The investigators

FIVE

Patricia Payne found her husband on the flagstone patio outside the kitchen, comfortably sprawled on a cast-aluminum lounge, and, surprising her not at all, with a thick legal brief in his hands.

"Guess who's coming to breakfast?" she asked.

Mr. and Mrs. Brewster Cortland Payne lived in a large, rambling house on four acres on Providence Road, in Wallingford, on Pennsylvania Route 252. It was a museum, Payne often thought gratefully, that Patricia had turned, with love, into a home.

What was now the kitchen and the sewing room had been the whole house when it had been built of fieldstone before the Revolution. Additions and modifications over two centuries had turned it into a large rambling structure that fit no specific architectural category, although a real estate saleswoman had once remarked in the hearing of Patricia that "the Payne place just looked like old, old money."

The house was comfortable, even luxurious, but not ostentatious. There was neither swimming pool nor tennis court, but there was, in what a century before had been a stable, a four-car garage. The Payne family swam, as well as rode, at the Rose Tree Hunt Club. They had a summer house in Cape May, New Jersey, which did have a tennis court, as well as a berth for their boat, a thirty-eight-foot Hatteras, called Final Tort IV.

The only thing wrong with it, Brewster Payne now thought, was that the children were now gone.

"Not Amy," he said. "I just talked to her."

Amelia Alice Payne, M.D., was the eldest of the Payne children.

"Matt."

"I'll be damned."

"He called here," she said. "And he said he would be here in an hour."

"I wonder what the probability factor of that actually happening is?"

"Maybe he's got something on his mind," Patricia said. "He seemed a little strange last night."

"He didn't seem strange to me," he said.

The telephone, sitting on the fieldstone wall that bordered the patio, rang.

Patricia answered it, then handed it to her husband.

"Brewster Payne," he said.

"Charley Emmons, Brew. How the hell are you?"

Charles M. Emmons, Esq., was a law-school classmate and a frequent golf partner of Brewster Payne, and the senior member of a Wall Street law firm that specialized in corporate mergers.

"Charley, my boy! How the hell are you?"

"At the moment, a little embarrassed, frankly."

"I can't believe you want to borrow money, but I will listen with compassion."

"I don't have to borrow money from you; I can take all I need from you on the links."

"Do I detect a challenge?"

"Unfortunately, no. I wish it was something like that."

"What's up, Charley? What can I do for you?"

"You don't know Tom Reynolds, do you?"

Thomas J. Reynolds, if that's who he's talking about, Brewster Payne recalled, is chairman of the board, president, and chief executive officer of-what the hell is the name? — a Fortune 500 company that has been gobbling up independent food manufacturers at what looks like a rate of one a week.

"Only by reputation. But if we're talking about the same fellow, Pat and I met his daughter last night."

"Susan?"

"Yes."

"Tom knows we're friends," Charley Emmons said.

"And how might Mawson, Payne, Stockton, McAdoo and Lester be of service to-what's the name of his company? "

"Tomar, Inc.," Charley furnished.

"Yes, of course, Tomar, Incorporated. You know our motto, Charley: 'No case too small, no cause so apparently harebrained, so long as there is an adequate retainer up front.' "

Charley Emmons laughed dutifully.

"The thing is, Brew-the firm is in pretty deep with Tomar; otherwise, believe me, I wouldn't be making this call-about Tom's daughter."

"Oh?"

"You were at young Nesbitt's last night?"

"Yes, we were. I rather thought we'd see you there."

"The story as I get it, Brew, is that Susan left the party with Matt and hasn't been seen since."

There was a perceptible pause before Payne replied.

"Charley, Matt is no longer a child. And neither is that young woman. Matt, you know, has an apartment in the city…"

"I understand, I understand," Charley said. "But the thing is, the girl always telephones her mother when she's out of town, just before she goes to bed, and she didn't call last night."

"How old is the girl? Twenty-two, twenty-three, something like that?"

"Actually, a little older. Twenty-six or twenty-seven."

"So when it comes to defending my son, I won't have to worry about statutory rape, will I?"

