Authors: Joe Keenan
“Catfight!”
I thought to myself. “At last
something
in this office a gay man can relate to.” But then the door opened, the ladies retired to their corners, and the Grimes boys
were upon us.
T
HEY DID NOT ARRIVE ALONE BUT
were attended by six cohorts, an assortment of dark-suited men so stern and judgmental of mien as to resemble the male ensemble
from a musical version of
The Crucible.
Rusty swaggered to his desk and seated himself. Hank took a chair next to it and the Menfolk of Salem clustered grimly around
the poker table.
“For those of you I haven’t met, I’m Rusty Grimes. I believe most of you have spoken to my brother, Detective Hank Grimes,
LAPD.” He introduced his deputies, whose names and titles need not concern us, then asked us to state our names and occupations
for the record. As we did he tried to project a solemnity appropriate to his office and the occasion, but his glee at having
us at his mercy was uncontainable and a bratty half smile kept leaking through the gravitas.
These preliminaries concluded, Stephen and Moira unmuzzled their lawyers, who bayed at length over Rusty’s scandalous mistreatment
of their clients. He had, they hotly maintained, blackmailed them into coming here, promising discretion only to orchestrate
a media ambush in a deliberate and malicious attempt to damage their reputations and scar their fragile psyches. They demanded
that Grimes apologize at once, then see them safely out through some secure and private exit. Should he fail to do so they
would sue him into the ground, dig him up, burn the remains, and sue the ashes.
Grimes took this all in with a smug patient air, being, like Moira, long inured to his victims’ impotent bluster. When their
wrath was spent he declared coyly that he had no idea who’d alerted the press and that the tattletale, when found, would be
properly spanked. His eyes scanned the room, then he turned to me.
“Where’s your pal Monty? And what’s her name”— he consulted a paper—“Claire Simmons?”
As I was saying I didn’t know, the door opened and Claire and Monty were escorted in by a fish-faced functionary who briefly
ogled Gina’s cleavage, then withdrew.
“You’re late,” scolded Rusty.
“Sorry, milady,” said Monty. “We had trouble getting past the welcoming committee you so thoughtfully arranged.”
“Are you sure you called everyone?” asked Claire. “Because I didn’t see Al-Jazeera down there.”
It was hard for me to read this salvo. While her cheekiness suggested confidence and was thus a hopeful sign, her expression
was more grim than cocky, which was not. I shot her an imploring look, hoping for some heartening sign, a discreet thumbs-up
perhaps or an ace poking cheerfully from her sleeve. All I got was a maddeningly inscrutable nod. They found seats and Rusty
resumed.
“I don’t need to tell you people why you’re here. It’s our intention to question you separately and alone about charges ranging
from pandering to extortion. But before we split up there are a few things I’d like to say to all of you.
“For a while now we’ve been asking you about all this and you’ve been lying to us. Stonewalling.” He smiled and shrugged.
“It’s understandable. People who break the law or hire hustlers aren’t in any rush to admit it. But playtime’s over, kids.
We have two witnesses who say they either paid or were paid for gay sex in the treatment rooms at Ms. Finch’s spa.”
“Witnesses!” scoffed Moira’s lawyer. “Do you really think a jury’s going to believe a Z-list talk show host and an employee
Miss Finch fired for drug use?”
Rusty smirked and shrugged again. “Who knows? People like a good story. And stories don’t come any better than Rex’s.” He
proceeded to outline Rex’s woefully accurate account of Monty’s porno disk, who’d filmed it and why, and how it had fallen
into Monty’s hands. He then produced a document bound with brass brads and tossed it to Monty, who failed to catch it, prompting
manly chuckles from Hank and the Salem Six.
“Rex also told us how you used that disk to make Stephen cough up half a million bucks for that.”
“What is it?” inquired Lily.
“It’s your screenplay, dear.”
“What’s
he
doing with it?” she demanded haughtily.
“He wanted to read it.”
Lily addressed Rusty. “I’ll have you know that screenplay’s copyrighted so if you were thinking of stealing my idea you can
just think again!”
“Steal it?” snorted Grimes. “That’s a good one. Who’d even want to sit through a moldy, stupid piece of crap like—”
“How
dare
you!” roared Lily, rising in majestic indignation. “So, now you’re a film critic, are you?
