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  “Ink is who they are.”

  “And of course Hunny is a godsend.”

  “He is a bit of a right-wing gay caricature. If Hunny hadn’t existed, Rush Limbaugh would have had to invent him. It’s why I think I’m basically glad to be working for him. I mean, in addition to walking away with a tiny portion of his billion dollars.

  In a world of gay folks like us who are busily turning queer life in America into a kind of insipid parody of our parents’ dull, stable existences, Hunny is this horrifying creature climbing out of the primordial homo ooze. I have to say that I find him alternately hair-raising and beguiling.”

  “Insipid? Donald, do you think our life is insipid?”

  “No, I like it. It’s nice. It’s comfortable. I wouldn’t have it any 56 Richard Stevenson other way.”

  “Then what are you saying? Would our lives — and the lives of our gay friends who are like us — be improved if we were all more like Hunny and Art and that gay menagerie they surround themselves with?”

  “No. But you know I like to quote Ogden Nash. ‘Home is heaven, and orgies are vile, but I like an orgy once in a while.’

  You’ve even been known to quote him yourself in recent years.

  If not in Albany, then certainly from time to time on vacation in Thailand.”

  He pretended to bristle, then laughed. “Of course we all have a streak of Hunny in us, expressed or unexpressed. But it’s the flaunting — there, I said the right-wingers’ word — it’s the flaunting of this life of booze and boys and mayhem that just gets tiresome. And, yes, embarrassing. There, I said that, too. In the straight world, people like Hunny make me embarrassed to be gay.”

  “Me too. Except I’m kind of embarrassed to be embarrassed.”

  “Yes, you would be. I’d like to be. But I can’t. I’m just embarrassed.”

  “The TU story doesn’t mention any gay groups in Albany or elsewhere coming to Hunny’s defense. That’s disappointing. I guess they’re embarrassed, too.”

  “With his billion dollars,” Timmy said, “Hunny probably doesn’t need any help. He can hire all the help he needs. Like you.”

  “Me, and he’s getting a lawyer to deal with the DeCarlo lawsuit. Plus, we agreed that after last night’s paintball episode he should hire some private security people for his house. I put him in touch with Gray Security, and they should have some people over there by now.”

  “You said it was unclear who the paint shooter this morning was trying to hit. Only the TV people and the Marylou Whitney impersonator were on the front steps at the time. But isn’t it possible that somebody who hates Hunny just took some potshots at the house, and they didn’t care who they hit? They just wanted to frighten Hunny and complicate his life?”

  “That’s what it looks like. And maybe with a little luck, humiliate a few fags. Not knowing that the Bill O’Malley people were in the line of fire.”

  “I am guessing that we haven’t heard the last of Focks News.

  I’m sure O’Malley will call for the death penalty.”

  “This is a job for the Albany PD, and all the indications are they’ll take it seriously. They know that paint is only paint, but those war-game pellets can do real harm to people who aren’t wearing vests and goggles. What happened last night was assault, and the cops I met seem prepared to treat it that way.”

  “Wouldn’t it be interesting,” Timmy said, “if the paintball attack could be traced back to one of the Family Preservation people.FPAAC is up to its eyebrows in local conservative wing-nuts — tea-baggers, birthers, deathers and other types of Obama haters.”

  “Except, when Second Amendment crazies lose control, they tend not to just shoot paint. They go in with real Uzis and go down in a blaze of glory taking as many people with them as they can. This thing feels more like a homophobic out-of-control loony or drunk.”

  “So, Donald, what exactly is your role at this point? The police will investigate the paint attack and the security people will protect Hunny. What will you be doing to earn your fee?”

  “There are still a few of Hunny’s former occasional and short-term boyfriends I need to check out. Guys who have sent threatening notes or phone messages.”

  “By short-term, I suppose you mean ranging from several hours down to ten minutes.”

  “Yes, speed dating seems to be one of Hunny’s favorite pastimes.”

  “And these Briening people. Surely you can be helpful dealing with them. You’ve dealt with extortionists before — though none 58 Richard Stevenson that I can recall who were quite as grandiose in their expectations as the Brienings.”

