Men of the Mean Streets

by Greg Herren

  Synopsis

  Noir has always been one of the most popular—and darkest—sub-genres of the mystery field. Following in the footsteps of such masters of the form as James M. Cain, Raymond Chandler, and Dashiell Hammett, some of the top writers of gay mystery explore this territory of amoral tough guys with a cynical view of the world by giving classic noir a gay twist. Edited by award winning author/editors Greg Herren and J.M. Redmann, Men of the Mean Streets changes the face of gay mystery—and the reader may never look at gay life and culture in the same way again.

  Men of the Mean Streets

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  Men of the Mean Streets

  © 2011 By Bold Strokes Books. All Rights Reserved.

  ISBN 13: 978-1-60282-537-6

  This Electronic Book is published by

  Bold Strokes Books, Inc.

  P.O. Box 249

  Valley Falls, New York 12185

  First Edition: August 2011

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission.

  Credits

  Editors: Greg Herren, J.M. Redmann, and Stacia Seaman

  Production Design: Stacia Seaman

  Cover Design By Sheri (GraphicArtist2020@hotmail.com)

  Dedication

  This is for Paul Willis.

  On the Dark Side

  Several years ago I was asked to contribute a story to an anthology called New Orleans Noir, which was part of the wonderful series of city-based anthologies produced by Akashic Books. This local New Orleans version was being edited by the sublime, award-winning mystery writer Julie Smith. It was an extraordinary opportunity—the other contributors included mystery writers I’d long admired, like Julie herself, Laura Lippman, Eric Overmyer, Ace Atkins, Barbara Hambly, and Chris Wiltz, among others—but it also presented me with a conundrum: What is noir, exactly? Because, you see, that was the question Julie gave us all as our assignment—to come up with our own definition of noir, and then write a short story illustrating that definition.

  I thought about it for a very long time before I started writing my story.

  I realized that, for me, noir was “the endless nightmare”; in other words, a story in which our hero makes a wrong decision—which leads to an endless nightmare of consequences and other choices that must be made—only with each progressive choice the options are bad and worse. An endless nightmare that continues to spiral downward, as the main character slowly loses their moral compass and continues downward, ever downward, until they’ve lost their sense of humanity. And so, my story “Annunciation Shotgun” was born. The story itself was inspired by a friend about whom I once joked, “the great thing about so-and-so is you can call him and say ‘I’ve just killed someone’ and he’ll answer, without missing a beat, ‘Well, the first thing we have to do is get rid of the body.’”

  Always a good trait for a friend to have, don’t you think?

  When the book was released, I did signings and readings with a number of the other contributors—and the question always came up. “What is noir?” we would be asked, and I would listen, fascinated and humbled by the brilliant definitions my fellow contributors had come up with. I was always rather embarrassed when it was my turn to define noir for the audience.

  But all the varied definitions also made me think about the term, and the books and films categorized by it—and the influence they had on me as a writer.

  I don’t remember which noir film I watched first, but I have to say my absolute favorite is Double Indemnity. When I watched it for the first time as the afternoon movie, I only knew Fred MacMurray as the perfect father on My Three Sons or from his Disney “Flubber” movies. I was stunned to see MacMurray embody the larcenous insurance agent perfectly, with his snide smirk and wise-ass attitude, figuring out how to defraud the company he worked for—and what’s a little murder for profit between lovers? The movie profoundly affected me…after that, the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew mysteries I had previously enjoyed reading paled a little bit in comparison. It was the first film I can remember evoking so profound a reaction in me, and from that point on, I watched any film I could that had “noir” in the description.

  I was a teenager when I discovered, with enormous joy, that Double Indemnity had also been a book—and the same author had also written The Postman Always Rings Twice and Mildred Pierce. For some reason, my local library didn’t have the books—but a secondhand bookstore did. For about a dollar, I bought almost the entire James M. Cain library. I spent a weekend reading them—they were all, alas, rather on the short side—but Cain’s spare prose and cynical characters opened up a whole new world to a mystery-loving teenager who, at that point, had only read Agatha Christie.

  Cain inevitably led to other authors who became heroes of mine—John D. MacDonald, Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett—and I like to claim all four of these men as influences on my own mystery writing. And while I write the humorous Scotty Bradley series, I like to think my other series is more noir.

  Ironically, in 2010 Julie Smith got me yet another gig writing noir—only this time, it was a radio play. I had never written a radio play before (neither had she), and it was a lot of fun for the two of us. Her contribution to this anthology, “Private Chick,” and my own (“Spin Cycle”) are adaptations of our radio plays into short stories.

  When Bold Strokes Books conceived of doing a gay and lesbian noir anthology, to be co-edited by me and my dear friend J. M. Redmann, I didn’t have to be asked twice.

  We eventually decided to split the book into two—a gay noir and a lesbian noir. We selected a group of writers—some of them mystery writers, some of them new writers, some of them better known for writing outside of the crime genre—and asked them the very same question Julie Smith asked me five years ago: “How do you define noir? And please, write a story illustrating that definition.”