"Now, take it easy, Brew. No one is suggesting…"

"What exactly are you suggesting, Charley?"

"I'm suggesting that I have a very important client-and a friend, too-who is worried about his daughter. You can understand that."

"All right. What is it you want me to do?"

"Find Matt, and have him have the girl call home. Do you have any idea where he is?"

"What makes Mr. Reynolds so sure his daughter is with Matt?" Payne asked.

"When her mother, in the wee hours, called her hotel-the Bellvue-and there was no answer, she called young Nesbitt's wife-the girls were at Bennington together-and she told her Matt had taken the girl somewhere to listen to jazz."

"Charley, I'm more than a little reluctant to intrude in Matt's personal life."

"I understand that, Brew. But under the circumstances…"

"Does the phrase 'consenting adults' ever come up in your practice, Charley?"

"Brew, the girl's an only child. A Presbyterian Jewish Princess, if you like."

"That doesn't sound like Matt's type," Payne said, thinking aloud. "As a matter of fact, Charley, Matt's on his way out here. I will, with great discretion, ask him if he is acquainted with this young woman, and if there is any way he can suggest to her that she should telephone her mother."

"And you'll call me, right?"

There was a perceptible pause before Brewster Cortland Payne II replied.

"All right, Charley, I'll call you."

He replaced the telephone in its cradle.

"The phrase 'consenting adults' caught my attention, darling," Patricia said.

"You remember the girl we met last night? Talking to Matt?"

"What about her?"

"No one seems to know where she is," Payne said. "When last seen, she was in the company of one Matthew Payne, headed for some jazz place."

"No," Patricia said.

"No?"

"I went looking for Matt last night. I couldn't find him, but that girl was still there."

"Maybe he was there and you couldn't find him."

"No. I asked Martha Peebles if she had seen Matt, and she said she had seen him leaving. And that was before I saw the girl. Her name is Susan Reynolds, by the way."

"Apparently, no one knows where Susan Reynolds is. She apparently calls home when she's away. She didn't do that last night, and she didn't answer the telephone at the Bellvue."

"But someone thinks Matt knows? Is there a problem of some sort?"

"I don't think so," Payne said. "Do you think it would be too much to hope that Matt has the whole day free? That he might have time for nine holes?"

"What you could do is ask him," Patricia said.

Peter Wohl had more than once told his mother, who kept raising the question, that the reason he had not married was that with the Jaguar to support, he obviously could not also afford to support a wife. His mother was not entirely sure that he was pulling her leg.

The Jaguar, on which he had spent a good deal of time and a great deal of money restoring, was an XK-120 Drop Head Coupe. It was now in better mechanical and cosmetic condition than when it had left the Jaguar factory in Coventry, England.

While he had never entered the Jaguar in any of the Concours d'Elegance competitions frequently held in Philadelphia and its suburbs, he attended many of them whenever he could find the time. He had disqualified his car from competition-very reluctantly-by adding to it what classic-car buffs call somewhat scornfully "an aftermarket accessory."

The accessory was not noticed by most people, even those pausing to take long and admiring looks at the pristine, always gleaming roadster, but the antenna, approximately ten inches in height, mounted precisely in the center of the trunk lid, would not for long have escaped the eagle eyes of Concours d'Elegance judges. And once they had noticed that desecration of form and style, it wouldn't take them long to start snooping around the passenger compartment, where they would have found, carefully concealed beneath the dash, the police-band shortwave transceiver to which the antenna was connected.

When Peter Wohl carefully turned the Jaguar into Jeanes Street in Northwest Philadelphia, the gleaming black Cadillac limousine provided by the City of Philadelphia to transport its mayor, the Hon. Jerome H. "Jerry" Carlucci, was parked before the comfortable row house in which Wohl had grown up.

Two police officers in plainclothes were in the process of removing insulated food containers from the trunk of the mayoral limousine and carrying them into the house. He recognized the police officers. One was Sergeant Charles Monahan, who was the mayor's chauffeur, and the other was Lieutenant Jack Fellows, a tall, muscular black man who was officially the mayor's bodyguard. It was also said of Jack Fellows that he was the police officer closest to the mayor, except, of course for Chief Inspector Augustus Wohl, Retired.

