Here Comes the Corpse

by Mark Richard Zubro

  Detective Hoge asked, “How well do you actually know your nephew? He lives in Georgia. You’re here. Does he visit you often?”

  “No,” Scott said.

  Rohter said, “We want to talk to the nephew and draw our own conclusions. If he didn’t kill him, there’s got to be a damn good reason why his bloody fingerprint is on that john wall. Donny Carpenter was certainly there before Ethan Gahain died, and we didn’t get any call until we got yours. We’ve checked all the 911 tapes and all other emergency calls. Nothing. The kid might have saved a life.”

  Scott said, “I think that’s the worst part of this. Even if it wouldn’t have saved him, walking out on an injured person was an awful thing to do.”

  “Donny couldn’t have killed Macintire in St. Louis. His plane ticket stub said Atlanta to Chicago one-way. He’d have had to go to St. Louis and back to Georgia. He’s only fifteen. That’s a heck of a lot of running around for a kid.”

  “But not impossible,” Hoge said.

  Rohter said, “The St. Louis police believe there are some key parts of the operation missing. These photos might be part of that. Some financial records are missing. They can’t find the model releases.”

  “Were they going to have lots of those?” I asked.

  “Not for the athlete stuff, but for the videos they made, yeah. Not having the names of who was in the videos sure makes it look like somebody took them. The killer might have wanted to cover up something.”

  “Are you sure they even had them?” I asked.

  “A couple people have come forward. They’ve confirmed signing them and making statements for the camera that they were making the film of their own free will.”

  Hoge said, “Trying to figure out who they all are by their pictures is going to take forever. Some may never be identified.”

  “Whose gun was it that was used on Cormac?” Scott asked.

  “The police say Cormac had a permit for the same type of gun they found.”

  “Was it definitely murder or did he commit suicide?” I asked.

  “They found powder residue on his hand. It looks like suicide, except they also found bits of skin under two of his fingernails. He fought back against somebody. When we get a suspect, we’ll be able to match DNA. It makes sense that whoever he fought against would be the killer.”

  I said, “This had to have been blackmail.”

  “Yeah,” Scott agreed, “but why? Everything in St. Louis sure looked profitable enough.”

  I said, “For some people there’s never enough profit.”

  “Maybe they wanted something else,” Scott said.

  “But what?” Rohter asked. “We haven’t been able to find any connecting motive.”

  “I know you’re going to look in the condo here,” I said, “but you won’t find any clues there. We sure didn’t see anything.”

  “Unless you were busy covering up for yourselves,” Rohter said.

  “Am I really a suspect?” I asked.

  “We don’t rule anybody out, ever,” Rohter said. “I’m not putting you on the top of any suspect list, but I wouldn’t suggest finding any more bodies for a few days at least. I tend to get testy the more bodies somebody finds.”

  I said, “I’ll do my best to keep clear of falling corpses.”

  Everybody left.

  25

  We had a message at the service from Scott’s reporter friend, Doug Clangborn. We called him on the speakerphone.

  “Have you guys heard anything about a live Internet Web site Ethan Gahain was supposedly running?”

  I told him the two we knew about.

  “Neither of those,” he said. “This was supposedly all masturbation all the time.”

  “You’re kidding,” Scott said.

  “Nope. It’s supposed to be a real Web site. Everybody here’s been trying to find it. We’ve looked under all kinds of key words starting with masturbation and every synonym we can think of for that word. We’ve looked under Ethan’s name and anyone’s name connected with the case. Nothing so far.”

  “Where’d you get the rumor from?” I asked.

  “Sources.”

  Weren’t amateur sleuths traditionally good friends with reporters? Didn’t everybody cheerfully reveal their secret sources to them? There’s got to be a union to complain to about this kind of treatment.

  “What good does it do to find the Web site?” Scott asked.

  “It’s another part of the whole,” Clangborn said.

  “Don’t some people have cameras on themselves all the time?”

