Murder in Hell's Kitchen (13 page)

15

THERE WERE TWO police cars at the scene when they arrived, and a third arrived half a minute later. Men in blue were swarming around the area and in the combination office and snack bar.

“Detective Bauer?”

“Yes. What's happening?”

He was a uniformed sergeant and he offered his hand to shake hers. “Sgt. Mike Fromm. Nice to meet you. Looks like nobody's here. What can you tell me?”

“John Grant left my hotel about eleven-thirty, give or take ten minutes. We'd been interviewing Jerry Hutchins, the night man here, in connection with several homicides in New York. Hutchins left the station house about eight, eight-thirty. We left later. I don't know what else I can tell you.”

“Hutchins a suspect in your homicides?”

“He was a possible. After we talked to him, it looked more like he could be the next victim or a material witness.”

“Hey, Sarge? I think this could be blood.” The man who called was in front of the doors to the workshop.

Jane and the sergeant jogged over. The uniform shone his light on the stain. It looked as much like blood as any Jane had ever seen.

“Move the light,” she said, “over that way.” She pointed toward the far end of the small building.

“Here's another one.” He turned the light toward the scrub brush behind the station.

“John?” Jane called into the blackness. “Jerry? You guys out there?”

“What kind of car was John driving?” the sergeant asked.

“Today it was an unmarked police vehicle.” She looked around.

“It's not here. What about Hutchins?”

“We drove him to the station house. His girlfriend has a small blue car, maybe Japanese. She could have dropped him off and gone home.”

“Or maybe he never came here tonight.”

“Maybe.” Her head was buzzing. “And whoever was waiting for him met John Grant.” She pulled her coat around her. “Someone with a light come with me?”

The three moved into a standard search pattern, arm'slength distance from each other, the uniforms sweeping their flashlight beams side to side, intersecting in front of Jane. As she walked, she kept calling the men's names, kicking an occasional can and stepping on something she'd rather not know the nature of. Twenty or thirty feet behind the small building was a stand of trees, preventing them from seeing what lay beyond.

When they reached the trees, they stopped. “Let's keep going,” she said. “You have any idea how far the trees go?”

Neither of them did.

Walking was harder now, little saplings poking out of the earth, slippery leaves hiding roots and debris that could trip them. She wondered what poison ivy looked like.

“Look at this,” the man on her right said. His light pinpointed a stain on some compacted leaves.

Jane knelt and looked at it closely. “I think it's blood.” She stood and looked around. “John? It's Jane Bauer here. Jerry? Let us know where you are.”

They stayed still for a moment as the two lights swept the woods.

“You hear that?” the man on her left said.

“Yes. Over there.”

They walked diagonally left. It had been a moan, or at least a faint sound from a human throat.

“There he is!” The man on her left charged forward, and they followed, dodging branches. “It's Detective Grant,” the uniform called.

Thank God. “Get Sergeant Fromm,” she told the uniform beside her, “and call for a bus. Ambulance,” she amended, not sure what the lingo was in the Midwest. Then she saw John Grant. He lay twisted on leaves and branches, as though his fall had been broken awkwardly and painfully. She got down beside him. “It's OK, John. We're getting you to a hospital.” She pulled off her coat and folded it under his head. His hair had twigs and leaves in it, which she brushed away.

“Looks like a bullet in his thigh,” the uniform said. “There's a lot of blood.”

She took John's hand and squeezed it. He squeezed it back with only a small amount of pressure. “Hang in there,” she said softly, her mouth near his ear.

The uniform had taken off his jacket, and they covered John and heard him make a sound. Then they heard a distant siren.

Mrs. Grant met them at the hospital. She was about his age, graying, and very frightened.

“Thank goodness you called me,” Jane said.

“He's very good about letting me know where he is and when he's coming home. I woke up and he wasn't there, and I didn't know what to do.”

“You did the right thing. He was shot in the leg and there's a possibility there's another wound, but we'll find that out. He's lost some blood, and it was cold out there.”

“I can give him blood,” his wife said. “We're the same type. I wish they'd let me see him.”

“They will. Come and sit down.”

“What is all this about? John's never been shot before. I don't think he's ever drawn his gun.”

His gun had been missing. “We were interviewing a possible suspect in a New York homicide earlier in the evening.”

“Why was John at that gas station?”

“The man we were talking to worked there at night. John wanted to make sure he was at work.”

“Where is he now?”

“We don't know.” They had combed the woods and not found Jerry Hutchins, dead or alive. Two uniforms had been dispatched to Cory Blanding's apartment, but there was no word yet.

Sgt. Mike Fromm came into the waiting area and went directly to Mrs. Grant. They hugged and he comforted her, telling her John would be fine and they would let her see him very soon.

Then he turned to Jane. “I just got a call from the men who went to the Blanding woman's apartment. Hutchins isn't there.”

“Did he go to work tonight?”

“I'm waiting to hear.”

“Hutchins may have shot John and taken off in John's car.”

“With John's gun.”

“Yes.” She shook her head. “We were both almost convinced he was a possible victim, not a suspect. Even so, we couldn't hold him.”

“We don't know enough yet. They'll be calling me when they've talked to the Blanding woman.”

“I'd like to talk to her myself, but I want to see John first.”

“It may be a while. He's in surgery. Let me call the men who are talking to her and then let's get over there.” He disappeared around a corner.

Mrs. Grant had been watching them. “Did they find the man who did this to John?”

“No.” Jane took a seat beside her. “We're going to talk to the girlfriend of the man we questioned this evening. Is there anyone you want me to call for you?”

“I've called my kids. That's enough for right now.”

“We'll be back to see John later. He probably won't be in any condition to talk when he comes out of surgery anyway.”

