by Don Travis
Once through the door, I was proved wrong. The interior temperature was comfortable. Something scrunched beneath my feet. Sawdust. The floor was covered in old-fashioned sawdust. To sop up spilled beer or spilled blood—or both. The decibel level was lower than I expected, giving the place the atmosphere of a corner pub. But it was early yet. The jukebox was modulated and the buzz of conversation, subdued. People—mostly men—clustered in twos and threes around small tables. A couple of bosomy waitresses in short shorts moved among the patrons bringing a steady supply of drinks. A quick glance around the bar revealed a glass or two of the hard stuff, but this was overwhelmingly a suds joint.
Conversation didn’t exactly die when we came through the door, but we moved through an odd tunnel of silence as talk faded with our approach and resumed with our passing. I felt the weight of curious eyes as we made our way to the bar.
“What’ll it be, gents?” The bartender sported a luxurious black moustache. His professional smile revealed a missing front tooth.
“A draft,” I said. Aggie nodded, earning him one of the same.
The beer was good, another surprise. Probably Coors, which was not one of the two brands advertised outside. Aggie and I exchanged glances as we silently sipped our brews. There was a raised dance floor at the east end of a room that seemed bigger than the building housing it. No one was dancing. In accordance with barroom protocol, we inspected the place with our eyes above the heads of the seated patrons, although several of them stared at us boldly.
“Newcomers?” a voice at my side asked.
I turned to find a man of about thirty with a bronzed face and a physique fashioned by hard work. Oilfield worker or open-pit miner, no doubt.
“Yeah, I’m up from Albuquerque. My friend’s visiting me from San Francisco. We’re trying to decide whether to tackle Navajo Lake or the San Juan tomorrow.”
“You already missed the best fishing, but it ain’t bad. We was up at the lake last week and pulled out a couple of pike. Best bet’s probably the Animas this time of year. Course, depends on what you’re fishing for.”
“Anything that bites,” Aggie said.
“I hear you. My name’s Oscar.” A strong, work-calloused hand clasped mine.
“Good to meet you, Oscar. I’m BJ, and my friend’s Aggie.”
“Aggie.” Oscar acknowledged my taller companion. “How’d you find the Sidewinder?”
“It’s all we’ve heard about since we got here. Best beer joint in the Four Corners.”
“That’s the truth. Anything else?”
So that was his game. Two strange males had entered the place, and he was already setting out his bait. What was it Dix Lee had said about the Sidewinder? It wasn’t a gay joint, but it attracted some of that trade. I took another glance at the man. My height and weight but younger. An attractive face if it hadn’t been so weather-beaten. But the arms and chest outlined by his tight T-shirt would have attracted anyone halfway leaning toward queer. The huge gold-and-turquoise Western belt buckle at his trim waist pulled one’s gaze to his groin. I nudged Aggie’s foot, hoping he’d get the message to keep his mouth shut.
I decided to deliberately misunderstand his question about “anything else.” “Just that we oughta check out the old Anasazi ruins around here. Walk through the tourist-trap art studios downtown. The usual.”
“I meant about the bar,” Oscar said.
“No, nothing in particular. Are you saying this is a drug joint?” I glanced around.
“Naw. Well, not so’s you’d notice. A few of the boys are probably toting a private stash, but this ain’t where you go to get it. That your game?”
“Nope. Don’t have a game. Came in for a beer. You have a game, Oscar?”
The broad shoulders lifted and fell. “Everybody has a game, BJ. You did say BJ, didn’t you?”
“Yeah, it’s BJ. My game is living my life and letting the other guy live his.”
“That’s a good game.”
“But it’s not yours,” I suggested.
“One of them.” He turned coy.
“And the other?”
“Well, I’m always looking for a good time.”
“Who isn’t? But one man’s good time is another man’s nightmare.”
