A Time for Secrets (17 page)

“Was it red-ish, or pink-ish or even brown-ish? They come in different tones.” He smiled at me. Part of him was enjoying this.

“It was pink.”

“Anything else?”

“There was a mole on the head, near the slit.”

“Excellent. Which side?”

“His right. What are you up to?” I half thought he was just getting his jollies at my expense.

“Did he see your dick at any point?” Lovejoy asked.

I thought about it. I was pretty sure I’d turned my back when I pulled on my boxers. “No, I don’t think so. What does it matter?”

“You’ll see.” With that he stood and walked out into the hallway. I heard him speak to an officer in the hallway. Then he came back in. “They’ll be here in a minute.”

“Maybe we should call Tony Stork,” I said. “He’s with district attorney’s office. He’s been…friendly.” Friendly was an understatement. He’d once given me a blowjob in an interview room at the Criminal Courts Building.

Lovejoy raised an eyebrow. “My, you are a connected young man. I don’t think we’ll need him, but it sounds like a good plan B.”

The door popped open and Detectives Haggerty and Lutz walked into the room. My attorney got up and came around the table to sit next to me. The detectives sat across from us.

Haggerty addressed me first. “You’re done, Nick. This will get your license pulled. We’re charging felony lewd conduct.”

“Felony? Really,” Lovejoy said, calmly. “That requires a minor be involved. Was your officer underage?”

“The YMCA is frequented by families. Children as young as fourteen are allowed to use the gym without a parent’s supervision.”

“Were children nearby?”

“Officer Wilson states that he saw two teenagers as he came into the locker room.”

Lovejoy smiled like this was an insignificant point. “Then I suggest you charge your officer with felony lewd conduct. Since he was the one exposing himself in the locker room.”

Detective Lutz opened a folder and slid a copy of a police report across the table. As he did he said, “That’s not what happened.”

Without reading the report, Lovejoy folded it up and tucked it between the pages of his legal pad. “There’s no description of my client’s penis in that report, is there?”

“A dick’s a dick,” Lutz said.

“Obviously, you have a limited experience of other men’s penises. For your information they come in a variety of shapes and sizes. For example, my client describes Officer Wilson’s penis as being a healthy pink, about seven and a half inches long, and three inches in circumference when erect. It lists to the left and has a small brown mole on the right side of the glans.”

“Glands? What glands?” Lutz demanded.

“Glans. It’s what the head of your penis is called.”

“How exactly did he see the officer’s penis?” Haggerty asked.

“Mr. Nowak got out of the shower, dried off, and began to dress. At that point, Officer Wilson became aroused and exposed himself to Mr. Nowak, causing my client to leave the gym which is when he was arrested by Detective Lutz.”

“That’s bullshit,” Lutz spat.

“It’s easy enough to disprove,” Lovejoy said. “Have your officer come in and pull down his pants.”

“For a couple of fags?” Lutz said. “No fucking way.”

Not to mention there were probably union rules against it.

“We’d like to leave,” my attorney said.

“No way,” Lutz replied. I watched Haggerty’s face. He didn’t like what was going on.

“If you charge my client without a description of his penis in that report, I’ll sue you for false arrest.”

“Voyeurism,” Lutz growled. At least we were back down to a misdemeanor.

“Voyeurism is only illegal when consent is absent. Are you now suggesting that Officer Wilson didn’t realize my client was watching him masturbate in the very public locker room of the YMCA?”

“I think we’re done,” Haggerty said and stood up.

“No fucking way. This guy goes down and there’s—”

“Shut it, Lutz,” Haggerty said. To us he said, “All right, you can go.”

Owen grabbed his pad and his briefcase. I smiled at Haggerty and, looking him right in the eye, said, “Thanks for the apology.”

“Fuck you.”

§ § § §

When I walked into my apartment it was right before lunchtime. I’d been gone more than twenty-four hours. The first thing I noticed was a disgusting smell coming from the kitchen. I was used to strange smells, mostly cabbage related, but this one was different. This one had a metallic edge to it that set my teeth on edge.

I walked into my living room and found it empty. I wound my way down the hallway to the kitchen and found Harker at the table with his mother playing two-handed Pinochle. Harker had a piece of notepaper next to his right hand so he could remember what meld was. I, of course, had no idea what meld was in this or any other game. I didn’t even know what the word really meant.

