“WHEN YOU SAID KRESGE, I was expecting a stool between Hardware and Lingerie,” Lee said.
Rick and the long-haired young man were sitting under the skylight in the Kresge Court Cafeteria, bathed in greenish light filtered through the orchids and ferns that grew in fuzzy profusion between the wrought iron tables. He had brought Lee there because the odds of running into any of his former police department colleagues in the lower court of the Detroit Institute of Arts were too small to measure. They finished their meals and listened to Frankie Avalon crooning over the speakers.
Rick said, “It’s good plain food but they make it look like an oil painting. You didn’t look the diner type.” Which was a lie; Lee Schenck looked as if he spent more time in diners than canned soup.
“It’s nice, but I could’ve caught a burger someplace. I’m not really into food anyway. Lunch is like an oasis, you know? In the working day.”
“Thanks for joining me,” Rick said. “I hate eating out by myself. People look at you.”
“I say let ’em look. Each to his own thing.”
Rick couldn’t tell if this guy was for real. He had the hair and the prole look, but looks were easy. He himself had ditched the jacket and tie back at the office. They had started to get in the way.
They split the check—Rick had learned early that picking it up only put others on their guard—and walked down Woodward, taking their time rounding the corner to where Rick had parked on John R. The late-June day was warming up for a two o’clock scorcher, but memories of the Michigan winter were still fresh and the sidewalks teemed with strollers drawing out their lunch breaks. A white Lincoln convertible with Oriental-looking headlights cruised past with its top down and Mitch Ryder screaming unintelligible lyrics from the radio. Lee jerked his long loose body with the beat.
“Almost bikini weather,” Rick said. “We’ll have to wangle lunch on Belle Isle then.”
“If I’m not overseas.”
He glanced at Lee. “Vietnam?”
“Peace Corps.”
“No kidding, how long you been?”
“I just got accepted last month. I’m waiting for my assignment.”
“What country you hoping for?”
“I studied Spanish six years. I’ll probably get Nairobi.” He laughed his short laugh.
“They say it looks good on the résumé.”
“I’m not doing it for me.”
Rick decided he was for real.
“So the Porter Group is just a temporary stop.”
“More than that,” Lee said. “It’s a chance to do something important while I’m waiting for the big one to come through. Safe cars are worth fighting for, right?”
“I guess.”
“Oh, yeah, I forgot. You’re the next Hubert Humphrey. Pammie told me.”
“Pammie seems to be the office intercom system.”
“She’s a groovy kid. I like everyone at PG. They’re not into that middle-class schtik. It’s like I’m part of a big family.”
“You an orphan?”
“Let’s just say my folks and I have agreed to ignore each other. What about you, married?”
“I tried living with someone once. We kind of came to the same agreement.” Rick fished his keys out of his pocket. “Sorry you got stood up.”
“Yeah, well, Enid’s dedicated.”
“You two been going out long?”
“I wish. We just work together. Sometimes we graze at the same table. She says I’m a sweet boy.”
“Bitch.”
“Yeah. Nice wheels.” Lee got into the Camaro on the passenger’s side. “You ought to see the accident stats on GM’s sports models.”
“I got an earful of them this morning.” Rick slid under the wheel.
“I’m into bikes myself. I had a Harley until the bank took it away.”
“Now, they’re dangerous.”
“Yeah, but they’re supposed to be.”
Rick started the car. He thought he heard a lifter. He’d pop the hood later and take a look. “Enid’s a good-looking woman.” He checked the mirrors and pulled out behind a DSR bus.
Lee laughed. “Ursula Andress is a good-looking woman. Enid’s the best argument against anti-Semitism I know. You better forget her.”
Jewish. He’d been betting on something more exotic, like Egyptian. “She taken?”
“Married. To the Porter Group.”
“Got a thing for old Wendell, huh?”
“You guys in suits.” Lee shook his head. “It’s a new generation, man. Everybody isn’t just looking out for themselves any more.”
“Yeah, I’ve heard Peter, Paul and Mary.”
“Even if she was warm for Wendell’s form she wouldn’t stand a chance. He’s been with the Arctic Princess since before I was born. That’s Mrs. Porter. Caroline, the future first female justice of the Supreme Court.”
“Not popular, I guess.”
“She’s a lawyer, what’s else to say? Capitalist dinosaurs, that whole lot. But she keeps us out of jail. You new guys sure ask a lot of questions.”
Rick backed off. He was getting his range now.
They discovered they were both Tigers fans and discussed Al Kaline and whether Charlie Dressen would recover enough from his heart attack to resume his management duties before the end of the season. Lee thought Mickey Lolich should be traded before he cooled off. “Guy’s twenty-six,” he said. “Over the hill.”
Rick stopped at the light on Adams. A Negro built like Rosey Grier, wearing a dashiki and dark glasses and an enormous Afro, was seated Indian fashion at the base of the Edison fountain, plucking a sitar for a small audience. A Maxwell House can stood on the grass nearby with a sign taped to it reading REMEMBER BLOODY SUNDAY—GIVE TO THE NAACP. Rick thought, but couldn’t recall what Bloody Sunday was all about. He bet himself that Lee could. He’d have the date.
“I never realized so much of this work was done on the telephone.”
“We stuff envelopes too, a shitload of envelopes. What did you think, we go into plants dressed as the help with spy cameras in our shoes?”
“Something like that.”
“You bought the GM line. They’d like people to think we’re a bunch of crackpots who break into files and go through the garbage at the proving grounds. Wendell says consumer advocacy is in the same position unions were in thirty years ago. Pushing for seat belts makes us Communists or something.”
Wendell says. Leary says. Tommy and Dick say. Che said. Talk about buying someone’s line. The whole fucking generation was a Chatty Cathy doll filled with other people’s words. Rick felt as if he’d aged forty years since morning.
“It’d throw a lot of people out of work for a long time,” he said. “All those new safety features.”
“Not so long, just during retooling. How much work you think gets done by people killed or crippled in accidents?”
“Did Wendell say that too?”
Lee lifted his chin. “He’s a great man. You’ll see when you meet him.”
Did it again.
The light changed. They crossed the intersection. The man with the sitar was playing for himself now; his listeners had drifted off.
“Don’t go stiff on me, Lee. I’m on your side.”
The young man exhaled and ran his fingers through his hair. “Sorry. These rednecks who put their goddamn jobs ahead of people’s lives get me uptight. Sometimes I think I might as well be talking to my folks.”
“Thanks for the indoctrination. I’m just the new kid in town.”
“You ain’t heard nothing till you talk to Wendell. When he gets back, ask him to show you his slides. Better yet, get him to take you to the Farm.”
“Where’s that?”
“It’s up in Macomb County. I can’t describe it. You’ll have to see it for yourself.”
They swung left on Jefferson. The sun had turned the surface of the river into a sheet of white metal. The Windsor skyline was fuzzy in the glare. “Is Enid uptight?” Rick asked.
“Most women with her bucks, when they get involved in a cause they just throw money at it. The Porter Group’s into her for ten thousand and she still spends sixty hours a week at the office. Practically runs the place.”
“Ten thousand?”
“What I heard.”
“Who’s she related to, Horace Dodge?”
“All I know is she inherited more than I’ll ever see. Hey, the game’s started.” Lee turned on the radio and found WJR. McLain was starting against Baltimore. The rest of the way back to the office their conversation centered on the game. Afterward Rick couldn’t remember who was ahead.