Oscar’s eyes told me he was tired of sparring. He’d either make his move or figure it was a lost cause. Then loud laughter and a booming voice in the corner beyond the dance floor diverted our attention to where four men were crowded into a booth.
“Hell, Bud,” someone yelled. “You been playing that same George fer two months now. Time to get some new bills.”
I picked Bud Yarborough out of the group by the nasty smile he gave his companions. From this distance he appeared to have a long, thin head. There was nothing attractive about him, but on the other hand, there was nothing unattractive either. He had one of those faces that if you considered each feature—the deep-set eyes; long, thin nose; sunburned cheeks; dimpled chin—nothing was particularly outstanding. Put together they looked “passable,” as my mother used to say. His dingy blond hair was gathered at the back in a ponytail that made me think of Melissa at the Trail’s End.
Aggie’s reaction to the name, Bud, was obvious—and unfortunate. Our new companion caught it immediately.
“Dollar poker.” Oscar leaned against the bar and took a swig from a dark amber bottle. “You know old Bud Yarborough?” The words were casual, but the body language was tense. His shoulders were thrown back, his chest motionless as he held his breath. His eyes swept back and forth between Aggie and me.
“Never met the man,” I answered. “Somebody we oughta know?”
Oscar put his elbows on the counter and shook his head. “Just a fella.” He stood straight and stared at Aggie. “You look like somebody I oughta know. We ever run into one another before?”
“Not unless you’ve been to Na… uh, San Francisco,” Aggie answered. “Spent a little time over in Taos. Maybe we saw one another over there.”
“Uh-uh. Can’t place it, but I will.”
He probably would; Aggie was a taller, older version of Lando Alfano. This Oscar character was on the hunt for something, and my guess was trouble. It was time to get out of there. I shuffled around in the sawdust as the bartender offered another round.
“No, thanks. Better get some shut-eye if we’re gonna go fishing tomorrow.”
“Where you guys staying?” Oscar continued to eye Aggie.
“One of the downtown motels. Must be something going on in town. Had to hit a couple of places before we found one with two vacancies.”
If Oscar knew that was a lie, he let it pass. His eyes fixed on me. “You’d save a buck or two if you doubled up.”
“Not my thing,” I said flatly. “I’m here for the fishing, not listening to some big galoot snore all night.”
I left a fiver on the counter as a tip and headed outside, sensing Aggie’s reluctance as he trailed along behind. He voiced his objections as soon as we were through the door.
“That was the guy we’re looking for over in the corner.”
“Right, and that was one of his backups in the fight with Lando standing right beside us. The guy was baiting us, Aggie. He was inviting us to make a move on him so his team could swing into action.”
“I’m not a lump of coal, BJ. I know what he was up to. Let’s go back in there and do what we came to do.”
“There were four of them in that booth, and Oscar made five. I’m not afraid of a good fight, but those odds are a little long.”
“Hell, Yarborough’s gonna be with buddies anytime we see him. I say we tackle him now.”
“Aggie, it’s important you trust me about this. We’re not going to win a fight with a man who’s got a whole bar full of buddies. Get in the car. We’re going to leave.”
He was still grumbling as he slammed the door. “What now?”
“You’ll see. Chances are somebody’s watching.”
I pulled out of the parking lot and
headed back toward Main Street and our motel. “Anybody follow us out?”
“Nope. Nobody.”
Once out of sight of the Sidewinder, I pulled a U-turn and drove back past the bar. Half a mile south of the building, I found a road that cut back to the east. It meandered through a semirural residential area before turning back north. By trial and error, I finally found a back entrance to the bar’s parking lot. A lone sycamore near the highway provided a dark spot to wait.
“Now you’ll see how a PI does most of his work. Sitting on his backside.”
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Chapter 10
AGGIE WASN’T cut out for surveillance. To calm his rising case of the fidgets, I asked if his father had hired another PI to look for his brother.
“No. At least not to my knowledge. But the old man does things his own way, and it’s usually the right way. He’s been known to hedge his bets. Why do you ask?”