They both glanced up at me, and then Harker said, “Good morning. Why don’t you go take a shower?”

“Can I talk to you first?” I asked.

“I’d rather you took a shower first.”

“What’s happening?” Mrs. Harker asked.

“Nothing, Mama, Nick’s just going to take a shower.”

Apparently, I was going to take a shower.

I went into the bedroom and grabbed fresh underwear and a t-shirt. I would have happily wandered around my apartment naked, but Mrs. Harker was there. Obviously, Harker was upset that I hadn’t come home, I thought as I went into the bathroom and ran the water until it was hot. He probably thought I’d spent the night with some trick.

It annoyed me a little that he thought I’d do something like that. I mean, yes, I messed around here and there, and I thought he was pretty aware of that. But I would never spend the night with someone else. Sleeping with someone suggested a kind of intimacy that having sex with them did not. Sleeping with someone meant you knew their name and wanted to be close to them; neither of which was necessary for sex.

When I turned off the shower and pulled back the shower curtain, I found Harker glaring at me. I grabbed a towel and said, “I was at the gym and—”

“I know what happened. Connors called me last night.” Harker wasn’t done. “Look, I know you’re not faithful, and I’m not in a position to demand that, but I do think I can insist that you be careful. I should have that much say in things.”

“That’s a nice little speech, Bert, but the thing is I didn’t do anything. It was trumped up.”

He raised an eyebrow. There were about a dozen lies Harker would be happy to believe. The truth, though, was going to be a tough sell.

“This guy started coming on to me in the locker room, playing with himself. He pulled it out, and I watched for a little bit. Then I left the gym and there were two policeman waiting to arrest me.”

He frowned at me. Obviously, he thought I was lying my head off. I was finished drying myself, so I pulled on my boxers. “Were you planning to come and bail me out?”

“Eventually,” he said. “Who did bail you out, your lawyer?”

“No one bailed me out. I never even saw a judge.”

“You weren’t charged?” he asked.

“No, and I’m not going to be,” I said, though I wasn’t completely sure that was true. If they could figure out what my dick looked like, they’d charge me in a minute.

“Really?” he said. He was beginning to believe me. He didn’t want to. I could tell he wanted to stay mad at me, but my not being charged went a long way to back up my story.

“Finnegan’s behind this, isn’t he?” he said.

“I wish that had been your first thought.”

Harker was quiet a moment and then said, “The good news is, he’s trying to stop you, but he’s not trying to kill you.”

“Maybe I’ll see that as good news tomorrow, but right now I’m a little too pissed off.”

“When you get the evidence you need, what are you going to do with it?” Harker asked.

I hadn’t thought that far ahead, but I immediately saw the problem. Finnegan had people all over the CPD. Between the officers who’d been following me and the ones involved in the YMCA sting, there were at least a dozen policemen doing his bidding. I had no idea how many more he could bend to his will.

“What about Connors?”

“It’s not his district. Even if he took the evidence they wouldn’t let him work it. They’d take it away and it would be back at Town Hall Station. It needs to go to Haggerty.”

“I don’t know about him.”

“Even if he’s a straight up guy there probably isn’t much he can do.”

There was a cold, hard fact we were tip-toeing around. Something both of us knew but never talked about. There was no such thing as an honest police officer in Chicago. We’d both been on the job, so we both knew that. When you joined the CPD your choices were go along, or get another job. To some extent at least, Harker and I had both gone along.

After I graduated from the academy, my father took me aside and said, “If anyone offers you an envelope, take it and say thank you.” So, when my TO drove me around to a bunch of liquor stores one afternoon and then handed me an envelope with two hundred dollars cash, I knew to take it.

Later, I found out that if you didn’t take the envelope you ended up on vertical patrol at Cabrini-Green and never got off. Because I took the envelope and because of my family, I didn’t see vertical patrol until Daniel shoved me out of the closet and everyone wanted me gone, especially my family. I got through almost three weeks of it before I called it quits.

