But that was after I’d seen Rath killed!
I was mentally reeling, so it was Jill who asked, “Are you sure of this?”
“Sure,” Carl deadpanned. “It seemed odd to me, that’s all.”
Now I had presence of mind to speak again: “What did?”
“The front of his jacket was all slashed, ripped up. But he was fine.”
16
That evening, at seven o’clock, the high-ceilinged pine dining hall transformed itself into a dimly lit night spot, where Frank Sinatra and big band music held sway. The snowstorm had prevented the arrival of the New York City — based dance band who’d been booked, but Mary Wright had put together a sound system and found a nice stack of smooth forties and fifties pop sides to create a nicely nostalgic aura; whether you were into Christie or Chandler, it didn’t matter — all mystery fans like to slide into the past.
Mary Wright herself was playing DJ, in a pretty pink satin gown rather than a Mohonk blazer for a change, and I — looking pretty natty myself in my cream sports jacket and skinny blue tie and navy slacks — went up to her and asked if she had any Bobby Darin.
“I think I can round up ‘Beyond the Sea,’ ” she said.
“Thanks. It’s not a ‘Queen of the Hop’ crowd, anyway.”
She smiled at that and it was a pretty, pretty nice smile; I wished things hadn’t gotten tense between us. But what the hell, it kept Jill from pinching me.
I went back to our regular table, where a few of us — myself and Jill included — were finishing up dinner (as this was a dinner dance, after all). Sardini and I were having a Vienna nut torte (not the same one) and Jill was putting away some pumpkin pie. Jack Flint and his wife sat across from us, and Jack was having a drink. Quaker roots or not, the Mohonk dining room did serve drinks with the evening meal, if you insisted on it.
I hadn’t. I wanted my brain nice and clear. While the day had been uneventful since my talks with Mary Wright and the Arnolds, I was still trying to make sense of what I’d learned. After the noon buffet, and before the afternoon panel on which Flint and Sardini and I discussed the recent comeback of the private-eye story, Jill and I had tried to put some of the pieces together — and hadn’t gotten anywhere much.
Fact Number One: Kirk Rath had been seen by the Arnolds after I supposedly saw him killed.
How was that even possible? Were the Arnolds confused about the time, or maybe just confused in general? Or did they see somebody else who merely resembled Rath — but if so, how do you explain the shredded jacket?
Fact Number Two: Kirk Rath and Mary Wright and Curt’s son Gary were college chums.
What did that mean? Nothing much that we could see, other than that Mary entered the circle of suspects by virtue of having previously known Rath.
Fact Number Three: Gary Culver (Culver being Curt Clark’s real last name, as you may recall) had been homosexual.
Did that mean anything? If Kirk Rath was Gary’s college roommate, did that make Rath homosexual as well? And if so, so what?
The latter subject Jill and I had disagreed on hotly, in an afternoon brainstorming session in our room. I insisted that the notion that Rath might have been gay was nonsense. In college, as a rule, you’re assigned roommates in dorms, particularly in the first year. So, the odds were (poor choice of words, admittedly) Gary and Kirk had become roommates by chance. Just because Gary had been gay, that hardly meant it figured Kirk was, too.
“Besides,” I told her, “Rath was too conservative. Politically, he was a reactionary — he’s taken stands on issues that make the Moral Majority look like the American Civil Liberties Union.”
“A perfect reason to stay in the closet,” Jill had said.
“He just wasn’t the type.”
“You mean, he wasn’t particularly effeminate? Grow up, Mal. Don’t expect every gay male to be a drag queen.”
“Give me a break, will you? I’ve seen him at various mystery conventions and such, and he’s always in the presence of a stunning girl.”
“Girl or woman?”
“I’d call them ‘girls’ — late teens, early twenties.”
“Have you ever seen him with the same girl twice?”
I thought about that.
“No,” I said. “It’s always been a different one, but then I’ve only seen him at three or four conventions.”
“Real babes?” she asked, archly.
“Yeah — real babes.”
“Prostitutes, perhaps?”
“Oh, Jill, don’t be ridiculous—”
“A call girl makes a nice escort for a gay man who’s pretending to be straight.”
I gave her a take-my-word-for-it look. “Look, I’ve heard rumors that he was a real stud, okay?”
“Rumors fueled by his being seen with knockout women. I think Rath was trying a little too hard to seem heterosexual.”
“Ah, I just don’t buy it.”
“Mal, he was a guy in his late twenties living in a houseful of men, right?”
“That’s his place of business — they all work with him.”
“I got a news flash for you, kiddo — at most businesses, you don’t sleep in.”
“I just don’t buy it.”
“Notice that you no longer can find any reasonable counterarguments. Notice that you begin to sound like a broken record.”
“Notice that you are getting obnoxious.”
“Okay, okay,” she said, patting the air. “Just think about it... Rath was a guy who liked to smear people. He was politically conservative, a regular self-styled William F. Buckley of the mystery world. If — and I say only if — he were gay, wouldn’t he be likely to hide it?”
“Jill—”
“If. Hypothetical time.”
“If he were gay, yeah, I guess he might try to hide it.”
“Somebody as hated as Rath, somebody as into smearing people as Rath, somebody who was very likely just as insecure as he was egotistical, sure as hell might have tried to keep his off-center sexual preference under wraps.”
“I just can’t buy it.”
“Change the needle. When you called his business, which is to say his home, where he and all the boys bunked, where did they say he was going on vacation?”
“Well... after Mohonk, he was going into the city. New York.”
“And didn’t they say he couldn’t be reached — that even his staff couldn’t reach him?”
“Yes. But I don’t see...”
With elaborate theatricality, she said, “Why would the editor and publisher of the Chronicler, a magazine so intrinsically tied to the personal vision of selfsame editor and publisher, not tell even his own staff where he could be reached? Does that sound like reasonable business behavior to you?”
“Sometimes executives do like to get away, Jill. Sometimes they need to be able to get away from the pressure, and the phones. That’s not so uncommon.”
“Yeah, and maybe he went into New York from time to time, for a little taste of forbidden fruit.”
“Bad, Jill. Very bad.”
“A tacky remark, yes, but to the point, wouldn’t you agree? A closeted homosexual — even if he is sharing that closet with a few other boys — might from time to time take a trip into the big city.”
“I suppose.”
“I rest my case.”
I gave the movie buff a slice of the world’s worst W.C. Fields impression: “And a pretty case it is on which you’re resting, my dear,” adding, natural voice, “although your argument is considerably less attractive. And even if you were right — even if Rath were a homosexual — what would that have to do with his murder?”