“Before I left Albuquerque, I got a whiff of someone else on the hunt for the orange Porsche.” I told him about the casual conversation with the clerk at the Acoma truck stop. “Of course, it could be an innocent comment about a car someone saw on the highway.”
I watched him for a moment through the darkness before continuing. “And then there’s what the motel clerk told me. Somebody was curious about the car while Lando and Dana were checked in at the Trail’s End.”
“That bomb always attracted attention.”
“And that might be all it was, but I don’t like coincidences. So what do you think? Your father’s man?”
“In all honesty I don’t have the foggiest idea.”
“I get the feeling Anthony Alfano is ashamed of Lando.”
“No, that’s not true. He’s proud of Lando. The kid’s good-looking, smart, and very good with people. And Papa’s convinced this gay thing’s a phase. He expects Lando to grow out of it any minute, start going out with girls, and give him a bunch of grandkids. It’s an Italian thing.”
“It’s a human thing,” I responded. “Do you think he’s right?”
A stray beam of moonlight caught in Aggie’s hair as he shook his head. “Naw. Lando’s who he is. The old man’s usually a realist, but he can’t handle one of his sons being gay. He’s in denial.”
“How do you feel about it?”
“I wish it wasn’t so—for Lando’s sake. The way I figure it, there are enough obstacles in a man’s life. He doesn’t need another one that flies in the face of convention. Not one that big, anyway. Lando’s life would be just about perfect if… if he wasn’t that way. No matter how much he accepts being gay, it makes dealing with most of society that much harder.”
“You don’t figure he’s up to it?”
“Oh, yeah. Lando’ll be just fine.”
“Except at home.”
He turned to glance at me. “I never thought of it that way, but you’re right. He runs into more bigotry in the Alfano household than out in the real world.”
“Sad.”
“Shit!” Aggie shoved the door open. I lunged to cover the dome light with my palm, but for a moment, our location was exposed to anyone watching. He slammed the door and stalked away. I understood he wasn’t angry at what I’d said; he was simply coming to grips with the price his brother paid for living life on his own terms.
Although my night vision was impaired, so far as I could determine, no one had taken notice of us. By the time Aggie returned, I had shut off the dome light.
“Sorry. It hit me in the gut, I guess. I started remembering my brother when we were younger. He was a cute little kid. And he grew up to be a cute big kid… man. Why does it happen? I mean, I’ve known gay guys ever since middle school, and it never bothered me a bit. But this is my brother.”
I drew a deep breath. He was asking for my take on things because his father had apparently told him I was gay. Either that or he had good gaydar. “I’ve read all the books, Aggie. And I’ve sorted through all the theories and come to the conclusion it’s a matter of predisposition… hardwiring, if you prefer. In my case it wasn’t anything my parents did or didn’t do. I had a normal childhood and a pretty typical adolescence.”
“When did they find out?”
“Before I was out of high school. My father was a very shrewd man, and he picked up on it. Probably before I did. Anyway, we talked, and that helped focus things for me.”
“So he brought you out… intellectually, I mean.”
“I guess that’s true. And as a result, I went into the Marines right after graduation to make a point. And learned I was as much a man as any of them.”
Aggie sighed. “Lando didn’t have the advantage of an understanding father. The old man just went for the jugular, telling the kid he wasn’t gay—or queer, as he put it. In spite of that, Lando’s a happy-go-lucky guy. Happy with who he is.”
“Not everybody agonizes over being different, but given his home environment, I suspect he went through a lot.”
“It’s like seeing a new brother.”
“No, it’s like seeing a brother anew.”
Bud Yarborough, or someone with a ponytail who looked like him, ambled through the front door of the Sidewinder Bar and Grill followed by three of his pals. The group made for a pair of double-cab, heavy-duty Ford trucks that could have been identical twins.