Of course, the FBI tried to clean things up in the mid-seventies, but you can’t fire the whole force at once. Some sacrificial lambs were offered up and things changed. Gone were the days of extorting liquor stores and bars. Now, the crooked cops did a little police work and used it to extort payoffs from low-end drug dealers and pimps. I guessed when the payoffs came from the crooks it was easier to hide. And, to be completely honest, easier to live with.

I had no idea how much Harker had taken, or from whom. He had a condo, a nice car, and he supported his mother like a good boy. He also never seemed to hurt for money. Over time, he’d taken his share. But then, back in the day, so had I.

“What about the FBI?” I asked. “Do you know anybody?”

“Maybe,”’ he said. “I don’t think it matters. This isn’t big enough.”

“The guy’s running for mayor,” I pointed out. That seemed plenty big to me.

“And if he wins it’ll be big enough.”

“This guy belongs in prison.”

“Christian,” Harker said abruptly.

“What?” I asked.

“You need to take this to Christian. Get it in the newspaper. Then the FBI will do something.”

I didn’t want to give Christian the scoop, mainly because he was Christian, and I thought he was a cocky little brat. But it might not be a bad idea. Still, I wanted to stew over the other possibilities.

“I don’t have enough yet,” I said. “All I really have is an old journal and an illegally obtained police report. I need a witness.”

We were silent for a long moment, as though waiting for a witness to jump up and say, “Here I am!”

Finally, to change the mood, I asked, “What on earth is your mother cooking?”

“Liver,” he said. Then, in a perfect, unconscious imitation of his mother’s accent, he added, “Is good for health.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Around two that afternoon I went to Pearl’s, but not without stopping at a payphone at the convenience shop outside the El station to call my Aunt Bev.

“You told someone, didn’t you?” I said when she picked up.

“I don’t know what you mean,” she replied, her voice weak and thin.

“You told someone about giving me that report, and I ended up spending the night in jail. Thanks a lot.”

She was silent. “It was for your own good. You need to stop what you’re doing.”

“Who was it? Who did you tell? Did you go to Finnegan directly, or was it one of his flunkies?”

“You have to be reasonable, Nicky. You know what this town is like.”

“They paid you, too, didn’t they?”

“That wasn’t why—”

“Don’t bullshit me. You wanted the money. How much did they pay you?”

“Nicky, I don’t—”

“How much? How much does selling out a relative go for these days?”

Practically overhead, a train was coming, its roar growing as it got closer and closer. It was an A train, so it zipped on by. When I could hear again, I listened for the sound of Aunt Bev’s breathing. I didn’t hear it. “Hello?” I said, but she was gone. She’d hung up.

I told myself not to expect a Christmas card this year.

Five minutes later, I was up on the platform and a B train rolled in. I rode the El north to Berwyn. I got off and walked about three blocks over to Sheridan. It was a patchy neighborhood. One block was nice. The next wasn’t. Ironically, Pearl’s was only a few blocks south of the Edgewater Arms Apartments. I wondered if I’d come full circle, or if I was just spinning my wheels.

The bar was located at the bottom of an eight-story brick apartment building built in a U and facing the lake. The plate glass had been painted black halfway up, so you couldn’t see too much of what was going on inside. Above that, in black and white, it said PEARL’S in a cursive script.

The place was tiny. There was just enough room for the mahogany bar, which featured about twelve stools, a couple of small tables for two, and a grand piano. The walls had been painted fleshy beige and the molding lavender. I supposed someone wanted to make the place bright and happy. I preferred my bars dark and seedy.

A poster over the piano let me know Pearl would be leading a Joan Baez sing-along on Friday night. Other than that there wasn’t anything to make you think the place was uniquely lesbian. The three women at the bar seemed pretty normal to me; well, maybe they were a little tougher looking than most women and perhaps a lot more likely to throw a punch, but otherwise they looked normal.

The bartender was a heavyset woman in her late fifties. She wore some kind of flowing purple caftan in an effort to disguise her weight. Her salt and pepper hair was cut into a severe crew cut. She wore big hoop earrings and a little too much make-up, even for a bar.

I sat down on one of the empty stools and waited for her to come over. She regarded me with suspicion but asked what I’d like to drink anyway. I ordered a Johnnie Walker, and when she set it down I asked, “You Pearl?”