When Lieutenant Fellows saw the Jaguar, he smiled and mimed staggering under the weight of the insulated food container. Peter Wohl waved and smiled, and then, when he had pulled up behind the limousine, reached under the dashboard of the Jaguar and came up with a microphone.

"William One," he said into it.

Regulations of the Philadelphia Police Department required, among thousands of other things, that senior police supervisors-such as the inspector who was the commanding officer of the Special Operations Division-be in contact with the police department twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, year round.

Inasmuch as senior police supervisors required to be in constant contact are also furnished around-the-clock, radio-equipped police cars, most often unmarked, so that they may quickly respond to any call of duty, this usually poses no problems for the individuals concerned. Peter Wohl, however, was quite fond of his Jaguar, and determined to drive it when he thought of himself as off-duty.

So, with some pain, he found himself purchasing with his own funds the very expensive police radio, and with even greater pain, drilling a hole in the center of the Jaguar 's trunk lid to mount its antenna.

He justified the expense to himself by rationalizing that he had just been promoted to Inspector, and didn't have a wife and children to support, and he tried hard not to think about the hole he had had to drill in the trunk lid.

"William One," a female voice responded to his call.

"Until further notice, at Chief Wohl's home," Wohl said. "You have the number."

"You and everybody else," the female voice responded, with a chuckle.

The reference was not only to the mayor's limousine (radio call sign "Mary One") but also to the four other identical-except for color-new Plymouth sedans parked along Jeanes Street, the occupants of which were also required to make their whereabouts known around-the-clock to either Police Radio or Special Operations Radio and had done so.

Two of the cars were assigned to Chief Inspector of Detectives Matt Lowenstein and Chief Inspector Dennis V. Coughlin, who were widely acknowledged to be the most influential of the eight chief inspectors of the Philadelphia Police Department. The other two were assigned to Staff Inspector Mike Weisbach and Captain Michael Sabara.

Staff inspectors-the rank between captain and inspector-and captains are not normally provided with new automobiles. There is a sort of hand-me-down system in vehicle assignment. Deputy commissioners and chief inspectors get new unmarked vehicles every six months to a year. Their "used" vehicles are passed down to inspectors, who in turn pass their used cars down the line to staff inspectors and captains, who in turn pass their cars down to lieutenants and detectives. At this point, the cars have reached the end of their useful lives, and are disposed of.

Mayor Carlucci, who was a political power far beyond Philadelphia, had managed to obtain substantial grants of money from the federal government for the ACT Program.

ACT was the acronym for Anti-Crime Teams. It was a test, more or less, to see what effect saturating a high-crime area with extra police, the latest technology, and special assistance from the district attorney in the form of having assistant district attorneys with nothing to do but push ACT-arrested criminals through the criminal justice system would have, short and long term, on crime statistics.

Mayor Carlucci was believed to be-and believed himself to be-the best-qualified mayor of all the mayors of major American cities to determine how the federal government 's money could be most effectively spent to provide "new and innovative means of law enforcement."

On Jerry Carlucci's part, this belief was based on the fact that before he ran for public office, he had held every rank-except policewoman-in the Philadelphia Police Department from patrolman to commissioner of police. The federal officials charged with dispensing the taxpayers ' largesse in the ACT Program, moreover, became aware that both of Pennsylvania's U.S. senators and a substantial majority of Pennsylvania's congressional delegation shared the mayor's opinion, and not only because most of them owed their jobs to him.

As soon as the money started flowing, Police Commissioner Taddeus Czernich-at Mayor Carlucci's suggestion-announced the formation of the Special Operations Division. The new unit to test new and innovative crime fighting ideas took under its wing the existing Highway Patrol, which had evolved from a highway-patrolling-often on motorcycles-police unit into an elite unit, two police officers per radio patrol car, with citywide authority, and a number of other police officers were transferred to it as ACT personnel.

