The Bar Watcher (20 page)

He paused long enough to take a couple forkfuls of pancake, and I knew I should say something to at least give the poor guy a chance to eat, but he was on a roll and obviously going somewhere with his part of the conversation. I didn't want to sidetrack him in any way.

He cut a sausage in two with his fork, speared it, tapped it lightly in the syrup, and conveyed it to his mouth. After chewing and swallowing, he made a very slight gesture toward me with his fork.

“The problem is,” he said, “that the department is also extremely protective of its own interests, and it won't tolerate anyone trying to do what it considers its business. That's where you come in, unfortunately.”

I shrugged and nodded, waiting for the other shoe to drop. We both concentrated on our breakfasts for a moment, although I suddenly wasn't as hungry as I'd thought. I noticed as we ate, though, that Richman kept glancing at me.

At last he said, “You were right about the bullet, and the tire. We missed it completely, which was obviously our own fault. I looked at the report on the ‘accident' again, and that's all it apparently was—two drunks going over the bluff. But from what you've said, I gather there's a whole lot more going on here.”

I nodded again. I could have played coy but decided to trust him and be honest.

“There is,” I said.

Richman sighed. “So now comes the dilemma. Now that we know there is some link between D'Allesandro's murder and the death of the two men in the car, we'll be doing our own investigation, and it's pretty likely that your involvement in all this will come out at some point. Some of the hotter heads in the department are not going to be too happy about what they will perceive as your interference in their business. I'll do my best to protect you from harassment if it comes to that—I'll say you are my informant…” He looked at me and gave me another small smile. “Sorry about that—it sounds a little disreputable, I know, but…”

I had a quick mental picture of myself, a two-week beard, dirty clothes, rummaging through a dumpster with one hand while the other clutched a bottle of Ripple in a brown paper bag.

“Well,” I said, “I hope it doesn't come to that, either. A private investigator with a reputation as a police informant wouldn't exactly be a magnet for new clients.”

He nodded, finished the last of his eggs and pushed his plate off to one side.

“The other alternative, of course, is for you to just back down, now. Drop the whole thing and let the department handle it from here.”

It was my turn to sigh. I shook my head.

“All well and good if it were just a cut-and-dried case of three murders. But I'm firmly convinced there's a lot more going on here—too many pieces and too many links between them, and all of them rooted in a community the police have little knowledge of or, let's face it, interest in.

“And even if the department did have openly gay officers who knew their way around the community and what to look for and what questions to ask and who to ask, there are so many different directions this case is leading I don't know how they could follow up on them all. Hell, I don't know how
I'm
going to be able to do it.”

I drained the last drop of coffee from my cup and put it back on the saucer.

“The other hand of it for me,” I said, “is that the police have a lot easier access to certain information than I might have.” I was thinking primarily of Giacomino's past history and business dealings. “So, is there any area of compromise here?”

Richman sat back and just looked at me for a moment.

“I'm putting my neck out here,” he said, “but I think we can probably find some way to work parallel, if not together. I'll have to insist that you keep me informed on anything concrete you come up with, and in exchange, I'll, as I said, do my best to protect your identity and what you're doing. Agreed?”

“Agreed,” I said, just as the waiter arrived with the check. I reached for it, but Richman got it before I could.

“I'll get it,” he said. “I'll take it out of our ‘informant's fund,'” and he grinned.

“Oh, by the way,” I said, “I understand there was another murder in Barnes Park yesterday. A gay bashing, I assume.”

“So it appears, unfortunately. Luckily, it's unrelated to these other cases—if he'd been shot, they'd have checked the bullet for a match with the other three deaths. This one died from a single blow to the back of the head. He was found in some bushes right behind the public restroom—apparently he'd been killed the night before.”

“Have they released his identity yet?” I asked.

Richman nodded as he hoisted his rear off the chair to reach his wallet in his back pocket.

“Barnseth, I think it is. Lynn Barnseth.”

I felt the coffee rising up in my stomach.
Barnseth!
That's it! Lynn Barnseth—George Atkins's lover!

Chapter 10

I didn't say a word to Richman—I didn't want to make a complicated situation any more complicated at the moment—and we said our goodbyes outside Sandler's and went our separate ways. But my mind was working overtime. I was thinking of the scene Lynn Barnseth had caused at Venture, and the fact he'd always been an incredibly nasty piece of work.

And with that thought, yet another piece of the puzzle fell firmly into place. I'd allowed myself to be sidetracked by the pieces that had seemed to connect everything to Comstock and Rage. I now was positive that Comstock, Giacomino, and Sharp the accountant's being linked in the embezzlement scheme were just three coincidentally connected pieces, not the picture. I felt without a doubt that, illogical as it may have been, their each being a thoroughly rotten son of a bitch was the link between all these deaths. My original theory of a gay vigilante determined to take out the human trash was right.

I suddenly realized I was just standing on the sidewalk staring off into space, and I'm sure some of the people walking by wondered what the hell this guy was doing—but if they did, I wasn't aware of it—or them. But I did finally force myself to let my motor functions resume walking me toward my car.

*

Although I knew the timing was really bad, the moment I walked into the office I went to the phone book to see if I could find George Atkins's number. There were two “G. Atkins” listed, but I recognized one of the addresses and wrote it down on a piece of scratch paper on my desk. I did have the decency to wait until around 9:30 to call.

