A Simple Suburban Murder (8 page)

Robertson continued. "I'm glad these guys stopped by. Did I tell you, Frank, they agreed to stop playing amateur detective and leave things to the police?"

"You did mention something about that this morning."

"Oh, yeah, so I did."

Frank gave me a hard stare. "It's a warning I'm sure they took to heart, and if they did stumble onto something, they'd call us first thing."

"Sure they would. Look at these baseballs—my boys will go nuts."

Robertson's reappearance brought back all my stubbornness. I decided to wait until I knew a little more, then tell them everything.

In the car I told Scott that the police knew about Phil. I mentioned the break-in at the Evanses'. He was as puzzled as I, and it added to his concern. I figured there had to be a connection, but I couldn't begin to understand what.

Scott interrupted my reverie. "You didn't tell him, did you?"

"There wasn't time, what with cops falling all over you." I rationalized, "For the moment our concern is the whereabouts of the kid, not the murder itself."

"The cops won't see it that way."

"No, I suppose not. We've got a full evening to cope with. Let's concentrate on that."

At home I cut a picture of Phil from an old yearbook. I tried calling Neil, but there was no answer. I called Heather Delacroix, the former social worker, and set up an appointment for the next afternoon. After we worked out, Scott went to his dinner. I read some of Boorstin's
The Discoverers.

We arrived at the bar at ten-thirty. The three-hundred-pound woman in leather still danced. In addition to last night's costume she wore a spiked helmet, a leather hook, spike pasties, and two-inch-wide dog collars up and down her arms. The problem was she didn't look out of place. The Saturday night crowd here made the creatures in the bar scene in
Star Wars
look normal. Only in the Womb, they would serve androids too.

I tried asking a few customers questions. Most of them hurriedly moved away before I finished asking or explaining. A few at least looked at the picture. They shrugged, looked down, to the side, anywhere but at me. They mumbled their negatives and shuffled awkwardly away.

At eleven-fifteen the stripper lumbered off. I assumed it was time for the bar to get a break from holding up all that weight. She came over to where we leaned against a dark wall. Up close the planes and folds of her skin glowed with sweat. She didn't chew gum, but should have. She held her hood in her hand. Sequins glittered in her black hair. She looked to be about thirty. She gave a smile that radiated unfriendliness.

"Can I help you boys?" she asked. Her voice was remarkably clear and crisp, cutting through the music without shouting.

"We're looking for someone, a kid, maybe you know him."

She broke in, "I don't like people bothering my customers. I've gotten complaints. Some of them think you're cops."

"We really need to find him. His family is worried."

"So? All the families in the world are worried about their lost lambs. Maybe if they worried sooner they wouldn't be lost. Me, I'm worried because you're bad for business."

Frustrated but undaunted, I tried to show her Phil's picture. She wouldn't look at it.

"I want you guys to leave, now, before I have to get rough. If you're Cops produce some I.D. and charge me. Either way let's move it." Her biceps expanded and contracted, squeezing the tightened leather. She clamped her hand on my arm preparatory to ushering me toward the exit. I tried to break her grip, but couldn't. Scott placed his hand on her wrist and held on. It was strength against bulk. Each strained against the other. A major blow up could scatter the already skittish clientele. Abruptly her grip on my arm loosened. She gave Scott a dirty look. "You some kind of professional?" she asked.

"Yeah," he said.

I rubbed my arm where she'd grabbed me. She rubbed hers where Scott had applied pressure. The bartender appeared. "Any trouble, Daphne?" he asked.

"Nothing I can't handle," she answered.

I looked around the bar. If anyone noticed our little scene they gave no indication.

"What's your interest in this?" she demanded. "You the father, uncle, mother's boyfriend, disappointed customer, jealous boyfriend?"

"I was the boy's teacher."

"You're the teacher? And you're going to this trouble?" For the first time she began to look less belligerent. She eyed me thoughtfully. "Follow me." She jerked her head toward the rear of the bar.