Staff Inspector Peter Wohl had been appointed commanding officer of Special Operations. There was some grumbling about this, both within police ranks and in the press, especially in the Philadelphia Ledger, which usually found something wrong with whatever the police department did.

The charges made in this case said Wohl's appointment was another example of cronyism within the department. The Ledger's readers were told that Peter Wohl was the son of retired Chief Inspector Augustus Wohl, who was generally acknowledged to be Mayor Carlucci's best friend.

On the other hand, there was approval of Peter's Wohl's appointment by many members of the police department, especially from those who knew him and were regarded as straight arrows. They pointed out that he had been the youngest-ever sergeant in Highway Patrol, the youngest-ever captain, and the youngest-ever staff inspector. In the latter capacity, from which he had been promoted to command of Special Operations, he had conducted the investigation that had sent-following a lengthy and well-publicized trial-Judge Moses Finderman off to pass an extended period behind bars.

Mayor Carlucci had been as deaf to the grumbling about the appointment of Peter Wohl to command Special Operations as he was to the grumbling within the department and howls of indignation from the federal government about how he elected to spend the ACT grants.

Since mobility of forces was essential to the idea of quickly saturating high-crime areas with police, one of the first expenditures of the federal funds available made by Commissioner Czernich-at Mayor Carlucci's suggestion-was to purchase for Special Operations a fleet of new cars, some unmarked and all equipped with the very latest and most expensive shortwave radio equipment.

Commissioner Czernich also went along with Mayor Carlucci's suggestion that a large part of the federal grant be expended to make "emergency" repairs to Special Operations ' new headquarters, which had begun life in 1892 as the Frankford Grammar School and had been abandoned three years before by the Board of Education as uninhabitable and beyond repair.

In cases that drew a good deal of attention from the press, Peter Wohl's Special Operations Division had quickly proved its worth, and was thus also to prove Wohl to be the extraordinary cop that Mayor Carlucci and his friends knew him to be.

The commissioner, at Mayor Carlucci's suggestion-it was said that the commissioner rarely did anything more innovative than blowing his nose without a friendly suggestion from the mayor-gave to the newly formed Special Operations Division the responsibility for running to earth a gentleman referred to by the press as the "Northwest Serial Rapist."

This gentleman had been shot to death by Wohl's administrative assistant after trying to run over the law of ficer with his van. At the time, he had neatly trussed up in the back of his van another naked young woman whom he had been regaling with specific details of what he planned to do to her just as soon as they reached some quiet spot in the country.

A massive Special Operations operation had run to earth another gentleman-a bank employee without any previous brushes with the law-who believed that God had told him to blow up the Vice President of the United States and was found at the time of his arrest to be in possession of the Vice President's Philadelphia visit itinerary as well as several hundred pounds of the latest high explosive, together with state-of-the-art detonating devices.

A Special Operations/ACT Task Force had, in a precisely timed operation, simultaneously arrested a dozen armed and dangerous individuals scattered all over Philadelphia on warrants charging them with murder in connection with the robbery of a South Philadelphia furniture store. With one exception, the arrests had been made without the firing of a shot. In the one exception, the individual had tried to gun down a Special Operations officer, who, although wounded, had saved the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania the cost of a lengthy trial with a well-placed fatal pistol shot.

More recently, Special Operations investigators had uncovered an operation smuggling heroin through Philadelphia 's International Airport. The operation had escaped the attention of the Narcotics Unit, and also-a police officer had been involved-that of the Internal Affairs Division, which had the responsibility for uncovering dishonest cops.

On the heels of that, Special Operations investigators had uncovered a call girl ring operating in Center City Philadelphia with the blessing of both the Mafia and the district commander-what are called "precincts" in most large cities are called "districts" in Philadelphia-and a lieutenant of the Vice Squad, who were being paid a percentage of the profits.

