Blood Passage (26 page)

“
A lot of dirt and shit on his clothes,” Karen said.

“
Yeah,” Butternut agreed, “and on the soles of his shoes as well. There’s a bit in the trunk, but we figure it was transferred there from the primary scene.”

“
Transferred from him to the trunk while he was being transported.”

“
That’d be my guess,” Butternut said.

“
If he was beat up at the primary scene before being shot,” Hank said, “he probably picked it up while rolling around on the ground.”

“
At least he won’t have to face the dry cleaning bill,” Byrne said.

Karen crouched down for a closer look. “Exit wound,” she said, pointing to the back of ShonDale’s thigh. “Through and through.”

Hank nodded. “Like Martin Liu.”

“
But we’ve got these two waiting for us,” Easton said, pointing at the head.

“
Nine mil, no doubt, from the Beretta over there.” Karen glanced at the gun that had been left next to the victim’s wallet. “Anything on his hands? Under the nails?”

“
I looked before we bagged them, but it’s not hopeful,” Butternut said. “He’s wearing a Rolex and some nice rings, so robbery would seem to be out.”

“
Maybe we’ll find something under his nails during the post,” Easton said, “but I doubt it. Logically, if his hands were bound while he was being held at gunpoint, which you’d figure, given how big he is, there’d be no chance for him to defend himself while he was being tossed around. So I doubt we’ll find anything under his nails to connect him to the perpetrator.”

“
What’d he have with him?” Hank asked.

“
Key ring with four keys in his front left trousers pocket,” Byrne recited, “a tissue, front right trousers pocket, package of spearmint chewing gum, front right trousers pocket, two pieces of gum missing. The watch. The rings. Two twenty-six in the wallet, plus four credit cards.”

“
No electronics?” Hank looked at Karen. “No cell phone? No iPod?”

She shook her head. “Nope.”

Byrne said, “Maybe taken by the killer.” He began to examine the flip side of ShonDale’s corpse.

Hank looked up. “I wonder what they have on the ownership of the car.”

“
Let’s go ask.” Karen led the way along the path of green versa-cones to the car where Sergeant Daravicius stood watching the crime scene technicians finish processing it.

“
Funny you should ask,” Daravicius said when Karen put the question to him, “I just got the update. Car is registered to a Victor Peter Danati, 1476 Juniper Lane, DOB six-twelve-sixty. Works as a night maintenance man at the Eastbank Mall across the bridge in Strathton. We called the home phone number and got his wife out of bed, said her husband took the car to work. Got the work number and spoke to Danati, who said he punched in at ten p.m. and had no idea the car was gone from the parking lot. Thought it was a practical joke at first.”

“
So we’re looking at a professional job,” Karen said. “Steal a car, whack the guy somewhere quiet, transport the body over here and dump it, leave the gun and drugs, leave the car, bug out.”

Hank looked at the abandoned building in front of which the car had been parked. The windows were boarded up with plywood on every story up to the roof. He took a step back, looked into the alley at the windows of the Biltmore Arms and saw that several lights were on. Had anyone been awake at the time of the murder?

“
Who were the responding officers, Sergeant?”

“
Johnson and Whitefish.”

“
They see any lights on in the apartment building when they arrived?”

“
You mean lights on the side facing the alley?”

“
Yeah.”

“
Good question. I don’t know.” He lifted his radio. “Johnson, you copy?”

“
Yeah, Sarge,” the radio buzzed.

“
Come here a sec, will ya?”

A police officer detached himself from a small knot of officers interviewing bystanders at the barricade and walked over to them. He was a slight African-American in his late thirties who walked like a cop and gave Hank and Karen the once-over like a cop, slowly, thoroughly and dispassionately.

“
Johnson, this is Lieutenant Donaghue and Detective Stainer,” Daravicius said. “They’ve got a few questions for you.”

