In the coffee shop, the large picture windows were covered with steam. Patches of ice clung to the corners of the interior of the windows. They found Detectives Roosevelt and Wilson talking to two uniformed cops. Turner and Fenwick pulled over two chairs to sit with them. They were the only patrons. De Paul University, only a block or two away, wasn’t in session, so even brave or demented college students wouldn’t be out on a night like this. The locals knew better. Not even a crazed jogger, numerous ones of whom infested this neighborhood, disturbed the deserted sidewalks outside.
“What have you got?” Turner asked.
“Nothing from any of the residents,” an older cop in the best big-gut florid-face tradition of the Chicago Police Department said. “We stopped in as many of the businesses as we could. Not many were open. There’s a gay bar called Au Naturel where we tried to talk to people. There was a little bit of a crowd, but we got no help. Nobody would talk to us. The owner was a little snotty. She called her lawyer while we were there.”
“Sounds suspicious,” Wilson said.
“Or a canny gay bar owner being careful,” Turner said.
“We’ll check it out,” Fenwick said. “Anything else?”
The uniformed cops shook their heads. They left.
Turner and Fenwick explained their tip about the judge being in Au Naturel.
“This Geary guy was sure it was Judge Meade?”
“Claimed to be,” Fenwick said.
Roosevelt shook his head. “We’ve got lots of call backs to make. We’re also checking into the possibility of a cab driver having dropped him off, especially if the judge drove all the way in from the airport to here. They’d remember that.”
“Wife said he liked to use the El,” Turner said.
“A federal judge?” Roosevelt asked, “In this cold?”
“The rich get more plebeian,” Wilson said.
“Where’s his luggage?” Fenwick asked. “I just thought of that.” He explained what they’d learned from Mrs. Meade.
“He have a ticket or key to one of those luggage lockers at the airport when you went through his pockets?” Wilson asked.
“Not that we found,” Fenwick said.
“I don’t think they have those anymore,” Turner said. “I think it was an antiterrorist thing years ago. Mad bombers kept putting bombs in them. You get rid of the lockers, the insane have one less venue to vent their spleen in. I haven’t seen them in any train stations, and I don’t remember them at the airport when I took Brian out there.”
“So where’s his luggage? Must have taken it out to the airport. Mrs. Meade would have wondered where it was when he left.”
“In his office?”
“No, we already looked through it.”
“Maybe the luggage went to Canada but he didn’t?”
“We’ll have to find out,” Fenwick said. “Where do we go next?”
“The testy bar owner,” Turner said. “Let’s find out what the story is there. If her lawyer is still around, it might help.”
They drove to Au Naturel. Fenwick parked in the bus stop out front and they walked in.
About ten people slumped on chairs around the front bar. A few watched a football game on a large screen television. Several glanced occasionally at a dancer who had to be at least in
his late fifties. The guy was in great shape, but no question he was soon going to be eligible for social security. No one approached him with money to stuff into his bright red thong. Turner saw the dancer yawn. Late night last night for everybody.
They approached the bar and asked to speak to the owner.
“Now what?” The bartender said. He was in his midtwenties. He wore faded blue jeans, a flannel shirt with the sleeves cut off, and a leather vest.
They took out their identification and showed him. He picked up the phone and punched two numbers. He turned his head away and spoke into the receiver.
Turner noted two men get up and sidle past them and out the door. Cop identification in a gay bar was not a good way to get patrons to stick around.
A woman in her early thirties came out of the back and walked up to them. She was slender, with dark black hair cut short, blue jeans, and a pink and brown sweater that clung to her torso and reached down to her knees.
“Come with me, please,” she said.
They followed her into the darkened back room, to a hallway, down this, past the washrooms to an unprepossessing door, which she opened. Her office was small and neat with an electric hurricane lamp on top of a desk with piles of neatly stacked papers. She had a clear plastic phone through which you could see the wires. The walls were painted medium gray. Several tasteful prints of pastoral scenes were framed and hung on each wall. There was a large leather chair behind the modern metallic desk. She motioned for them to sit in the two low-slung leather chairs that faced the desk.
“You didn’t think you ruined enough of my business with those first cops? You had to come back?”
“You’re the owner?” Fenwick asked.
“I’m Dana Sickles. I’m in charge of what little is left of my clientele. We’d have had a good crowd if your uniformed buddies
hadn’t been in here harassing my people earlier. I don’t break any laws. I do whatever the local commander from the district says. When Ernie the bartender called back here about you two, I called my lawyer. He’s on his way. Why am I being hassled?”
“We’re investigating a murder.”
“Yeah, well so? That’s what the other cops said.”
“We have reason to believe the victim may have been in your bar.”
“Don’t give me that crap. Half the planet could have been in here last night. Who would know?”
“Gentleman named Billy Geary who works for you claims he saw him.”
“Billy? He shows up on time and is good with the customers. One of the better employees. How’d he know it was him?”
“He goes to law school during the day.”
“How does going to law school confer the power of identification?”
“He attended some of the hearings last year on the gay law in Du Page County.”
“Good for him. He never bothered to tell me he was going to school, but I get all kinds of different guys here.”
Fenwick said, “Tell me about the different kinds.”
She glowered at him. “What does that mean?”
