Текст книги "Third man out"

Автор книги: Richard Stevenson

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 9 (всего у книги 12 страниц)

19

I watched the 8:25 A.M. local-news insert in "Have a Nice Day, USA" on the monitor in the Channel Eight foyer. Troy Pillsbury, the morning anchor, reported on a flaming six-car pileup on the Northway; on Albany judge and Federal Appeals Court nominee

"Pincher" Goerlach's approval in Washington by the Senate Judiciary Committee despite protests from liberal groups over his outbursts from the Albany bench directed at "adherents of deviant lifestyles"; and on the previous evening's bon voyage ceremonies at the Albany airport, where Scooter Raymond was seeing off a schoolgirl and her parents, who were carrying the bird with the broken wing to Minnesota.

After the commercial, Ronnie Linkletter came on and he and Pillsbury acted hugely amused with each other for no reason discernible to viewers. Ronnie predicted continued balmy weather, to which Troy replied, "That's the way we like it." They both chuckled at this mot.

Linkletter had insisted to me on the phone an hour earlier-when I of course threatened him with blackmail if he refused to see me-that I not come to the station. I said I preferred to meet him there-I wanted to check his mud flaps and we could have breakfast somewhere else. When I arrived, I didn't know which of the eight cars in the Channel Eight lot was Linkletter's, but none had damaged, missing, or newly replaced mud flaps, so that was that.

At 8:35 Linkletter came out grinning, still delighted, I guessed, with the Shavian wit of his exchanges with Troy Pillsbury. His smile fell away, though, once we were away from the Channel Eight building and inside my car.

"You're a real asshole," he said. "It isn't bad enough that John Rutka practically ruined me. Now you're going to come after me, too, with his fucking file on me." He looked as if he might burst into tears.

"Look, I just used the files to get your attention. Just answer some questions for me, Ronnie, and I promise you that when John Rutka's killer is caught, the files will be trashed. I'll do it myself."

His sweet boy's face with the button nose and round soft eyes got a stricken look and he struggled for control. "What do you mean, get my attention? What are you trying to get me to tell you? You are blackmailing me!"

"I truly do not want to hurt you, Ronnie, because I know you've been hurt already and you don't need this. Just answer a couple of questions to help me out and that's probably all I'll need from you."

"Probably!"

We had pulled out onto Central Avenue and were headed east in the fuming stop-and-go morning traffic. "What happens next," I said, "all depends on the veracity and the particular nature of your answers. So take care."

"Oh, Jesus."

"The first question is, of course, did you kill John Rutka?"

First he jerked up, as if I'd jabbed him with a pitchfork, and then he began to shake all over. I said, "Does that mean your answer is yes, or no?"

"No! No! Jesus, of course not!"

"You threatened him after he outed you."

Linkletter's slight body writhed in his seat belt. "Well, of course I did. I was fucking out of my mind. The man nearly ruined my life. All I ever wanted was to be in the media, and that asshole almost blew my career right out of the water. Sporkin Communications has let me know-indirectly of course-that when my contract is up next year it might be nice if I had something lined up in Montana or some other diddly-doo minor market. John Rutka was shit. I'm sorry somebody killed him, but he was shit and he deserved to die. I don't mean actually die, but you know what I mean."

I said, "I agree that Rutka did things to people that were all wrong and you were one of those people."

"Then why are you harassing me too?"

"So that I can find out who killed John Rutka and then get rid of the bloody files. Get it?"

"Oh, sure." He looked unimpressed.

"So. Where were you Wednesday night, Ronnie?"

"When Rutka was killed?"

"Yes. Between, say, seven and ten?"

"At a meeting. At the Parmalee Plaza Hotel."

"And Scooter Raymond watched, right?"

That got him with the pitchfork again and he jerked up and then he jerked down. Here I was, taking out my pent-up disgust with the monumental inanity of local television news on this unlucky twerp. I resolved to be more objective with Linkletter from that moment on.

"How do you know about that?" he moaned.

"That wasn't fair, I admit, but I'm trying to evaluate your trustworthiness."

"Maybe somebody should evaluate yours."

He had me there. I pulled off Central into the parking lot of Albany's premier Long Island-style, Athenian-glitz diner and parked at the deserted far end of the lot.

I said, "I talked to Bruno Slinger last night."

"Oh. I guess I'm his alibi and he's mine. And Scooter's too."

"Bruno thinks you're wonderful."

