Crimes On Latimer
From the Early Cases of Marco Fontana
Joseph R.G. DeMarco
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Published by Lethe Press at Smashwords.com
Copyright ©2012 Joseph R. G. DeMarco. All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, by any means, including mechanical, electronic, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission of the author.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictionally; and any resemblance to actual persons (living or dead), business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Published by:
Lethe Press, 118 Heritage Ave, Maple Shade, NJ 08052.
lethepressbooks.com [email protected]
Cover by Niki Smith
Book design by Toby Johnson
ISBN 1-59021-374-2 / 978-1-59021-374-2
Also by Joseph R.G. DeMarco
Murder on Camac
A Body on Pine
A Study in Lavender: Queering Sherlock Holmes
(editor)
Praise for the Marco Fontana mysteries:
Murder on Camac
“All in all, this is a stellar effort that will leave readers eagerly awaiting the next book in what should prove to be a popular series.”
—SF GLBT Literary Examiner
“The setting of Philadelphia suits the story well, with both a well-established gay community and an entrenched Catholic presence. If you’re from the city of brotherly love, many landmarks were written into the tale, even including some gay establishments like the oldest gay bookstore in the country, Giovanni’s Room. Don’t be surprised if the gayborhood is far more exciting than in real life...”
—Edge Philadelphia
“So start clearing some room in your library, mystery and detective fiction aficionados, because Mr. DeMarco and his private dick hero Marco Fontana are going to warrant a space of their own on your shelves.”
—BookWenches
A Body on Pine
“In his second book in this mystery series, DeMarco again provides a captivating and complex mystery that will delight purists of the gay mystery genre, for whom pickings have lately been sparse. The characters are colorful yet relatable, the Philadelphia setting perfectly nuanced, and the use of humor and personal emotions perfectly in the mix of a great read.”
—Echo Magazine
For Jason Li
And for my mother, Caroline
Acknowledgements
Thanks is a small word that encompasses a huge concept. I am very fortunate to owe a debt of thanks to some wonderful people. I have to thank Jason Li, my closest friend, who believes in me, gives me confidence and critique, is generous and kind, and is the best friend a person could ask for; my mom, Caroline, who has been an unfailing source of support and love; Michele Hyman who saw me through some dark times; Steve Berman whose friendship and guidance and whose sense about these stories has been invaluable; Richard R. Smith and Eric Mayes whose advice and critique have been so very helpful; Louise, Tom, Sal, Jody, Howard, Geneva, and a host of others who keep me grounded. There are some who I know are watching and guiding still, whose presence I miss: my father, Fred; my aunt Mary; Rusel; Harry L. and Harry M.; and most of all of these my late partner William Phillips. There are others. I am grateful and thankful and I’ll never forget.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Table of Contents
The Kronos Elect
The DaVinci Theft
The G-String Thief
Too Many Boyfriends
Pride is a Drag
A Killing in Leather
About the Author
The Kronos Elect
As he fell his nostrils flared, making his rough piggy nose seem even more porcine. The flabby pink cheeks of Patrick Bidding, the school disciplinarian, trembled each time he struck a step on the steep, deserted back staircase. The air in his lungs was forced out in grunts with every bounce. He hadn’t had much time to think, once his foot engaged the thin wire drawn taut across the stairs. He had put out his hand but the banister was slick with oil causing him to fall even faster. Hitting the landing with a thud, the remaining air was knocked from his lungs. Bidding’s last thoughts before the final blackout were very unchristian for the Head of Discipline in a very Catholic school for boys. He wheezed out his breath at the bottom of the stairs and was gone.
***
I’d gotten news of the murder the night before. The guys at St. T’s have an informal network and when anything happens, news travels fast.
So I was surprised when I arrived at school the next day and didn’t see total panic and chaos. Things were orderly, as orderly as they could be with more than one thousand boys trying to get into a school building all at the same time. I melded into the back of the crowd and watched faces. No one seemed sad or even ghoulishly thrilled. A murder had taken place right under their noses and no one seemed to care. Of course, it was Patrick Bidding, the disciplinarian, who’d been whacked. Not even his own son liked him.
Two older, pot-bellied cops were stationed outside St. T’s huge, oak, front doors. No surprise there, I expected cops to be crawling all over the place. They peered at us as we streamed into the building. Cops didn’t trust students any more than teachers did.
The whole scene reminded me of some movie about the end of the world. I glanced at the cops as I passed them and felt vaguely guilty for no reason at all.
Inside the building. That’s where it was chaos. That’s more like what I expected.
The foyer was alive with people wandering every which way, looking like they had no idea where they should be. Priests flew through the crowds flailing their arms. Faculty shouted orders that no one followed. Students walked quickly to nowhere in particular. The only ones not moving were the cops standing silently at the margins of the foyer, scrutinizing everyone.