Commissioner Czernich's response to that-at, of course, Mayor Carlucci's suggestion-was to form another organization, to work very closely with, and be supported by, Special Operations. It was called the Ethical Affairs Unit (EAU). Staff Inspector Michael Weisbach, whose reputation-smart as a whip, straight as an arrow-was much like Peter Wohl's, was named to head EAU and charged with making sure that never again was the Philadelphia Police Department-and thus Mayor Jerry Carlucci-going to be embarrassed by a senior police official getting caught selling his badge.

Mike Weisbach had barely had time to find a desk in the Schoolhouse and turn in his battered unmarked Ford for one of Special Operations' brand-new Plymouths when another case caught Mayor Jerry Carlucci's personal attention.

Officer Jerome H. Kellog, who worked as a plainclothes officer in the Narcotics Unit, had been found brutally murdered in his own kitchen. Among the initial suspects in the homicide had been Officer Kellog's estranged wife, Helene, and Mrs. Kellog's close friend, Mr. Wallace J. Milham, into whose apartment she had moved when she left Officer Kellog's bed and board. Mr. Milham fell under suspicion not only because of possible motive, but also because it was known that Mr. Milham habitually carried on his person a pistol of the type and caliber that had killed Mr. Kellog.

Mr. Milham was a detective in the homicide division of the Philadelphia Police Department.

Shortly after her husband's death, Officer Kellog's widow had appeared at the apartment of Sergeant Jason Washington of Special Operations. Mrs. Kellog told him that she had come to him because he was the only cop besides Wally Milham of whose honesty she was sure. She then went on to say that if they really wanted to catch whoever had shot her late husband, they need look no further than the Five Squad of the Narcotics Unit, all of whom, she stated flatly, were dirty.

Jerry, she suggested, had been killed because he knew too much, or was about to blow the whistle on the others, or, probably, both.

Sergeant Washington had of course considered it possible that Mrs. Kellog was making these accusations to divert attention from herself and Detective Milham, but he didn't think so. He believed himself to be-and in fact was-an usually skilled judge of humankind, especially in the areas of veracity and obfuscation.

Washington reported to Inspector Wohl his encounter with Mrs. Kellog and his belief that she, at least, believed what she was saying. Wohl, knowing that Mayor Carlucci would want to know immediately of even a hint that a police officer had been murdered by other policemen, had passed what he knew on to the mayor.

At that point, the murder of Officer Kellog had been solved by a longtime ordinary uniformed beat patrolman, Woodrow Wilson Bailey, Sr., of the 39th District. Bailey, who had been keeping a more or less routine eye on one James Howard Leslie, whom he knew to be a burglar, had found in Leslie's burned trash pile a wedding photograph of Officer and Mrs. Jerome H. Kellog.

Correctly suspecting that Mr. Leslie had not been a close enough friend of Officer Kellog to have been given a wedding photograph, Officer Bailey investigated further, and sought assistance from other police officers. Soon after that, Mr. Leslie explained to Sergeant Washington why he had felt it necessary to shoot Officer Kellog.

That cleared Officer Kellog's widow and Detective Milham of any suspicion in the matter, of course. But it did not address the Widow Kellog's allegations that the entire Five Squad of the Narcotics Unit was dirty, and at least in her opinion, capable of murdering one of their own to ensure his silence.

Three months before, investigation of such allegations would have been routinely handled by the Internal Affairs Division, which was charged with uncovering police corruption. But three months before, Internal Affairs hadn't dropped the ball on that dirty cop passing heroin through the airport, or on the dirty Center City captain and Vice Squad lieutenant taking money from a call girl madam.

Three months before, Mayor Carlucci hadn't felt it necessary to suggest the formation of the Ethical Affairs Unit.

Inspector Peter Wohl, as he walked up to the front door of his childhood home, knew that while there would be lots of beer and whiskey and wine, and lots of tasty Jewish, Italian, German, and southern barbecue food served in the basement recreation room of his father's house this afternoon, as well as lots of laughs, and almost certainly a long trip down memory lane, that was not the reason Jerry Carlucci had suggested that everybody get together.