  “Twenty-four seven,” Clangborn said.

  I’d vowed to beat into insensibility the next person I heard say that. Unfortunately, reaching through the phone was not an option.

  “Huge numbers of those people who put themselves on the web must have sex and masturbate,” I said. “How many of them are involved in a murder investigation? The people who he got to appear on the site wouldn’t have much reason to kill them. Assumedly if they’re appearing live, it’s a choice. Porn is always a good thing to mix in with murder, and a blackmail angle makes sense. Hell, simple embarrassment at doing something stupid and wanting to cover it up could be a reason.”

  Scott said, “Didn’t that kid in the movie American Pie have a camera set up?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “It wouldn’t be all that complicated.” I called the cops and left a message about what we’d just heard.

  We went to the electronics room and turned on the computer. We surfed the Net looking for the masturbation site. We found Ethan’s basic Web sites easily enough. There were a lot of links to a lot of pornographic things, kinky and unkinky. Nothing about all masturbation all the time.

  After half an hour of some fairly salacious viewing, Scott said, “You’d think they’d want people to find the site.”

  “They must. If it exists.”

  We called Jack Miller’s pager number. He’d managed to set up a meeting with a porn expert.

  He told us, “Somebody’s got hold of a bunch of the tapes and is putting them on the Internet.”

  He gave us that URL. We punched it in while we talked. Miller said, “They take a while to download and for some of them you’ve got to have a pretty sophisticated computer. The universities involved have that. You’ve got some angry young jocks coming out of the woodwork.”

  “I still don’t get that,” Scott said. “I wouldn’t want somebody to see me naked changing clothes, but I’m not sure I’d be pissed off about somebody seeing me naked changing clothes. There’s nothing I did to plan it. There’s nothing I can do to stop it now. Why fight it? Why get angry? Why even care? Even if I was running for some public office and somebody saw me naked in pictures taken without my consent, who is going to give a rat’s ass?”

  Miller agreed and added, “I’ve got the URL number for that all-masturbation Web site.”

  “Everybody up here has been frantically searching for it.”

  “My guy in St. Louis found it.” He gave us that URL. Scott called it up while we talked.

  I said, “This had to be an awful big operation to have it run continuously. It couldn’t just be three guys.”

  Miller said, “Do you have it there?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You can see that it wasn’t quite as continuously live as rumors claimed it to be. They did lots of live things in the past. They ran a whole lot of ads for their other stuff interspersed with printed interviews, pictures, older videos, clips from upcoming productions. They didn’t have a new person doing some kind of sexual thing every minute. They didn’t go from live orgasm to live orgasm, although they did that sometimes. Most often they’d tape folks. You’ve got people using the Internet for porn the way they used to use magazines. It’s just more uncomfortable sitting up in a chair whacking off than it is lying down in bed with a magazine.”

  “Porn Positions 101,” I said. “A required course for technology sexuality.”

  “They did a lot of those solo
jack-off things where the guys beat off. Before the guys would undress, they’d talk to them about sexual activity. A lot of the athletes have tuned in to the site. They’ve got herds of lawyers trying to get it shut down. The actual physical broadcast site could be anywhere on the planet.”

  I said, “They’ve got to be able to track it down. There’s got to be a provider like AOL or something.”

  “Ain’t necessarily so,” Miller said. “For whatever reason, it hasn’t been shut down yet and the world is tuning in to watch masturbation. The kinkiest stuff I’ve seen advertised is for several sets of twins, both genders, making love with themselves and others.”

  I asked, “Do you have reason to believe something kinky led to the murder?”

  “No.”

  I asked, “Does this fourth site use the athlete videos?”

  “There seem to be several separate sets of materials. So far on the first two sites they’ve found video of four professional and seven amateur athletes who in their college days changed clothes. We’re getting some of the same reactions as you did from those guys you talked to earlier. Some want residuals for showing their studly selves. Some want to sue. Some are outraged, or at least they think the public wants them to be outraged.”