  “I’m trying to figure out whether the Brienings’ delusional venality will be an advantage or a disadvantage. Lack of rationality is generally an obstacle in situations like this, but these people are so off the wall that I may mau-mau them and they’ll just go poof.

  Anyway, I should soon get an inkling as to what I am dealing with. I’m going to drive out to Cobleskill this afternoon.”

  Something somebody was saying on Meet the Press caught Timmy’s attention, and then my cell phone went off.

  “Strachey.”

  “Don, I need your help,” Hunny said, his voice shaky. “Can you drive over to East Greenbush? Art and I came out to Golden Gardens to see Mom. But she’s gone.”

  Gone? “Hunny, do you mean that your mother has passed away?” This could solve certain problems.

  “No, she’s just not here. And nobody knows where Mom went. ”

  I said I’d be there in ten minutes.

  “They say they’re going to have to notify the police,” Hunny said. “They’re searching the premises one more time, and if Mom doesn’t turn up they are going to have to call the sheriff ’s office.

  I’m thinking maybe they shouldn’t wait. I mean, they found her wheelchair by the front door, for heaven’s sake. It sounds like she somehow just left. Got out the door and wandered away somewhere.”

  “There’s a receptionist,” I pointed out. “Or isn’t she always at her desk?”

  Art said, “We’ve come in here when she’s back out of sight in the office, catching some zees, or trimming her nose hairs, or whatever.”

  “Mom rides around in that chair — she calls it her taxi to nowhere — but she can walk in her slow, rickety way. There was nothing to prevent her from strolling right out the door and -

  CoCkeyed 59 what? Hitching a ride to almost anyplace.”

  “The other doors are alarmed,” Art said, “but not the front.”

  “What was she wearing when she was last seen?”

  “Just her bathrobe and slippers. Mom has been meticulous about her appearance all her life. Or she was until recently. She might not have been aware that she was dressed somewhat inappropriately for appearing in public.”

  I was standing and Hunny and Art were seated on a bench in the corridor outside the administrator’s office. Elderly men and women in various stages of inert disrepair were slumped in wheelchairs up and down the hallway. Some had looked up at me as I walked in, but most took no notice. The place was decorated with pretty-posy wall stencils, under the apparent assumption that none of the inmates would have found Motherwell interesting or gotten a charge out of a Munch or two. The hall we were in did not smell fetid, but the stench of disinfectant was not much of a substitute.

  “I talked to Mom yesterday afternoon,” Hunny said, “and she told me how much she was looking forward to my visit. The staff here had told Mom about me winning the lottery even before I called her on Thursday, so I guess everybody here knew I was coming. And I told Mrs. Kerisiotis, the administrator, that I would donate new flat-screen TVs to all the rooms. That went over big, and I have to say, it went through my mind that Mom might get a little extra tLC as a result.”

  Art said, “Hunny also offered to have the dietician sent on a long trip to Hawaii and replaced by somebody who could cook, but nobody here has said any more about that.”

  “Was yesterday afternoon the la
st time you spoke to your mother?” I asked.

  “Not long after I got home from your office.”

  “And she sounded normal?”

  “Normal? Well, normal for Mom in the past couple of years is not exactly what Dr. Joyce Brothers would call normal.

  Sometimes she’s her good old self. Other times she forgets things and people. And she gets frustrated and mad. A couple of weeks ago one of the nurses told me that Mom had thrown her Depends at an aide and told people to stop treating her like a baby. I asked her about this, but she said she didn’t remember doing it, and we both had a good laugh over that one.”

  Hunny and Art both stood up as a tiny middle-aged woman wearing a blue business suit, a pink ruffled collar and a huge brooch that looked like a sea urchin came striding up the corridor.

  “That’s Mrs. Kerisiotis,” Hunny said. “When Mom went missing, she came in, even though it’s Sunday.”

  I was introduced by name but not title or function, and Mrs.

