“The Ledger is really on our ass, yours in particular,” Pekach said.
“Now, I’ll have to read it,” Wohl said, as he walked with Pekach to the door.
Wohl carried the beer bottles to the sink, emptied the inch remaining in his down the drain, and put them both in the garbage can under the sink.
He went to his bedroom, undressed, and then, giving into curiosity, walked naked into the living room and reclaimed the newspapers.
He spread them out on his bed, and sat down to read them.
There was a photograph of Elizabeth J. Woodham on the front page of the Ledger, under the headline: KIDNAPPED SCHOOLTEACHER. Below the picture was a lengthy caption.
* * *
Elizabeth J. Woodham, 33, of the 300 block of E. Mermaid Lane in Chestnut Hill, is still missing two days after she was forced at knifepoint into a van and driven away. Her abductor is generally believed to be the serial rapist active in Chestnut Hill.
Inspector Peter Wohl, recently put in charge of a new Special Operations Division, which has assumed responsibility for the kidnapping, was “not available for the press” for comment, and Captain Michael J. Sabara, recently relieved as commander of the Highway Patrol to serve as Wohl’s Deputy, refused to answer questions concerning Miss Woodham put to him by a Ledger reporter.
Sources believed by the Ledger to be reliable, however, have said the police have no clues that might lead them to the abductor, and no description of him beyond that of a “hairy, well-spoken white male.” [Further details and photographs on page B-3. The Police Department’s handling of this case is also the subject of today’s Ledger editorial, page A-7.]
* * *
Peter turned to the story, which contained nothing he hadn’t seen before, and then to the editorial:
* * *
HOUSECLEANING NEEDED, NOT WHITEWASH
It Is frankly outrageous, considering the millions of dollars Philadelphia’s taxpayers pour unquestioningly into their police department, that a woman can be taken from her home at knifepoint at all. It is even more outrageous that twenty-four hours after the kidnapping, the police, rather than devoting all of their time and effort to apprehending the individual responsible for the kidnapping, and rescuing a kidnapped schoolteacher, have instead elected to assign many members of the so-called elite Highway Patrol to finding witnesses willing to say that the father of the four-year-old boy killed when a stoplight-running Highway Patrol smashed into his car was at fault, not them.
It was unconscionable that Inspector Peter Wohl, a crony of Police Commissioner Czernick, who is the responsible senior police official involved, should make himself “not available” to the press. The people have a right to know how well—or how poorly—their police are protecting them.
Mayor Carlucci should replace Czernick and Wohl with police officers dedicated to protecting the public, and not to whitewashing the Highway Patrol’s unjustified, frequent, and well-documented excesses and failures. Anything less is malfeasance in office.
* * *
“Oh, shit,” Peter Wohl said, tiredly, closing the newspaper. Then he picked up the Bulletin. There were two stories about the Woodham abduction. One, a tearjerker, was written by a woman, Cheryl Davies, and chronicled the anguish of Elizabeth J. Woodham’s family and friends. She had done her homework, Peter admitted grudgingly. There was a photograph of, and the reactions of, two sixth-graders who had been in her classes.
Mickey O’Hara’s story was more or less upbeat. He wrote that Czernick had agreed to transfer to
* * *
…Staff Inspector Peter Wohl’s Just-forming new command two of the most highly respected homicide detectives, Jason Washington and Anthony Harris. Wohl, who himself enjoys a wide reputation as an investigator, has turned over the Woodham abduction to Washington and Harris, and is reported to be himself working around the clock on the investigation.
* * *
He finished reading Mickey’s story, then folded the Bulletin closed, too. He exhaled audibly, stood up, and carried the newspapers into the kitchen, intending to put them in the garbage. Then he changed his mind and simply laid them on the counter by the sink.
When he went back into his bedroom, he smashed his right fi
st into his open palm, grimaced, considered for a moment getting drunk, and wound up with his head pressing against the closed Venetian blinds on the window beside his bed.
Without knowing why he did it, he pulled on the cord, and the blinds twisted open, and he could see the Big House thirty yards away.
There were lights in only several of the windows, and he had just decided they were the windows of Two B, Chez Schneider, when there was proof. Naomi Schneider, wearing only her underpants, pranced into view, smiling happily at someone else in the room, and handing him a drink.
Without thinking about it, Peter turned off the lights in his bedroom.
“Peel him a grape, Naomi,” Peter said, aloud.