by Lanyon, Josh
“Claude said you’re into the whole leather scene. That he used to see you at a club called Ball and Chain.”
His eyes were very green as they held my own. If this was the secret he had killed to protect, I had just put the finishing touches on my death warrant.
“Is it true?”
“Why? Looking for sponsor?”
“I’m strictly a safe sex kind of guy.”
“Yeah?”
I didn’t understand that odd smile. Maybe he thought finding a guy leaving my apartment in the a.m. was a normal occurrence for me.
I was afraid to ask. I asked anyway. “What about Robert?”
“What about him?”
“Did you know him?” What I meant was, did you kill him?
“No.”
I don’t know if I believed him or not. I wasn’t sure why he had revealed as much as he had to me. International Coffee Moment? Or because there was simply no one else in his life he could confide in? I couldn’t imagine what it would be like trying to live under so much pressure, the strain of a double life. Small wonder if he wasn’t schizoid.
He said casually, “By the way, we ran that card for fingerprints. Clean — other than yours.”
“Mine?” Where would he get a comparison set of my fingerprints? I opened my mouth to ask, then caught his expression.
“Rob’s apartment,” I said. I remembered that before we left he had picked up my glass and carried it to the kitchen. At least that's what I'd thought; apparently the glass and my gloves had been removed for evidence.
As though I hadn’t spoken, he added, “The flowers were a dead end.”
“I hate for you to keep wasting your time. Maybe you should just plant evidence against me.”
He let that go too. “It’s interesting about the cat, though. It had been asphyxiated. It was too old and well-fed to be a stray. Any of your neighbors missing a cat?”
“I don’t know.” I dragged my thoughts back from the realization that the bastard had taken advantage of my moment of weakness. Why not? He was a cop and I was his numero uno suspect. This was a good reminder that I could not let my guard down with him. “Asphyxiated, huh?”
“Right.” He watched me speculatively.
I said, “There’s a Thai restaurant next door. If someone’s missing a cat, you should probably talk to them.”
His laugh sounded like it caught him off guard.
“I didn’t kill someone’s cat and stow it in the stockroom to lend weight to my story of being stalked.”
“It does seem unlikely,” he admitted.
I said, “Thanks for that much. So why didn’t this freak chop the cat up too?”
“Maybe he liked the cat,” Riordan commented. “Maybe he’s kind to small animals and little old ladies.”
“Then he wouldn’t be the normal serial killer.”
“Normal serial killer …” he repeated thoughtfully.
Was I totally off the mark? Shortly before his death Robert had been romantically involved with someone none of his friends knew — someone who might or might not be his killer. The same person who had killed Robert had broken into my shop. Whoever had broken into my shop was almost certainly the same person sending threatening cards, flowers, etc. My anonymous phone caller was someone I knew or someone who had access to the phone directory of someone I knew, namely Robert.
That all added up, right? Logically, Robert’s killer and my stalker had to be one and the same.
And while I was the one who had originally suggested the possibility of a serial killer — and as popular as barking mad, opera-playing, Chianti-swilling serial killers are in fiction — I was more and more inclined to believe that whoever had killed Robert had some discernible motive.
I was thinking aloud, “He lets himself in with Robert’s key. He trashes my place, leaves the cat in the trunk to rot and lets himself out again. Why didn’t he just wait and kill me?”
Riordan traced the painted leaf on the cup with his thumb. “Harassment? Dirty tricks? Maybe someone who knows you’ve got a bum ticker.”
“You think someone’s trying to scare me to death?”
Riordan shrugged.
“Why not just kill me?” I repeated.
“I’ll play. Why not?”
As they used to say in those B sci-fi movies from the Fifties: Reverse polarization! What was the motive for not killing me?
I rose, refilled my cup. “Was the same weapon used to kill Claude and Robert?”
“Won’t know for sure till we see the ME’s report. I’d guess yes. I’m not big on coincidence. I’ll tell you something, though. The wounds were not the same. The level of rage was not there.”
I remembered how the newspapers had described the viciousness with which Robert had been attacked. His face slashed, stab wounds in his throat, his eyes —
“Claude was killed more ... conventionally?”
He smiled faintly. “You could put it that way. Hersey’s killer was acting out some fantasy. An orgy of violence. La Pierra’s was in a hurry.”
“He couldn’t have known I was coming back.”
“Right.”
“Unless you think I killed Claude?”
He glanced at the slightly puffy knuckles of my hand resting on the table. “Not nearly enough blood on your clothes. And no murder weapon.”
“Not even in the Bronco?” I inquired blandly. “I wondered why you were so considerate as to have me driven home.”
“You’re so cynical.” Riordan was grinning.
He drained his cup. Rose to leave. I rose too and went to get his jacket. Brown leather and no epaulettes. So maybe the S/M thing was more of a hobby than a vocation.
At the door I asked, “Have you had any luck tracing Felice or any of the others from the Chess Club?”
He shrugged into his jacket, not meeting my eyes. “No.”
“No. You haven’t even tried.”
I must have sounded bitter enough that he said after a moment, “Look, I did run some inquiries. Okay? Nothing yet.”
