The Ninth Man

by Dorien Grey

  “Okay, then,” I said, deliberately ignoring both his reaction and his comment. “I’ll see you in an hour.”

  I hung up, went into the bathroom to say goodbye to Tim and to ask him to call me as soon as he had anything, and left.

  *

  Rholfing’s apartment was everything I had expected it to be and more. The style was Early Overdone. Some of his ideas were basically good, but he must have been out to corner the glitter-and-spangle market. Gold lame swag curtains covered every window and door, all pulled back with either velvet or rhinestone ties—and in one or two garish instances, both.

  He kept apologizing for the mess the place was in, although as I’d expected, there wasn’t a gnat’s eyebrow out of place. The only hint of overt masculinity in view was a set of barbells inexplicably lying on one side of the foyer.

  He ushered me in and sat me down on one end of an overstuffed love seat (guess who intended to use the other side) and, still apologizing, whisked out into the kitchen. I could hear the tinkle of fragile cups and good silver in the few microsecond pauses in his chatter.

  An obviously new and exorbitantly expensive art book graced the coffee table; and I was delighted, as I leaned forward to thumb through it, to find several of the pages uncut.

  Rholfing swept back into the room a moment later, bumping the kitchen door closed with his rear-end without missing a step. The tea tray, glinting except for a few rather obvious thumb prints, was heaped high with various croissants, muffins, breakfast rolls, and assorted goodies. Obviously, he’d made a record-time sprint to the corner bakery, and I probably would have been flattered that he’d gone to the trouble if I didn’t recognize trick bait when I saw it.

  He set the tray on the coffee table, made a little hands-up gesture of pleasure, and settled himself, like a bird onto a nest full of eggs, onto the love seat next to me.

  “One lump, or two?” he asked, picking up the tiny sugar tongs with a practiced hand.

  “None, thanks,” I said. “I take it black.”

  He bravely fought back a slight sneer. With movements that would have done a symphony conductor proud, he poured the coffee. I resisted the temptation to applaud.

  “Did you find the photo?” I asked, realizing all the while that I was being more than a little tacky considering the considerable effort he’d gone through to impress me.

  “Yes,” he said, not quite able to cover his disdain of my obvious lack of sophistication. “I have it in there.” He gave an offhand wave toward what I assume to have been the bedroom.

  “So tell me a little about you and Bobby,” I said, accepting the cup and saucer as gracefully as possible under the circumstances.

  Rholfing gave a deep, Weltschmerz sigh, dropped two lumps of sugar and a plip of cream into his coffee and stirred, holding the small spoon between thumb and index finger, pinkie raised.

  “What’s to tell?” he said, finally. “I’d known him for years—absolutely years—before we ever got together. We lived in the same building. He had this tacky little place—furnished, you know—and I was living in the penthouse suite with a delightful boy named Herb…something. We’d bump into one another from time to time but never really exchanged…” He gave a puckered-lip smile. “…words. Croissant?”

  He offered me the tray; I took what looked like a miniature prune Danish.

  “Soooo,” he continued, “then there was this absolutely terrible affair in the building, and I just couldn’t stand to stay there any longer. Herb and I moved our separate ways, and that was the last I saw of Bobby for ages. Another croissant?”

  Licking my fingers—to his raised-eyebrow horror—I shook my head.

  “Well, I knew he was a whore even then,” Rholfing said, pausing only long enough to take a dainty nibble from something with powdered sugar on it. “But then, about a year ago, while I was ‘between engagements,’ as they say, I ran into him in one of those sleazy bars I always seem to stumble into when I’m bombed out of my mind. He was almost as drunk as I was—which is saying something—and I asked him home.”

  Rholfing’s eyes misted over, and he sat quiet for the first full moment since I’d come in.

  “I’ll never forget his words,” he resumed, his lower lip quivering ever so slightly. “He looked at me, and he said, ‘I hear you’re a great fuck.’ And I said, ‘You bet your sweet ass, Charlie,’ and we came home together.”

