The Detroit Electric Scheme

by D. E. Johnson

  “I know just the place.” Edsel grinned and rubbed his hands together. “This is exciting. Feels like I’m doing something illegal.”

  I began tying Wesley’s cravat, determined to treat him like any other friend. But it made me nervous. I certainly didn’t want him to think I was interested.

  A few minutes later, we snuck out the back door. Mr. Hatch kept the lone reporter out there away from us while we hurried to Edsel’s car. I expected to see his Detroit Electric brougham, but instead a Model T roadster was parked at the corner. This was no ordinary Tin Lizzie. The car was bright red with black fenders and top. It sat lower than a standard flivver, had a longer hood, and seemed to be leaning forward, aching to speed. Again, it crossed my mind there was something I was forgetting, something about a car.

  Wesley let out a low whistle. “She’s a beauty.”

  Edsel’s grin split his face. “It’s a custom Torpedo model I put together with some of the men at the factory. We’re going to produce a toned-down version next year.” He laughed and waggled his eyebrows. “I’ve had her up over sixty.”

  Despite myself, I smiled, remembering a white-knuckled ride in a Model T on the ice of Lake Huron the winter before.

  A rotund man stuck his head around the side of the apartment building and began running toward us. “Gentlemen,” he called. “I just need a few minutes.”

  I helped Wesley into the right side of the car and squeezed in next to him, no time to worry about touching. Mr. Hatch grabbed the reporter and pushed him away, toward the front, but his rivals and the photographers, alerted by the commotion, streamed around the corner toward us.

  Edsel set the spark and throttle, ran to the front of the car, and spun the crank handle. The engine burst out with explosions, first sporadic, then building to a roar, very unlike the normal putt-putt-putt of a Model T. Mr. Hatch and the other guard stiff-armed and tackled the reporters they could get hold of, but the rest of the men, all shouting for us to wait, dodged and weaved around them.

  “Will!” one man yelled. “I’ll give you fifty bucks for a five-minute interview.” Mr. Hatch cut him off at the knees, and he hit the ground with a wicked thump.

  Edsel pulled down his goggles, ran back around the car, and vaulted into the driving seat. He shoved the brake lever forward, mashed on the clutch, and jerked the throttle lever down. We squealed away from the curb, leaving a dozen disappointed reporters in the street behind us. A second later, Edsel pulled his foot up from the clutch, and we were in high gear, hurtling around the corner onto Temple Street.

  I leaned across Wesley and tapped Edsel’s arm. “So much for an inconspicuous escape.”

  He couldn’t keep the grin off his face. “Yeah. Great, isn’t it?”

  I wondered how long it would take Mr. Ford to change him. Like me, Edsel took after his mother. He was an enthusiastic doe-eyed boy with the soul of an artist. His father’s flintiness had yet to rub off on him, which gave me hope Edsel would be strong enough to hold his own with Henry Ford. Few people were.

  He took Rowena Street into Corktown. After a few more turns, he stopped in the middle of a residential neighborhood in front of a little saloon called Abick’s. I helped Wesley down, and we traipsed inside.

  Edsel held the door for us. “Just what the doctor ordered. Dark and out of the way.”

  Gas lamps cast a sickly light on the interior, a mix of dark wood and plaster. A dozen tables, half of them occupied, took up most of the room. The bar that ran the length of the wall on the right filled the rest. The saloon echoed with laughter and shouts from men with Irish accents. No one paid any attention to us. Edsel led us across the sawdust-covered floor to a larger dining area in the back. A table was open in a dark rear corner. We sat in the shadows, Edsel and me against the walls, Wesley facing us. The aroma of roasting meat nearly overcame the background of beer and vomit.

  A pretty brunette waitress sauntered over. “What’ll you have?”

  “Scotch,” Wesley said and then gestured toward me. “Bourbon for him and—”

  “No,” I said. “Ginger ale.” If I was going to do anything for Elizabeth, I had to be able to think.

  Wesley cocked his head at me for a second before turning to Edsel, who hesitated, like he was trying to decide what he could get away with. He finally sighed and said, “Ginger ale here, too.”

  The waitress handed us menus and left to get our drinks. It was Irish fare, not my favorite, but for the anonymity the place offered, I was more than willing to put up with it. When she came back, Wesley and I ordered stew, and Edsel the corned beef and cabbage.

  “I hope you don’t mind me asking, Will,” Edsel said, “but how bad was it? Jail, I mean.”

  I hunched over the table and spoke quietly. “I won’t lie to you. It’s frightening.” I told them about the other prisoners, the taunts and threats, and the guards, menacing with their truncheons and guns. “But I was lucky. I got to stay in my own cell the whole time.”

  “But if you have to go to prison . . . ,” Edsel began. He saw the look on my face and didn’t finish the thought.

  Wesley leaned over the table, jaw set, eyes narrowed. “If you do have to go back, you need to remember something—fur and feathers.”

  I just looked at him.