  I cannot tell you how pleased I am with the results.

  I hope you will be, too.

  Now kick back, dim the lights, and pour yourself a nice, stiff cocktail.

  And join me on the dark side.

  Greg Herren

  New Orleans, 2011

  Keeping the Faith

  ’Nathan Burgoine

  The gray-haired woman at the door aimed a glower at me that would have drawn blood from a lesser man.

  “No soliciting,” she said.

  “I have an appointment with Robert,” I replied.

  She frowned, probably at the familiarity I was tossing about. “Your name?”

  “He has multiple appointments tonight?” I smiled at her. “Busy man.”

  Silence. Her lips thinned.

  I glanced up. “Looks like it might rain soon.”

  Her frown deepened. “Your name?”

  I told her, and she paled. Her disapproving gaze didn’t waver. She did cross herself—subtle—and raised one finger before closing the door on my face without inviting me in.

  No accounting for manners these days. I checked my watch. I was routinely ten minutes early, just for these sorts of delays. My reputation can be handy. Or just a pain in the ass.

  She’s heard of you. I flicked my eyes to the left, where the transparent figure of a man in priest’s vest
ments regarded me. Still fairly recent to being dead, I figured. Not more than four or five months. He was still getting the hang of things, though he’d managed to make his voice heard—by accident, most likely.

  “Something you need?” I asked him. He shivered, surprised that I answered him, and faded away on the next strong breeze, face twisting into confusion even as it broke into mist.

  It started to rain.

  *

  I wasn’t sure what I was expecting inside the old stone building, but it wasn’t the comfortable sitting room. Polished, well-kept wood furniture filled the room without looking cluttered. It offered up a cozy welcoming not reflected in the old woman’s stare. I wiped some of the rain from my jacket and settled into one of the plush chairs. The gray-haired woman stood near the fireplace with her arms crossed, her eyes locked on me like I would start swiping anything that wasn’t nailed down if she so much as blinked.

  When my potential client entered, I rose and offered my hand.

  He didn’t take it at first, but I held it there unmoving. Eventually, he shook it. He had a firm grip, not too large a shake. Just right.

  “Thank you for coming,” he said. It even sounded honest. I supposed that was a trick of the trade.

  “My pleasure,” I said.

  He gestured to the chair and I sat. He sat across from me, not speaking. This isn’t unusual. People need time to find the right place to begin.

  I took this opportunity to look at him. He was built lean and tall, with dark hair but soft eyes a shade of blue that was almost too pretty for a man. Had I bumped into him at one of my regular haunts, I’d have offered a gin and tonic and proposed we take ourselves somewhere more comfortable. His bed, preferably, though I’m not known to be fussy with the details. But given Robert Bryce’s calling, it didn’t seem advisable.

  “Father,” I said, after the long silence had started to strain my patience. “You gotta open your mouth.”

  He shifted, frowning slightly. “Of course,” he said. He glanced at the gray-haired woman. “Grace, could you bring our guest a glass of water?”

  Grace nodded deferentially and left. She frowned again when she met my gaze on her way out.

  “I don’t think she likes me,” I said.

  The priest hesitated before speaking. “I require your services.”

  I nodded. I’d gathered that much from the phone call. I waited, but he seemed stalled again.

  “No offense, Father,” I said. “But I seem an unlikely choice given your…uh…position.”

  He sighed, looking directly at me for the first time. His gaze was full of longing and pain. “I need a believer,” he said.

  Ah. I didn’t have to ask why he thought I qualified. Whatever else he thought of me, if he’d heard and believed the stories, then he knew that much. I am many things—many of them darker than he’d probably like—but I am indeed a believer. You can’t meet Ol’ Scratch and not believe in his boss.

  “Okay.”

  He looked at me a long time, deciding. I waited for him to get over his righteousness and come to practicality. If he’d had other options, he wouldn’t have called me.

  “Something was stolen from me,” he said.

  I nodded. “And you’d like it back.”

  He paused, lips tight. He’d be a lousy poker player.

  “I can’t find it if you don’t tell me what it was.” I leaned forward, aiming my gaze up at him. I fixed a smile on my face and tried to appear approachable.

  He couldn’t meet my gaze. He looked away, a flush creeping up his neck. “It’s not…a traditional…” He sighed. “It sounds impossible, but I know it was stolen.”

  I nodded, waiting for him to blurt it out.

  “My faith,” Bryce said, almost breathing the word. “Someone stole my faith.”

  “Your faith,” I said. It wasn’t the strangest thing I’d been asked to recover.

  “Yes.” He seemed buoyed by my lack of reaction.

  “Is it bigger than a breadbox?” I asked, smiling.

  He scowled.

  “Sorry,” I said, raising a hand. “Just trying to take the edge off.”