  He turned quickly to the side, and I could see him dabbing at his eyes with a handkerchief that had, as in my office, suddenly appeared from nowhere. If I’d suspected there was even a trace of sincerity in his actions, I probably would have felt sorry for him. After a second he took a deep breath and straightened up, regally.

  “And we were together ever since. Until some sonofabitch killed him.”

  I reached for another prune Danish.

  “I don’t suppose you have any idea as to who might have done it,” I said, “or why. One of the main problems in cases like this is that a lot of times it’s a trick the victim’s never seen before.”

  “Oh, Bobby knew him,” Rholfing said casually, flicking some powdered sugar off his pant leg. “I always knew when he had somebody special. Not regular special, mind you—not one of those little numbers he’d fuck like clockwork for a week or two until he dumped them—or they dumped him.”

  He rummaged through the diminishing stack of goodies on the tray until he found the one he was looking for, picked it up daintily, and took a mouse-sized bite before placing it on his saucer beside his still-full coffee cup.

  “I should have known that last morning,” he said, ritual completed. “He’d been acting like the cat who ate the canary all the night before, and that morning he had that special look he gets…got…when a big dick was on the horizon. I knew better than to ask. You never had the privilege of seeing Bobby do one of his ‘how-dare-you-accuse-me’ numbers. He was a real bastard but…but…I miss him!”

  He suddenly burst into tears and threw himself on me, grabbing me so tightly I thought I’d choke. A little awkwardly, I put my arms around his shoulders and patted him on the back. A wrong move, I immediately knew when, with one arm still locked around my neck, his other hand dropped to my crotch.

  I pried myself loose as diplomatically as possible and, pleading a kidney problem, excused myself and hastily found my way to the bathroom.

  After combing my hair for a minute or two and studying my thumbnail carefully for another minute, I flushed the toilet and returned to the living room. Rholfing was sitting there, drinking coffee and looking regally unconcerned.

  “I suppose you’d like the picture now,” he said.

  “Yeah, that might be a good idea,” I said, lamely—being careful not to sit down again.

  He got up like the czarina rising from her throne and undulated into the bedroom, to return seconds later with a Polaroid picture of a good-looking young guy, totally nude, in what might best be described as a “suggestive pose.” Rholfing hadn’t been kidding when he said Bobby McDermott had certain striking resemblances to a horse.

  “I thought you’d like one that showed off his best features,” Rholfing said. “More coffee?”

  “Uhhh, no, thanks,” I said, forcing myself to stop looking at the photo and putting it in my shirt pocket.

  “Is there anything else I can get you?” he asked, coquettishly, at the same time giving a not-too-subtle glance toward the bedroom. This guy apparently had difficulty with the more complex words of the English language, such as no.

  “Ah, no, thanks. I’ve really got to get going. Thanks for the pic—I mean, thanks for the coffee. I’ll call you as soon as I find out anything.” Somehow, I bumbled my way to the door.

  “Do that,” Rholfing said—just a little sarcastically, I thought. And when he closed the door behind me, it was just a little more forcefully than necessary. As a matter of fact, it was just this side of a slam.

  *

  I went home to shower and shave and change clothes, did some laundry
, then went to the office and farted around for awhile with a crossword puzzle, hoping to hear from Tim.

  In a way, I suppose I was trying to avoid thinking about just what in hell I’d gotten myself into. What I’d thought would be a quick case-open, case-closed affair looked like it could be something I wasn’t sure I really wanted to get involved in. A simple drug overdose is one thing, suicide another, but murder—make that probably six murders?

  After what seemed like four days, I glanced at my watch and saw it was only two o’clock, so I decided to go back to Hughie’s. Bud had mentioned somebody named Tessie who might have known Bobby. Back when I’d been assuming Bobby had OD’d on drugs, it didn’t really matter who knew him or who didn’t. Now it mattered. Maybe Bud had Tessie’s phone number. Besides, now that I had McDermott’s photo, it might help find out if anyone else there knew him.

  Walking into Hughie’s in the daytime is always like entering a coal mine—and the brighter the day outside, the stronger the contrast. The day’s heat was suddenly replaced by the clammy, stale-beer-smelling dampness of the air conditioning.

