The Big Enchilada

seat.
    “If anyone’s going to be dog meat, pal,” I said, “it won’t be me.”
    “Oh yeah, fuck face?” Clever, very clever comeback.
    “I wonder what your boss would do if he found out one of his trusted employees was a police snitch.”
    “He’d laugh,” he said somewhat uncertainly.
    “Would he? Not if he knew that that trusted employee was playing it cute with Detective Thomas Ratchitt of Vice.” Faro paled and his bony face took on the appearance of a skull-“Tell me what I want to know, or I’m going to throw you to the sharks.”
    He protested some more, but finally realized that he had no choice.
    Faro had been at the club just under two years—it had been operating for about three or four—and he said he was a kind of general assistant. He then confirmed some things that I already knew or had suspected. Basically, the Black Knight was a very expensive whorehouse that specialized in fairly kinky stuff. They put on fancy sex shows for the members, and there were a number of back rooms for more personal endeavors. There was a lot of S-M, a good deal of elaborate costume fantasies, and a fair use of children. In all categories there were hookers of both sexes, depending on the clients’ persuasions or momentary interests, and the club’s specialties could be combined in any variety of ways to meet all possible scenarios. Naturally all this came high. Faro didn’t know for sure how much, but it was a lot, and you had to be pretty wealthy or want it very badly to indulge yourself. Faro recognized a few celebrities who made use of the facilities, but other than that, he had no idea who the members were. One of the features of the club was the guarantee of complete security. I let that pass for the time being.
    A guy named Freddy Lascar ran the club. Faro stayed with that story for a while, but after I put on some more heat, he said that Lascar was just fronting for someone. Lascar ran the day-to-day operation, but if there was a big decision to be made, it was referred somewhere else. Faro didn’t know who was behind Lascar. He said he had never heard of anything or anyone called Domingo, and I believed him.
    He had heard of Mountain, though. When I mentioned the name he went pale again and started to sweat. Mountain had served as the club’s muscle for a while, but there were a couple of incidents where he used a little too much of it. He had broken up one of the club’s girls pretty badly while he was taking his pleasure with her. I had trouble imagining what that monster liked to do, but I knew it would have to be rough on his partner. It was, and the girl was in an institution for life. But Faro said that was more of an annoyance than anything else. The real trouble came when Mountain messed up one of the members—the host of a TV game show. Faro didn’t know the reason behind it, but the guy had to spend a lot of time with a plastic surgeon before he could face the cameras again. It was hushed up pretty well, but some of the other members heard about it and got nervous. Mountain was tanked soon after that. Faro didn’t know where he went, but Mountain still came to the club every so often. He would spend a few minutes with Lascar and then leave. I showed Faro the picture of Linda Perdue, the missing girl, but he said he’d never seen her.
    Naturally there was a big fix in, and Ratchitt was getting to be a wealthy man as a result. Faro was on the payroll because the Vice cop wanted to know about anything unusual going on at the club. Faro figured Ratchitt wanted to be able to up the ante if something happened, but Faro said he’d only given the cop garbage.
    Throughout all this, Faro had grown increasingly nervous. “Hey, man, that’s all. I don’t know any more. It’s a very tight operation there. If they hear I talked to you, I’m finished.”
    “Then you better make sure they don’t. And if I find out you haven’t been straight with me, you’re just as finished.”
    “I’ve been straight,” he said. “Now will you let me go? My arms are killing me.”
    “A couple more questions.”
    “Hey, man, I don’t know anything more.”
    “Tell me about the blackmail.”
    “What blackmail?” His voice rose an octave and he started to sweat again.
    “Don’t play cute. I saw your darkroom.”
    “Photography’s my hobby.”
    “Smarten up, or your only hobby will be growing flowers from the bottom up.”
    He sighed. “Okay. Some of the rooms have hidden cameras, both