Amelia Flies Again!
is a soulful and thrilling work of cinematic art! Philip and I can see that, as can my nephew, who knows a damned sight more
about movies than you do! I’m not surprised that its poetry eluded a philistine like you, but that hardly means Stephen was
forced to buy it!”
“Well said, my dear.”
“Thank you, Monty. The very idea!”
Grimes turned to Moira with a skeptical smile. “So you liked the script?”
“
Adored
it. I mean Stephen and I felt it could use a wee polish, but the story was just gripping.”
Stephen emphatically seconded this opinion. “You don’t like it, that’s your privilege, but no one here’s blackmailing anyone!”
This assertion led to an even pricklier discussion of Stephen’s decision to cast his seventy-five-year-old aunt as the film’s
heroine at a salary of five million dollars. Stephen’s slightly red-faced contention that his aunt’s “ageless beauty” would
make her fully credible as a woman of forty-seven drew rude sniggers from the lawmen, which sent Lily into a sputtering rage.
“Get up, Monty! We’re leaving! I refuse to spend one more minute being insulted by this cherry-faced fool! So now you’re a
beauty expert too? Buy yourself a mirror why don’t you and take a good look at that beet-stained lump of cauliflower you call
a nose! And shave your ears while you’re at it, you insufferable gargoyle!”
Eventually Monty succeeded in calming Lily and persuaded her to stay if only to help defend her costar against still more
grievous accusations.
“So,” said Grimes, “where were we before I offended Miss Teen America here? Oh, right, Rex. As all of you know, Rex didn’t
just watch Monty’s home movie. No, he’s a resourceful guy, Rex, and he secretly recorded it so he could break the story on
his show. Let’s give that tape a listen, shall we?”
Noting that it was pretty raw stuff, he gallantly offered the ladies the option of sitting out the risqué portion in the anteroom
with Dottie. Sophie’s choice if you asked me, but Gina promptly took him up on it and flounced melodramatically out of the
room.
“Mom...?” hinted Stephen, his eyes pleading.
“I want to know what we’re facing,” replied Diana, every inch the tragedienne. He didn’t even bother asking Lily, whose wide
eager eyes made clear her determination to hear every racy minute.
Having watched the film some nine thousand times I knew the dialogue by heart and could understand why Stephen was writhing
at the thought of the assembled hearing the sweet nothings he’d cooed to Oscar. He’d have writhed even more had he known as
I did that this furtively recorded version included Rex’s ribald running commentary, making it sound like the director’s track
on the Criterion Collection edition of
Assbusters III.
Rusty produced a Walkman and pressed play. An electronic hiss filled the room, followed by some slapping noises and moans.
After a moment we heard a giggle and Rex’s high, inebriated voice.
“Ooh—Miss Stephen likes that! Miss Stephen likes that a lot!”
This and many similar remarks from Rex may actually have helped Stephen, who, determined to declare the recording a forgery,
was striving to maintain a look at once outraged and mystified as though to say, “Who can this skilled impersonator be?” Every
time Rex piped in with a “Lordy, lordy!” or “Ain’t she in heaven!” this outrage came more easily to him. When we reached the
point where Stephen was loudly exhorting Oscar not to stint on the pistons, he decided mere grimaces weren’t enough to sell
his innocence and began exclaiming, “Who the fuck is this guy?! ’Cause it sure ain’t me!”
“If you say so,” stage-whispered Lily, “but you must admit it sounds awfully like you.”
“Quiet!” snapped Diana. “It’s clearly not Stephen!”
“Harder! Yeah, pound that ass, gold boy!
Yeah!!
”
“My mistake, dear. Nothing like him!”
After a few more excruciating minutes we heard the knock on the door and Gina calling, “Stephen?” This prompted drunken gales
of laughter from Rex.
“Oops!! Oscar
interruptus!
”
Grimes paused the tape and asked that Gina be brought back in.
“I’m sorry, Miss Beach, but I’ll have to ask you to listen to this next portion.”
You may recall that most of the après-Oscar conversation had centered on Diana’s boozy skirmish with Lily, who was venomously
disparaged by both her niece and sister. Lily’s response to these calumnies did little to bolster claims that the recording
was fraudulent.
“Lies! All lies!!” cried Lily, rehearsing for the courtroom. “I was sober as a judge that night!”
“Be quiet!” pleaded Diana. “That’s not even us!”
“Don’t play innocent! I remember it clear as a bell. You were drunk and belligerent! Caused a hideous scene!”
“Shut the fuck up!” suggested an attorney.