Johnson nodded. He appeared to be waiting for the sort of nit-picking, condescending criticism that responding officers occasionally received from investigating detectives.

“
When you and your partner arrived and secured the scene,” Hank said, “did you notice any lights on in any of the windows on the alley side of the apartment building?”

Johnson’s eye’s involuntarily flicked up to the building. “Yeah, there was one.”

“
Where was it?”

“
Between the two dumpsters,” Johnson replied, “five or six floors up. Hang on, I wrote it in my notebook.” He took it out and flipped it open. The pages already used were held together with an elastic band so he could immediately open the notebook to the first blank page available for that day. He flipped forward a page. “Here it is. Sixth floor.”

Hank wrote it in his notebook. Then he remembered there had been eyewitnesses four years ago, an old woman and her grandson. They’d seen the body from their bathroom window, hadn’t they? He turned back a few pages to look through the notes he’d made while re-reading the Liu murder book. Yeah, there it was. Mrs. Ethel Williams and her 14-year-old grandson, Millard. She’d seen the body from her bathroom window in apartment 605 and sent Millard down to take a look. Was it possible they’d seen something again this time? It was the same floor.

“
You said your officers are going door to door in the Biltmore right now, Sergeant. Anybody covered the sixth floor yet?”

Daravicius checked on his radio and then shook his head. “Not yet. We’ve covered the basement to the third so far.”

“
That’s the same floor as the old woman who was a Liu witness four years ago,” Hank said to Karen. “How about I take a walk while you continue down here?”

“
Sounds good,” Karen said.

“
Can I borrow Officer Johnson?” Hank asked.

The sergeant glanced over at the far barrier and saw that the other patrol officers had pretty much finished questioning the spectators who stood there watching the scene. “Be my guest,” he said.

“
This way, Officer,” Hank said to Johnson. He led the way past the alley entrance and through the heavy walnut front door of the Biltmore Arms. On his right was a long row of mailboxes. Only a few had names written in different colors of ink on pieces of paper or cardboard. There were three names over boxes numbered in the six hundreds, and none of them was Williams. He pushed through the inner door and went over to the elevator. A handwritten sign said that it was out of order. Sighing, Hank started up the stairs. The air stank of mildew, urine, curry, burned toast, stale vomit, and a medley of other smells that Hank tried to block out. He turned back over his shoulder.

“
What’s your first name, Officer Johnson?”

“
Robert.”

“
Like the blues man.”

“
Yeah.”

“
You like the blues?”

Johnson shook his head. “Country music.”

Hank continued up the stairs. After an eternity they reached the sixth floor.

“
So it’ll be about half way down,” Hank said. “Apartment 605.”

He reached the door and knocked as Johnson took up a position on the other side of the doorframe and casually unholstered his weapon.

The door abruptly opened. A short, slight African-American man in his early twenties stood there with his hand on his hip, glaring at them. He wore a purple robe and his feet were bare. He had short hair and a trimmed beard. A lit cigarette jutted from the corner of his mouth and he was squinting against the smoke that curled from its glowing end.

“
What the hell’s going on around here tonight, anyway?” he demanded before Hank could open his mouth.

“
Police, sir,” Hank said, holding up his badge. “Sorry to disturb you. Have you been awake for a while tonight?”

“
Hell, yeah,” the man replied. “Goddamned insomnia. Why? What’s going on?”

“
Is there a Mrs. Ethel Williams or a Millard Williams who lives in this apartment?”

“
Don’t know no Williams, there’s just me. Been here four months now and damned if I’m going to stay. I might as well try to sleep in a damn bus station as sleep around this damn place.”

“
What’s your name, sir?”

“
Harden. Marcus Harden. Why?”

“
Did you happen to see or hear anything outside in the alley tonight, Mr. Harden? Maybe around midnight or so?”

“
Looked out and saw you dickin’ around down there,” he said to Officer Johnson, “then saw when the other guys came and set up all the goddamned lights and shit, clacking and banging like they were getting ready for a party or something.”