  The door opened, and Grace returned, with the smallest glass of water I was likely to see outside of a child’s tea party. She put it onto the table next to me, even though I held out my hand for it.

  “Any thoughts,” I said, picking it up and taking a swallow—it was lukewarm tap water—“on who might be…” I decided to go for a more subtle word than “thief.” “Likely?”

  Bryce sighed. “I counsel the locals when I can, and sometimes there is resistance. But no, not really.” He looked out the window, watching the rain hit the glass. “There is a young man at a local bar. Rusty. I thought perhaps I’d been making headway, but he recently closed the door. It was unfortunate. His mother hoped I could help. His father doesn’t speak to him.”

  I finished the water and handed the empty glass back to Grace. “Thanks,” I said. “It really hit the spot.”

  Her smile was false and showed too much teeth, like a dog angry at everything and far too old to change its ways. Her eyes flicked down. She wanted to get away from me.

  I have that effect on people.

  “That will be all, Grace,” the father said. She left.

  “What do you mean ‘closed the door’?”

  Bryce looked back at me. “Russ—that’s his given name, Russ Maxwell—canceled a discussion we’d scheduled and then simply didn’t show for the next one.”

  I thought about that. “Have you asked Rusty yourself about your loss?”

  The father regarded me with a pained expression. There was so much misery in his eyes that I actually felt sorry for the guy. For a second.

  “Without my faith? I don’t dare…” He blushed.

  Ah. Temptation. I smiled at him. “Got it.”

  “I require discretion.” He swallowed.

  This was familiar territory. “I’m used to that. It’s two hundred a day, plus expenses. Your vow of poverty isn’t my problem. I can’t pay the rent in goodwill.”

  The priest nodded. “Of course.”

  I rose, and so did Bryce. I offered my hand again, and this time squeezed just a little longer than was polite, wondering. He shivered, and let go.

  “Please don’t,” he said, clearly uncomfortable.

  I regarded him. “If you’ve lost your faith, why are you so eager to get it back? Why not find a new way?” I had a few ideas on several new ways he could try, if he was willing.

  He looked at the ground for so long I wondered if he was going to speak.

  “I didn’t lose it,” he said. “It was taken. I remember my faith, what it was like when I had it. There’s something missing…” He tapped his chest over his heart, and closed his eyes for a moment. He looked up. “Have you ever felt completely at peace?”

  “Not even once,” I said, winking.

  He smiled, but it held no joy. “Then I would say we’re both looking for something irreplaceable.”

  “I ain’t looking for peace.” I smiled.

  Bryce regarded me. “Is it…true? What they say about you?”

  My smile grew. “Which part?”

  “Please,” he said. The weight of the world rested on that one syllable.

  “I can find it,” I said. “And yes, I met…him.” Bryce shivered. I nodded. “I’ll call you if I need any more information.”

  He nodded. I left.

  *

  A little research time in my office told me Robert Bryce had made quite the name for himself, entirely by virtue of his honesty. Newspapers liked his story, especially the same rags that warned us of the dangers of Liberals, equality, and gin. Robert Bryce had known he was gay since he was fifteen and had spoken openly of his “affliction.” He had “resisted the urges of the flesh” and though it was controversial—to say the very least—the church had definitely approved of his abstain-and-pray response to his sexuality.

  It hadn’t hurt that he was so ch
arismatic and handsome. He looked—in his pictures—like a man wholly at peace.

  So who’d taken that from him?

  I didn’t question the theft. I’d only had to be in the same room with him to feel the crack in his spirit. He’d been busted open like a boxer in a fixed fight, and those sorts of things didn’t happen to a man’s soul by accident.

  But the motive…

  Well, that’s always the rub, isn’t it? I made a short list of names of those who’d spoken out against him, but nothing jumped out.

  Plenty had decried him, both within and outside the church. His largest supporter had been a seventy-four-year-old priest, Father Raymond Clayton. I instantly recognized his small photo as the soul I’d seen outside Bryce’s church residence. Bryce had taken over his role at the church when Father Clayton had passed away four months earlier. It had been Father Clayton’s wish that the young Robert take over his flock, and the bishop had fulfilled that request.

  I had a harder time with Rusty at first, but found ads for his “dancing” and “private performances” at the Brass Rail once I scraped the bottom of the periodicals. Here was someone easier to understand. Born Russ Maxwell, “Rusty” was blond, muscular, and coolly handsome. It appeared his services were available to all—for a price. He’d come from a pretty religious background himself—he was a minister’s son.

  I couldn’t imagine his family was proud of him.

  I added them to the list, under Rusty’s name.

  I checked my watch and grabbed my coat. The rain was beating at my office window. I didn’t want to go back out in it, but if I hurried I could catch Rusty’s first “performance” of the evening. Perhaps even get a private session with him, on the church’s dollar.

  Sometimes my job has unusual perks.

  I tossed a drenched parking ticket off my windshield and into the gutter, and drove off.