  Kerisiotis said to Hunny, “Did you telephone your mother early this morning, Huntington?”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “Your mother’s roommate, Nola Conklin, says your mom received a phone call at about a quarter of eight. Nola was half asleep and she couldn’t make out what was said. It wasn’t long after that that Rita left the room in her wheelchair. She was dressed only in her nightie and bathrobe, so of course any staff seeing her headed down the hall would have thought she was going in the direction of the lounge or the game room. Can you ask around among friends and relatives and try to find out who might have phoned her?”

  “Yes, I will do that. Oh God.”

  “Huntington, there is still no sign of your mother, and I think I will have to notify the sheriff ’s department. Some of our staff have even walked up and down the highway asking if any neighbors might have noticed your mum, but no one reported seeing her. I am so, so sorry this has happened. I think that Rita may have been determined to leave the building, and cleverly she took advantage of the front desk shift change at eight o’clock.

  She has certainly never done such a thing before. Has she talked to you at all about wanting to leave Golden Gardens or of wanting to go to a particular place?”

  CoCkeyed 61

  “No,” Hunny said. “Mom has always said this place suits her. I mean, she says it’s boring and smells bad and the food is revolting and sometimes she feels like she would just as soon be rotting in a grave as rotting in a nursing home. But she says most of the staff are nice, and the heating system works fine in the winter.”

  “Yes, she seems to like it here, and Rita is well-liked by both the staff and the other residents. Now, Mrs. Conklin told me your mom became agitated while watching the six o’clock news on TV yesterday evening. I know that you have been in the news, and I am wondering if she may have become upset over a report on you and your lottery prize and these Albany people who are trying to have your prize revoked. Did she not mention anything about this to you?”

  Hunny looked stricken and reached for his cigarettes and then quickly put them back. “No, but she means to tell me things and then things slip her mind. She has mentioned that this happens.

  So she might have seen me being maligned by those religious nut cases and she decided to give them a piece of her mind or something. That would be just like Mom.”

  “Mother Rita is a cheerful lady who likes to have her bit of fun,” Art said. “But she doesn’t suffer fools, either.”

  Hunny said, “I wonder if she went to find the fPAAC people and tell them off. But how would she even know who they were or where to find them? Now I’m really worried. Maybe the sheriff ’s people could look for her wherever the FPAAC idiots are.

  Do they have an office, or a den, or a nest, or what? And Donald, girl, you could check out fPAAC, too, and maybe infiltrate them or keep an eye on them or something.”

  “I’ll add them to my list. This afternoon I may visit the Brienings in Cobleskill. But if your Mom doesn’t turn up soon, she’ll be my first priority.”

  Hunny grabbed his cigarettes and in the same motion jammed them back in his shirt pocket. “I almost forgot about the putrid Brienings. Good grief, maybe they kidnapped Mom. Called her up and lured her outside and then whisked her away!”

  Art said, “Why would they do that, luv?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Because I’m rich and famous. Like when those people snatched Frank Sinatra Junior or the Getty kid.”

  “But those were for the ransom. The Brienings don’t need Mother Rita to extort money from you. They’ve got that letter instead.”

  Mrs. Kerisiotis said, “Who are the Brienings?”

  I could all but see the wheels spinning inside Hunny’s head and the terror he felt over the possibility of his mother’s being revealed in Golden Gardens as a thief. He said, “They’re people Mom had some trouble with a long time ago. It was an argument over a breaded zucchini recipe.”

  “It’s hard to imagine your mother having a long-standing disagreement with anyone, Huntington. She is generally such a cheery lady. She can be outspoken, of course, and she has her opinions. And she doesn’t like to be bothered with Depends.

  But five minutes after she lets off steam, she is back to being as sweet as can be. The aides all love Rita. She tells them stories that I would consider off-color, but the staff all think she is just a hoot.”

  Tears welled in Hunny’s eyes. “That’s my mom.”

  Now the large-breasted black man with a heavy beard and glittering earring who Timmy and I had seen on television at Hunny’s winning-the-lottery party came down the corridor in a green nurse’s outfit. His cornucopia of rhinestones still dangled from his left ear.