We climbed down two flights of dimly lit wooden stairs. At the bottom we turned left, through a door marked
DANGER HIGH VOLTAGE
. But the only sign of electricity inside was a single bare bulb painted red, attached in a socket above the door. Three chairs sat in the middle of the clothes-strewn room. From one of the heaps of clothes she took a red silk cape and flung it over her bulk. She billowed like a tent in a high wind when she twirled to overburden a chair. With a lighter that matched the color of her cape she lit an un-filtered Camel cigarette.

She peered up at us. "Who are you two?" she demanded.

I introduced us. She gave no sign of recognition at Scott's name. She motioned us to the other chairs. We three sat in the glimmer of the red light. I explained, "We need to find a kid, an eighteen-year-old, named Phil Evans. He's run away. He's probably a suspect in a murder." I gave her the picture.

She looked at it and handed it back to me.

"Why don't you let the family handle it, or the cops?"

"The family's a mess. His dad is the one who was murdered. His mom asked us for help. The cops are more worried about the murder. We care about the kid."

"A teacher busting his butt for his kids. Corny, but I like it." She waved her cigarette at me. "I used to be a teacher. I taught for five years." She laughed. "I made more money my first year as owner of this bar than in all five of those years put together."

"You own this place?" Scott asked.

"Do you think I'd be allowed to do that tawdry little act if I didn't?"

"You've got a point there," Scott said.

She ignored his comment and continued. "But I didn't quit teaching because of the money. I taught high school." She dragged deeply on her cigarette. "I loved kids. I think I really helped them. They used to come back and thank me for the help I'd given them. So why'd I quit? The cash was adequate. It was one of those rumor things. Someone—kids, teachers, parents—who knows—and it doesn't make much difference where it started—began to spread rumors about me. Eventually everybody knew I was a lesbian.

"Then it got ugly. I got in a major fight with my department head. She hated it that kids liked me better. She threatened to tell the principal, superintendent, and school board that I was a lesbian if I wouldn't knuckle under. I laughed at her and dared her to do her worst. Then she threatened to say I seduced little girls. She laughed at me. She said she didn't need proof. A simple accusation like that would ruin my career.

"I'll never forget the astonished look on her wrinkled old face when I belted her one. The punch broke her jaw. She sued. I agreed to quit if she dropped the case. She did, so I left."

She lit another cigarette from the butt of the last one. "So what difference does that little story make? I guess it means I understand a teacher who cares, because I thought of myself as one. I'm going to help you."

"Great," I said.

"Don't get too excited. I'll help in that I'll tell Phil you've been looking for him. If he wants to see you, I'll set up an appointment. If not, forget it."

"But you do know where he is?" Scott asked.

She gave him a sour grimace. "Of course, or how could I tell him?"

"You're not worried about the police?" I asked. "You're here. They're not. I assume that means you know something they don't. I assume in exchange for my little help you keep your mouths shut." We agreed.

"Good, now I want you to leave my customers alone. Come back tomorrow afternoon around five. I'll have definite information."

We got up to leave. "Thank you, Daphne," I said. She stubbed out the last of her chain-smoked cigarettes. "Daphne's my stage name. My real name is Janet Stewart." Outside the bar Scott put a hand on my arm and stopped me. "We've got to do something. She knows where the kid is."

I scrunched deeper into my jacket against the biting wind that blew off Lake Michigan.

"What could we do?" I asked him. "Call the cops."

"We gave our word. Besides, she'd deny everything." "There were two of us. I'm a witness. She can't deny saying it."

"I think she could, and get away with it. She's smart. She knows we want the kid. And she knows the cops around here. You can bet on that. We're amateurs. She's a pro. I doubt if we'd stand a chance."

We stopped at Fullerton and Clark to wait for a walk signal.

Scott asked abruptly, "What if she's lying?" "I don't picture that. She didn't have to admit anything to us, and she did. No, I don't see why she would." I shivered. "I think we should trust her for now. She trusted us. I'll give her the benefit of the doubt."

"What if she really does know and something happens to the kid? We're partly responsible."