Now some of the tension went out of him and he let loose with a wan little grin. "I know. I think he's wonderful."

I said, "Even though a couple of prime suspects like you and Bruno corroborating each other's alibis wouldn't impress a jury, the fact that people at the hotel saw you coming and going-assuming they did-would probably be enough to establish your whereabouts somewhere other than at the scene of the abduction and murder. And, I guess, Scooter would testify as to your whereabouts."

He got trembly again. "Oh, Jesus, poor Scooter. I shouldn't have let him come. I never liked threesomes, but I knew Bruno wouldn't mind, so I let him talk me into it. If the station finds out about Scooter, they'll have him sweeping the newsroom floor for the rest of the term of his contract. But he wanted to come. He has this thing about watching weathermen being-you know.

Scooter's a little weird."

"Bruno mentioned that. What is it about Bruno you find so attractive, Ronnie?"

A puzzled look. "You don't think he's attractive?"

"That kind of thing is pretty subjective."

"Well, for me it's his charisma."

"That's not a word I'd have come up with for Bruno."

"You know," he said, gesturing vaguely, "his power and glamour. Somebody who's in his natural element when he's in the media eye. Bruno is brilliant and aggressive-and God is he butch. I get goosebumps just thinking about him."

"Have you ever been involved with that type of man before?"

His body tightened. "Sure. I've gotten lucky a couple of times."

I looked at him and said, "Who was the last powerful, butch man in your life?"

Sweat popped out on his forehead and he looked away. "I can't tell you that."

"You can't, or you won't?"

"I can't. And I won't, ever. That subject doesn't have anything to do with John Rutka, so drop it. What else do you want to know?"

"I'm getting the idea there was a connection between your last boyfriend and John Rutka. Maybe his name is in Rutka's file on you. I'll have to go back and check."

He shook his head. "No. He was too careful. There's no way John Rutka could have known about this man. It won't be in my file, I'm sure. You'd be wasting your time with this man. Take my word for it." Sweat was dribbling off his nose.

"In your file," I said, "there's a note that says you were at a certain motel with someone referred to as 'A' once a week for nearly a year up until mid-June. Was that your boyfriend?"

Tears slid down his face. "I can't take this."

"Was 'A' one of his initials?"

He shook his head and wept silently.

I said, "If John Rutka had known about this man and had been preparing to out him, what would the consequences have been?"

He pulled a perfect white handkerchief out of his back pocket and mopped the tears and sweat from his face.

"Awful," he said. "It would have been– Oh, God. Look, I can't talk about this anymore. I really can't."

"Just tell me this, Ronnie. What would this man's reaction have been if he had been outed?"

He sat there for a long moment shaking his head again, when suddenly he gave a furious shudder, yanked up the sleeve of his jacket, and thrust his left wrist in front of my face.

"Do you see that?" he rasped.

I stared at the scar.

"Ten years ago I had enough of a world full of people like you. If you keep pushing me, Strachey, I'll do it again. And I'll leave a note blaming you."

"No need for that," I said.

"I mean it!"

"I can see you do. I believe you."

"And this time nobody will find me."

"Hey, I'm cool."

"Are you going to stop leaning on me?"

"Yup."

"Is that a promise?"

"I promise."

"How can I believe you?" he said desperately, and flung himself back against his seat.

"I'll take you back to Channel Eight now, Ronnie, if that's where you want to go, and I won't bother you anymore. You'll see."

He sat there for another minute catching his breath, while I spoke to him reassuringly. Finally he interrupted me and said, "Oh, let's have some breakfast." And he got instantly out of the car.

Inside, Linkletter grinned as people throughout the crowded restaurant recognized him and said Hello, and Have a nice day, and I just washed my car so I guess it's gonna rain, huh? Ronnie thought that last one was a knee-slapper.

After breakfast, as I drove back to Channel Eight, we chatted about baseball and of course the weather. Linkletter said the next twenty-four hours would be nice, and I was about to say, "Hey, that's the way we like it," and then thought better of it and just said thanks.

So much for Ronnie Linkletter as a route to the Mega-Hypocrite. end user

20

The Fountain of Eden Motel on Route 5 was an old clapboard house with a neon sign on the roof and a long "L" of fifteen single-story shingled motel units appended to its backside. The office was in the back of the house, and you could pull around and ease up to it without being seen from the highway.