When the mayor decided the time had come, what they were going to do in good ol' Augie Wohl's recreation room this afternoon was decide how they were going to clean up the Narcotics Unit, and how to do it right, so that nobody dirty would get to walk because some goddamned defense lawyer caught them with an i they hadn't dotted, or a t they'd forgotten to cross.

He went in without knocking, and walked to the kitchen to kiss his mother.

There were six wives in the kitchen, dealing with the food: Chief Lowenstein's comfortably plump wife, Sarah; Angeline "Angie" Carlucci, the slight, almost delicate woman who was said to be the only human being of whom Mayor Carlucci lived in fear; Mike Weisbach's Natalie, a younger version of Sarah Lowenstein; Mike Sabara's Helen, a striking woman with luxuriant red hair; Jack Fellows 's Beverly, a tall, slim woman who was an operating-room nurse at Temple Hospital; and Peter's mother.

Peter wondered tangentially how Martha Peebles-once she became Mrs. Captain David Pekach-was going to fit in with her fellow officer's wives. She would try, of course-she was absolutely bananas about her "Precious "-but her experience with feeding people was limited to telling her butler how many people would be coming to dinner, when, and what she would like to have them fed.

For that matter, he absolutely could not imagine Amy Payne in a kitchen, stirring spaghetti sauce, either.

Mrs. Carlucci and Mrs. Lowenstein insisted on their right, as women who had known him since he wore diapers, to kiss him.

"Your father and everybody's downstairs," his mother said.

"Really?" Peter replied, as if that was surprising.

"He's always been a smarty-pants," his mother said.

"Yes, he has," Sarah Lowenstein agreed. "But his time is coming."

"How's that?" Peter asked.

"There's a young lady out there-you just haven't bumped into each other yet-who will change you."

"And any change would be an improvement, right?"

"You took the words out of my mouth."

Peter smiled at her and went down the narrow steps into the basement.

He made his manners first with Mayor Carlucci, a tall, large-boned, heavyset fifty-three-year-old with dark intelligent eyes and a full head of brown hair brushed close to his scalp.

"Mr. Mayor," he said.

"I like your suit, Peter," Carlucci said, and tried to crush Peter's hand with his.

He failed.

"You're stronger than you look," the mayor said.

"Thank you, sir."

"Smarter, too," Peter's father said, draping an arm around his shoulders.

Peter shook hands with the others, then made himself a drink.

The trip down memory lane started. Peter didn't pay much attention. He had heard all the stories at least twice before. He sensed that both Mikes, Weisbach and Sabara, were slightly ill at ease.

Sabara's uncomfortable, probably, Peter thought, because he's here and Dave Pekach isn't. And Weisbach is legitimately worried about how much of this Five Squad investigation is going to be placed on his shoulders.

The conference vis-fnbsp;-vis the investigation of allegations of corruption within the Narcotics Unit began when everyone declined another piece of cake, whereupon Mrs. Wohl announced that she would put another pot of coffee on and leave them alone.

"Peter, you help carry the heavy things upstairs," she ordered.

In three minutes, the Ping-Pong table pressed into service as a buffet table and all the folding tables were cleared and put away.

"I always like a second cup of coffee to settle my stomach, " Mayor Carlucci announced.

Lieutenant Fellows quickly served him one.

"Don't mind me," the mayor said. "If anyone wants something harder than coffee, help yourselves."

Chiefs Coughlin and Lowenstein went to the refrigerator and helped themselves to bottles of Neuweiler's ale. The others poured coffee. The pot ran dry.

Lieutenant Fellows went upstairs to see how the fresh pot was coming.

"I talked to Jason Washington about this," the mayor began. "Maybe I should have asked Augie to have him here for this. Anyway, Washington told me he believes Officer Kellog's widow believes what she told him about the whole Five Squad being dirty. No disrespect to Captain Pekach intended-he's a fine officer-but despite what he says about if there was something dirty going in Narcotics he would have known about it, I don't think we can ignore what the widow said. Now, what else have we got?"

"The threatening telephone call," Peter Wohl said. "I believe that Mrs. Milham-"

"Mrs. Milham?" Mayor Carlucci interrupted.

