Men In Blue (Badge of Honor 1)
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When Peter Wohl reached the Marshutz & Sons Funeral Home, there were six Highway Patrol motorcycles in the driveway, their riders standing together. Behind them was Chief Inspector Dennis V. Coughlin’s Oldsmobile. Behind that was a Cadillac limousine with a “FUNERAL” flag on its right fender, then a Cadillac hearse, then finally two Ford Highway Patrol cars.
When Peter drove in, Sergeant Tom Lenihan, Denny Coughlin’s aide, got out of the Olds and held up his hand for Peter to stop.
“They’re waiting for you inside, Inspector,” he said. “Park your car. After the funeral, there will be cars to bring you all back here.”
Peter parked the car behind the building beside other police cars, marked and unmarked, and a few privately owned cars, and then walked into the funeral home. The corridor was crowded with uniformed police officers, one of them a New Jersey state trooper lieutenant in a blue-and-gray uniform. Wohl wondered who he was.
As he walked toward them, Wohl saw that the Blue Room, where Dutch had been laid out for the wake, and which had been full of flowers, was now virtually empty except for the casket itself, which was now closed, and covered with an American flag.
“We were getting worried about you, Peter,” Chief Inspector Dennis V. Coughlin said to him. “The Moffitts left just a couple of minutes ago. I think Jeannie maybe expected you to be here when they closed the coffin.”
“I took Miss Dutton to identify Gallagher,” Peter replied. “And I just left Homicide. Vice turned up a suspect who seems to know something about why Nelson was killed.”
“I thought maybe you’d run into the commissioner,” Coughlin said.
He’s pissed that I ‘m late. Well, to hell with it. I couldn’t ‘t help it.
“Was the commissioner looking for me?” Peter asked. “I think you could say that, yes,” Coughlin said, sarcastically.
“Chief, I’m missing something here,” Wohl said. “If I’ve held things up here, I’m really sorry.”
Coughlin looked at him for a long moment. “You really don’t know what I’m talking about, do you?”
“No, sir.”
“You haven’t seen the Ledger? Nobody’s shown it to you? Said anything about it?”
“The Ledger? No, sir.”
“When was the last time you saw Mickey O’Hara? Or talked to him?”
“I saw him a week, ten days ago,” Peter said, after some thought. “I ran into him in Wanamaker’s.”
“Not in the last two, three days? You haven’t seen him, or talked to him?”
“No, sir,” Peter said, and then started to ask, “Chief—”
“Now that we’re all here,” an impeccably suited representative of Marshutz & Sons interrupted him, “I’d like to say a few words about what we’re all going to do taking our part in the ceremonies.”
“You ride from here to Saint Dominic’s with me,” Chief Inspector Coughlin ordered, earning himself a look of annoyance from the funeral director.
“With one exception,” the man from Marshutz began, “pallbearer positions will reflect the rank of the pallbearer. Chief Inspector Coughlin will be at the right front of the casket, with Staff Inspector Wohl on the left. Immediately behind Chief Inspector Coughlin, the one exception I mentioned, will be Lieutenant McGrory of the New Jersey State Police. From then on, left, right, left, right, positions are assigned by rank. I have had a list typed up . . .”
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Patrol cars from the Seventh District were on hand to block intersections between Marshutz & Sons and Saint Dominic’s Roman Catholic Church.
When Dutch Moffitt’s flag-draped casket had been rolled into the hearse, Dennis Coughlin and Peter Wohl walked forward to Coughlin’s Oldsmobile. The Highway Patrol motorcycle men kicked their machines into life and turned on the flashing lights. Then, very slowly, the small convoy pulled away from the funeral home.
The officers from the Seventh District cars saluted as the hearse rolled past them.
“Tom, have you got the Ledger up there with you?” Denny Coughlin asked, from the backseat of the Oldsmobile.
“Yes, sir. And the Bulletin. “
“Pass them back to Inspector Wohl, would you please, Tom? He hasn’t seen them.”