I kicked over the motor. “We’ve got to get closer. It’s going to be hard to keep the right truck in sight. Watch them and tell me which truck he gets into.” I dropped the car into gear and allowed it to coast forward slowly without turning on the lights. Once out of the shadow of the overhanging sycamore, it was almost as light as day. The cloudless sky and bright moon spotlighted us—or so it seemed.
There was no sign we had been observed. The four men shouted good-natured insults and split up into pairs. Yarborough stepped up into the cab of one pickup; Oscar joined him in the passenger’s seat. With a blast of horns, the two trucks roared out of the parking lot and turned north toward town.
“You get a fix on them?” I maneuvered my way without benefit of lights.
“Yarborough’s in the second truck.”
Just before turning out onto the highway, I flipped on the lights. Yarborough was lead-footing it out of sight, so I goosed the rental.
“What’s the plan?” Aggie asked.
“Play it by ear. Hopefully he’ll drop Oscar by his place and go home alone.”
“What if they hit another bar?”
“Then we wait.”
In less than a mile, brake lights flashed as the truck directly in front of us slowed for a right turn into a trailer park. The other pickup kept going. I took the turn more cautiously and watched as Bud braked beside a doublewide. Both men got out.
“Either they’re roomies or Bud’s going in for a Bud,” Aggie said.
“Makes you wonder, doesn’t it?”
“You think Bud and Oscar…?”
“Dunno, but it’s possible. At any rate, it doesn’t look like they’re going to split, so I guess we get to take on the pair of them. You up for it?”
“Let’s do it.”
Yarborough had already stripped off his boots and shirt by the time he answered my knock. Work at the oilfield had added muscles to his slender frame. Sun bronzed around his arms and neck, he was a pale ivory from there down, making his dark nipples seem almost obscene. His plain face twisted at the sight of us. The ash-blond ponytail had been released, and his hair flowed over his shoulders.
“Who’re you?” Yarborough’s voice was like a bass drum.
“Need to talk to you a minute. Can we come in?” I asked courteously.
“I repeat, who the fuck are you?”
“My name’s Vinson. I’m a private investigator from Albuquerque. This is—”
He shot a thumb in Aggie’s direction. “This is kin to one of them queer sons a bitches tried to put the make on me awhile back.”
“And therein lies the rub,” I said, stepping up into
the trailer.
I halfway expected Yarborough to stop me, but he backed away. Aggie was hard on my heels. Once inside the door, I stepped aside so as not to block him. Oscar came out of the back, also shirtless. Had we interrupted something?
Yarborough emerged from his trance. “Get outa here. I didn’t invite you in.”
“You backed away and gave us access,” I said. “That constitutes consent. Of course, if you insist, we’ll have to leave.”
“I fucking insist,” he snarled.
“Very well, then we’ll have to ask our questions at the police station after they invite you down. But then we’ll have a couple of other people with us.”
“Who?”
“Two… and possibly three others you’ve baited and assaulted.”
“I don’t know what—”
“Sure you do. And you know who too. It doesn’t take long for word like that to get around. Hell, it was the cops who put us onto you. They’d like to get you out of their hair. So do we leave, or do we talk?”
“About what?”
I motioned toward Aggie. “About Mr. Alfano’s brother.”
“What about him? The asshole got zonked and grabbed my cock, so I invited him outside and taught him a lesson his brother oughta taught him before he got out of short pants.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Aggie’s fists ball. I stepped forward, putting myself halfway between him and the idiot standing in front of me.
“That’s not what the cops say. You baited those two men and waylaid them when they left the bar. We hear they held their own against three of you. But as much as I’d like to push your face in for that, it’s not why we’re here. I want to know what happened after that.”
“Nothing. The cops sent us on our way. We left, and I guess they did too. Never saw them again.”
“That’s not true. Mr. Alfano’s brother and his friend came back to the Sidewinder later and hooked up with a fellow you felt you had a claim on.”