"She and Wally Milham went to Maryland and got married, Mr. Mayor," Peter said. "I thought you knew."

"Now that you mention it… go ahead, Peter."

"I believe there was such a call," Peter said. "And so does Wally Milham."

"He would have to believe it, wouldn't you say, Peter? I mean, after all, he was slipping the salami to her before her husband was murdered."

"Wally Milham is a good cop, Mr. Mayor," Peter said.

The mayor looked at him for a long moment without expression.

"Tell me about the tapes," the mayor said finally.

"They're in the process of being transcribed," Peter said.

"Still? Christ, you've had them for a week."

"The tapes were damaged by fire, Mr. Mayor," Peter said. "They're very hard to transcribe."

"Get somebody good to do it. Somebody smart and fast."

"Detective Payne is transcribing them," Wohl said.

"And working hard at it, sir. Like last night at midnight, " Mike Sabara interjected. "I listened to a little of them…"

"Did you?" the mayor asked, not pleasantly.

"I was surprised he's able to get anything off them at all," Sabara said.

"So they're useless?" the mayor said.

"No, sir," Peter Wohl said. "Both Payne and Sergeant Washington, who has read what Payne has transcribed so far, believe there will be something useful in them when we're finished. "

"The point I'm trying to make, Peter, and I'm not just trying to give you a hard time, is that we really don't have anything, except accusations made by a Five Squad wife who wasn't sleeping with her own husband," Carlucci said. "Against which, we have the opinion of a damned good cop who used to work Narcotics and says if there was anything wrong, he would have known about it."

No one replied.

The mayor looked at Chief Inspector Dennis V. Coughlin.

"You think we'd be spinning our wheels on this one, Denny?"

"It may turn out that way, but I think we have to do it," Chief Coughlin said.

"Matt?" the mayor asked, turning his head to Chief Inspector Matthew Lowenstein.

"I agree with Denny," Lowenstein said, looking at the butt of his cigar.

"You think we should go ahead, in other words?"

"Yeah, Jerry, I do."

"You don't seem very happy about it."

"No, I'm not. For one thing, if we find dirty cops in Five Squad, the whole department looks bad. Internally, so does Internal Affairs because we dug it out, not them. Let's say you give this to Peter-"

"I'm thinking of suggesting to the commissioner that it be given to Ethical Affairs."

"Same thing. Nothing personal, Mike," Lowenstein said, looking at Staff Inspector Weisbach, "but you can't do it without Peter's help, which, the way I see it, puts Peter in charge."

"And since Peter-nothing personal, Peter-" the mayor said, "can't do it without the help of the chief inspector of detectives, the way you see it, does that put you in charge?"

"Come on, Jerry."

"Or without the help of Chief Coughlin, does that put Denny in charge?"

"What are you driving at, Jerry?" Coughlin asked "That you want me, or Matt, to take this?"

"Nobody pays attention to what I say is what I'm driving at. I'll try again. I'm going to suggest to Commissioner Czernich than an investigation of certain allegations concerning the Narcotics Unit is in order, and that it should be conducted by the Ethical Affairs Unit. Therefore, Mike Weisbach will be in charge. I am also going to suggest to the Commissioner that he direct Peter, Denny, and you, Matt, to provide Mike with whatever he thinks he needs to get the job done. Now, is that clear in everybody's mind?"

There was a chorus of "Yes, sir."

"And since everybody involved is an experienced police officer, it will not be necessary for me to tell you that the best way to blow this investigation is to let those scumbags even suspect somebody's taking a close look at them, right? Do I make that point? I want them. I want them bad. If there's anything worse than a drug dealer, it's a police officer either hiding drug dealers behind his badge, or, God forbid, dealing drugs himself."

He looked around at all of them.

"Peter, since you'll be working closer with Mike than anybody else, once a day, either Fellows or myself will telephone you and you'll tell us what's happened in the past twenty-four hours. You'll also keep Matt and Denny up to speed. As little as possible in writing. Papers have a way of turning up in the wrong hands."

"Yes, sir," Peter Wohl said.