They went inside and Hodgkins led the way up the creaking wooden steps. Though he appeared composed, excitement urged him on; Carver had to hustle with the cane to keep up with him. Their footsteps and the clatter of the cane echoed in the bare, enameled stairwell, but no one opened a door to peer out at them.
“I was the one that found him,” Hodgkins said over his shoulder. “But I knew enough not to touch anything and mess up the scene. Mizz Jackson had told me she’d be watchin’ the place, so I knew she was parked across the street. I went and told her about what I found, then she phoned you.”
The door to Gretch’s apartment was slightly ajar. Hodgkins, breathing heavily from taking the stairs so fast, stood to the side and let Carver enter first.
Beth was standing and staring out a living room window whose Venetian blinds were raised crookedly. When she heard them enter, she turned. She looked older, but she was calm. The dead weren’t strangers to her.
She said, “In the bedroom, Fred.”
She led the way into Gretch’s bedroom. The first thing Carver noticed was the old blue carpet that had been on the floor, wadded now against the far wall. Sprawled on his back on the bare wood floor was Carl Gretch, his limbs in close to his body but at odd attitudes. His face was so swollen that his eyes were dark slits that looked like folds of pinched flesh. No matter. He wouldn’t need eyes where he was now.
“I seen earlier this mornin’ that his door was open,” Hodgkins said, “so I stuck my head in and called. Didn’t get no answer.” He looked apprehensive and scratched his scalp beneath his gray hair. Dandruff flakes settled on the shoulder of his blue shirt. “I know I shouldn’t have, but I figured maybe somethin’ was wrong, maybe a prowler’d been there, so I went on inside and seen nobody was home and the carpet had been rolled up in here. I knew right away somethin’ was inside it, so I lifted one end and unrolled it, and that’s what fell out.” He nodded toward Gretch’s body.
“What then?” Carver asked.
Hodgkins looked at Beth.
“I saw Mr. Hodgkins staring at my car earlier,” she said, “when he’d come out to empty some trash. So I let him know why I was there. When he found Gretch, he came and got me. That’s when I phoned you.”
Carver supported himself with his cane and leaned down to look more closely at the corpse. Gretch was wearing only white Jockey shorts. He’d fouled them in death. Carver held his breath. There were several ugly dark blotches on Gretch’s thighs and torso, as well as his face, but the skin was unbroken.
“Whaddya figure happened to him?” Hodgkins asked. He was whispering now, as if he feared waking Gretch.
“I think he was rolled up in the carpet and then beaten to death,” Carver said. “It might have taken a long time.”
Hodgkins said, “Jesus H. Christ!”
Beth said, “More likely Beni Ho.”
“Probably,” Carver said. “He could have held a gun on Gretch, or knocked him unconscious, to get him in the carpet. One turn of the carpet and Gretch would have been helpless, like being wrapped in his shroud before he was dead. Then Ho could have his sport.”
“Sick, sick bastard,” Hodgkins said.
“Could anyone have entered the building last night and sneaked into Gretch’s apartment?”
“No reason why not,” Hodgkins said. “In fact, I mighta heard someone on the stairs about two in the mornin’, but I didn’t think nothin’ of it and went back to sleep.”
“The beating itself wouldn’t make much noise, considering Gretch was rolled in the carpet, even if he screamed. But somebody might have heard. Who lives directly beneath this apartment?”
“Old Mrs. Carpenter. She’s deaf as a stone. She sleeps with her hearing aid turned off and wouldn’t have heard cannon shots right next to her bed.”
Beth said, “This building needs better security.”
Hodgkins said, “Hah!” and made a face as if about to spit. But he didn’t. He said, “Tell it to Billy. I have, often enough!”
“Who’s Billy?” she asked.
“The landlord,” Carver said. “He keeps losing Gretch as a tenant, then getting him back.”
“Well,” Hodgkins said, “he ain’t gonna get him back this time. And if he got a security deposit, it’ll be the first time he came out ahead dealing with Gretch.”
“Where from here?” Beth asked Carver, glancing down at Gretch and wrinkling her nose at the odor.
“We phone Desoto and report this to the police.”
“I gonna get in any trouble?” Hodgkins asked. “I mean, for comin’ in here like I did when I found him?”
“You’re the manager and the door was open,” Carver said. “You thought something might be wrong so you investigated. If you’d come in and saved Gretch’s life, you’d be a hero.”
“Or dead,” Beth said.
“Fella can be both,” Hodgkins told her. “I’ll tell the cops that, Carver, case they give me’ any shit.” He stared down at Gretch, looking nauseated and furious. “Gretch was no good,” he said, “but I hate to see anybody die like he did.” He stared at Carver as if angrily seeking answers. “Who’d do somethin’ like this to a man? What kinda person’d be so cold?”
“The kind who might show up as your escort for the evening,” Carver said.
He went to the phone and called Desoto.
The police were at the scene within five minutes. First two polite and efficient uniforms who asked Beth, Carver, and Hodgkins the basic crime scene questions, then requested they stay in the apartment. Then Desoto and two plainclothes detectives. The plainclothes cops took Beth and Hodgkins to Hodgkins’s apartment to take their statements separately. Desoto took Carver’s statement, then said they’d all have to go down to headquarters and repeat them all again for the recorder so they could be transcribed and signed.
Also so any discrepancies in the three statements would be noted, but Desoto didn’t mention that to Carver. They both knew there was no need. Carver understood how the game was played.
“Beni Ho did this,” Carver said, when Desoto had closed his notebook and they were off-the-record.
“Seems that way,” Desoto agreed. The police photographer and assistant medical examiner had finished, and the paramedics passed through the living room carrying Gretch zipped tight in a body bag. Each paramedic had hold of an end of the bag with one clenched fist. Neither man was straining. Gretch had been a small man and wasn’t much of a burden. Not in death, anyway. Carver and Desoto stood silently watching.
“Let’s go outside,” Desoto said. The technicians were still vacuuming the area where the body had been found and dusting the entire apartment for prints, like a-somber and efficient maid service. “We should get outa these people’s way.”
They went downstairs and stood outside the building, where Hodgkins had been standing and smoking when Carver arrived. Two unmarkeds and a cruiser were lined at the curb. The ambulance, lights flashing in the sunlight but siren silent, was pulling away with Gretch’s body. Carver and Desoto watched it turn the corner off of Belt and disappear.
“You gonna talk to Beni Ho?” Carver asked.
“Sure, but if he did Gretch, we both know he’ll have his alibi ready.” Desoto buttoned his caramel-colored suit coat. His tie was tightly knotted and gold cufflinks winked on his white French cuffs. He wasn’t sweating and looked entirely comfortable and at ease, a darkly handsome guy who might have been one of Walton’s catalog models. He said, “Why would Beni Ho kill Gretch?”
“Because Gretch knew something about Mark Winship’s death and he wasn’t a stable character. In fact, he was a flake and a hothead. He might have talked, so killing him was the lesser risk.”
“What about Donna Winship? You think she was murdered too?”
“No,” Carver said. “Hers looks like a genuine suicide.”
“That’s what doesn’t feel right,” Desoto said. “Donna kills herself, then somebody thinks Mark has to die.”
“That’s how it was.”
“Give me a reason.”
“I can’t yet, but I think there is one. After what happened to Gretch, I’m convinced Mark was murdered.”