime, Internal Affairs, and even out in the detective districts and among the staff inspectors whom Washington acknowledged to be good detectives; that is to say, detectives at his level. For example, before he had been given Special Operations, Staff Inspector Peter Wohl had earned Washington's approval for his work by putting a series of especially slippery politicians and bureaucrats behind bars.

  Jason Washington had, however, been something less than enthusiastic when Wohl had arranged for him (and Tony Har-ris) to be transferred from Homicide to Special Operations. He had not only let Wohl know that he didn't want the trans-fer, but also had actually come as close as he ever had to pleading not to be transferred.

  There had been several reasons for his reluctance to leave Homicide. For one thing, he liked Homicide. There was also the matter of prestige and money. In Special Operations he would be a Special Operations detective. Since Special Op-erations hadn't been around long enough to acquire a repu-tation, that meant it had no reputation at all, and that meant, as opposed to his being a Homicide detective, he would be an ordinary detective. And ordinary detectives, like corpo-rals, were only one step up from the bottom in the police hierarchy.

  As far as pay was concerned, Washington's take-home pay in Homicide, because of overtime, was as much as a chief inspector took to the bank every two weeks.

  Washington and his wife of twenty-two years had only one child, a girl, who had married young and, to Washington's genuine surprise, well. As a Temple freshman Ellen had caught the eye of a graduate student in mathematics and eloped with him, under the correct assumption that her father would have a really spectacular fit if she announced that she wanted to get married at eighteen. Ellen's husband was now working for Bell Labs, across the river in Jersey, and making more money than Washington would have believed possible for a twenty-six-year-old. Recently they had made him and Martha grandparents.

  Mrs. Martha Washington (she often observed that she had nearly not married Jason because of what her name would be once he put the ring on her finger) had worked, from the time Ellen entered first grade, as a commercial artist for an adver-tising agency. With their two paychecks and Ellen gone, they lived well, with an apartment in a high rise overlooking the Schuylkill River, and another near Atlantic City, overlooking the ocean. Martha drove a Lincoln, and one of his perks as a Homicide detective was an unmarked car of his own, and nothing said about his driving it home every night.

  Wohl, who had once been a young detective in Homicide, understood Washington's (and Tony Harris's) concern that a transfer to Special Operations would mean the loss of their Homicide Division perks, perhaps especially the overtime pay. He had assured them that they could have all the over-time they wanted, and their own cars, and would answer only to him and Captain Mike Sabara, his deputy. He had been as good as his word. Better. The cars they had been given were brand-new, instead of the year-old hand-me-downs from in-spectors they had had at Homicide.

  They had been transferred to Special Operations after the mayor had "suggested" that Special Operations be given re-sponsibility to catch the Northwest Philly serial rapist. After the kid, Matt Payne, had stumbled on that scumbag and put him down, Washington had gone to Wohl and asked about getting transferred back to Homicide.

  Wohl had said, "Not yet. Maybe later," Explaining that he didn't have any idea what the mayor, or for that matter, Commissioner Thad Czernick, had in mind for Special Operations.

  "If the mayor has another of his inspirations for Special Operations, or if Czernick has one, I want you and Tony already here," Wohl had said. "I don't want to have to go through another hassle with Chief Lowenstein over transfer-ring you back again."

  Chief Inspector Matt Lowenstein headed the Detective Bu-reau, which included all the detective divisions, as well as Homicide, Intelligence, Major Crimes, and Juvenile Aid. He was an influential man with a reputation for jealously guard-ing his preserve.

  "What are we going to do, Inspector," Washington had argued, "recover stolen vehicles?"

  Wohl had laughed. Department policy required that a detective be assigned to examine any vehicle that had been sto-len and then recovered. There were generally two types of recovered stolen vehicles: They were recovered intact, after having been taken for a joyride; or they were recovered as an empty shell, from which all resalable parts had been re-moved. In either case there was almost never anything that would connect the recovered vehicle with the thief. Investi-gating recovered vehicles was an exercise in futility and thus ordinarily assigned to the newest, or dumbest, detective in a squad.

  "For the time being, I'll talk with Quaire, and see if he'd like you to work on some of the jobs you left behind at Homi-cide. But I have a gut feeling, Jason, that there will be enough jobs for you here to keep you from getting bored."

  And Wohl had been right about that too. Police Commis-sioner Czernick (Washington had heard even before leaving Atlantic City for Philadelphia where the decision had come from) had decided to give Special Operations the two murder jobs.

  And there was no wheel in Special Operations. In Homi-cide, as in the seven detective divisions, detectives were as-signed jobs on a rotational basis as they came in. It was actually a sheet of paper, on which the names of the detec-tives were listed, but it was called the wheel.

