A Dance at the Slaughter House Read online

Page 22

 

  I said, "The reason I think the older boy is dead is I saw a film he was in with a man and a woman. At the end of the film they killed him. I think the younger boy is either dead or in danger because last week I saw him with a man who I think was one of the performers in the film. "

  "And you drew these sketches. "

  "I couldnt draw water. A police artist did these. "

  "I see. " She looked off to one side. "Are there many movies like that? Is it very profitable to make them?"

  "I dont know how many there are. And no, I dont think its particularly profitable. I think these people made the film for their own amusement. "

  " For their own amusement. " She shook her head. "There was a figure in Greek mythology who devoured his own children. Cronus. I forget why. Im sure he had a reason. " Her eyes flashed at me. "We are devouring our children, a whole generation of them. Wasting them, trashing them, throwing them away. Literally devouring them, in some cases. Devil worshipers sacrificing newborns and… and… cooking them, eating them. Men buying children on the street and having sex with them and then killing them. You say you saw this man, you saw him with the younger boy? You actually saw him?"

  "I think it was the same man. "

  "Was he normal? Did he look human?" I showed her the sketch. "He looks ordinary," she said. "I hate that. I hate the thought that ordinary people perform such awful acts. I want them to look like monsters. They act like monsters, why shouldnt they look like monsters? Do you understand why people do such things?"

  "No. "

  " I envy you, Father Joyner said. I envy you, I wish to God I could quit myself. Afterward I thought, well, Buster, that was a pretty well calculated way to get me to stay. That was pretty crafty. But I dont think so. I think he meant it, I think it was the literal truth. Because its true for me. I wish to God I could quit. "

  "I know what you mean. "

  "Do you?" She looked at the sketches again. "I could have seen them here, the boys. I dont recognize them but its possible. "

  "You wouldnt have seen the older one. You said youve been here ten months, and I think theyd already made their picture by then. "

  She asked me if Id wait for a moment and disappeared into the building. I stood there while a couple of kids entered the building and a few others left. They just looked like ordinary kids, not streetwise like the ones on Forty-second, not as woebegone as their circumstances would warrant. I wondered what had driven them out of their homes and into this crumbling city. Maggie Hillstrom probably could have told me, but I didnt much want to hear it.

  Brutal fathers, negligent mothers. Drunken violence. Incest. I didnt have to hear it, I could figure it all out for myself. Nobody walked out of The Brady Bunch and wound up here.

  I was reading the rules again when she returned. No one recognized either of the sketches. She offered to keep them and show them around later. I told her that would be good, and gave her extra copies of both. "My numbers on the back," I said. "Call anytime. And let me give you some copies of the third sketch, the older man. You might want to show those around and tell your kids not to go anywhere with a man who looks like that. "

  "We tell them not to go with any men," she said. "But they dont listen. "

  Chapter 12

  "Father Michael Joyner," Gordie Keltner said. "I get mail from him, I suppose most of the free world gets mail from him, but Ill receive his newsletters forever because I sent him money once. I can save a boy for twenty-five dollars- that was the headline of one of his fund-raisers. Heres fifty, I wrote. Save two of them for me, wont you? And I sent it back with my check for fifty dollars. Have you met the good father?"

  "No. "

  "Neither have I, but I caught his act on the tube. He was telling Phil or Geraldo or Oprah all about the danger of adult males who prey on lost youth, and the nasty role of pornography in inflaming all concerned and creating an industry that exploits the kids. All of which may well be true, but I thought, Oh, Michael, arent you playing it the least bit heavy? Because I swear the good padres as gay as a jay. "

  "Really?"

  "Well, you know what Tallulah Bankhead said. All I know is he never sucked my cock, dahling. I havent heard any stories and I havent seen him around the bars, and he may be perfectly celibate, although you dont have to be when youre Episcopalian, do you? But he looks gay and his energy is gay. It must be hell for him, living among all those hot kids and making sure he keeps his pants zipped. No wonder he doesnt have too many kind words for those of us who arent such good little boys. "

  I first met Gordie years ago when I was a detective attached to the Sixth Precinct in the Village. The station house was on Charles Street then- its long since moved to West Tenth- and Gordie was working part time behind the bar at Sinthias. Sinthias was gone now- Kenny Banks, whod owned it, had sold out and moved to Key West. Before that happened, Gordie and a partner had moved to my neighborhood and opened Kid Gloves in the room on Ninth Avenue where Skip Devoe and John Kasabian had had Miss Kittys. Kid Gloves didnt last too long, and now Gordie was working in a joint that had been warehouse space back when I was carrying a gold shield. It was down in the southwest corner of the Village at Clarkson and Greenwich, and it had called itself Uncle Bills when it opened a few years ago. Since then it had been reborn as Calamity Jacks, with a western motif.