  The 25-watt bulbs behind the bar were not materially aided by three or four flickering candles in those God-awful net-stockinged colored bowls set out in the booths along the wall. I was, as usual, temporarily blinded. As I stumbled to the bar, I bumped rather abruptly into a well-rounded ass in tight Levi’s.

  “Sorry,” I mumbled.

  “Twenty-five a feel, mack,” was the gracious reply from somewhere in the darkness beneath what I dimly made out to be a cowboy hat.

  “You take MasterCard?” I asked, and reached for an empty barstool. My eyes were now becoming accustomed to the gloom, and I could see half a dozen forms slouched on various stools along the bar. Most of the forms, when I could make out their faces, I recognized as regulars.

  Bud cut off a muttered conversation with one of them at the far end of the bar, waved, and automatically reached into the cooler for a glass. He pulled me a dark and brought it over. I handed him a wadded bill I’d found that morning at the bottom of my pants pocket.

  “Planning to make a spitball?” he asked as he unwadded the bill. I just grinned.

  “Hey, Bud, remember I was asking you about a guy named Bobby McDermott?”

  “Yeah—but like I said, nobody’s much on names around here. Did you find Tessie?”

  “Nope, I didn’t get a chance to come back. I got tied up.”

  “So I see from the bags under your eyes. You S-and-M types are all alike.”

  We both laughed, and I reached into my shirt pocket for the Polaroid photo.

  “This is the guy I’m interested in.” I handed the photo to Bud, who reached under the bar for a flashlight to enable him to see. He snapped on the light and let out a long, low whistle.

  “Holy shit!” he said. “No wonder you’re lookin’ for him! If you find him, can I have seconds?”

  I didn’t tell him Bobby McDermott was no longer in any condition to give firsts, let alone seconds.

  Before I had a chance make any reply at all, I felt a dark form beside me and turned to see Cowboy had moved down the bar to look at the picture. In the reflection of Bud’s flashlight, and with my eyes a bit better accustomed to what little light there was in the place, I could see Cowboy was definitely not one of the regulars.

  I momentarily was tempted to say something brilliant, like: “What’s a guy like you doing in a place like this?” But because it was a place like this, I knew good and well what he was doing in it.

  “Lemme see, Bud,” Cowboy said, holding out a large uncallused hand.

  “Recognize him?” I asked Bud, who continued to stare at the photo.

  “I dunno—I haven’t gotten up to the face yet.”

  “I said lemme see, Bud,” Cowboy repeated, hand still calmly extended.

  Bud shot him a dirty look, flicked off the flashlight, and handed him the photo. He tilted it toward the nearest dim light then nodded.

  “Know him?” I asked.

  “Who wants to know?” he replied, not belligerently.

  “I want to know,” I said. “Didn’t you just hear me ask?”

  “You vice?”

  I pulled out my wallet to show him it had no police badge. He seemed to relax a bit.

  “What’s it worth to you?” he asked in his best hustler voice.

  “Would you believe my undying gratitude?”

  The flicker of a grin crossed his face like summer lightning.

  “What are you looking for him for?”

  “I’m not looking for him,” I said. “I know where he is. I just want to find out some more about him.”

  “Then why don’t you ask him?”

  “I wish I could.”

  Cowboy stared at me.

  “He in trouble?” Again I could feel him tense up.

  “Not anymore,” I said. “He’s dead.”

  “Oh.” The voice was like a little boy’s. When he spoke again, it was neither a little boy’s nor a hardened hustler’s. “Yeah, I know…knew…him.” He gave a long sigh. “Buy me a beer?”

  I have fairly strong moral scruples about buying hustlers drinks, but in Cowboy’s case, I was willing to make an exception. After all, I rationalized, I could write it off my income tax as a business expense, particularly if he could give me some information about Bobby McDermott. And what the hell—he hadn’t asked for champagne.

  I drained my glass, signaled to Bud, and raised two fingers. He nodded and moved off to draw two.