“
Anything before that? Before the police arrived?”

“
No, I was reading in bed until you guys started crashing around.”

“
Reading,” Hank said. “What were you reading?”

“
Fuck you care?”

“
Humor me,” Hank said.

Harden left the door and came back a moment later with a large text book in his hand, which he held up so that Hank could see the title on the front cover:
Tietz Textbook of Clinical Chemistry and Molecular Diagnostics
. “I’m half-way through the section right now on analytes,” he said in a condescending tone. “Porphyrins and disorders of porphyrin metabolism.” He looked at Johnson and back at Hank. “Not that you’d know what a porphyrin is, but we’re talking about organic compounds that provide the basis for hemoglobin, chlorophyll and some enzymes.”

“
You’re a student?”

“
Uh huh. So what the hell’s going on out there?”

“
There’s been a death,” Hank said. “We need to question everyone in the building.”

“
Like I said, man, I didn’t see or hear nothing until you folks started raising hell.”

“
Well, we’re sorry to have bothered you, Mr. Harden,” Hank said. “Another officer will be by shortly to take your statement in more detail. Sorry for the disturbance.”

“
What-fuckin-ever.” Harden closed the door abruptly.

“
We’re supposed to believe he’s still got insomnia after reading that book?” Johnson said.

Hank started to turn back the way they had come when he noticed the door to the next apartment down the hallway was open a crack. He caught Johnson’s eye and pointed, then slowly made his way down to apartment 607. Hank stopped in front of the door and saw a pair of eyes staring out at him.

“
Hello there,” he said, “police. Can we talk to you for a minute?”

The door opened slightly to reveal a tiny, wizened old man wearing pajamas, a black silk robe and red plaid carpet slippers. His skin was the color of dark chocolate, his hair was snow white, and the hand holding the door was small and delicate. “I didn’t hear anything.”

“
Hello, sir,” Hank said, holding up his badge. “Could you open the door all the way, please? We’d like to talk to you for a second.”

“
All right.” The door opened fully and the old man stepped back. “Would you like to come in?”

“
Just for a moment,” Hank said, crossing the threshold into a cluttered living room. He looked over his shoulder and nodded to Johnson that he could return his gun to its holster. “My name is Lieutenant Donaghue and this is Officer Johnson. What’s your name, sir?”

The old man looked at Johnson and nodded, then met Hank’s gaze. “Randolph Jenkins. What’s going on, Lieutenant?”

“
A body was found in the alley,” Hank said. “Did you hear or see anything tonight, perhaps around midnight or so?”

Jenkins gravely shook his head. “As I said before, I didn’t hear anything.”

“
How long have you lived here, Mr. Jenkins?”

The old man looked down, pursing his lips. “Oh, now, I suppose about eighteen years, it would be. I’m seventy-eight, I came here after I retired at the age of sixty, so, yes, that would be about right. I was a librarian. I dabble in used books now.”

“
You remember Mrs. Ethel Williams, used to live next door?”

“
Oh yes, lovely woman. She moved out at the end of last November, went to live with a cousin in Baltimore. Did you need to get in touch with her, is that it?”

Hank shook his head. “No, she was a witness to a homicide four years ago in the alley outside. Do you remember that?”

Jenkins nodded gravely. “I do. Very sad. Unfortunately I didn’t see anything that time, either.”

“
What about Mrs. Williams’s grandson, Millard. Is he still around?”

“
No,” Jenkins sighed. “He was shot to death coming home from school. That’s why Ethel decided to move away. She just couldn’t bear to be around here any more with all the bad memories.”

“
I see. That’s too bad.” Hank paused. “You live alone, Mr. Jenkins?”

The old man hesitated.

“
Mr. Jenkins?”

He put his hands into the pockets of his silk robe and looked at the floor. “My son Charley lives with me. But he didn’t hear anything, either.”