his 1969 Ford van and covered her with a tarpaulin.
'The next thing I knew,' Mrs. Schneider said, 'there was shots, and then breaking glass, and then the van crashed. Then this handsome young cop was looking down at me and smiling and telling me everything was all right; he was a police officer.'
Moments before Officer Payne shot the kidnapper and believed rapistmurderer, according to Mayor Carlucci, the man had attempted to run Payne down with the van, slightly injuring Payne and doing several thousand dollars' worth of damage to Payne's personal automobile.
'Payne then, reluctantly,' Mayor Carlucci said, 'concluded there was no choice but for him to use deadly force, and proceeded to do so. Mrs. Schneider's life was in grave danger and he knew it. I'm proud of him.'
Mayor Carlucci, whose limousine is equipped with police shortwave radios, was en route to his Chestnut Hill home from a Sons of Italy dinner in South Philadelphia when the rescue occurred.
'We were the first car to respond to the 'shots fired' call,' the mayor said. 'Officer Payne was still helping Mrs. Schneider out of the wrecked van when we got there.'
Payne, who is special assistant to Staff Inspector Peter Wohl, commanding officer of the newly formed Special Operations Division, had spent most of the day in Bucks County, where the mutilated body of Miss Elizabeth Woodham, 33, of 300 East Mermaid Lane, Roxborough, had been discovered by State Police in a summer country cottage.
Miss Woodham was abducted from her apartment three days ago by a masked, knife-wielding man. A Bucks County mail carrier had described a man meeting Mr. Warren K. Fletcher's description, and driving a maroon 1969 Ford van identical to the one in which Mrs. Schneider was abducted, as being at a cottage where her body was discovered. Police all over the Delaware Valley were looking for a similar van.
Payne, who had been assigned to work as liaison between ace Homicide detectives Jason Washington and Anthony Harris and Special Operations Division, had gone with Washington to the torture-murder scene in Bucks County.
He spotted the van in the early hours of this morning as he drove to the Chestnut Hill residence of Inspector Wohl to make his report before going off duty.
'He carefully appraised the situation before acting, and decided Mrs. Schneider's very life depended on his acting right then, and alone,' Mayor Carlucci said. 'She rather clearly owes her life to him. I like to think that Officer Payne is typical of the intelligent, welleducated young officers with which Commissioner Czernick and I intend to staff the Special Operations Division.'
Payne, who is a bachelor, recently graduated from the University of Pennsylvania. He declined to answer questions from the press.
'This is going to thrill them in Wallingford,' Matt said, when he had finished reading. 'When they sit down to read the morning paper.'
'Dad already knows,' Amy said. 'I called him and told him.'
'That was smart!' Matt snapped.
'I wanted Dad to know before Mother,' Amy said, unrepentant. 'Matt, do you want me to give you something…'
'I've got it, thanks,' he said, picking up his glass. Then he looked around at all of them. 'Doesn't anyone but me care that the whole article is bullshit?'
'You've undergone a severe emotional trauma,' Amy said.
'Tell me about it,' Matt said. 'But we were-I was-talking about bullshit.'
'I can give you something to help you deal with it,' Amy persisted. ' Liquor won't help.'
'That's what you think,' Matt said. 'Youare talking about the bullshit?'
'I'm talking about the shock you've suffered,' Amy said.
'I'm talking about bullshit,' Matt said. 'I damned near killed that peroxide-blond woman,' Matt said. 'I didn't know she existed until I heard her screaming. I shot that sonofabitch because he tried to run me over. I was not the calm, heroic police officer. I was a terrified and enraged child who had a gun.'
'I don't know what you're talking about,' she said.
'You're right, Amy,' Matt said. 'I am not cut out to be a cop.'
'You don't want to make a decision like that right now, Matty,' Dennis Coughlin said.
'Nobody's listening to me,' Matt said. 'If there is one thing I learned from this is that I am not my father's-my blood father'sson.'
'Matty!' Dennis Coughlin said.
'I was afraid out there,' Matt said. 'Terrified.And insane.'
'That's perfectly understandable under the circumstances,' Dennis Coughlin said.
'I almost killed that woman!' Matt said, angrily. 'Doesn't anybody understand that?'
'You didn't,' Wohl said. 'You didn't. You kept her alive.'
'Did you know I fell asleep on the job tonight?'
'No.'
'Did Washington tell you I fainted when I saw the Woodham body?'
'So what?' Wohl asked.
'Matty,' Dennis Coughlin said. 'Listen to me.'
Matt looked at him.
'I admit, Mickey and the mayor laid it on a little thick,' Coughlin said. 'That it was, excuse me, Amy, bullshit. But so was the story in theLedger. So you're not a hero. But neither is the Police Department as incompetent as Arthur J. Nelson wants the people to think it is. What he's trying to do to us has nothing to do with the truth about the Police. That's pretty rotten. So the bottom line here is you took this critter down. He's not going to rape or murder anyone else. A lot of single young women around town are going to get to sleep tonight. That's all we try to do on the cops, Matty, try to fix things so people can sleep at night. And if they read in the newspapers that we' re all stupid, or on the take, or just can't be trusted… Am I getting through to you?'
'I don't know,' Matt said.
'And as far as your father-your blood father, as you call him- is concerned. He was my best friend. And I know he would be proud of you. I am. You were scared, but you did what had to be done. And there's something else about your father, Matty. They have his picture and his badge hanging in the lobby of the Roundhouse. He's a hero, an officer who got killed in the line of duty. But-I was his best friend, so I can say this-he didn't do his duty. He let that critter kill him. And before we caught him, he killed three civilians. You didn't let this critter kill you. That psychopath isn't going to get to hurt somebody else. In my book that makes you a better cop than your father. That's the bottom line, Matty. Protecting the public. You think about that.'
Matt looked at Coughlin for a moment, then at Wohl, who nodded at him, and then at his sister.
'Matt,' Amy said. 'Maybe you shouldn't be a cop. But now is not the time for you to make that decision.'
'Jesus!' Matt said. 'From you?'
There was a knock at the door. Wohl went to it and pulled it open.
Charley McFadden was standing there, a brown bag in his hand.
'What do you want, McFadden?' Wohl asked.
'It's all right, Peter,' Chief Coughlin said, 'I sent for him.'
'I came as quick as I could,' McFadden said. 'I figured he could use a drink. I didn't know if he had any, so I brung some.'
'Come on in, McFadden,' Dennis Coughlin said. 'We were all just leaving.' He looked Amy Payne in the eye. 'Officer McFadden, Amy, is the man who was about to apprehend Gerald Vincent Gallagher when he fell beneath the train wheels.'
'I wondered who he was,' Amy said.
'He's a friend of mine, Amy, all right?' Matt snapped.
'No offense meant,' Amy said. She looked at Chief Inspector Coughlin.
'I think you're right, Uncle Denny,' she said. 'You don't mind if I call you that, do you?'
'I'm flattered, darling.'
'You take care of him, Mr. McFadden,' Amy said.
'Yeah, sure,' Charley McFadden said. 'Don't worry about it.'
