"Well, I-Dr. Thurston has stepped out, but as far as I know, he's done everything he and Mr.
Blount and the judge talked about last week. The judge was quite insistent regarding the maximum-security aspect, and Dr. Thurston, I know, has been making arrangements. Has young William been located?"
"Not just yet. But he will be soon, hopefully."
"Should I have Dr. Thurston call you?"
"Thank you, no. Mr. Blount will be in touch. In a week or so, I should think."
"All right, then. Thank you for calling, Mr. Tarbell."
"Thank you for answering when I did. Have a nice day."
"Thank you. Good-bye."
"Bye now."
I hung up and said it out loud: Asshole Blounts! Hardy Monkman had once lectured me against the pejorative use of the word "asshole." It was counterrevolutionary; it mimicked homophobes. But, as I'd tried to explain to Hardy, there were assholes and there were assholes.
The Blounts were assholes.
I phoned Stuart Blount's office and told his secretary I'd need another two thousand dollars within forty-eight hours. She put me on hold, then came back and said she would mail the check to my office that afternoon. I said, "Have a nice day."
I drove over to my apartment and retrieved the Blounts' letter to their son from the jacket of "I'm Here Again." I wanted to rip it open, but I didn't. I carefully steamed the flap loose, then unfolded the typed note. It said:
Dear Billy:
You must come and talk with your mother and me. We can help you, plus we have good news for you. We know where Eddie is, and perhaps we can arrange to put you two in touch.
Your father, (Signed) Stuart Blount
Eddie again. The guy whose lookalike had once gone into the Music Barn and sent Billy Blount into a tailspin. Who the hell was this Eddie?
12
I drove out Western. Dlsco 101 was playing the Village People's "Sleazy." I switched over to WGY and wound down with some Tommy Dorsey-way down, too far. Public radio had on a Villa-Lobos guitar piece, and I stayed with it on the drive out to Trucky's.
Truckman put out a light buffet every day from twelve to two-for $1.95 you could fill up on water-soaked starches and poisoned cold cuts. It was popular and drew a mainly straight crowd from SUNY and from the State Office Campus.
I ate macaroni salad and salami with yellow mustard on a day-old bun. I looked for Mike Truckman but didn't see him around. The dance floor was roped off and the juke box was playing something of the Bee Gees'. I went back to the disc jockey's booth and saw a DJ I'd met a few times at parties. He was inside, sorting through records and listening to something on his headset. I opened the door and went in.
Niles Jameson was a small, skinny black man with a full Afro and a big nimbus of black fuzz all around his placid, delicate face. He wore black pants and a black T-shirt and looked like a dark balloon on a dark string. He glanced my way as I came in and shoved the headset off one ear as he went on examining a stack of new records.
"Hi. I forget your name." He had a big, resonant voice, like a radio DJ's.
"Don Strachey. We've met at Orrin Bell's. I was there the night the guy from Tulsa went through Orrin's waterbed with his spurs."
He looked at me and smiled. "Niagara Falls."
"The people downstairs thought so."
"Wet."
He flipped a record off the turntable and, using the palms of his hands like fingers, popped it into its jacket. "You're the detective, right? Superfly."
"Something like that." I looked at the records he was going through. "What's new that's good?"
"The Pablo Cruise is nice. And an Isley Brothers that's gonna knock your socks off." He put another record on and moved his body to the sound in his ear.
I always felt like Barbara Walters in these situations. I said, "Is disco going to last?"
He said, "Is dancing?" He was young. But I nodded knowingly.
I said, "Have you taken Steve Kleckner's place?"
"Some nights," he said. "I free-lance."
"Where abouts?"
"Parties, college dances, a straight club in Watervliet. Whoever'll hire me."
"You knew Kleckner, didn't you?"
He changed records. "Yeah. I knew Steve. He set me up with Truckman. The DJs all help each other out, mostly. There's a couple of turkeys, but not too many. Steve was a good man. I liked Steve."
"I heard he was depressed about something the couple of weeks before he was killed. Do you have any idea why that might have been?"
He flipped the record on the turntable over with his palms and set the needle back on it. "Nope. I don't."
"I don't think Billy Blount killed him," I said. I'm trying to find out who did. Steve was popular, I know. But it looks as if somebody didn't like him. Who didn't?"
He pushed the headset down around his neck and looked at me now. "I know the Blount dude's friends all think he's innocent," Jameson said. "And maybe that's so. But if Blount didn't do it, I can't help you out, brother. I wish I could. People liked Steve, and we all miss the hell out of him.
I mean, yeah, Steve was a little bit loose and sometimes he probably went home with people he shouldn't have. And shit, maybe he ran into somebody once, some crazy fuck who wasn't playing with a full deck, somebody who couldn't stand anybody gay being as cool and together as Steve was-I've met that type-or maybe somebody who didn't dig the records he played, or didn't like the way he kissed. Shit, I've met a few weird people. They're around. But not that weird." He gazed down at the spinning turntable and shook his head in disgust.
Through the big window overlooking the empty dance floor, I saw Mike Truckman come in a side door and head up towards the bar.
I said to Jameson, "Were you here the night it happened?"
"I was over doing a party in Schenectady." He pulled the headset over one ear again and moved the turntable arm to the second cut of the record that was on. "I heard the next night when I came in. From the cleaning lady. She was having the jimjam fits. Carried on like the crazy bitch she is."
"You mean Harold?"
He nodded. "You know Harold?"
"I've seen her-him-her around."
"A trip, isn't she?"
Harold was the sometime drag queen who cleaned up after closing each night at Trucky's. She had the look of a forties movie queen and the meanest, foulest mouth in Albany County. Her shrill anger, as she pointed out to anyone who would listen, resulted from the twist of fate that had made her a cleaning lady instead of a star. She claimed that if she had been born in 1926 instead of 1956, her life would have been very different. And it might have been. With peace of mind, or enough Valium in her, Harold could have been some other studio's answer to Rita Hayworth, or at least Virginia Mayo.
Jameson said, "I'd seen Harold freak out before, but nothing like that day. I mean, it really got to her. Fact, she said she'd seen it coming. She knew something bad was coming down with Steve.
She started screaming and throwing things around, and finally Mike had to hustle her out of here.
Mike was sauced up even more than usual, and we were all down, and Harold was just making it worse."
"Mike has a bad drinking problem, doesn't he?"
"Yeah, especially since summer it's gotten worse. It's a shame. Mike's a good man. Floyd the doorman is pretty much running the place now."
"Does Mike have blackouts? When he can't remember where he's been and what he's done?"
"Could be. I wouldn't know about that."
"What's Harold the cleaning lady's last name?"
"Snyder."
"Where does she live?"
"Pine Hill somewhere. Floyd's not here, but Mike could tell you, if you catch him sober. You gonna visit Harold?" He raised his eyebrows and grinned.
"I think so," I said.
"You watch out now. That bitch is man-crazy. Came in here one night after closing and wanted to do me on that stool over there."