  It was late afternoon and Gordie had plenty of time to spend with me. I was one of three customers in the place. An older man in a suit was drinking Irish coffee and reading a newspaper at the end of the bar, and a stocky man in jeans and square-toed black boots was playing bumper pool. I showed Gordie my sketches, as Id shown them in other Village bars, and he shook his head.

  "Theyre cute, though," he said. "But I never had a taste for chicken, my campy remarks to Father Mike notwithstanding. "

  "Kenny liked them young," I remembered.

  "Kenny was incorrigible. I was a sweet young thing myself when I worked for him, and I was already too old to catch his eye. But you wont find much chicken around the bars, Matt. Not the way you used to, not since the drinking age went from eighteen to twenty-one. A fourteen-year-old could pass for eighteen in dim lighting, especially if he was tall for his age or could show some convincing fake ID. But youd have to be seventeen to pass for twenty-one, and by that time youre past your prime. "

  "What a world. "

  "I know. I decided years ago not to be judgmental, and I know most young boys are eager participants in their own seduction. Sometimes they even initiate it. But I dont care. Im turning into a moralist in my old age. I think its wrong for a grown-up to have sex with a child. I dont care if the kid wants it. I think its wrong. "

  "I dont know whats right and wrong anymore. "

  "I thought cops always know. "

  "Theyre supposed to. And that might have been one of the reasons I stopped being a cop. "

  "I certainly hope this doesnt mean Im going to have to stop being a faggot," he said. "Its all I know. " He picked up one of the sketches and tugged his lower lip as he looked at it. "The boys who hustle older men are mostly on the street these days, from what I hear. Lexington Avenue in the low Fifties. Times Square, of course. And the Hudson piers from Morton Street on up. The kids hang out on the river side of West Street and the johns drive up in their cars. "

  "I was in a few of the West Street bars before I came here. "

  He shook his head. "They dont let the young stuff in those places. And the hawks dont gather there, either. Theyre mostly bridge and tunnel types, cruising in their cars, then going home to their wives and kiddies. " He put a fresh squirt of seltzer in my glass. "There is one bar you should try, but not until later on in the day. Not before nine-thirty or ten, I wouldnt think. You wont find boys there, but you might run into some dirty old men with an interest in them. Thats at the Eighth Square. On Tenth Street just off Greenwich Avenue. "

  "I know it," I said. "Ive passed it, but I never knew it was gay. "

  "You would
nt necessarily know from the outside. But its where all the most dedicated chickenhawks do their drinking. The name says it all, doesnt it?" I must have looked puzzled. "Chess," he explained. "The Eighth Square. Thats where a pawn becomes a queen. "

  I had called Elaine earlier and shed begged out of our dinner date. She had either flu or the worst cold ever and it had knocked out her energy, her appetite, and her ability to make sense out of what she was reading. All she could manage was naps in front of the TV. I stayed downtown and had spinach pie and a baked potato at a Sheridan Square coffee shop and went to a meeting at a storefront clubhouse on Perry Street. I ran into a woman Id known at St. Pauls. Shed sobered up there, then moved in with her boyfriend on Bleecker Street. She was married now, and visibly pregnant.

  After the meeting I walked over to the Eighth Square. The bartender wore a tanktop with a German eagle on it and looked as though he spent a lot of time at the gym. I told him Gordie at Calamity Jacks had suggested I ask him for help, and I showed him the sketches of the boys.

  "Look around," he said. "See anyone like that here? You wont, either. Didnt you see the sign? Be twenty-one or be gone. Its not purely decorative. It means what it says. "

  "Juliuss used to have a sign," I said. " If youre gay please stay away. "

  "I remember!" he said, brightening. "As if anyone who wasnt a little light on his feet would ever darken their door. But what would you expect from those Ivy League queens?" He leaned on an elbow. "But youre going way back. Before Gay Pride, before Stonewall. "

  "True. "

  "Let me have another look. Are they brothers? No, they dont really look alike, its more attitude, isnt it? You look at them and you think of wholesome things, Scout hikes and skinny-dipping. A paper route. Playing catch on the back lawn with Dad. Listen to me, will you, I sound like The Donna Reed Show. "

  He didnt recognize the boys, and neither did the few customers he showed the sketches to. "We really dont allow the sandbox set in here," he said. "We come here to complain about how cruel they are, or how much it costs to keep them happy. Wait a minute, now. Whos this?" He was studying the third sketch, the one of Rubber Man. "I think Ive seen him," he said. "I cant swear to it, but I think Ive seen him. "

  A couple of other men came over and leaned over me to examine the sketch. "Of course youve seen him," one said. "Youve seen him in the movies. Its Gene Hackman. "

  "It does look like him," another said.

  "On the worst day of his life," the bartender said. "I see what you mean, but its not him, is it?" I said it wasnt. "Why use drawings, though? Isnt it easier to identify someone with a photograph?"

  "Photographs are so common," one of the others said. "Im all for drawings, I think theyre a very fresh idea. "