  “Who are the most outraged?” I asked.

  “There’s a few guys who are talking about going to Mr. Gahain’s wake and having a protest.”

  “I doubt if anything will come of that,” I said. “Most athletes talk big about doing brave things, but they really aren’t very political.”

  “Think Steve Largent,” Scott suggested.

  “Think moronic twit,” I suggested.

  Miller said, “I’ve got a contact in the porn world for you to interview. He wouldn’t talk to me. I mentioned your name. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised that Scott’s name got you an interview. Unfortunately, along with the name, it’s going to require an in-person appearance. You’re not afraid the guy would use this to blackmail you?”

  “Star baseball player meets with prominent porn person,” I said. “I can see the headlines.” I told Miller to set it up.

  We explored all the Web sites. They seemed to be filled with a whole lot more glossy ads for themselves, but there were certainly links that you could reach for a credit card number and a fee. We checked a few of them out. In one of the video clips I thought I recognized the fixtures at the condo. After several minutes in several different sites, I said, “I’ve seen naked men before.” Nothing on the sites gave us clues to the murderer.

  26

  We drove to Caribou Coffee on Broadway to meet with Jack Miller’s porn connection. We found him waiting outside the door. As so often is true, all the tables were filled in the coffee shop, so we walked up to Windy City Sweets several doors north. This is perhaps the warmest, friendliest, and best-stocked candy store in town. They also have a few seats inside. We settled down to single-dip ice cream cones on the high wooden chairs.

  Marty Burnes, the porn prima donna in Chicago, reviewed videos for several gay publications under different pseudonyms. I’d read a rumor in the gay press that the last reviewer, a closeted kindergarten teacher, had married a porn star and retired with him to Australia. Burnes had added the gig at the Gay Tribune at that time. The previous writer had also written several sexual-fantasy columns. Burnes was slender and a head shorter than Scott and I. He had skin the color of mocha coffee, heavy on the cream. Not a blemish on it. His hair was thick and black with a slight upsweep in front that was dyed a dark shade of brown. He looked to be in his midtwenties, lean with taut muscles. He had heavy, black eyebrows and white teeth. He smiled at us. He said, “I’ve always wanted to meet a baseball player who was gay. I think every gay guy on the planet wants to meet you.”

  “We’re here for information,” Scott said.

  Burnes looked thoughtful. “I will supply it. It’s just so cool being with a gay icon who is an athlete.”

  “You must have played sports,” I hazarded.

  “Yep, but it’s not the same. I was a soccer fag. Went with my university team to the national championships. We lost, but you, you’re a star.” We did a few more minutes of starjock-sniffing before we got Burnes onto the track we wanted.

  “Pictures, pictures, pictures,” he said. “Did he have any of you?”

  I said, “We found two of me from back in high school. One with me in my football uniform. The other from a pool party when a bunch of kids went skinny-dipping.”

  “That sounds like Ethan.”

  I asked, “What can you tell us?”

  “I know everything there is to know about porn in this city.”

  “What was the deal with Ethan? How did he get started in the business?”

  “Innocently enough. When Ethan was a kid, he let older guys take pictures of him.”

  “Kid? How young?”

  “Certainly high school.” Burnes held up a hand. “Don’t get hyper. Ethan did not take pictures of kids. He told me numerous times he didn’t. Believe me, kiddie porn is dangerous business. I won’t have anything to do with it. No selfrespecting pornographer will. That’s a fast way to go to prison. However, being a subject of the pictures is another thing. Ethan told me how he used to love to turn older guys on, said he made tons of money doing it.”

  Thinking back on it now, I didn’t remember Ethan ever having money problems as a teenager.

  “While Ethan was in college, one of the guys who took pictures of him was retiring from the business. He set up Ethan. Ethan started with his few little videos and an ad or two in some sleazy gay-porn rags. He made a lot of money very quickly, a surprising amount. He just kept taking pictures of stud athletes. Then he found a few guys who were willing to beat off for cash, and the rest, as they say, is history.”

