THE MASERATI PURRED on straightaways and growled around corners. Judging by his expression, the Tomcats' owner seemed to enjoy the sound the way Steve Sabol enjoyed Elvis.
We passed an elegant old brick and stone structure with "Cavalier" written in some sort of plant-life across the sloping front lawn.
"Out of town, eh?" Bobby Frye finally stirred himself to ask. "Where from?"
"Philadelphia."
"Yeah? Eagles are good this year. They'll give the 'cats a run for my money."
I tried to smile at his humor, but the fist hidden next to my leg was clenched. Just to make nice, I said, "This rides like a dream."
"You want to try it later?"
"Oh, no. I'm nervous enough right here."
Frye laughed. "I'm not surprised. You're awfully married to be picking up strangers."
My lungs decided it was okay to breathe. "You noticed."
"Oh, yeah."
"Do you mind?"
"Oh, hell no. Makes for a change. Unless you're selling something. It's usually one thing or the other."
I reiterated the stock donation spiel. Frye didn't answer, just steered the powerful car east then south onto a wider avenue along the beach. Left and right were tidy low hotels and other businesses rooted into much paving.
Frye pulled into a lot at 30th Street, nosed the sports car to the curb facing the ocean. The nearest landscape was a bit of grass, an asphalt bike path, then a strip of tall white lampposts stretching out of sight in each direction. A cement "boardwalk" supported trash cans, two telephone kiosks, and several wooden benches. Beyond that, the long, winter-blown beach was stroked by blue, brown, and slate gray water broken into ragged strips of foam.
Frye opened a window. Sharp winter air spiced with salt water opened my eyes and cleared my head. I couldn't shake my nervousness, though, couldn't forget that despite all his wealth and power, this man probably should be regarded as a murder suspect.
Frye turned toward me, his arm draped behind his bucket seat. "You need the deduction this calendar year?" he asked. He had decided to play my game whether he believed my ploy or not.
I said, "No," because saying, "Yes," would have exposed me as a liar. This close to the end of the tax year, if I had even theoretically needed the write-off, I simply would have made the donation and been done with it.
"Then why don't you hold your shares until this time next year?" Bobby recommended. "Our last dividends are posted on December 15. I think you can be fairly confident that the stock will rise in value between now and then, and the appreciation will give you a larger deduction. Your charity will make out better, too."
"Thank you."
I suddenly felt awful for insinuating myself into this man's life...although..., I quickly reconsidered. He hadn't taken long to agree to lunch with me, and not because he believed I was available.
Maybe he was just another lonely divorced person, made even lonelier by his position. Regular people never invited their bosses out for so much as a drink, and with good reason–too little to be gained, too many pitfalls to avoid.
"So tell me about this Jewish Mother restaurant," I said. "It sounds like fun."
Frye broke off his contemplation of the ocean and scowled as he threw the car into reverse. "Why don't I just show you?"
Had he become slightly peeved? Disappointed? Perhaps I should back off, regroup, reconsider.
Not many blocks along and inland to Pacific Avenue an unassuming building squatted at the edge of the sidewalk. Green window squares had been unprofessionally painted with Hanukkah symbols.
Frye parked in a far corner of the adjacent lot and helped me out. Then he hustled through the cold breeze to hold the restaurant door open for me.
Inside to the left lay a long case of baked goods with potholders and mugs hanging above. A ceramic cookie jar of an older woman with round glasses seemed to offer a brown bag of goodies from The Jewish Mother. To the right and straight ahead lavender and aqua cubbyholes with black edges displayed bottled beverages of all sorts. Further in to the right lay a bar, and beyond that a stage backed by a wall of photos and a sign that read, "Budweiser presents Rumble Fish." For evenings, no doubt.
Everywhere else booths or round tables with bentwood chairs had been scribbled with crayons or markers until what had been graffiti crossed over into a decor.
We found a booth on a far wall and Bobby greeted a smiling waiter.
"Yo, Mr. Frye, what'll it be today?" The server, “Clint,” slapped napkins and flatware onto the scarred table.
"My guest here needs a minute with the menu," Bobby hinted, "but in the meantime, something to drink?" he inquired of me with a raised eyebrow.
"Red wine?" I had to lose this edginess somehow.
The waiter listed their offerings, and I chose. Frye went with "Maisel's Weisse," which turned out to be a beer.