"I'm open to suggestions, preferably in the warmth of your penthouse." It was too damn cold to be arguing in the middle of the sidewalk. "There's nothing we can do until tomorrow."

* * *

Sunday morning at eleven-thirty Neil called.

"I've got some information for you," he said.

"We found out some things too."

"Me first, dear. I'm enjoying being detective. I must apologize for taking so long to get back to you, but mother was prying into many deep dark little closets. One can't be too careful in these matters. First the escort services. None of the reputable ones have, heard a thing about the kid."

"Could they be holding out on you?"

"Possible but not probable. Beyond these services there are several prominent call-boy groups, assorted pimps, and independents. I think the actual house of prostitution is somewhat anachronistic in this day and age. None of the above ever heard of the kid either. That doesn't mean there isn't some lesser-known or newer group he's working for, or like I said the other night, the kid could be freelancing."

"So you didn't get anything."

"Be not too hasty, gorgeous one. I went back and checked several of the disreputable escort services. That was much more difficult. One of them had this tidbit. They never heard of a Phil Evans, but they knew Jim Evans. I was sure it wasn't the same man. Who ever heard of a forty-six-year-old hustler? I described the elder Evans from what you told me. My source insisted that it was the same man. He didn't know what Evans did for the service. He only knew there was some connection."

"What would Jim Evans have to do with a gay escort service?" I asked.

"That I couldn't tell you." "Could you at least tell me which escort service it was?"

He mulled this over. "I suppose it wouldn't hurt. I know you can't reveal my source, and you won't reveal where you got this from."

I assured him I wouldn't.

He warned, "It's unrealistic to expect to call and expect them to talk to you."

"I've got to try."

"When we worked together, you were the most trustworthy one, often the only trustworthy one. Use this information carefully. It's called Adonis-at-Large. It specializes in pretty young men. Be careful when you call them," he said. "It's most likely they'll simply hang up on you, but there's a real possibility of danger when you start getting nosy around those prostitution things."

"You're involved with them," I pointed out.

"Yes, dear, but that's different. I'm involved in the community and have well-connected sources whom I trust and who trust me."

"Would you be willing to come with me if I decided to go see them?"

"No. I can't go beyond my sources, sorry."

"Thanks anyway. I'll be careful."

"Good. Now, I've also checked at every point available to me in the general community: social service agencies, hotlines, whatever. As far as they know or were willing to tell, the kid isn't in Chicago. Sorry, dear, that's not what you wanted to hear, I know. Tell me, what did you learn?"

"We might have a lead from a three-hundred-pound lesbian named Daphne."

"Janet, from the Womb?"

"You know her?"

"I know a great deal about her." His voice dripped the acid of a vicious queen on the attack. "Don't trust that woman. Better yet, have no dealings with that woman."

"Why not?"

"She has the most foul reputation of any so-called community leader in the city. She's double-crossed half the prominent gays in town and all the bar owners."

"Double-crossed?"

"The examples are legion. Here's the major problem. Say they'd all get together to endorse a candidate for office, or to deal with police raids on our bars. They'd agree on united action. A few days later, sometimes only hours later, they'd find out that she'd cut her own deal with the alderman, the ward committeeman, or the commander down at the local police station. To say she's intensely disliked is an understatement. Don't expect much help from her. She's got one of the most prosperous bars in the community, and she never spends a cent on any gay causes."

"She might be able to lead us to the kid."

"She told you that?"

"She said she'd talk to him and let us know if he would talk to us."

"Don't believe her. Anyway I haven't gotten to the worst. She's one of the disreputable crowd I couldn't check on. My sources wouldn't even talk about her. I do know this. She's got boys working out of that bar, and we're talking
young
boys. What's more, she's never been raided, not even harassed slightly. She's got to have powerful connections."

"Does she actually own the bar?" I asked. "She said she did."

"I doubt it. She runs the place and may own a part of it. It's more likely a partnership deal. Most of them are these days."

After a dozen more warnings and predictions of doom, Neil rang off, insisting we keep in touch with him.