A wooden door with a patched screen led into a registration alcove. The tiny room, which stank of the nicotine stains that gummed the walls, contained a wooden counter, a condom machine, and no chairs. I pressed a button on the counter and could hear a buzzer sound in the inner reaches of the house.

"She's out back!" The male voice was muffled but the words decipherable.

"Whereabouts?" I yelled back.

"Doin' the laundry. Past number six."

I found an open door to a small room squeezed in between units six and seven. A squat, middle-aged woman in shorts and a T-shirt was stuffing sheets into a washing machine, a filtered cigarette dangling from the corner of her mouth. She was blond and sad-eyed and had a long-lost pretty face somewhere. The cigarette was lighted and her breathing sounded like somebody walking around in a swamp.

"You want a room?"

"How much until noon?"

"Eighteen."

I gave her a twenty and got back two that came from the shorts pocket. The twenty went in there with her wad. She took a key out of her other pocket and said, "I just made up eleven."

"Should I register?"

"No need to."

"What if I stole something-walked off with your television? The rooms have TV, don't they?"

"Sure. VCRs too. But if anybody steals anything, we can get it back. Are you planning on stealing something? You better not."

"How come?"

"I know your license number." She recited it. "I looked at it while you were inside the office and I'll write it down when I get back to the desk. If we need to get ahold of you for anything, we can find you through the DMV. People who stay here usually'd rather not leave their names, but we can track you down if we want you. Jay handles it."

"I don't plan on stealing anything," I said, "but I'd like to speak with Jay when he comes in. Would you give him this?"

"Sure."

I handed her the sealed envelope containing the note I wrote to Gladu after I drove Ronnie Linkletter back to Channel Eight. I went out and pulled the car over to number 11. Only two other cars were in the lot, a new Acura and an old Ford Galaxie in front of units 3 and 4. I checked the mud flaps on both; all four were intact.

Room 11 was small and dim with thick curtains drawn shut. A water bed in a lacquered pine frame that matched the paneling on one wall took up much of the room. The print on the filthy bedspread showed pastoral vistas and Georgian mansions. The TV set on the dresser was hooked up to the discount store-brand VCR beside it. Two walls of the room were covered with mirrors, as was the ceiling above the bed. The towels beside the small sink outside the bathroom were worn but clean. Above the sink an ancient contraption of an air conditioner was jammed into what had been a window. When I switched it to "on," nothing happened.

I'd brought the Times along and sat by a low-watt lamp in the airless room plugging away at the crossword puzzle-one of those with puns so dumb you wanted to call up Sulzberger and ask for your fifty cents back– until just after ten, when a knock came at the door.

I opened it and a thirtyish groover in baggy black shirt and pants and jackboots grinned at me a little too brilliantly out of a pale smooth face. "Are you the blackmailer?"

"Yup."

"How much do you want? If it's too much, I may have to have you killed."

He was still grinning, contented with his existence and mine, and apparently not prepared to take me as much of a threat. He seemed to be a man who had found inner peace, though whether its provenance was spiritual or chemical I didn't know.

"I don't want your money," I said. "I just want to find out who killed John Rutka, and I thought you might be able to help me out, Jay."

"I don't think so."

I sat in my chair again and Gladu flopped onto the water bed and arranged the pillows behind his back.

"John Rutka paid you more than six thousand dollars last year," I said. "What for?"

"No, he didn't."

"It's in his financial records-the amounts of the disbursements and the dates."

"That might be in John Rutka's financial records, but it's not in mine. There are no canceled checks. You won't find my signature anywhere in John Rutka's records. Or in anyone else's. Except New York Telephone's, of course. I'm a phone-company subscriber and proud of it. The power company too."

"I see your point. On the other hand," I said, "there's an exceptionally large number of references to the Fountain of Eden in the files Rutka kept on gay Albanians he was planning to out. In all of the files, the Fountain of Eden comes up eighty or ninety times. Apparently someone here was feeding Rutka information on the assorted couplings and quadruplings that the participants, your paying customers, assumed to be private. If the police or the tax authorities had possession of those files-which they do not, yet-they might imagine a connection existed between the cash disbursements and the carefully indexed sexual reports.

They'd think poorly of you, as would your customers once word got around. Your business inevitably would suffer."

He shrugged and peered at me brightly. "This place is not my only source of income. I've got an art gallery in Woodstock and a pet shop in the Millpond Mall. But don't get me wrong. I get your point. What is it you'd like to know?"