Mike Fromm was on his way back. “Let's drive over to the Blanding apartment.” He turned to Helen Grant. “Helen, anything I can get you?”

“I'm fine. Just go before it's too late.”

Cory Blanding was in her nightgown, a maroon velour robe over it. She sat on a sofa in the small living room, her hair disheveled. She looked pale and scared as Jane and Mike Fromm walked into the apartment. “Can you tell me what happened?” she asked in a quavering voice.

“We're looking for Jerry,” Jane said. “He's not at the gas station. Can you tell me where he is?”

She shook her head. “He was there; that's all I know.”

“How do you know?”

“Because Jerry went there.”

“How sure are you?”

“Where else would he go?”

“How did he get to the station, Cory?”

“In the car.”

“How did you get home?”

“He drove me home. Then he went to work.”

“In your blue car?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Is that how he usually gets to work?”

“Most of the time. He gets home about six-thirty in the morning, and then I take the car to work. Unless he needs it during the day.”

“We'll have to put an alarm out for the car,” Jane said.

Mike Fromm took the information from Cory. Cory got up to get her bag to find the license plate and VIN numbers. When she sat down, the sergeant went to the phone and called it in.

“What time did Jerry drop you off tonight?” Jane asked.

“I don't know. We had a quick bite when we left the police station. Then we came home. Then he left. Nine-thirty maybe?”

“How do you know he went to the gas station?”

“Where else would he go?” she asked for the second time.

South Dakota, Jane thought. Iowa. California. “Did you talk to him after he went to work?”

Cory thought a minute. “Yeah. He called me.”

“You're sure he called you, not the other way around?”

“I'm sure, yes, I'm sure.” She seemed overwhelmed. “Why are you asking me these questions? Where's Jerry?”

“We don't know where he is. We want to find him. You're sure you didn't call him, right?”

“He called me. I was getting ready for bed. I remember I turned down the TV when the phone rang.”

“How long did you talk?”

“A couple of minutes. He usually calls me about that time.”

“What time?”

“Eleven-thirty. Twelve o'clock.”

“Are you cold, Cory?” Jane asked. The girl seemed to be shivering.

“I'm freezing. I didn't turn the heat up when I got out of bed.”

“You want to turn it up now?”

She got up from the sofa and went to the wall near the front door. She moved something on the thermostat, then came back to the sofa, hugging the robe around her. “It'll take a while,” she said.

Jane kept her coat on. It still had debris from the woods clinging to it, but it kept her warm. “What did Jerry tell you about our interview with him?”

“He said he told you everything he knew, how he'd been so scared he'd be the next one killed, how he thought someone was living in that empty apartment in New York, everything.”

“Did you know all about it before tonight?”

“Yeah. I knew. He told me a long time ago. And we talked about it sometimes.”

“Suppose you tell us everything that Jerry told you about what happened in New York.”

She exhaled, looking annoyed, if not angry. Then she set her lips. Then she started her story.

She didn't remember the names of most of the players, but she had the story substantially accurate, starting with the discovery of Arlen Quill's body and finishing with Jerry's return to Omaha. They had known each other before he left, and they had talked about Cory joining him in New York, but it had never happened. About the time she had seriously considered moving east, Henry Soderberg had been found dead, and sometime after that Jerry moved out. There was too much upheaval in his life at that point for him to take on a live-in girlfriend, which meant finding a new apartment that would be suitable. Also, he was scared for a long time, both for himself and for anyone living with him. There had been too many deaths, he told her, too much that was unexplained. And he just didn't understand what was going on.

“What did he do when he came back here?” Jane asked.

“He stayed with his mother for a while. Then he moved in with me.”

“Where's his mother now?”

“She died. It was very sudden.”

“Is that when he moved in with you?”

“A little while after that, yeah.”

“Does he have brothers and sisters?”

“No. There's just Jerry.”

“Does he have a good friend that he might go to if he was in trouble?”

“There's a couple, Richie Strohman and Carl Gibbs.”

“We'll need their addresses and phone numbers.”

She got up and went to the kitchen, returning with a piece of paper she had written on. “He's not with them,” she said. “He would know you'd look for him there.”

Jane thought she was probably right, but it had to be checked out. “What about old girlfriends?” she asked.

Cory set her lips again. “I don't know anything about them.”

“He keep an address book?”

“I don't think so.”

“Cory, if you know a name—”

“I don't. I don't.” She was almost shouting. “What's happened to Jerry? What have you people done to him? Where's my car? How am I supposed to get to work in the morning?”

“We're looking for your car. As soon as we find it, we'll let you know.”

“This is a nightmare,” Cory said, her voice breaking. “Yesterday we were just two people living together, and today Jerry is missing and I'm in the middle of a bad dream.”

“I know, and we're trying to help, but we have to find out if Jerry took off or if someone took him away.”

“Why would anyone do that?” There were tears on her face. “Why would anyone want to hurt Jerry?”

Mike Fromm, who had been standing somewhere behind Jane, came forward and sat in the chair that matched hers. He leaned toward her. “It's possible he just decided to get away,” he said in a soothing voice.

“He wouldn't leave me.”

“The problem is, we have two cars missing from the gas station, yours and one belonging to Detective Grant, who went to check up on Jerry. It's hard to explain the disappearance of two cars unless there are two drivers. If Jerry drove off, maybe because he was scared after being interviewed at the police station tonight, that would account for one of the cars. Does Jerry own a gun?”

“A gun? No. Why?”

“He might have thought he needed it for protection.”

“He never owned a gun. I wouldn't let him own a gun in this apartment.”

“Maybe he kept it hidden,” Mike Fromm said. “Maybe he came back to the apartment with you after dinner and picked it up.”