Free Hugger Mugger by Robert B. Parker Page A

jukebox played a song I’d never heard before,sung by a woman I didn’t know. The lyrics had something to do with a barroom in Texas. Two guys got up and slow-danced to it on the dance floor.
    â€œI know Wyatt,” Sapp said.
    â€œHe come in here?”
    â€œNot very much,” Sapp said. “I do some counseling too, on, ah, gender identity issues.”
    â€œWyatt came to you?”
    â€œYeah.”
    â€œWhat can you tell me?”
    â€œAnything I want. I’m not licensed or anything. I know something about gender identity issues. I just talk to people.”
    â€œWhat do you want to tell me about Wyatt?” I said.
    â€œHe’s fighting it,” Sapp said. “Something I know a little about. He wants to be straight and rich and have nice teeth.”
    â€œMan’s reach must exceed his grasp. . . .” I said.
    â€œSo he sits on the feelings and sits on them and finally he can’t sit on them anymore and he goes off the wagon, so to speak.”
    â€œKids?” I said.
    Sapp nodded.
    â€œProstitutes mostly,” Sapp said. “In Augusta.”
    â€œHe ever get in trouble about it?”
    â€œYeah. Augusta Vice got him in a street sweep once, Clive got him off. He moved on a kid here in Lamarr once. Kid’s mother called the cops.”
    â€œClive get it buried?” I said.
    â€œYep.”
    â€œMoney?”
    â€œAnd fear. Delroy does it for him.”
    â€œI don’t see Becker taking a bribe.”
    â€œNope, but his boss will.”
    â€œDelroy the bagman?”
    â€œYep.”
    â€œWhat about the fear?”
    â€œDelroy offers money to the kid’s family. They don’t take it, he tells them that something bad will happen to the kid.”
    â€œWyatt tell you this?” I said.
    â€œNo.”
    â€œYou talked with the kid,” I said.
    â€œCouple years afterwards,” he said.
    â€œHe came to you?”
    â€œYeah,” Sapp said. “He was afraid he was gay. I told him I thought he’d been exploited by Wyatt. I told him if anyone threatened him again he was to come right straight to me and we’d see about it.”
    â€œAnyone threaten him again?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œIs he gay?” I said.
    â€œI don’t think so,” Sapp said.
    â€œYou tell him that?”
    â€œI’m not looking for converts,” Sapp said. “I told him it’s not important to be straight or gay. It’s important to be what you are.”
    â€œLike you,” I said.
    Sapp grinned at me.
    â€œI’m queer, and I’m here,” he said.
    â€œKnow anything else about the Clive family that would interest me?” I said.
    â€œNot much. I got a friend might be able to help you out, though. She’s done some business with the other son-in-law. Whatsisname, Pud.”
    â€œHow’s she know Pud?” I said.
    â€œShe’s a madame.”
    â€œIn Lamarr?”
    â€œIn Lamarr.”
    â€œAnd how does she know you?”
    â€œShe’s a member of the gay community,” Sapp said.

SIXTEEN

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    T HE HOUSE SAT on a nice lawn behind a white fence, on a wide tree-lined street where other houses sat on nice lawns behind white fences. All the houses dated from before the Civil War and, had they been a little grander, would have thus qualified as antebellum mansions. I parked in the driveway and walked up to the front door and rang the bell. The yard smelled richly of flowers. In a minute the door was opened by a smallish woman in jeans and a white shirt. She wore no shoes. Her toenails were painted dark maroon. Her gray-blond hair was twisted into a single long braid that reached nearly to her waist.
    I said, “Polly Brown?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œMy name is Spenser. Tedy Sapp sent me over.”
    â€œTedy called me,” she said.
    She stepped out onto the porch and closed the door behind her.
    â€œWe can sit on the veranda,” she said.