  If the mayor hadn't given Wohl the two murders and they had gone instead to Homicide, it was possible, even likely, that the wheel would have seen the jobs given to somebody else. He and Harris, because of the kind of jobs they were, would probably have been called in to "assist,'' but the jobs probably would have gone to other Homicide detectives. In Special Operations it was a foregone conclusion that these two murder jobs would be assigned to Detectives Washington and Harris.

  And they were good jobs. Solving the murder of an on-the-job police officer gave the detective, or detectives, who did so greater satisfaction than any other. And right behind that was being able to get a murder-one indictment against one mafioso for blowing away another.

  Jason Washington was beginning to think that his transfer to Special Operations might turn out to be less of a disaster than it had first appeared to be.

  He was not surprised when he pulled into the parking lot at Bustleton and Bowler Streets to see Peter Wohl's nearly identical Ford in the COMMANDING OFFICER'S reserved park-ing space, although it was only a quarter to eight.

  When he walked into the building, the administrative corporal called to him, "The inspector said he wanted to see you the minute you came in."

  He smiled and waved and went to Wohl's office.

  "Good morning, Inspector," Washington said.

  "Morning, Jason," Wohl replied. "Sorry to have to call you back here."

  "How am I going to get a tan if you keep me from laying on the beach?'' Washington said dryly.

  "Get one of those reflector things," Wohl replied, straight-faced, "and sit in the parking lot during your lunch hour. Now that you mention it, you do look a little pale."

  Jason Washington's skin was jet black.

  They smiled at each other for a moment, and then Wohl said, "Harris was at Colombia Street-"

  "I talked to Tony this morning," Washington said, inter-rupting him.

  "Okay," Wohl said. "Did I mention last night that a Narcotics sergeant named Dolan thought Matt Payne was in-volved at the parking garage?"

  "Tony told me," Washington said.

  Then that, Wohl thought a little angrily, must be all over the Department.

  "Well, I don't think he's dirty, but he did find the girl, and DeZego's body. If you want to talk to him, he should be here any minute."

  "He called the hospital while I was there," Washington said. "I told him I'd see him here."

  "You were at the hospital?" Wohl asked.

  Washington nodded.

  "I don't know why I got out of bed so early to talk to you," Wo
hl said.

  "Early to bed, early to rise, et cetera, et cetera," Wash-ington said. "You going to need Payne this morning, Inspec-tor?"

  "Not if you want him for anything. If I have to say this, Jason, just tell me what you think you need."

  "I thought I'd take him to Hahneman and then to the park-ing garage," Washington said. "I didn't get in to see the girl. That needed permission of a doctor who won't be in until eight."

  Wohl's eyebrows rose questioningly.

  "They're giving me the runaround," Washington went on. "I didn't push it. Incidentally, they've got a couple of Wackenhut Security guys down there guarding her room. One of them is a retired sergeant from Northwest detectives."

  "I'm not surprised. The victim, according to the paper-have you seen the papers?"

  Washington nodded.

  "Is the Nesfoods Heiress," Wohl concluded.

  "Which is something I should keep in mind, right?" Washington laughed.

  "Right," Wohl said. "There's coffee, Jason, while you're waiting for Payne."

  "Thank you," Washington said, and went to the coffee-brewing machine.

  Wohl picked up one of the telephones on his desk.

  "When Officer Payne comes in, don't let him get away," he said, and then, "Okay. Tell him to wait." He turned to Washington. '' Payne's outside.''

  "I think he might get some answers I couldn't," Washing-ton said. "Is that all right with you?"

  There was a just perceptible hesitation before Wohl re-plied, "Like I said, whatever you want, Jason."

  "You know what I'm asking," Washington said.

  "Yeah. I think we have to give him the benefit of the doubt until proven otherwise. I think he knows he's a cop."

  "Yeah, so do I. And I really think he might be useful. I don't have a hell of a lot of experience with Nesfoods Heir-esses."

  "Don't let them worry you," Wohl said. "Dave Pekach seems to do very well with heiresses."

  "How about that?" Washington laughed. "Is that as se-rious as I hear?"

  "Take a look at his watch," Wohl said. "He had a birth-day."

  "What's he got?"

  "A gold Omega with about nine dials," Wohl said. "It does everything but chime. Maybe it does that too."

  "Well, good for him," Washington said. He put down his coffee cup and stood up and shot his cuffs.

  "I'll keep you up-to-date," he said. "Thanks for the cof-fee."

  "Let me know if I can help," Wohl said.

  "I will. Count on it," Washington said.

  He walked out of Peter Wohl's office. Matt Payne was lean-ing over the desk of Wohl's administrative sergeant.

  "Still have your driver's license, Matthew?" Washington said.

  "Yes, sir."