Grimes was naturally quick to pounce on this. If the tape was a malicious fiction, why did Lily recall its events so clearly?
There was a brief flummoxed silence, then Gilbert, that prince of prevaricators, leaped into the fray.
“Honestly! You call yourselves detectives? You couldn’t detect a skunk in a perfume shop!” He pointed out that Diana and Lily’s
spat at the spa had been no whispered exchange of hostilities but a noisy, flat-out brawl that could easily have been overheard
by any number of guests. And who happened to be on hand that very night?
“Rex Bajour!” I exclaimed.
“Precisely!” cried Gilbert, all but tucking his thumbs into imaginary suspenders. “When Rex came to make his defamatory tape
he decided to incorporate the squabble, knowing that adding the expertly mimicked voices of Diana and Gina would help him
pass it off as authentic. We don’t, of course, know who Rex hired to portray the stars or what has since become of them. We
can only speculate on the fate of those who’ve outlived their usefulness to Rex Bajour.”
This last flourish was a bit over the top but Stephen and Gina endorsed the theory and their lawyers vowed to produce experts
who’d testify that the tape was a sham. Rusty, unfazed, said he’d match them expert for expert, and lest we forget, Rex had
not merely heard Monty’s sex disk, he’d seen it. He then poked his intercom and said, “Send Rex in.”
The office had a second door that gave onto a conference room. This door now opened and Rex entered. I had never in my twenty-nine
years as a gay man seen someone actually sashay. I did now as Rex paraded in, employing the sort of gait one only excuses
in tall, strikingly beautiful women wearing large feathered headdresses. It was clear from his face that our day of dark reckoning
was for him some combination of Mardi Gras and Christmas morning. How it must have thrilled him to see the clamoring press
outside and know he’d soon bask in its full ravenous attention. Never a Star, he would finally find glory as a Star Witness,
all thanks to Stephen, on whom he bestowed a curdled smile of triumph.
Grimes asked if he could identify the man he’d seen on film having sex with a Les Étoiles masseur and a man costumed to resemble
an Oscar.
“It was him!
Stephen Donato!
” he cried, thrusting a righteous finger at the accused.
“Oh, dial it down, Tallulah,” said Monty.
At Rusty’s prompting Rex proceeded to identify me, Gina, Diana, and Claire as the other players in the film Monty had shown
him.
“Before you go, Mr. Bajour, tell us — did a man dressed as a police officer and claiming to be Detective Hank Grimes visit
your apartment this week and confiscate a voice recorder from you?”
“He most certainly did!” harrumphed Rex.
“Is that man in this room?” asked Rusty, and Rex, still miffed at having been duped, gloatingly fingered Gilbert, adding that
I’d served as his accomplice.
“What utter rubbish!” cried Gilbert. “I’ve never laid eyes on this man! And as we’ve established that he’s a liar and expert
forger—”
“Let’s have Mrs. Popov,” said Grimes to his intercom.
A lumpy beak-nosed woman in a floral housedress was escorted in. I stared a moment, bewildered. Then I placed her and blanched,
overcome by that abrupt chagrin Wile E. Coyote feels when he glances down and finds that he parted company with the mesa several
strides ago.
Rex giggled. “I see you remember my neighbor.”
She identified Gilbert and me as the faux Hank and his confederate. Then she and Rex were thanked and escorted out, Rex blowing
a kiss to Stephen as his witty parting gesture.
“Two witnesses, boys. Looks like you’ll be bunking with us tonight.”
“WHAT!!” shrieked Gilbert, who could at least find speech. The best I could manage was a high-pitched wheeze like an off-key
concertina. I turned frantically to Claire, whose eyes met mine. They brimmed with sympathy, but sympathy was not what I wanted.
I wanted a chopper on the roof and a suitcase full of Krugerrands and I wanted them now.
Grimes, his smile broadening, turned to Moira.
“I think we’ll be making room for you too, Miss Finch.”
“Oh?” said Moira blandly.
“On what charge?” howled her outraged counsel.
“Well, we got two witnesses who say she’s the new Hollywood madam, so I guess we’ll start there.”
Moira yawned showily. “Do you honestly think you can win this on what you’ve got?”
“Maybe, maybe not. But we will on what we’ll
get.
This case has been a tough one to crack ’cause your staff and la-di-da customers have kept their traps shut. But once they
see people going down they’ll get nervous. And when people get nervous they talk. Just ask Rex.