"Bingo," Captain Kozniski said.
"Get on the radio, please, Stu," Knotts said, "and have a car meet us here. And see if Philadelphia has any more on it."
"There was another car," Kozniski said. "You can see where they turned around." He used his flashlight as a pointer.
"If it was a couple of kids who 'borrowed' it, and then had second thoughts," Knotts said, "why get rid of it out here in the sticks?"
Kozniski went to the bumper and carefully examined it with his flashlight.
"It wasn't pushed in here, either," he said. "That rubber stuff on the bumper doesn't have a mark on it. I mean, I was thinking maybe it broke down, and they had to leave it."
"If they were going to dismantle it, there wouldn't be anything left by now but the license plate," Knotts said.
Captain Simons walked up to them.
"If the driver is apprehended," he said, formally, "he is to be held for questioning about a homicide."
"Double bingo," Captain Kozniski said. "You telepathic, Major?"
"Absolutely," Major Bill Knotts said. "You mean you didn't know?"
He walked to the Ford, switched the radio frequency to the statewide frequency, established communication with state police headquarters in Trenton; and, after identifying himself and reporting they had located a car NCIC said was hot, and which the Philadelphia police were interested in for a homicide investigation, asked for the dispatch of the state police mobile crime lab van.
"And first thing in the morning, I think we had better get enough people out here to have a good look at the woods," he said. "In the meantime, I'll need somebody to guard the site. I pulled a car off patrol, but I'd like to get him released as soon as possible."
They all got back in the Ford and waited for the patrol car to come to the scene.
Captain Kozniski, without really being aware he had done it, switched on the radar. A minute or so later, it came to life, and a car headed for Atlantic City came down the highway twenty-five miles an hour faster than the posted limit.
"You want to ticket him, Major?" Kozniski asked.
"God no, if we pulled him over and a major and two captains got out of the car, we'd give him a heart attack," Knotts said.
The car was filled with chuckles and laughter.
Two minutes later, Kozniski saw in his rearview mirror the flashing lights on top of a patrol car.
"Here comes the car," he said. Knotts got out of the Ford, explained the situation to the trooper, and then got back in.
He looked at his watch as Kozniski got the Ford moving.
"Christ, we're going to be late for the wake," he said. "You better step on it, Gerry."
The Wackenhut rent-a-cop on the Arch Street entrance to the Stockton Place underground garage stooped over and looked into the Ford LTD. Recognizing Louise Dutton, he smiled, went back to his little cubicle, and pushed the button raising the barrier.
Once inside the garage, Peter Wohl parked the LTD beside her yellow Cadillac convertible, and they got out.
She met him at the back of the LTD.
"If you find the time, dear, you might do the ironing," Louise said as she dropped the keys to her apartment in his hand. "But don't wear yourself out."
"What I think I'll do is call Sharon," Peter said.
"You bastard!" she said, and kissed him quickly and got in her Cadillac convertible.
He waited until she had driven out of the underground garage and then walked through the tunnel to the elevators. The call button for the elevator required a key to function, and he had to work his way through half a dozen before he found the right one. And then he had trouble getting into the apartment itself.
He felt strange, once he was inside and had snapped on the lights, and wasn't sure if he was uncomfortable or excited. There was something very personal, very intimate, in being here alone. He took off his jacket and threw it on an overstuffed chair, and then changed his mind and hung it in a closet by the door. There were two fur coats in there, a long one, and one so short it was almost a cape.
That reminded him that his uniform and other things were still in the LTD, so he retraced his steps and carried them up. He carried everything into the bedroom. The bedroom smelled of Louise. There was a display of perfume bottles on her dressing table and he walked to them and squirted a bulb, and then it really smelled like her.
He found the bathroom, voided his bladder, and then took a good look around. The bathtub looked like a small black marble swimming pool. He wondered if it contained a Jacuzzi, and looked for controls, but found none.
What he needed, he decided, was a drink. He went back in the living room and opened doors and found her liquor supply. He carried a bottle of scotch into the kitchen and found ice cubes and made himself a drink. Then he said aloud, "You goddamned voyeur, Wohl," and went back in the bedroom and opened the drawers of her dresser, one at a time. He found the array of underwear erotic; but a rather diligent-one might say professional-search of the premises failed to come up with a photograph or any other evidence, of any other male, young, old, handsome, ugly, or otherwise.
He was pleased. He went to make himself another drink, and then changed his mind. This was a momentous occasion; the most beautiful girl in the world, the love, finally, of his life, was going to welcome him into her bed, and the worst thing he could arrange would be for him to be shit-faced when she came home. No more booze.
Christ! Washington!
Five minutes later, he had relayed the information to Detective Jason Washington that he would have Miss Louise Dutton at the medical examiner's office at eight o'clock the following morning.
Champagne! Why didn't 't I think of that before? I'll have a couple of bottles on ice when she walks in the door.
He put his coat back on and went out in search of champagne. He bought three bottles, instead of two, and two plastic bags of ice, and returned to the apartment. He couldn't find a champagne bucket, so he put the champagne and the ice in the kitchen sink and covered it with a dishcloth. That raised the question of champagne glasses, and a further diligent search came up with some, which apparently had not been washed for years. He washed and rinsed two of them and then polished them with a paper towel.
He was ready. But she would not be here for an hour, an hour and fifteen minutes.
An idea, so ridiculous and absurd on its face that he laughed out loud, popped into his mind.
What the hell, why not?
He went into the bathroom and turned the taps on to fill the marble swimming pool. He saw a glass container with BUBBLE BATH printed on it. If half a cupful of detergent was the proper amount to use for a washerful of dirty clothes, that measure would probably work for a bubble bath. He poured what he estimated to be a half cupful into the tub.
Next, he looked for and found a razor. He examined it carefully. It was a ladies' razor, with a gold-plated head, and a long, pink, curved handle. But the working part of it, the gold-plated device, seemed to be identical to a regular razor. He decided it would do.
He took the cover from the bed, folded it neatly, and then turned a corner of the sheet and blanket down, and finally returned to the bathroom. The swimming pool was now overflowing with bubbles. There were more bubbles than he would have imagined possible.
There was nothing to do about it now, obviously, so he slipped into the water. There were so many bubbles that he had to push them away from his mouth with his hand.
There's room in here for both of us. I wonder how she would read to that suggestion?
There came the sound of a door opening against a lock chain.
Oh, Christ, she came home early! And I put the goddamned chain on the goddamned door!