* * * * *
Friday afternoon brought galleys from my publisher. This proof that my first novel was fast approaching the reality stage took my mind off my other problems. I went upstairs, made myself a cup of Special Roast, got out a box of Belgian chocolate almond cookies, and began poring over the galleys. Soon I was lost again in the world of my own imagination, wincing at certain phrases, pleasantly surprised at others. Absorbed in the pages before me, I was amazed when I came up for air and it was nearly five o’clock.
I went downstairs. Angus was eating a subway sandwich and pondering the obituary section of the Times. Bits of lettuce and salami dotted the newsprint like confetti.
“Dead you wail the western male,” he enunciated through layers of sandwich.
“Come again?” Not that anything surprised me at this point. If he’d started spouting Chaucer I’d have taken it as par for the course.
Angus masticated ferociously, swallowed, and repeated as though for the deaf, “Did you want the rest of the mail?”
“Thank you. I did.” I picked up the bundle of mail and felt around under the counter. “Do you know what happened to the letter opener?”
“No.”
“It was right here.” I squatted down, running my hands along the shelves. “It looks like a miniature dagger. Mother of Pearl handle?”
Actually it was a witch’s bolline, a long ago Halloween gag gift from Mel.
“I never saw it,” said Angus.
I stared at him. He blinked nervously behind his specs, bit his lip. I had no idea if he was lying or not. He was the kind of kid who acts guilty even when he isn’t.
I tried to think of the last time I’d seen the letter opener. I’d been using the one in my office for the past few days. I didn’t remember seeing the bolline since Robert had opened the mail Friday last.
It wasn’t like I still had any special attachment to the thing. I couldn’t rid myself of the suspicion it had
been taken during last Monday’s break-in, but that didn’t make sense. Still, the feeling of unease persisted.
I went back to the office and began shuffling through the post. Along with the usual books and magazines and catalogs (how did I get on the Things You Never Knew Existed mailing list?) was a flat, square package wrapped in brown paper and tied with string. The writing was crooked, a child’s scrawl in red crayon.
I used my pen knife on the string. Slid the blade beneath the brown flaps. A CD lay on my desk. Verdi’s Requiem.
“God damn it!” I picked the plastic case up and threw it across the room. The case pinwheeled through the air, hit the metal shelf and broke open. Two parts landed on the floor. The CD rolled in a neat circle, flipped over and lay face up.
I jumped up, crossed the room in two strides and picked up the CD. Across the front in black Sharpie were printed the words, “Our fatal shadows that walk by us still.”
Fatal shadows. Fatal shit. I reached for the phone.
But then, slowly, I replaced the receiver. What was the point in calling the police? Messrs. Serve and Protect had me pegged as a hysterical faggot who had only himself to blame if a disgruntled suitor was stalking him. Riordan was obviously undecided as to whether I was capable of sending myself gruesome presents for attention. Not amazing if he still suspected me of offing Robert.
I went upstairs, put the CD on the player. Immediately the music spilled out, silken and somber, gliding around the sunlit rooms, trailing after me into my study. I pulled out my Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations and scanned the index. I found what I was looking for under “Fatal.” English Dramatist John Fletcher (1579-1625) — of whom I’d never heard — had written something called “Honest Man’s Fortune.”
Man is his own star; and the soul that can
Render an honest and perfect man,
Commands all light, all influence, all fate,
Nothing to him falls early or too late.
Our acts, our angels are, for good or ill
Our fatal shadows that walk by us still.
Chapter Twelve
What would Grace Latham have done in my position? Well, in close to twenty mystery novels she would have run straight to the murderer with the only piece of proof, and placed herself in mortal jeopardy. That was the difference between me and Grace — she usually managed to stumble onto a piece of evidence, a useful clue, something. Grace also had dapper Colonel Primrose to feed her inside info and to save her well-bred ass at the last minute. I had no such ally.
So despite the blue skies smiling at me that early Saturday morning, my mood was gloomy. I stood at the kitchen window watching white clouds gambol playfully across blue fields of sky, the sun shining with relentless cheer, drying out the rain puddles, the wet roofs, the glistening streets — and my soggy brain.
Over a can of Tab I jotted down what I thought I knew so far — what I believed to be the facts of the case.
Tara had motive: according to the police she stood to inherit a sizeable chunk of change. That was usually sufficient grounds for murder in most Leslie Ford novels, but how did it apply to knocking me off? I didn’t benefit from Robert’s will, and when I died whatever I left went to various gay men’s organizations.
I could think of other reasons someone might decide to get rid of Robert: jealousy, for one. Claude had been sick with jealousy after Robert dumped him, but Claude had been killed too. Of course Claude was just one of many, so maybe another of Robert’s discarded lovers was out there evening the score. But again, why come after me? Robert and I had not been romantically involved.
Maybe Robert had been the victim of a hate crime. Max certainly loathed Robert, but I couldn’t quite picture Max killing Robert except in the heat of the moment. Robert’s murder had been premeditated. No one randomly carries chess pieces around, except maybe disgruntled Russian ex-champs. Besides, while Max might not care for my lifestyle — or me, for that matter — I couldn’t believe my existence troubled him enough for him to bother killing me.
