In the confidential records maintained on him in the high-school files he was recorded as being highly intelligent, imaginative, a poor organizer, poorly adjusted socially, no athletic ability, inclined to be argumentative and sarcastic. Dedicated teachers considered this limp, spindly, myopic gangling, acned, large-headed, unorganized child a challenge. The journeyman teacher was delighted to pass him through the course and be rid of him. His more muscular contemporaries believed they could make of him a more socially desirable citizen by beating him on the head at every opportunity. But they could never whip him past the point where he could still wipe his bloody mouth and in iciest contempt call them peasants.
His two sisters thought of him as an almost unendurable social handicap. His parents were baffled by him.
Carl Lartch was not confused at all. He had read his way through better than half the books in the Laughlintown library. The world of the books was infinitely more satisfying than the world around him. He kept a private secret journal and wrote his opinions and impressions in it, comfortably aware of the danger that, should it ever be made public in his home town, the reaction would be murderous. A recent exposure to early Mencken had solidified his contempt for the booboisie. His was a total confidence that one day the people of Laughlintown would be astonished that such a man could have once lived among them, and so gratified even his continuing contempt for them would be a welcome recognition of the place of his birth.
On this particular summer Carl had learned that books could be made even more enjoyable if devoured far from the foolish clatter of mankind, and so on every day when the weather was favorable, he would load books, his private journal, his peanut butter sandwiches and his Thermos of milk into the basket on the front of his bike and pump his way up into the hills.
On Monday morning, the twenty-seventh day of July, Carl pedaled up the long slopes of highway, panting audibly by the time he came to his turnoff, a sandy road that was wide and clear for a hundred yards before it faded away to an impassable track. As he rested, before hiding his bike in the brush, he noted that a car had turned around with some difficulty and gone back out, leaving the only set of fresh tracks since the last rain. He also saw a jumble of footprints. Picnickers or neckers, he thought. It was correct to assume their activities were trivial, whatever they were.
He hid his bike and, clasping his packaged possessions, went down the short, steep slope from the road to a fast, wide, noisy brook, crossed by stepping from stone to stone, and climbed the long hill beyond the brook until, winded once more, he came to his favorite place, level, grassy, shaded by old trees. From there he could see for miles but it was a view undefiled by man, consisting of only the gentle contours of the uncontaminated hills.
He spent the long summer day in reading, writing and peaceful contemplation. When he was finally warned by the angle of the sun, he gathered up his things, took a look at his private landscape, and trudged back down to the creek. His view was obscured by the brush that grew on the hillside. Sometimes he angled to avoid especially steep places. Consequently he came out at the creek at least thirty yards downstream from where he had crossed in the morning.
As he crossed the creek he noticed something out of the corner of his eye, not far away. He turned and saw, sprawled against the small round boulders at the water’s edge, the silent, lovely symmetry of a woman’s legs, a soiled white skirt wrenched upward to mid-thigh, a quiet curve of back in close-fitting green, a hand stubbed cruelly against a boulder, wedged there by her weight. The face was hidden, but the water, moving with chill insistence around a small pebbled curve, tugged with endless persistence at a floating strand of blond hair.
He stared, then burst up the abrupt bank in front of him, running wildly toward the hidden bicycle. But as he ran he began to realize that his reactions were not suitable to a Villon, a Mencken, a Christopher Fry. Detachment was the epic quality of his whole galaxy of heroes. And so he stopped and turned and went slowly back to the woman and knelt there for a moment, studying her closely. He then reclimbed the bank and began to saunter toward home. After he had reached the highway, he remembered his bicycle. Once he had retrieved the bicycle, the empty basket reminded him of his books. By retracing his steps he found them beside the creek.
He was able to coast a good part of the way to Laughlintown. He went directly to the police station and strolled in.
“I should like to report something,” he said haughtily to a bored shirtsleeved man working at a scarred desk, typing a report with two fingers.
The officer looked at him with growing distaste. “Report what, kid?”
“Perhaps twenty minutes ago I found the body of a woman up in the hills. She’s either dead or seriously injured. She’s blond, barefoot, possibly in her twenties, wearing a white skirt and a green blouse. From tracks on a sand road near where she’s lying, I’d say she’s been there since last night.”
After a few moments of astonishment, the officer jumped to his feet and said, “Tell me exactly where you saw this woman, kid!”
“We could be there before I could possibly explain to you how to get there. So why don’t you get a doctor and an ambulance and more officers if you need them, and I’ll ride in the lead vehicle and show you the way.”
“If this is some kind of a gag...”
Carl said icily, “If I enjoyed jokes, I’d think up better ones than this.”
It went well because it was handled by experts, and because the plan was flexible, imaginative and airtight. And there had been advance warning from so high a place that it was taken seriously.
The instructions from the control centers were monitored and recorded, and so this particular pickup was sufficiently well documented to become a classic — written up in the mass magazines, and used as a case study in the police schools.
When a pickup is badly handled, it becomes a bloody, dramatic, unorganized thing. Where it is done properly, it can happen so quietly that people ten feet away are unaware of it.
This pickup presented a unique problem. A high-speed, high-density, limited-access highway is no place for heroics with sirens. A car can’t be forced over onto the shoulder without the risk of a gigantic pile-up. A chase could result in heavy casualties among the innocents on vacation. And so it was decided that it had to be a stalk, a stalk so discreet that the prey would be lulled into a place where they could be taken quietly. It could be assumed that if it was fumbled, their desperation could result in explosive violence. And it was assumed the vehicle was a rolling arsenal. There can be no room for optimism in such an operation.
At 5:22 the target car entered the Pennsylvania Turnpike at Station 22 at Morgantown. The attendant phoned the nearest control center immediately and reported the license number. It checked out as a car reported stolen in the Pittsburgh area Sunday night. As any law enforcement agency will confirm, plate numbers and descriptions of stolen cars are constantly circulated, but they are next to useless in apprehending car thieves. The volume is just too great. A very few patrol officers with excellent memories make a hobby of constantly checking for stolen vehicles as a way of combating the boredom of patrol, but generally speaking, if a stolen car is operated in a legal manner by a person who does not excite suspicion, apprehension is exceedingly rare. Routine checks of operators’ licenses, arrest due to traffic violations, and abandonment of the vehicle are the usual channels through which recovery is made.
In this instance the check of the license against the latest theft list was an additional confirmation of the identity of the vehicle.