Most of the students looked lost and meek, which was unusual since they were arrogant rich brats who generally acted like they owned the school. Which they sorta did since their families contributed so much money.
I was there on a scholarship, so most of them treated me like a poor relative feeding off table scraps. Me, I didn’t care what they thought. I was in school for one reason and I’d get out with the same diploma they’d get.
A few teachers moved through the foyer looking even more like zombies than usual. I guess some of them could’ve been wondering who’d be next on the hit list and if it might be them.
The maintenance people hadn’t even had a chance to take down the banner proclaiming: “Welcome Class of 1996.” After three weeks of classes and now the murder, the banner drooped sadly. My senior year had started off with a bang, so to speak, and there were still more than nine months to go before June and graduation.
As I stared at the banner, a gang of freshmen whizzed by like a cloud of gnats. I wondered if I’d ever looked that small and geeky. I realized that I had, since I started high school before I was even thirteen. Thanks to the grammar school nuns who’d pushed me ahead a grade or two, I was graduating early and that felt both good and confusing. I glanced once more at the banner and blended myself into the flow of kids going nowhere.
Some adult shouted for people to keep moving and get to their lockers, which was like a splash of cold water and woke me up. A notice on the wall said the day would start with an assembly to “comfort” the school community. It wasn’t bad en
ough somebody’d been murdered. Now we’d get treated to priests and counselors, and members of the religion department spilling platitudes like molasses over all of us. They’d say all kinds of things which wouldn’t make anyone feel any better and might cause a few more murders.
Had me wondering what’d happen next. That’s what I was thinking about as I walked to my locker on the second floor. I passed the conference room, which students were never permitted to enter, and was surprised by voices coming from the room. The door was partway open and I heard Mr. Sullivan gasp. It was a distinctive sound. Mr. Sullivan gasped a lot whenever something unexpected happened, which in his English Lit class was often. He was the nervous type and lots of kids enjoyed making him flinch. And gasp. The two always went together.
He was cute in his soft, gentle way. Not that I’d ever mention that fact to anybody except for my best friend Cullen. I wasn’t exactly ready to tumble out of the closet to everybody. I think Sullivan must’ve guessed about me, though, because he never failed to praise my work and always gave me the best assignments on the school newspaper. My guess, Sullivan knew about me because Sullivan was also gay. Not that we could ever discuss that. Not in this school. Still I felt we had a kind of secret bond, even if we couldn’t acknowledge it.
I’d gotten to know Sullivan pretty well from working on the school newspaper. He was the faculty moderator and was pretty serious about it. He’d worked on a real newspaper a few years before getting into teaching and knew his stuff.
If you know anything about newspapers, you know nothing ever happens on time and you’ve gotta plan for late nights especially around publication time. That meant Sullivan and the staff spent lots of time together, ate take out together, and had long talks on things we wanted to write about in the paper. As Editor, I probably spent the most time with him and he trusted me. Even better, I trusted him, which wasn’t easy for me. I hardly trust anybody.
But Sullivan was cool. We worked lots of late nights together and he never even hinted around at anything sexual. Never made a move on me. That gave him a lotta points in my book.
When I passed the conference room and heard him gasp, I knew he was in some kind of trouble and I figured it was about the murder. Not that I could imagine Sullivan committing a murder. And I really couldn’t believe he might’ve murdered Pat Bidding, the disciplinarian, who was a foot taller and a hundred pounds heavier than Sullivan.
Of course, I do remember Sullivan arguing with Bidding once or twice. It’s hard to hide things like that in a school. Especially a place like St. T’s. There’s always somebody hidden around a corner or sitting in a room out of sight. I’d stumbled on plenty of things that people weren’t happy about anyone else knowing.
When I thought about it, I realized that even if Sullivan was gentle and easily spooked, he did stand up for himself when he had to. In fact, he was one of the few who’d publicly called Bidding out on his habit of poking into the private lives of faculty and students. That’s what I’d heard them arguing about.
Sullivan would argue, sure, but murder? No way. Sullivan didn’t have it in him to do something like that. He wasn’t weak. He was just too nice, which is why I liked him. Murder just wasn’t in the mix of his personality. I refused to believe that. From what I knew of him, he was lots more moral than some of the faculty who liked dressing up as priests and pretending they had cornered the morality market.
I lingered outside the conference room and spied through a small opening in the doorway. I couldn’t hear what they actually said. It all sounded like murmurs and rumbles and occasional gasps. I saw a tall, black guy in a rumpled suit standing over Sullivan. Had to be a cop. A ring of dark hair wrapped around his otherwise bald head, his back to me as I watched. When the cop turned and spotted me, I kinda coughed and got myself outta there. Whatever was going on, he didn’t look happy. Neither did Mr. Sullivan.