  Hunny shouted, “Antoine!” and the two embraced and Art soon joined in the hug.

  “Hunny, honey, we can’t find your mom, but I’m sure she is somewhere okay. That Rita can take care of herself, girl. You better believe it!”

  “Oh, Antoine, honey, where in the world would Mom go? It sounds like she knew what she was doing — snuck out during the front desk shift change. Or maybe it wasn’t premeditated, and CoCkeyed 63 it was just a moment of opportunity and she took it. But Mrs.

  Kerisiotis says you all have looked high and low, and now she’s going to call the sheriff. Oh God, please don’t let the police find her dead in a drainage ditch being gnawed on by wild dogs!”

  This image seemed to spur the administrator to action, and Mrs. Kerisiotis headed into her office making speaking-into-a-receiver gestures.

  “Hunny, honey, your mom is just such a dear lady, and I’m sure she is going to be back here where she belongs in no time at all.”

  “Oh, Antoine, honey, I am trying to believe that.”

  “Rita told us a joke the other day that had us all rolling on the floor and screaming our heads off. Did she tell you the one about the lady who led a cute bag boy out to the supermarket parking lot? The lady says to the bag boy, ‘I’m glad you came outside with me. I have to tell you, I have an itchy pussy.’ The humpy kid says to the lady, ‘Well, you’re going to have to point it out to me. All those Japanese cars look alike.’”

  Hunny and Art’s laughter was so rollicking that several of the old folks staring at the floor in the corridor looked up.

  “I know Mom gets on the phone with her old friend Tex Clermont once a week to trade jokes.”

  “Hunny, I sure do see where you get your sense of humor.”

  “Antoine, Mom has had a nice time here overall. Minus the disgusting food and so on. So I can’t begin to imagine why she would just walk out the door. It’s true, her mind is going.”

  “I’ve noticed that, Hunny. But she has two or three marbles left, and on a good day she’s one hundred percent. Well, eighty-two.”

  “Maybe she just went for a stroll. It’s such a sunny day out. It’s kind of hot, but Mom has never minded the heat. Or she walked down to Dairy Queen for a treat.”

  “We all checked down there. But don
’t you fret, Hunny.

  Those girls in the sheriff ’s department will have her back here 64 Richard Stevenson in no time at all. One time a lady made it out the door and three miles down Route 43, and the officers found her in the waiting room at Jiffy Lube reading the Troy Record. She said she liked it there because the coffee at Jiffy Lube was better than the coffee at Golden Gardens. That poor lady — her name was Turalura Butterworth — passed away a week after the sheriff brought her back here. But that was just a coincidence, I am certain.”

  Now Mrs. Kerisiotis came back out from her office. She said two sheriff ’s deputies were on their way, and they would get word out to all patrol officers in the region about the missing Golden Gardens resident. When Mrs. Kerisiotis told the duty officer the name of the missing patient, he had said to her, “Van Horn? Why is that name sounding familiar?”

  “Huntington,” Mrs. Kerisiotis said, “you are such a celebrity.

  The next thing you know I’ll go into the Grand Union and your face will be on the cover of the National Inquirer. We’ll find out all about your hidden secrets and scandalous love life.”

  Mrs. Kerisiotis grinned, but Hunny only smiled back feebly.

  Chapter Nine

  The noontime sun was brilliant and the air steamy, and I cranked the AC as I sped down the interstate toward Cobleskill.

  It seemed unlikely that the Brienings were in any way connected to the disappearance of Rita Van Horn. She was most valuable to them settled comfortably among her unknowing and potentially judgmental fellow residents at Golden Gardens. But I needed to talk with them anyway about their crude extortion plot, so it wasn’t going to hurt to gauge their reaction to Mrs. Van Horn’s having gone AwoL.

  Hunny, meanwhile, was phoning family members and his mother’s friends and acquaintances to find out if any of them knew of her whereabouts. And the East Greenbush Fire Department was preparing to launch a volunteer ground search if Mrs. Van Horn had not been found by mid-afternoon.