  “If he was making so much money, why did Ethan coach at all?”

  “Respectability? The desire to be among young, muscular, hot men? The chance of seeing gorgeous guys naked up close and personal? He was stupid? He enjoyed coaching? Could be any number of reasons.”

  “Were he and Cormac ever lovers?” Scott asked.

  “Not that I know of. Supposedly, Cormac was not gay. He was hot, a former swimmer who kept in shape. Ethan said his partner was only in it for the money.”

  “Did they have any rivals in the business, fights that you know of?”

  “Not in the porn business. He had problems at Carl Sandburg University with Robert Murphy. That was a classic rivalry.”

  “I knew him slightly from when we were kids. He said he got along fine with Ethan.”

  Burnes gave an unpleasant little laugh. “Robert is a shit. They hated each other. He’s betrayed more people in this town than anyone else. Robert was rich, young, and hot. He and Ethan were bitter rivals in the department.”

  “What was the problem?” I asked.

  “Robert Murphy is the kind of guy who is gay, but who avoids other people who are. He’s the kind who is afraid people will think you are gay if you have a friend who is homosexual.”

  Scott said, “You catch being gay by being in close proximity to someone who is gay?”

  “I think it’s a little more subtle than that for those who are severely closeted, which Robert is. He hated Ethan. If you’re looking for a killer, he’d be a great one to start with, or end with, as the case may be. Ethan found the ins and outs of university politics easy. He was a charmer. Kids in the program liked Ethan better. Ethan was better at recruiting. Robert was the Bobby Knight of Carl Sandburg’s athletic program in all of the negative aspects of that comparison.”

  “Murphy wasn’t invited to the wedding,” I said. “He may have a perfectly legitimate alibi.”

  “You’re sure the killer was invited to the wedding?” Burnes asked.

  “It would make sense logistically.”

  “But are you sure?”

  “Well, no.”

  “You should check Murphy out,” Burnes said.

  “They were rivals,” I s
aid. “What else?”

  “Bitter rivals. The severely closeted are often a big problem. Ethan wasn’t about to tell everyone that Murphy was gay, but Murphy found out about the porn. He threatened to expose Ethan if he didn’t quit teaching. Ethan barely batted an eye. He got an offer from Lafayette and took it. Although that turned out to be kind of a hoot itself.”

  “Why?”

  “There’s a guy down there, Salvatore Fariniti.”

  “We met him.”

  “Hot man. He and Ethan made love. Ethan secretly videotaped it. I told Ethan that was stupid. Ethan claimed he gave the guy the only copy of the tape. I doubt it. Not the way Ethan worked.”

  I asked, “Fariniti knew about the porn operation?”

  “Sure.”

  “He lied to us.”

  “This is a murder investigation. What did you expect?”

  “Was Ethan frightened of these people?”

  “When you’re in an edgy, extreme business such as porn, there’s always a bit of a sense of danger.”

  “But were people after him? Was he more worried lately?”

  “He talked once in a while of getting out of the business. Not often. I didn’t get the impression he was more worried than usual lately, but I hadn’t talked with him in a couple of weeks.”

  “Is the porn mob-connected?” I asked. “Could that have had something to do with the murder?”

  “Let me answer this carefully. The mob is less interested in porn than it used to be. The Internet has gotten porn beyond any single entity’s ability to control it, the U.S. Congress’s beliefs notwithstanding. You can show naked pictures of yourself in your own chat room anytime you feel like it. People can connect with all kinds of people with all kinds of kinks. You don’t need the mob.”

  “But Ethan’s organization was kind of big,” I said. “At least he was making lots of money.”

  “I haven’t heard of any connection between him and the mob. Nor have I heard that the mob was angry at him.”

  “Do you know that for sure?” I asked.