  "The next time you say 'Yes, sir' to me, I will spill some-thing greasy on that very nice sport coat," Washington said. "Come on, hotshot, take me for a drive." He saw the look on Matt's face and added, "I fixed it with the boss."

  ***

  "Frankly," H. Russell Dotson, M.D., a short, plump man in a faintly striped dark blue suit that Jason Washington thought was very nice, indeed, said, "I'm very reluctant to permit you to see Miss Detweiler-"

  "I understand your concern, Doctor," Washington said. "May I say two things?"

  Dotson nodded impatiently.

  "Time is often critically important in cases like this-"

  "I know why you think you should see her," Dr. Dotson interrupted. If the interruption annoyed Washington, it didn't show on his face or in his voice.

  "And we really do understand your concern about unduly upsetting your patient, and with that in mind I arranged for Officer Payne to come with me and actually speak with Miss Detweiler. Officer Payne is a close friend-"

  "So that is who you are! Matt Payne, right? Brewster Payne's boy?"

  "Yes, sir," Matt said politely.

  "I thought I recognized you. And you're a policeman?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "That's a new one on me," Dr. Dotson said. "Since when?''

  "Since right after graduation, Dr. Dotson," Matt said.

  "Well, you understand my concern, Matt. I don't want anything to upset Penny. She's been severely traumatized. Physically and psychologically. For a while there, frankly, I thought we might lose her."

  "She's going to be all right now?"

  "Well, I don't think she's going to die," Dr. Dotson said. "But she's still very weak. We had her in the operating room for over two hours."

  "I understand, sir," Matt said.

  "I'm going in there with you," Dr. Dotson said. "And I want you to keep looking at me. When I indicate that I want you to leave the room, I want you to leave right then. Un-derstood? Agreed?"

  "Yes, of course, sir."

  "Very well, then."

  If it had been Dr. Dotson's intention to discreetly keep Jason Washington out of Penelope Detweiler's room, he failed. By the time the doctor turned to close the door, Wash-ington was inside the room, already leaning against the wall, as if to signal that while he had no intention of intruding, neither did he intend to leave.

  Penny Detweiler's appearance shocked Matt Payne. The head of her bed was raised slightly, so that she could watch television. Her face and throat and what he could see of her chest were, where the skin was not covered with bandages and exposed sutures, black and blue, as if she had been se-verely beaten. Patches of hair had been shaved from the front of her head, and there were bandages and exposed su-tures there too. Transparent tubing fed liquid into her right arm from two bottles suspended at the head of the bed.

  "Now that the beauticians are through with you, are you ready for the photographer?" Matt asked.

  "I made them give me a mirror," she said. "Aren't I ghastly?"

  "I cannot tell a lie. You look like hell," Matt said. "How do you feel?''

  "As bad as I look," she said, and then, "Matt, what are you doing here? And how did you get in?"

  "I'm a cop, Penny."

  "Oh, that's right. I heard that. I don't really believe it. Why did you do something like that?"

  "I didn't want to be a lawyer," Matt said. He saw that Dr. Dotson, who had been tense, had now relaxed somewhat.

  She laughed and winced.

  "It hurts," she said. "Don't make me laugh,"

  "What the hell happened, Penny?"

  "I don't know," she said. "I was walking to the stairwell. You know where this happened to me?''

  "We found you. Amanda Spencer and me. When we drove on the roof, you were on the floor. Amanda called the cops."

  "You did? I don't remember seeing you."

  "You were unconscious," Matt said.

  "I guess I won't be able to make it to the wedding, will I?" she asked, and then added, "What are they going to do about the wedding?"

  "I saw Daffy-and the Brownes-before I came here. They asked me what I thought about that, and since it was none of my business, I told them."

  She giggled, then winced again.

  "I told you, don't make me laugh," she said. "Every time I move my-chest-it hurts."

  "Sorry."

  "What did you tell them?"

  "That Chad is in the Marines and that they couldn't post-pone it."

  "And?"

  "I don't know, but I think everything's going ahead as planned."

  "Just because this happened to me is no reason to ruin everybody else's fun," Penny said.

  "I still don't know what happened to you," Matt said.

  "I don't really know," Penny said.

  "You don't remember anything?"

  "I remember getting out of my car and walking toward the stairwell. And then the roof fell in on me. I remember, sort of, being in a truck-not an ambulance, a truck-and I think there was a cop in there with me. But that's all."

  "There's no roof over the roof," Matt said.

  "You know what I mean. It was like something ran into me. Hit me hard."

  "You didn't see anyone up there?"

  "No."

  "Nothing at
all?"

  "There was nobody up there but me," she said firmly.

  "Does the name Tony DeZego mean anything to you?"

  "No. Who?"

  "Tony. Tony DeZego."