Cartoons of the bespectacled "mother" graced the newsprint menu, which little visitors could color with the crayons provided. Food items went by such names as "Gemiste Salad," "Mother's Grandson Frank (a hot dog)" or "Mother's Sister Adele (hot corned beef, coleslaw and Russian dressing)." I chose "Mother's Mother," a chicken salad sandwich with apples, raisins, nuts, avocado and Muenster cheese. Bobby Frye requested the Jewish Mother Club.
"Pleasant as this is," he remarked after the drinks arrived, "why are we really here?"
"Partly the donation," I fibbed, "and partly I wanted to know if you thought the value of my stock would go down because of the...the murder."
"You must have one hell of a lot of stock," Bobby thought aloud. "What is it? A thousand shares? Two?"
I waved the question away. "So what do you think?"
"A little dip, if anything." His face had gone a bit gray, probably because of the stockholders' lawsuit that was much more likely to hurt my hypothetical shares than Tim Duffy's death.
We considered each other for a moment, and I decided I had better address the latter difficulty, too. To ignore it would make me appear ignorant.
"We won't even mention the other, uh, problem," I remarked kindly. "You're obviously a superb manager, and I'm sure your lawyers will have no trouble proving that in court."
Frye grunted.
"A little dip, if anything," I quoted him, again referring to the value of his company’s stock.
He huffed out a small laugh.
The food arrived, and I asked for a Diet Sprite to go with it. The wine had been a bad idea–or maybe not, since it was gone.
Frye had withdrawn into his own dour speculations, so I asked if he was developing anything interesting.
The corporate genius took a bite of his sandwich, marveled at the taste, then allowed some enthusiasm to seep into his eyes. "Always," he answered as soon as he’d swallowed. "Best part of being in business, taking on something new."
As we ate, he described an inter-computer communication glitch and how his engineers had worked for months on the problem. “Almost there,” he said with a wink. Then he actually blushed. "I love solving problems, all sorts of problems," he confessed.
"Me, too," I admitted, which secured his attention.
"Like what?" he wanted to know.
I wiped my mouth with a napkin. "Take this mayonnaise for example," I hoisted my sandwich to illustrate. "The factory makes the stuff, puts it in a bottle. The bottle gets put into a box. The box is moved to a loading platform and lifted into a truck." Bobby had stopped chewing. "Next the truck drives miles and miles to a store where it's unloaded and the boxes are stacked somewhere. Sooner or later somebody puts the mayonnaise bottles on a shelf."
I pointed at myself. "Then I go into the store, put the one of the bottles in a cart, drive it around the store and eventually transfer it to the checkout conveyor.
"The clerk stuffs it in a bag. I put the bag in the car, drive home, take the bag out of the car and into the house. I finally lift the mayonnaise out of the bag and put it in my pantry. Before anybody even uses the stuff it's been handled and moved dozens of times. There ought to be a better way."
"Never thought of that before," Frye admitted. "But it does sound pretty inefficient now that you mention it."
"Your turn."
"Okay. The earth's full of water, water's full of hydrogen, and hydrogen's full of energy. The trouble is it costs much too much to separate the hydrogen from the oxygen to use it for power." He shrugged.
"There must be a way."
"Maybe there is."
We smiled over our mutual silliness. At least I thought it was silliness. For all I knew Bobby Frye would be on the phone the minute we got back to his office talking with one of his scientists about how inefficient grocery shopping was.
I could feel Frye trying not to glance at his watch, so I quickly asked, "Why'd you bench Walker Cross last Sunday?" I sounded melancholy when I said it, and perhaps I was.
Frye waved his head. "Who says I did?"
I pushed away my plate. "Nobody else cared one way or the other whether he could make his quota."
"Football is big business, Ms. Barnes."
I told him to call me Gin.
"Okay, Gin. If you play your stocks the way I think you do, you're no dope when it comes to money. So tell me. Is there a businessman alive who wouldn't cut one point seven million dollars off his budget if it didn't make any difference to the rest of his enterprise?"
Instead of agreeing to the obvious, I answered a different question. "So Walker Cross really couldn't blame Tim Duffy for his loss of playing time."
"No. What's your point?"
"No point," I equivocated, for I had finally realized something else.
The only payoff Tim Duffy’s heirs would be getting now would be from an insurance company.