"Yes?"
"Don Strachey, Bruno. I'm a private investigator and I'm doing some work for someone on the John Rutka case. I have Rutka's files. You're in there. We should talk."
A pause. Then: "You're scum."
"For the time being, I am. But these things work themselves out ethically in the end, I'm told. Could I drop by?"
"No, you could not. I'm on my way out. What do you want from me?"
"Just to talk and to ask a couple of questions, and maybe to reassure you regarding the ultimate disposition of Rutka's files."
"Are you going to demand money?"
"Would you pay it if I did?"
"Don't be ridiculous."
"So, now that neither of us feels so threatened by the other, what's a good time for me to drop by? I live in your neighborhood and I stay up late. Around eleven?"
"I know exactly who you are and I know exactly where you live. Do you mean eleven o'clock tonight?"
"If a passerby spotted a known homosexual like me knocking at your door, I'd just tip my hat and say I was a neighbor dropping by to borrow a cup of sulphuric acid."
"Don't get funny with me. It's not a good idea. All right, eleven o'clock." He hung up.
On my way out of the Parmalee Plaza, the desk clerk shrank back when I glowered at him menacingly.
"I feel like J. Edgar Hoover," I told Timmy in the corridor outside room F-5912. "I lie to people, I bully and threaten and manipulate people, I invade their privacy- and all for some higher cause." I had just given him a rundown on the day's events.
"Hoover never did anything for a higher cause. He was an evil psychopath, nothing more."
"Oh, thank you. Now I feel better."
"No, I know why you're doing it. To solve the murder and then destroy the files. But you don't have to use Hoover's methods-or John Rutka's."
"But these are the kind of people it turns out I'm dealing with, evil Hoovers and screwed-up Rutkas. The Hoovers are so repulsive I'm almost enjoying hoisting them on their own petards."
He said, "I think you might even be starting to look a little like Hoover. You should get some rest-and food. Have you not eaten again?"
"I'll agree not to look like Hoover if you agree not to look like Clyde."
"I promise not to for the next ten years or so. After that-hey."
"No, I haven't eaten," I said. "I'm going over to Bruno Slinger's after I leave here, so I could use some coffee and a Mars bar or whatever people dine on around here after the cafeteria closes. Where can I pick something up?"
"Why don't you go in and see Mike and Stu and I'll scrounge up what I can?"
"Thanks. I'll provide you with some unsatisfying, undernourishing repast someday."
"I'm sure you will."
Timmy went down the corridor after a phalanx of priests who'd just come out of Bishop McFee's room and I went into room F-5912 past the skeletal comatose man nobody paid any attention to. Stu Meserole lay amidst the machinery, which looked like some droll array of bleeping and gurgling nonsensical equipment from one of the Ealing comedies of the early fifties.
Stu had discovered the Ealing gems in a video store during his last year of consciousness and they had filled him with delight.
Timmy and I were with him when Stu watched The Lavender Hill Mob and The Ladykillers and The Man in the White Suit for the second or third time. Now I half expected a demented-looking Alec Guinness to rise up from behind Stu's machinery wielding a smoking beaker that would turn out to contain a cure.
But he didn't. Rhoda Meserole said, "Hello, Donald. It was good of you to come."
"How is he?"
"Oh, the same. All we can do is pray."
Al Meserole was inexplicably missing, freeing up the most comfortable chair for Rhoda. Mike was in his customary seat, and stood up when I came in. He signaled for me to step outside the room, which I did after briefly grasping Stu's limp hand.
"Al's gone," Mike whispered. "He went back to work."
"But Rhoda's still here all the time?"
"Yes, but she's letting down her guard. The woman is human, after all. She goes to the john, she goes to the cafeteria. Sometimes she's gone for half an hour at a time. I could do it. All I need is the drug. You're going to get something for me, aren't you?"
"Yes."
"When?"
"What did the doctor say today?"
"The same as yesterday. I asked him again just to be certain. The part of Stu's brain that made him human doesn't exist anymore. Stu is dead. It's a travesty what's going on in that room. When can you get me something? I'll pay you whatever it costs."
"I'll have to call someone in New York. You might have to go down and pick it up."
"I can't."
"Why?"
"Rhoda would be suspicious. When I got back, she'd never leave Stu out of her sight."
"I'm kind of tied up around here. And Timmy-he'll have to be told, but he won't want to be involved. He'll accept it, but he won't be able to bring himself to participate. I can get it Fed-Exed up, I guess."
"When can you get it?"
"I'll call New York tonight and let you know tomorrow."
"Don't put it off, okay?"
"I won't."
He squeezed my hand and went back into the room.
When Timmy came back, he said, "Don't tell me. I do understand, but don't tell me."
"I don't know what you're talking about," I said, and we left it at that. end user
18
Where's the file?" Slinger said, gaping at my empty-handedness. "You didn't bring it with you?"
" It'?"
"You said you had the file Rutka kept on me. Do you mean to say you didn't bring it?"
I was seated on a settee across from Slinger in the living room of his Chestnut Street townhouse with the air conditioner on high and a gas fire blazing symmetrically in the fireplace. The portrait hanging above the mantel was of the Republican leader of the state senate, and on a sideboard there were signed photos in silver frames of, among others, Roy Cohn, Barbara Walters, and Adnan Khashoggi.
Slinger leaned toward me, looking edgy and vaguely predatory, and it was hard to resist the urge to back away. He was a big man and it was plain that under his dressing gown he had the massive chest and shoulders of someone who worked out an hour or two a day. He had a granite face with angry gray eyes, and wore a pompadoured hairpiece worthy of a CNN anchor.
Slinger suddenly pulled something from the pocket of his gown and flipped it onto the mahogany coffee table between us.
"What have we here, Bruno?"
"Count it."
"That won't be necessary."
"It's five thousand dollars. Take it. I'll trust you to walk home and bring back the file."
"The file is staying where it is, but that's beside the point."
He looked at me and made no move to take back the wad of cash wrapped with a rubber band. "I suppose you want me to suck your dick," he said. "Is that what this is all about? You want me to come over there and get down on my knees and suck your cock and lick your balls."
"Why did you work so hard to kill the hate-crimes bill?" I said.
He fell back now and snorted once. "I don't believe this. You call me up and threaten me with Rutka's goddamn files and then when I try to play your game the way you want it played, you back off. What's with you anyway, Strachey? What do you want?"
I said, "It's true, I did introduce the subject of the files in hopes of getting your cooperation, Bruno. But I don't want your money, and God knows I don't want you slobbering on any part of me. I just want you to answer two questions and then we can talk about the files. The first question is-I repeat-why did you work so hard to kill the hate-crimes bill?"