Mason indicated the pile of packing boxes. “I heard them fall just as I was getting out of the elevator,” Holcomb admitted. “How did you know he was there?”
“I didn’t,” Mason said. “I happened to notice that peculiar reddish-brown stain which had seeped through the crack in the bottom of the packing case. I climbed on a box. The box collapsed. I grabbed at the packing case, and the whole pile came down.”
“Where was he?”
“Jammed in that big packing case.”
“Where was it?”
“Up on the very top of the pile.”
Sergeant Holcomb inspected the packing case and said, “He was evidently shoved in there right after he’d been shot.”
“And then put up at the top of the pile,” Mason said.
Holcomb nodded. “That was because they didn’t have a cover for the packing case, and they didn’t want him discovered.”
Mason said, “It’s a cinch he’d be discovered there sooner or later.”