“Why do they do it? What’s their story?”
“Why do you need to know this?”
“Background. Trying to understand the milieu. We’ve got a famous person dead. Knowing why he was in your bar, knowing the nature of those working in the bar, could make a difference.”
“I don’t see how.”
Turner said, “If you could please, Ms. Sickles. We’re cops trying to solve a murder. We don’t want to hassle you. We recognize this is a tremendous inconvenience.”
She gave him a skeptical look, but began to answer. “The
boys work here for any number of reason. Essentially for most of them it’s because they have low self-esteem.”
Turner expressed his astonishment. “Guys who look good enough to be paid money just for twitching have low self-esteem?”
She smiled briefly. “You’d think they’d be on top of the world, but think about it. If you felt positive about yourself, would you need to do this?”
“If I looked that good, I wouldn’t mind showing off my body,” Fenwick said.
“Maybe for you, but basically these guys need affirmation that they are okay, needed, even loved. Maybe that’s why you’d be willing to do it. Maybe that’s what you need.”
Fenwick smiled. “I’ll stick to chocolate. That seems to fulfill a lot of my needs.” He showed her the picture of Judge Meade. “You recognize him?”
“You mean do I know what he looks like, or was he in here last night?”
“All of the above,” Fenwick said.
“Nope, to all of the above.”
“We’ll need to talk to everybody who was working here last night.”
“Are you nuts?”
“We’d like to do it tonight if at all possible.”
She glared at them a moment, then said, “I know I don’t have any choice but to cooperate with you, but I’m not happy about this.”
The door swung open. Turner thought that being muffled in his overcoat, scarf, hat, and gloves made the man seem more rotund and porcine than he probably was.
“This is my lawyer, Adolf von Steinwehr.”
“Don’t say anything Dana. You haven’t done anything wrong. I’ll handle it.” He threw off his outer accoutrements. He wore a black business suit, a white shirt, and a red tie. He leaned his butt against the front of the desk almost blocking the view
of Dana Sickles behind him. “What’s the problem?” he demanded.
Turner said, “Nobody is trying to hassle a gay bar. Nobody is trying to shut this place down. We don’t want to arrest anybody connected with the establishment unless they had something to do with the murder of Judge Meade.”
“The goddamn prick is dead. Except for lighting bonfires, shooting off fireworks, and having parties, why should we care?”
Fenwick asked, “If he was hated in the gay community, why wouldn’t somebody here have reason to murder him?”
“Why here? There’s lots of gay establishments in the city.”
“We have a witness who says he was here,” Turner said.
“Here! Before he was murdered?”
Turner explained about Billy Geary.
Steinwehr looked at Dana. “Who’s he?”
“Dancer. Sensible. Never had any problem with him.”
“We need to question the employees who were working here last night. We need to know if anybody else saw him, when, what he did, who he was with? You should know the drill.”
“You probably don’t have a lot of choice, Dana, but I’ll stay around to make sure everyone inside isn’t strip searched.”
Dana said, “Having murder connected with the bar might or might not be good for business, but having cops hovering around the place is a death sentence. You really think you’re going to find somebody who saw him?
“We already got one we didn’t expect.”
“I don’t know how much good it’s going to do to talk to my employees, but I’ll do what I can. Most of them aren’t going to want to talk to you.”
“Why not?” Fenwick asked.
“The gay ones are going to be suspicious because they’re gay and you’re cops. Plus they’re going to be glad, unlike me, that the judge is dead. The straight ones …”
Fenwick interrupted, “The straight ones? Geary mentioned that. At the time, I thought it was odd.”
“Yeah, two of my bartenders and a few of the dancers are straight.”
“But they all let the guys paw them?” Turner asked.
“You’ve been here?”
Turner nodded.
She gave him an appraising look. “A gay detective. Are you both?”
“Would it help if we were?” Fenwick asked.
“I don’t know. Straight guys, or at least those who say they are, can be just as exhibitionist, just as in need of attention, and just as in need of money as gay men. I pay well. The customers are generous.”
“Why are the straight guys not going to want to talk to us?” Fenwick asked.
“You should be able to figure that out. They may work here, put up with the pawing, as you put it, and make decent money, but I bet it’s not something they tell their girlfriends or moms and dads.”
“Why aren’t you glad the judge is dead?” Turner asked.
“I’m a lesbian Republican. I think there are three of us in the country. Talk about endangered species. I agreed with a lot of the judge’s decisions. I believe protecting the dignity of the individual should be the highest aim of government. I also think we need lower taxes, less government interference in our lives, and no tax money for abortions. I’ll skip the whole list.”
“Did you know him?”
“Nope. Never met him. Wouldn’t have known him if I passed him on the street.”
They called in to Area Ten for a couple of uniformed officers to help them. Sickles worked the phones and called in the employees. Some were reluctant to come in. Turner listened to Sickles’s half of the first few conversations and heard her reassure them that the bar’s lawyer would be present.
It would be a wait before the first employees showed up so
Turner took the time to drive to pick up Jeff from his overnight trip. While Fenwick waited, he would check the bar carefully. If the killer did the murder in the bar, they doubted if they’d find a convenient spot still covered in blood and gore. They’d probably have to have Crime Lab people in to go over the place.