"I'd like to know who came to the Fountain of Eden with Ronnie Linkletter every Wednesday night for a year. I'd like you to instruct whoever it is on your staff here who keeps track of these things to talk to me and to answer truthfully every question I ask. And I want to leave here with copies of your license-plate records for the past year. Arrange those few things and we'll call it even."

"What do you mean, 'even? What's in it for me?"

"After whoever killed John Rutka is caught, Rutka's records will be destroyed. I'll do it myself. All those embarrassing connections to you and your business will be gone."

A dry laugh. "Do I look embarrassed?"

"Not yet."

"Well, maybe instead of doing all those things you're demanding I do, I should do what I first thought when Sandy gave me your threatening note. I should just arrange to have you killed." He grinned.

"Is that something you do to people routinely, or would I be receiving exceptional treatment?"

"I can't answer that. It would be giving something away."

Hoping I was guessing right about Gladu, I said, "I'm not impressed with your chemically induced bravado, Jay, and I'm getting bored with your line of utter bullshit. I want answers and I want them now. Who do I talk to around here to get them?"

He blinked twice, tapped his fingers on the bed frame, and said, "You can talk to me. I have the answers to your questions, and I'll give you the answers in return for one thousand dollars."

I sighed. "Jay, how would you like Cityscape to do a story on the Fountain of Eden as the Albany area's most popular quickie heaven, where the elite meet to fornicate, except the management spies on the customers and sells the information to political dementos like John Rutka and also tries to sell it to private investigators working on murder cases? The story would be a natural for Cityscape, and I'd be happy to supply the paper with the evidence that would pretty much put you out of business."

"I'd hate that," he said with a little slit of a smile and the same bright eyes. "If that happened, somebody might arrange to kill me."

"Could be."

"I have to admit, Strachey, that you've got me backed into a corner. So I've decided that I will answer your questions." His eyes got even brighter. "And then later I'll arrange to have you killed. Months from now, or even years, when you're least suspecting it.

You'll be walking down Lark Street. Or you'll be home doing some blow, or you'll have your tongue wrapped around your boyfriend's willy, or you'll be lying in bed looking through Mirabella. And all of a sudden– ka-powie! – you're a piece of Center Square roadkill!"

I said, "You're full of shit, Gladu."

"You think I am, don't you?"

"Yes."

"You're right." He guffawed.

"I know."

"What were the questions you wanted answered? I forgot."

"First, tell me how it worked-your data-gathering methods. Who were the actual spies?"

"Sandy in the daytime picks up quite a bit. She's got the tube on all the time and remembers faces, so when some local mega-celeb shows up she'll spot him right away and make a note of it. She gets five bucks a pop for a regular spotting, ten for media heavies like Ronnie Linkletter. I've got two queens who alternate nights– Royce and Lemuel, who live over in the house-and they know everybody and don't miss a trick. They're devastated that Rutka is dead, because now there's nobody to sell their dirt to."

"They knew the dirt was going to Rutka?" "Sure, I told them. Not that they cared. A dollar is a dollar. Being a bitch is being a bitch whether it's politically correct or not. For them, it's just a hoot."

I said, "I've been through Rutka's files, Jay. And I have a pretty good fix on who was spotted here, and when, and who they were with, and what kind of lubricants were left behind, and used condoms in the linen and on the floor, and roaches in the ashtrays, and all the rest of the detritus of hundreds of happy romps at the Fountain of Eden. What I'd like is any additional information you can give me on one man in particular: Ronnie Linkletter." Gladu sniffed a couple of times to clear his nostrils and his mind.

"I knew you were going to ask about Ronnie." "Why?"

"Because I thought maybe he had something to do with Rutka getting offed." "You thought Ronnie did it?" "No-not that he was actually the one." "Then what? What made you think of Ronnie at all?" Gladu sat forward now and struggled to stay in focus.

"Well, for one thing, Ronnie was one of the people John was really after-somebody he just had to uncloset. There were these three people John used to talk about as the dudes he wanted to get the most. One was Bruno Slinger, on account of how he helped kill the queer-bashing law or whatever that was. When John finally got Slinger he was high for a month. Of the three big assholes on his list, Bruno was the first one outed. Then Ronnie was the one he wanted, partly because he was so popular in Albany, and famous, but there was another reason, too."

"What was that?"

"It had something to do with Ronnie's boyfriend, somebody he met here every Wednesday night from seven till ten, when he had to get back to Channel Eight and get the weather report ready for the eleven o'clock news. When John found out who the boyfriend was, then he really wanted to get Ronnie."

