We ran into the alliance crowd and learned that the judge had denied a restraining order against the Bergenfield police, and that Jim Nordstrum, out on bail, was planning to close the place if it was raided one more time. Despite the absence of any discernible warm feeling for the Rat's Nest and its approach to gay life, there was real anger among the movement people over the sour indifference of the legal establishment toward the harassment of a place that detracted from the moral fitness of no one who chose not to go there. The human machinery of the law was smug and petty and substantially corrupt; that was what hurt. No one could figure out what step to take next, and I did not tell what I knew.
I went looking for Mike Truckman, found him, and ushered him almost forcibly into his office.
I said, 'I did think you had something to do with Steve Kleckner's death, Mike. It was mainly because of the company you keep. And your booze problem didn't help-you've got one and you'd better do something about it fast. Anyway, I was stupid and wrong-headed, Mike, and I hope you'll forgive me.'
He raised his glass, tried to smile, and set the glass down. 'Forget it, Don. Shit, I guess you had your reasons. Let's pretend it never happened. I'm game if you are. We need one another, all of us. Gay people can have their differences, sure, but when push comes to shove, we gotta stick together, right, buddy?'
'That's well put, Mike. Which brings up a painful but related matter.'
He'd been glancing at the manila envelope I'd carried in with me, and now he watched me open it and spread the photos out across his desk. He sat blinking, his mouth clamped shut, and peered at them.
I said, 'You know what you have to do, don't you? If you're going to get your head together and come back to us, Mike, you've got to start by dealing with this shit.'
He managed to get his mouth open far enough to rasp, 'Yeah. Yeah, I guess I know.'
I took off my jacket and shirt. I removed the Albany PD microphone and wires and recorder from my torso and placed them on the desk alongside the photos of Truckman handing money to the Bergenfield police chief and his plainclothes associate, in payment for their raids on the Rat's Nest.
I said, 'Before I show you how to work this thing, I'd appreciate your answering a couple of questions.'
He blinked boozily at the display on his desk and said, 'Oh, God.'
I called Sewickley Oaks from a pay phone up the road from Trucky's. Then I walked back to the disco and danced with Timmy, among others, until closing.
The usual crowd was on hand-Phil, Mark, Calvin, the rabbi-and while most people were subdued at first, only just beginning to recover from the shocks of the past week, one by one each of us gave in to the New Year's Eve atmosphere that gay life can, with luck, produce two or three times a week. By the time Billy Blount arrived with Huey Brownlee at two-thirty, the mood was entirely festive, even celebratory. The DJ played 'Put Your Body In It,' and everybody did.
At four-forty Timmy and I crouched behind the pile of tires next to the Bergenfield police station. We watched while Mike
Truckman handed over a roll of bills. Timmy took more pictures. The three men lingered longer than they had the last time we'd watched this scene unfold; Truckman was making sure everyone's voice was recorded, that he got it all.
Truckman drove away first, as he had the last time; then the chief; then the plainclothesman, the asshole in the wind-breaker who'd frisked me and spoken disrespectfully during the raid at the Rat's Nest.
As the plainclothesman pulled his Trans-Am onto Western, two unmarked vans that had been parked nearby came to life and pulled into his path, blocking him. The man in the windbreaker jumped from his car cursing and sputtering, and we could make out the look of befuddlement on his face when the back doors of the vans were flung open and seven extremely large men in white jackets poured out and surrounded him. One of the big beefy fellows waved a document in the cop's face, and then they carried him off. He fought, but the straitjacket fit nicely. Within three minutes they were gone, and Timmy and I fell laughing raucously into the pile of tires. end user
Epilogue
Eddie Storrs was locked up again, this time forever. Stuart and Jane Blount fled back to Saratoga.
Chris Porterfield returned to Albany; Timmy and I had a nice Sunday brunch with her and Margarita Mayes, and they sold us a February vacation trip to Key West. Billy Blount moved in with Huey Brownlee, at least temporarily. Mark Deslonde-who had gone back to his apartment that Friday night to pick up some belongings and gotten distracted by his mirror-moved in with Phil permanently. And I moved in with Timmy.
Late on the first night in my new home, I said to Timmy,
'One thing. When you and Blount were in that cubicle at the tubs that day-what did you two do all that time?'
'Oh, fucked and whatnot. Blount was worried about his sexuality. He said he needed reassurance. Why do you ask?'
'Oh, just wondering.'
Some Jesuit. This wasn't going to get easier.