I scratched my nose with the end of my pen. Yeah, lots of possible reasons, and each more improbable than the last. Maybe the blackmail theory wasn’t so far-fetched. Rob desperately needed money and he would get a kick out of watching someone squirm. He’d never had any sense about taking a joke too far. And Detective Riordan, for example, didn’t seem to enjoy much sense of humor. But while I could see it might be to Riordan’s advantage to frame me for Robert’s murder, I couldn’t see him risking a third homicide.
So while I could think of a number of reasons — bad and good — for killing Robert, I couldn’t arrive at a common motive for eliminating both Robert and me. And I was convinced that Robert’s murder was not a unique and separate event. It was connected to … my murder.
Though apparently the cops didn’t share my vision, I believed this indicated a larger pattern. But that’s where my tidy logical equation fell apart. Why hadn’t I been killed? Why instead had Claude been killed? What did Claude have to do with anything?
I sighed and tossed my pen down. Went to put on Verdi’s Requiem once more. Though it had probably been intended to strike terror in my heart, ironically, as I listened absently to the haunting beauty of “Libera Me” I felt calm, certain that if I just kept at it, the answer would come to me. So what if the police wouldn’t help me? The police didn’t have a vested interest. I did.
The problem was, I kind of had to agree with Riordan and the inscrutable Chan. A motive for murder stretching back to adolescence seemed farfetched.
What the hell did it mean? That I could add the facts of the case all day, and not get any closer to the truth?
I glanced at the clock, got out the phone book and tried calling all the numbers under “Landis.” As it was Saturday I hit fewer answering machines and more real people, but eight phone calls later I still had no leads. I didn’t get it. It always worked in mystery novels.
Right before eleven o’clock I went downstairs to spell Angus. He was reading about Claude’s murder in the paper which he folded guiltily and shoved beneath the counter when I appeared. I’d already caught the headline, “Slasher Targets Gay Community.”
We had a writer’s signing scheduled for the next weekend — provided we were all still alive for it. A lot of preparation goes into a successful signing: having enough of the author’s books on hand, advertising ahead of time, planning the refreshments. I put as much time into it as I hoped someone would do for me one day.
Since this author was gay, I knew we’d have to prep harder than usual. Claude had been lined up to handle the refreshments; now it was back to me and Trader Joe’s.
Angus returned from lunch and we worked out the menu; which is to say I threw ideas out and Angus made faces and simulated gagging motions.
“Cheese puffs,” he advised.
“Powdered cheese gets all over the books.”
“Everybody loves cheesy puffs. Even f —”
“Even fags?”
He started coughing as though he’d inhaled one of his own cheesy puffs.
I eyed him. “From your vast culinary expertise what do you think about water chestnuts wrapped in bacon?”
“Uh … yeah, whatever. I mean. …”
I waited.
Angus fiddled with a paper clip. “Do you need me that day?”
“Some reason you don’t want to be here?”
Angus turned red everywhere his skin showed and I felt a little sorry for him.
“No,” he squeaked.
“Good. Because I need you here.”
“It’s just — it’s a full moon.”
I bit back my first comment and said, “There will be other full moons, Angus.”
* * * * *
Bruce called a couple of hours later. I was doing the bills. Not my favorite thing.
“What are you doing?” His voice was low, intimate.
“Working.”
Quiet laugh. “Doing what?”
“The usual. What are you doi
ng? What are you working on these days?” Two phone calls in less than twelve hours. Wow. At long last I was winning friends and influencing people.
“I’m freelance. I pick and choose.” He talked about what he was picking and choosing. I listened absently, totting figures. “I don’t like to travel though,” Bruce was saying. “I must be getting old. I try to find stuff that interests me close to home.”
“Must be nice.” I squinted at my calculations.
A pause and then, “Is something wrong?”
“No. Of course not.”
“Yeah. Something is. Look, Adrien, I told you the truth. I’m not working on this Gay Slasher story. Boytimes put a staffer on it. I just want to see you again.”
“I believe you.”
“So when can I see you?”
I don’t know what the problem was. I’d been celibate — which is a more dignified word for lonely — for years. Now I had someone in my life saying all the right things, doing all the right things, and suddenly I felt pressured. So much for preaching to Riordan about healthy, satisfying homosexual relationships.
“I don’t know,” I said finally.
“Tonight?”
I tried to think of a good reason not to. There wasn’t one.
“Tonight is fine.”
“I’ll pick you up.”
* * * * *
Late afternoon trade picked up and I had to put aside the amateur sleuthing for the day.
After an initially slow start, business was improving steadily. That was one reason I had been able to offer Robert a job when he needed one — the store was really more than I could handle on my own — although I had tried. I had been reluctant to end my period of suspended animation by letting a living breathing person invade my space. Now I couldn’t help feeling like maybe that instinct had been a good one.
When we finally had a lull, I took a quick break, eating an apple and half a chicken salad sandwich in my office while I thumbed once more through Robert’s yearbook. I studied the immature, unformed faces of the Chess Club as though it would be possible to read their thoughts. That’s when the light bulb went on.