"Who was the boyfriend?"

"I don't know. I thought I knew, but I guess I don't actually know."

"Explain that, please."

He was sitting cross-legged in the center of the bed now, rocking gently, and measuring his words. "Well," he said, "the boyfriend always arrived after dark in a raincoat with the collar turned up and wearing a baseball cap with the brim pulled down."

"What team?"

"Nobody ever got close enough to see anything like that. Although Lemuel and Royce tried their best to get a look. But they were never quick enough. The dude would drive in after Ronnie was already here and the room was paid for, and he'd slip inside the room with the curtains shut. They were always in unit fifteen, down at the end. Ronnie would reserve it and Lemuel or Royce would hold it even if we got busy, because Ronnie and his honey were always punctual."

"How did Rutka find out who Ronnie's boyfriend was if Lemuel and Royce didn't even know?"

"Through the license plate of the car he drove. We had that much. John and I both have DMV contacts and we found out who owned the car. It's some nobody in Pine Hills. I've got his name written down over in the office. I don't know how, but John figured out that Ronnie's mystery boyfriend was somebody who borrowed this other guy's car every Wednesday night, and it was somebody he wanted to drag out of the closet even more than Bruno and Ronnie. He got Bruno, and then he got Ronnie. But I don't think he ever outed the third one, the one he wanted the most. I'm not sure why, but I think John was scared of this one."

"What makes you think so?"

"From the way he talked. He always referred to this one as the All-American Mega-Hypocrite. He was some hot-shit something-or-other who was a deep closet case, and I got the impression he was one dangerous asshole."

"Did he threaten John?"

"No, I don't think he even knew John was onto him. John never said so, anyway. For a while John was always working on a way to get a picture of Ronnie and the Mega-Hypocrite in bed, or a tape or something. But I wouldn't go along with that. I didn't want anything traceable to me or my business. You don't stay in the motel business pulling shit like that."

Mr. Situational Ethics. I said, "When did Ronnie and the mystery man break up? Or did they? It's Ronnie's story that they broke up."

"All I know is," Gladu said, "they stopped coming here about two months ago, and it wasn't long after that that I heard Ronnie and Bruno, John's first– and second-favorite outees, were getting it on together at the Parmalee Plaza. Well, that's cozy, I remember thinking. I don't know what became of Mr. Mega-Hypocrite. Maybe he scared Ronnie off too. Though with Ronnie, it looks like the bigger and meaner they are, the siffer his dick."

"It looks that way."

"At the time, I thought maybe they didn't come back here because of what happened in unit fifteen later that night after they were here for the last time. But I don't see how they could have known about it. We kept it quiet. You didn't hear anything, did you? It's not in John's files, is it?" He looked apprehensive.

"I don't know if it's in the files, because I don't know what you're referring to, Jay. Clue me in."

A pause. Then: "The mirror fell off the ceiling in unit fifteen. I guess all those hours of fucking over the years loosened some screws and one whole six-by-four-foot section of mirror over the bed in that unit dropped off. If anybody had been in the bed at the time, they could have been killed."

We both looked up at the mirror above Gladu and winced. Long metal flanges held the mirror sections in place. It looked as if the flanges were screwed into the old ceiling beams. We saw ourselves up there looking back at ourselves with nauseated looks.

I said, "How does your insurance company feel about those mirrors?"

He looked queasy. "They don't know about them, actually."

"Ah."

"The mirrors have all been tightened up. Hey, if you ever bring a trick out here, you won't have to worry."

"I happen to be in a monogamous situation, but thanks for the reassurance."

"Maybe you and your boyfriend would like to come out for a weekend getaway sometime. We have special weekend rates."

"What are they, higher?"

"Naturally."

I said, "Who was working here the night the mirror fell?"

"Royce. Poor Royce was wrecked for a week."

"I'd like to speak to him. Is he here?"

"Over in the house."

"Is Royce his first name or his last?"

"It's Royce McClosky."

"Do you know who D.R. is?"

"D.R.?"

"The initials D.R."

He thought about this. "Donna Reed?"

"I don't think so. Who besides you was John Rutka paying to spy on people and feed dirt to him for his outing files?"

"That's confidential, but since you're blackmailing me, I'll tell you. Nathan Zenck at the Parmalee Plaza was paid, I know."

"Just Zenck?"

