Harlan's Race

hard-drinking friends flooded in. As the buffet was demolished, people stood around telling war stories of the show circuit—bad horses, nasty falls at fences. Russell guided me from group to group, introducing me.
    “Oh... Harlan Brown,” said Andrea della Ponza, a young pro rider. “God, how great to meet you,” she added in a low, conspiratorial tone.
    By 3 a.m., several revelers passed out in guest rooms. Russell was a little drunked up himself.
    When the house was silent, the two of us lingered in the library talking. What was on his mind?
    As Russell threw an oak log in the massive fireplace, firelight played over Asian mementos and photos of the young cavalry officer jumping fences at the 1936 Olympics. The terriers snoozed on the rug. Russell poured himself a whiskey from a decanter, and settled into more stories. His discovery at private school that he was gay — the hiding, the anxiety. Covert doings with another member of the Cornell polo team.
    ‘You and I met years ago,” he said suddenly, casually. ‘You might not remember.”
    “Where was that?” I said.
    Then a chill flushed along my back.
    “The hotel room was dark,” he added.
    That client had felt like a man of 40-something. He had paid $1000 for an aggressive active’s time. He hadn’t wanted games or role-playing. He wanted to get to an edge. In the dark, without whips or other aids, I took him there.
    I was aghast. The worst kind of small-world scenario.
    “I see you do remember,” said Russell.
    He opened an antique safe in the wall. Out came a morocco photograph album. When I opened it, a deep shock ripped through me. Russell had known the photographs must exist, so he had gotten them. The nude poses of a working professional in the gay sex industry. There I was
    — looking like a young, angry, hot-eyed Michael, with my schlong dangling down my thigh. The poses were created by Marty Ekstein, noted gay photographer of the ’60s. I had destroyed the negatives and my portfolio when I left New York to go to Prescott. But a few prints were still blowing around the city like dead leaves — worth money now.
    ‘You aren’t ashamed of those years,” Russell mused.
    I swallowed the anger, and slapped the album shut.
    “No,” I said, trying to sound casual. “I was young, dumb and full of cum.”
    Why had he pulled this move? To convince me that a relationship was foregone, since I’d already had him? He’d just made me feel young indeed — vulnerably young, and violated.
    Russell got up, and poured himself more whiskey.
    ‘You keep crossing my path,” he said. ‘The next time was the Montreal Olympics. Jaeger was on loan to the U.S. team. Next, Marvin’s party. I wanted to see you, close up, in the daylight.”
    “I don’t understand,” I said.
    ‘You’re out in a way that’s .. . inconceivable to me.”
    “Not by choice.”
    “Cici is gone, my children grown, less reason to hide. No, I am not going to...” He waved one hand dramatically.
    .. Come out, walk down Fifth Avenue carrying a sign. I think that kind of thing is so common.”
    I’d already heard his horsey friends use that word. To them, common meant “not well-bred”.
    “How will things change, if some of us common folk don’t show our faces in public?” I asked.
    Unsteadily, because he was really drunk now, Russell put away the album, and locked the safe. In his blunt boot-leather way, like he was driving a high-powered horse at a big fence, Russell was proposing to me. He stood by the window looking out into the dark. It was snowing again — large flakes blew softly against the pane.
    “I’d like to have you in my world,” he said. “You’re not discreet company. But I can manage that.”
    “Why not some dewy young stud?”
    “I’ve had my fill of the young studs.”
    The fire popped in the silence. As I put my empty tea mug on the coffee table, I thought of Vince.
    “These days, I go to bed only with people I love,” I said. “And love has worn a little thin.”
    Russell’s eyes went to my gold wedding band, no doubt wondering how he could get me to take it off. But I was on edge about the way he’d handled the photo thing. I didn’t feel any quiver of interest in him. His world didn’t feel comfortable to me. I’d be a bird, all right — a canary in a gilded cage. When we retired, I locked my bedroom door.
    Next day, the limo swept me back toward New York City. On the back-seat bar, I found a manila envelope containing the