“No, not to my knowledge. He hasn’t been one for socializing,” Obrowski said. “When he stays here, he spends most of his time meeting with subcontractors and tramping around the woods, plotting out the resort and directing what construction they’ve already started—cutting down trees, plowing roads, that sort of thing. Opperman, his business partner”—he tilted his head toward Clare—“handles the paperwork. He’s been up frequently, too, but he stays at one of those concrete-cube chain hotels along the Northway.”
“I keep telling you, Steve, if we put up some bad art and wall-to-wall carpeting, we could get that trade, too.”
“Ron…”
“Maybe if you put in an ice machine down the hall?” Clare offered. Handler looked delighted.
Russ cleared his throat. “Okay, it’s unlikely anyone knew Emil was going to be here last night. Which leaves the possibility we were discussing earlier.”
Obrowski looked down into his coffee cup. Handler’s dazzling smile disappeared, replaced by a wary look in his eyes.
“What?” Clare said. “What?”
“When we were walking Emil out, there was a drive-by.” Stephen Obrowski’s amiable voice turned hard. “A truck with a bunch of rednecks shouting a lot of homophobic crap. They’ve been by before a few times, but the worst that’s happened so far is a few beer cans chucked on the lawn.”
“And they continued east toward Route One Twenty-one?” Russ asked.
“We asked him if he wanted to wait. I was worried about him heading in the same direction as the pickup.” Obrowski shook his head. “I wish to God I had insisted. If he had waited until the police arrived, we wouldn’t be standing here having this conversation.”
Clare looked at Russ.
“They called in a report right after,” he said. “We had an officer up to Cossayuharie who came down to check things out. It was when he was headed back into town that he found Emil’s car.”
“You think it was a hate crime?” Clare put down her coffee mug. “Somebody beat him half to death because he’s gay?”
“It’s not like it hasn’t happened before,” Handler said.
“They might not have even known Emil was gay.” Obrowski turned toward his partner. “He might have been attacked because he was leaving our inn. Have you thought about that?”
Russ held up his hands. “Let’s not speculate too wildly here. We—and by ‘we,’ I mean law enforcement and the business community—want to be real careful not to start unsubstantiated rumors about a bunch of punks targeting gay-owned businesses. I also don’t want to be telling one and all that that this was a gay-bashing episode.”
Ron Handler looked outraged. “We’re supposed to ignore the fact that we might be killed because of who we are? That our friends and customers might be in danger? That’s—”
“That’s not what I said.” Russ took off his glasses and rubbed them against the front of his shirt, the steel edge clinking faintly when it tapped the badge over his breast pocket. “If you call something a hate crime, you glamorize it. You make assault or vandalism sound like a political statement, and political statements have a way of attracting imitators. I’ve seen it happen. There’s big play in the newspaper about somebody painting a swastika on a bridge, and next thing you know, every asshole in the county with a can of spray paint and pretensions of grandeur is doing the same thing. ’Scuse my French.”
“But that’s different from what happened to Emil,” Clare protested. “It may be vile, but painting a swastika isn’t kicking someone into a bloody pulp.”
“No, it’s not. But right now, our only pieces of evidence are a scrape of red paint on Emil’s car and the fact that a pickup truck drove by here a half an hour or so before he was attacked. We can’t take those facts and label them a hate crime.”
“You don’t have to confirm that what happened to Emil Dvorak was definitely a hate crime,” Clare said. “But you’ve got to warn the community that it might be repeated. That another gay man might be attacked. If people know that their friends and neighbors might be at risk, you have a better chance of preventing copycat crimes before they happen.”
“Clare, you’ve got a real uplifting view of humanity, but let’s not kid ourselves. If word gets around that someone in Millers Kill might be going after homosexuals, it’s more likely to scare everyone away from associating with the potential victims. Let law enforcement take care of this quietly by finding these jerks and slinging their butts in jail. I promise you, that’ll get the message across.”
“The chief is right,” Obrowski said. “Bad publicity, even for a good cause, can kill a business, especially one like ours, which relies on word of mouth.”
“So we cower quietly in the closet and wait for the big bad police to save us? Until the next time it happens?” Handler flung his hands over his head and looked at Clare.
“Ron is right,” Clare said. “I come from the South, and I can tell you that sitting quietly and not making a fuss didn’t do diddly to stop black folks from being vandalized, assaulted, or even killed. It wasn’t until those crimes were held up to the light of day that things changed.”
“Oh, for God’s sake,” Russ said. “We’re not talking about lynch mobs and Jim Crow laws. It’s assault and battery, not a civil rights issue.”
“Isn’t it?” Handler said.
“What’s a more basic right than the right not to be attacked because of who you are?” Clare said.
“Thank you, Reverend King,” Russ said. He looked at Stephen. “Look, I’ve gotten all I need—” A torrent of barking, both deep and high-pitched, erupted from behind the kitchen door, cutting him off. “What the hell?” he said.
Chapter Five
“The rat pack is back,” Ron said. He held out a hand for Russ’s empty mug and thrust it into the sink, twisting the tap on full force.
“We have five Pekingese,” Stephen explained over the noise of dogs and running water. “They like to make their