  In the pause, I took stock of Cowboy. There was a lot there to take stock of. Six-three, Levi’s, boots, Levi’s jacket open to the navel, no shirt. Nice chest with just a patch of hair bridging the space between his nicely shaped pecs and trailing down suggestively toward his crotch. A very respectable basket and an ass to match.

  Bud returned with the beers, and Cowboy gestured thanks as he raised his glass and took a long, Adam’s-apple-bobbing drink. Then he set the glass down and pushed his hat to the back of his head, exposing a beautiful head of wavy black hair.

  He hooked his free thumb under his belt and raised one boot to the bar rail. Turning to me, he leaned against the bar on one elbow. This kid had the pose down to a tee. All he needed was a pack of Marlboros.

  He pulled out a pack of Marlboros, tapped one out of the pack with an index finger, and lit up with cupped hands. When he’d done just about everything butch he could think of at the moment, he took a long drag, blew it out one corner of his mouth slowly, and said, “What happened to Bobby?”

  “That’s what I’m trying to find out.”

  He took the cigarette out of his mouth and set it in the ashtray in front of him.

  “Thought you said you weren’t a cop?” he said, watching my face closely.

  “I’m not, I’m a private investigator.”

  Cowboy reached out and tamped the cigarette out in the ashtray then looked at me again.

  “What you want to know?”

  “Well, for starters, my name’s Dick—what’s yours?”

  “Tex.”

  “Yeah, I know. But what’s your name?”

  He grinned, and once again I could see him relax—a lot further this time. The thumb came out of the belt, the boot off the rail, and he leaned forward to put both elbows on the bar.

  “Phil,” he said, and gave me a natural smile, showing about 72 of the whitest, evenest teeth I’d ever seen.

  “I like it better than Tex,” I said, returning the smile. “So, how well did you know Bobby?”

  “Not all that well, I guess, but then, how well does anybody know anybody in this business? We made it a couple of times when business was slow, and we turned a couple of tricks together. Mostly, we’d just stand around and bullshit.”

  “Did he come in here often?”

  “I don’t know. Probably not. He had a lover—some possessive little fag from what I hear—who kept him on a pretty short leash. You got a lover?” I could feel his eyes on mine and I looked up f
rom my beer to find I was right. I stared at him for a few seconds, and felt the old electric current flowing between us.

  “Not at the moment. Why’d you ask?”

  He shrugged and grinned.

  “Just wondered.” He peered into his nearly-empty glass. “Be interested in a little action?” he asked, almost shyly.

  Is the pope Catholic? I thought. Damn, why did he have to be a hustler?

  “Sorry, Phil, I don’t pay for it. Besides, we haven’t finished talking about Bobby yet.”

  “I don’t always charge,” he said. “You got someplace we can go…talk?”

  “My office is a couple blocks from here,” I said, feeling myself weakening.

  “Great. I do some of my best talking in offices.” He drained the rest of his beer, put his glass down, and pushed away from the bar with both hands. “Let’s go.”

  I set my beer down without finishing it and followed him out the door.

  *

  By the time I’d closed and locked the office door, Phil had taken his shirt off and tossed it in the general direction of the chair by the window. Taking one look at that flawless, muscled torso I started unbuttoning my shirt, but Phil panthered across the room and stood inches away.

  We did a fast-forward version of undressing, throwing clothes into a general pile in the center of the room. When he finally slipped his shorts down, I swore I’d died and gone to heaven.

  Sliding my own shorts down, Phil gave an appreciative whistle.

  “Not bad!” he said and pushed me back onto the couch.

  Fade to black.

  *

  After what must have been three of the most wonderful days of my life, we disentangled, and I struggled valiantly to get my head out of the clouds and back to reality.

  “I hate to bring up the subject of business—my business, that is,” I said as I forced myself off the sofa to get a cup of water from the cooler, “but I really need to find out some more about Bobby McDermott.”

  “Sure,” Phil said, grinning and running a big hand over his sweat-beaded chest.

  “When’s the last time you saw him?”

  He rummaged through his Levi’s for cigarettes and matches. Finding them, he tossed the Levi’s back onto the pile of our mixed clothes and lit up. He took a long drag and eased himself back on the sofa.