"He's the only one I know of. I know Nathan. He's a silly queen but an excellent businessman. We're different but we have a lot of respect for each other."

I told him I wanted to look at his license-plate records and we walked over to the office. I bent down briefly to check the mud flaps on Gladu's Mercedes. Both were intact. Inside the registration alcove, Gladu flipped up the hinged end of the counter and went behind it to rummage through some drawers. He produced a long box of index cards with dates, times, and license-plate numbers written on them.

"Some people we actually register. The state says we have to," Gladu said, and brought out a much smaller box of registration cards filled in with probably mostly phony names and addresses. "We like to respect people's privacy," he said, "so not everyone is required to register, and all transactions are in cash."

"What crap. You cheat the state and federal governments out of the taxes and you sell information on people's private lives for additional cash."

He suddenly glared at me and slammed his left fist on the counter. His other hand came up from behind the counter with a. 38 caliber revolver, which he aimed at me. "Now I am going to see that you die, you scumbag blackmailer, and I'm going to do it myself right now!"

"Gladu, just shut up and get me the files. And put that thing away before it goes off and the rest of your mirrors drop."

He chuckled and put the gun back under the counter.

"Where's Royce?" I said.

Gladu pressed the buzzer on the counter.

"She's out back!" came a voice from above.

"Royce is off-duty now. He's probably watching Geraldo with Lemuel and wishes not to be disturbed. But I guess you're going to insist on disturbing him."

"Yes, I am."

"Royce, get down here!" Gladu yelled. "A blackmailer wants to talk to you."

He placed the two file boxes on the counter along with a sheet of paper on which was written a license-plate number, a name, and an address.

"Who's this? The owner of the car Ronnie Linkletter's mystery man came in?"

"That's what John told me. But not the man himself, according to John."

The name on the paper was Art Murphy, and the address was 37 Flint Street, Albany, a short street I'd passed a thousand times that ran off Washington Avenue in the old Pine Hills section of the city. Art Murphy did not sound like an arch-hypocrite, but maybe Art regularly lent or rented his car to a man who was. I wondered if Art had ever been blackmailed and if he ever thought he would be.

"This man's name is Strachey," Gladu told Royce when he appeared. "He's a pond-scum degenerate blackmailer, and as your employer I am directing you to answer every question he asks you. Later I'm going to have him killed, but for now tell him whatever he wants to know." Gladu beamed.

Royce, a skinny, bleary-eyed man in his fifties with a stubble of beard, and mouthwash on his breath, looked at me uncertainly and then back at Gladu. "Tell him what, Jay?"

"Anything. Everything. I told you-he'll never live to use any of it against any of us."

"Let's go outside," I told Royce.

Royce didn't like the sound of that. He looked as if he had last been exposed to sunlight in the year of the Watergate break-in, but Gladu beamed contentedly and motioned for Royce to move out.

I carried the Fountain of Eden registration and license – plate files with me, and we sat in my car with both doors open.

"Where you going with those?" Royce asked.

"I'll bring them back eventually," I said, "so not to worry. The only thing you need to concern yourself with, Royce, is doing what Jay said and telling me the absolute truth on all the topics I bring up. Okay?"

"Sure."

"Who got hit with the mirror?"

He'd been looking bewildered up to now, and only vaguely apprehensive, but now his eyes narrowed and he looked at me with suspicion tinged with dread.

"Who are you?" he said. "Are you a cop?"

"No, I'm just a blackmailer. I have tons and tons of incriminating crap on Jay, so you better answer my questions or he'll be ruined and you will too. This is all off the books, and I know you're used to that, Royce, so let's get on with it and everything will be cool. Once again, who got hit with the mirror?"

"How did you know about that? If you were one of the people who came out that night, you'd know who it was. If you're not one of them, how did you know it happened? Jay doesn't know, or even Sandy. Lemmie didn't tell you, did he?"

I said, "Nobody had to tell me. Linkletter and his boyfriend were here every Wednesday night for almost a year, and then the mirror fell and they stopped coming. Jay swallowed your story that the mirror fell after Ronnie and his friend had left because Jay has a lot invested emotionally and financially in believing that that's the way it happened. But it's mighty unlikely that Ronnie's failure to come back to his habitual trysting place ever again is mere coincidence. How much did they pay you to keep your mouth shut?"

"Two hundred dollars," he said, brushing away a sweat bead from the end of his nose with a trembling hand.

"Who was hit? The boyfriend?"

He gulped and nodded.