Tongue tied

"I did manage to get him sprung from the psych hospital his parents had put him in.

When I found out where he was and tried to see him, they wouldn't let me in, naturally, or even let me talk to Ro

"A week later, we had Ro

"We stayed with some of the Fairmount Park kids for a month or so. But Ro

"As soon as Ro

He was twenty-six when he died."

I said, "Those were the people who never knew what hit them. It didn't even have a name in the begi

"No, just things like 'gay cancer.' Most guys suspected, though, that it had something to do with all the fucking. That it was some kind of communicable disease. I saw Ro

"But in an age that had Edith Massey there to record it instead of Edith Hamilton," I said. Then I asked, "Did you know a man named Kurt Zinsser? He was involved in the rescue of two Albany kids around 1970 from a mental hospital in New Baltimore, New York. I met Zinsser briefly in seventy-nine when he sheltered one of the two kids, Billy Blount, when Blount was being set up on a phony murder rap."

"Sure, I knew Kurt. He was still with the group in seventy-three when I joined up. He was a bit of a doctrinaire lefty, always quoting Fanon and Marx, and a bit tiresome in that regard. He stuck with the FFF after several of us got fed up and left in seventy-five."

"Any idea where he is now? In seventy-nine he was living in Denver."

"No, I've kept in touch with several of the old gang, but not Kurt."

"Thad," I said, "I certainly admire your going off and doing the Lord's work, so to speak, for the two years when you were with the FFF. But I'm wondering about one thing."

"What's that?"

"The first real skill you developed beyond eighteenth century-style farmwork was there's really no more accurate way of phrasing it-kidnapping. That's what the FFF's work amounted to. True?"

Diefendorfer's big ears reddened now, and he laughed. "That's one way of putting it."

"So, I have to ask you. Let me just blurt it out. Have you had anything to do with the kidnapping of Leo Moyle?"

He gri

"Your showing up to try to divert attention from the obvious suspects in the kidnapping, the old FFF, is certain to leave some investigators wondering. I'm sure Lyle Barner will consider the possibility of a cu

"I'm clean," Diefendorfer said easily. "Anyway, I believe that I arrived on the scene before Mr. Moyle was abducted, no?"

"Well, before anybody at the radio station knew about the kidnapping, yes. But of course you could have known all about it, and timed your arrival to sow doubt and confusion just as the investigation turned urgent. Not so?"

"Strachey," Diefendorfer said, looking pleased, "you know, you're really getting my blood racing."

"Thank you. Please elaborate."

"Look, I left the FFF after two years because, as with so many radical organizations, things got complicated and even ugly after a while. Disagreements developed over philosophy and even strategy, and I could deal with that. Men-nonites know how to find consensus. What I couldn't stand was the intrigue and backstabbing that got started after some new people came into the group. I came out of a background where people disagreed openly and resolved disputes in a mutually respectful way. The FFF conducted itself that way in the begi

"But when the scheming got started, I was too naive and inexperienced in the world-and too shocked, really- to put up with the machinations, and I got out. I lived in a commune in Oregon for a while, and then ran a truck farm with some friends. 1 gradually adapted to the customs of life among the English, a lot of which I find reasonable and humane.

"But I'll tell you, Strachey, I really loved the excitement of those early FFF days before things went sour. It was a righteous life, and it was thrilling. So, when you talk about me being part of a kidnapping, it brings that all back. It gives me goose bumps just thinking about it. See?" Diefendorfer displayed a muscular forearm, and in fact the skin on it resembled the skin of a particularly masculine and well-shaped naked goose. This gesture was in keeping with Diefendorfer's apparent longtime habit of expressing his emotions with varying presentations of his limbs.

"I can see that you're feeling happily nostalgic," I said.

"I am, but that's all it is," Diefendorfer said. "Just nostalgia. The people the FFF snatched away wanted to be kidnapped. None of us would have carried off people who didn't want to be freed. Robbing people of their freedom, which is what someone has done to Leo Moyle, is the opposite of what we did. Being held against your will is a terrible thing. Some of the stories I heard from the kids we rescued would break your heart."

"But," I said, "don't you feel just a twinge of empathy- sympathy even-for the neo-FFFers, whoever they are, when they try to rid the public airwaves of a man who embodies the hateful impulse that got all those i

"Sure, I sympathize," Diefendorfer said. "But, at the risk of sounding not righteous but self-righteous, I'll say that I also know that to fight evil with evil is to increase the amount of evil in the world. Usually. There may be exceptions, I know."