When I dialed, the phone was answered on the second ring.

“George?” I asked, not recognizing the voice.

“No, this is John. Can I help you?”

“John,” I said, having no idea who he was, “this is Dick Hardesty, an old friend of George's. I just heard about Lynn's death, and wonder if I might talk to him for a minute, if he's up to it.”

There was a brief pause, then: “Hold a second, I'll see if he can talk with you.”

A muffled hand-over-mouthpiece comment, pause, another comment, then the sound of the receiver exchanging hands and George's voice.

“Hi, Dick. It was nice of you to call.” He sounded a bit tired, but not bereft. Considering all he'd put up with from Lynn, I hardly expected him to be.

“I just heard about Lynn,” I said, “and wanted to extend my condolences.”

“I appreciate that, Dick,” George said, “but I think you know the situation between Lynn and me. Condolences aren't really needed, to be honest.”

I was somehow relieved to hear him say that.

“I'm glad you're looking at it realistically,” I said. “You've always been such a damned kind soul, I was afraid you might have been devastated in spite of what you've had to go through.”

“Well, he was part of my life for a long time,” George said, “so naturally, there's some sense of…well, loss, if you will, but….”

I decided to push my luck.

“I know this isn't a good time, George,” I began, “but I'm working on a case, and I think that Lynn's death might be connected with it in some way. Would it be at all possible for us to get together for a few minutes and talk about it?”

There was almost no hesitation before: “Sure. It would be good to see you. We didn't have a chance to talk the…the other night. When would you like to meet?”

“The sooner the better, really,” I said. “Whenever it's convenient for you, that is.”

“Today's fine. I've got some arrangements to make on behalf of Lynn's parents later this afternoon, but if you wanted to come by this morning, yet, that'd be all right.”

“Great!” I said. “How about in an hour?”

“Good. We'll see you then.”

I hung up, not unaware of the “we'll” and wondering just who John might be.

*

John, I discovered, was a co-worker at the insurance company where George worked. From watching the two of them together, it was fairly obvious how John felt about George, and it was also fairly clear that now Lynn was out of the way, George and John were free to become something more. John seemed like a really nice guy, and I was glad to think George might at long last have a chance to be happy.

“We'd been to an office retirement party Sunday night,” George explained as the three of us sat in his living room drinking coffee. “And when the party broke up quite a bit earlier than expected, John suggested we stop by the Mardi Gras for a quick drink before heading home. I was a little hesitant after what had happened at Venture, but Lynn knew I was going to be late, so I agreed. They were having some sort of anniversary party, and the place was jammed for a Sunday. So we walked in and…”

He paused and stared into his coffee cup. John, who was sitting beside him on the sofa, picked up the story in mid-sentence, casually, as though they were already used to finishing each others' sentences.

“And there was Lynn, at the bar, all over some guy, but when he saw us, he went ballistic. I'd never even met him, but he came storming over to us and started screaming and yelling really terrible things at George at the top of his lungs. I won't even begin to tell you what he said, but I'm sure you can imagine the gist of it.

“The whole place just stopped dead. Finally, the bouncer who'd been checking IDs at the door came over and told Lynn he'd have to leave.”

George picked up the story in a way that reminded me of two jugglers effortlessly tossing tenpins between them.

“‘Oh, I'll leave, all right,' Lynn yelled as the bouncer started to pull him toward the door. ‘I'm gonna go out and get myself fucked by a real man, you fucking eunuch.' And that was the last time I ever saw him.”

“We went out the back door just in case Lynn might be waiting out in front,” John said, “and I insisted George come spend the night at my place.”

“That finally did it for me,” George said. “I knew I couldn't live one more minute like that, or with Lynn. John said I could stay at his place for a while, until I could get Lynn out of here or find another place. Almost everything here is mine, but I figured Lynn could have it all just to get rid of him.”

“I loaned George a change of clothes so we could go to work Monday,” John said, “and then Monday night we came over here to pick up some of his things. We were dreading another encounter with Lynn, but of course we didn't have one. There was a message from the police on the answering machine.”

“Did the police question you at all?” I asked.

George shrugged. “Not really. I guess they took John's word that we'd been together—we'd gone to a coffee house and talked for about an hour after we left the bar, and we had witnesses there. And the doorman at John's building saw us go in. To be honest, the police didn't really seem all that interested.”

Why am I not surprised?
“Did you by any chance notice anybody who left the bar right after Lynn did?”

George gave me a weak smile.

“A lot of people left,” he said. “They went out the front, and we went out the back.”

We sat in silence for a moment, until George spoke again, quietly and almost to himself.

“Lynn had no reason to be the way he was. I never cheated on him…never! And while I don't know how I could have gotten through the past few days without John, I really don't know why he is being so kind to me—we've known each other for two years, but we'd never so much as touched one another, except for a handshake.”

Well, maybe George didn't know, but John obviously did, and I certainly could make a good guess.

*

While there were several complicated and interwoven links between most of the six—six, I feared, and counting—dead men, there was one indisputable link other than their cruelty—the bars. While Comstock and D'Allesandro were more or less public figures who amply and regularly displayed their despicableness in their workplaces, they, like every single one of the others, had been observed mistreating someone in a bar.

Nuh-uh!
my mind taunted like a little kid.
Not D'Allesandro
.