***
I decided to hole up in the newspaper office after the assembly. Classes had been cancelled and students were allowed to leave or spend the day studying or working around campus. Most of the kids left the building like bats out of hell. Kids on sports teams or in activities hung around along with some who wanted to study or couldn’t go home early. That didn’t leave a whole lot of people in the building.
The third floor was deserted, which made sense. Most of the rooms on that floor were either school activity rooms, offices for counselors, or conference rooms. With everybody gone, the silence was almost creepy.
I unlocked the door, threw my backpack on the old couch, and went to the button fridge for a bottle of orange juice. For some reason, even after what I’d seen and heard, I felt at home and safe in the newspaper office. For all the time I spent there, it was like a second home. An old staff photo, stuck on the back of the door, caught my eye. We were all laughing and smiling in that picture. I was a freshman then and it was hard to believe it’d been almost four years. I looked so small compared to the others.
As I stared at the photo, I heard footsteps outside. Whoever it was stopped near the door. Then I heard him speak. It was Mr. Sullivan.
“You said it…. I can’t believe any of this is happening…. It’s all crap, Charlie. Total crap. They’re looking for a scapegoat…. And I’m it,” he said, sounding angry. I’d never heard Mr. Sullivan when he was really angry. “You’ve got to get me a lawyer, Charlie. Fast.” He went silent for a moment.
I could hear him shuffling his feet as whoever it was on the phone must have been talking. Then Sullivan cleared his throat and started speaking.
“Of course, I’m angry. I should be angry. I’m innocent. I didn’t kill anybody. Especially that creep. Figures that he’d be causing me problems even after he’s dead. Of course, the administration is taking the cowardly way, as usual. I’ve just about had it with this place.” He paused again. “Yeah, all right. I’ll try to stay calm…. Won’t be easy…. Okay. Find one fast, okay? Bye.”
I heard him jangle his keys and knew he’d be coming into the office. I didn’t want to get caught listening at the door so I dove onto the couch and tried looking bored. Just as I did, Mr. Sullivan opened the door, his arms loaded with papers and books.
“Hey,” I said.
“Who’s there?!” Sullivan gasped and dropped everything which went flying all over the floor. “Oh! It’s you… I… didn’t expect anyone to be here.” There was a sad note in his voice. He bent down to pick up the papers and I knelt on one knee to help.
“Didn’t feel like going home right away,” I said. “And anyway, somebody’s got to start writing the story…”
“The story?” Sullivan said, still picking up papers.
“Yeah, you know, Bidding’s murder. The paper has to run something on it. Maybe we can even get our own suspect list together and talk about motives.” I hoped this would give him an opening to tell me why the police had been questioning him that morning.
“Oh…” Sullivan sounded less than thrilled and occupied himself with straightening out his papers.
“I saw the police talking to you this morning.” Might as well just plunge in rather than wait for him, I decided.
“They— they think I’m— not a suspect exactly. Well, yeah, I suppose they think I’m a suspect.” Sullivan placed his stuff on one of the long tables and sat in the chair across from me. He let out a sigh so full of despair I was worried.
“Suspect!? You?” I said. “You couldn’t murder anybody. Did you tell them?”
“They hear that from everybody they question. That’s what they said. Nobody’s ever guilty.”
“But you’re not guilty. You can’t be…” I kinda thought this is what he’d say but it hit me like a hammer anyway. It felt personal. Sullivan was a friend.
“The administration seems to think the police have a point.”
“What did they say?”
“They didn’t come out and say anything exactly, you know how they can be.”
“Yeah, I do,” I said. The priests running t
he place could be cryptic whenever they said or did something on the record. Anything that could come back to bite them made them nervous, so they naturally weaseled their way around everything. After they were finished shading their views you could never tell exactly what they believed. So whatever position they took after the fact, they could claim that was their position all along. “What’d they tell you?”
“They suspended me. Without pay. Until this is all over. Of course, if it’s all over and I’m in jail…” He paused and stared at the floor.
“How can they?” Not a lot shocks me but this did. I’d seen plenty even if I was only fifteen, but the way adults treated people they were supposed to care about, or at least stand behind, mystified me.
“I suppose I can understand their position—”
“I can’t. It’s not fair.” I shouted. I was sure anyone in the hall outside could hear my voice. “You can’t just sit there and take this.”
“What choice do I have? They run the place. The faculty works at their pleasure. We don’t have written contracts. Even if we did, they’d fill the contracts with clauses to allow them to do exactly what they’ve done.” He sighed again. “That’s the way it is. I’m a suspect and now I’m a suspended suspect. Without pay.”
“What made the police target you?”
“Somebody told them about my arguments with Bidding. That, and they kinda have…” he went silent all of a sudden. As if somebody flipped his “Off” switch.
I looked at him hoping he’d come back to life. But he just stared at the floor.
“They kinda have what? What do they have, Mr. Sullivan?”
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