  “Fur and feathers,” he repeated. “In the wild, when there’s fur or feathers on the ground, it means an animal has been either killed or injured. If it’s injured, it’s an easy target. And both the predators and carrion eaters like an easy dinner. Prison is the same. If you get hurt or show weakness, you’d better find somebody big to protect you. But if you do that, there’ll be a cost.”

  “I don’t think I’m going back.” I wasn’t going back.

  “I hope you’re right. But if you do, you’ve got to be tough. The men need to think you’re dangerous. Here’s something that might give you a fraction-of-a-second advantage.” He tilted his head back a little, and there was just a hint of tension in his brow. But his eyes transformed. His lids had dropped a little, but it was more than that. Wesley the entertainer was no longer looking at me. This new man was scary.

  “Dead eyes,” he said. “You want to look at the man like you have a long history of putting away punks like him, and he’d just be another notch. But remember, it’s not going to save you. Most guys in prison have that look. And theirs is real. So the second thing to remember is hit first, in the groin if possible.”

  I shook my head. “I’m not going back.”

  Edsel smoothed his dark hair and leaned forward. “How can I help?”

  “Help?” I said. “You need to stay out of this, Edsel. It’s too dangerous.”

  He sat back and folded his arms over his chest, a smile flitting across his face. “I’ll find the killer.”

  “No!” Wesley and I said simultaneously.

  “Our company has some pretty powerful resources. Let me have them do some digging. I won’t get personally involved.”

  “No. It’s too dangerous,” I said.

  “I’m getting to the bottom of this whether you want me to or not. Now cooperate.”

  I thought for a moment before agreeing. “So long as you stay out of it yourself.” I nodded toward Wesley. “Wes tangled with the murderer, and he’s lucky to be alive.”

  A grim expression settled onto Wesley’s face, but he didn’t say anything.

  Edsel looked from me to Wesley and raised his ginger ale. “To finding the killer.”

  We clinked our glasses together and drank.

  Wesley’s head popped up. “What about the kid who took the money? The killer trusted him enough to let him do that. They must know each other.”

  “Yeah, I thought of that, too,” I said, “but there are thousands of kids on the streets, and probably thousands more in the city who match the description. How in the world would we find him?”

  After a moment, he nodded. “You’re probably right. But let’s keep our eyes open anyway.”

  Wesley had another Scotch, and w
e worked on our meals, which were surprisingly tasty. While we ate, Edsel grilled me about John Cooper’s murder, looking for an angle he could use. “What was Cooper like?”

  “Friendly, charming, but really tough. Not someone you’d want to make angry. He always seemed to be on the winning side. He was always on . . . the right side.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, of course he was human, but he didn’t show that to many people. It was always important to him to do the right thing, the thing that was expected of a person like him—rescuing kittens from trees, pitching in on campus projects. You know, your prototypical hail-fellow-well-met.”

  Edsel was watching his glass as he swirled the ginger ale around. He glanced up and met my eyes. “But he did have a darker side?”

  “Well, yeah, but doesn’t everybody? Present company excepted, of course.”

  “So, what did he do?”

  “It wasn’t so much what he did as how much pleasure he took in certain parts of it. He loved the contact, the violence of football. After he took the EAD job, he’d tell me about the fights they’d had with union organizers. He always played down his part in them, but his eyes glowed just like they had during a big football game. I only saw him in action once. About twenty Teamsters were picketing our factory. John, Frank Van Dam, and about ten of their men came in and just laid waste to those poor guys.”

  Frank had taken out three or four of the union men with his fists, feet, and blackjack, but, as usual, John outshone everyone. He put down half a dozen of the organizers, swinging a four-foot-long axe handle like a baseball bat. One swing was all it took. After the fight, when I told him I had watched, he winked and said, “Ty Cobb ain’t got nothing on me.”

  Edsel nodded. “What about this Frank Van Dam fellow? What was his relationship with Cooper?”

  “They were best friends. Frank worked for John, and I think he may know who killed him. But Frank’s disappeared.”

  “I’ll have someone look into it,” Edsel said.

  “Frank quit his job before John’s murder and moved out west.” I took a sip of my drink. “Anyway, I think the most important thing is that the unions hated John. By killing him at our factory and framing me, they could get rid of Cooper and create a big problem for an open shop.”

  Edsel nodded. “That would seem the most likely scenario. So that leaves us with a pool of only ten thousand or so suspects. But I might be able to winnow it down a bit. My father’s security men have been collecting information on the unions for the past couple of years. I’d guess I can get my hands on a pretty complete file on the AFL unions and the Wobblies.”

  I reached across the table and held on to his forearm. “Don’t you go and try anything crazy here. You stay out of it. And make sure your father’s men know what they’re up against. Whoever this is, he is not afraid to spill other people’s blood.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  The noise in the saloon kept ratcheting up as more men and women streamed in, most packing into the front room. I pushed away the empty stew bowl, pulled my cigarette case from my waistcoat, and held it out to Wesley. He took one, and I grabbed one for myself. Edsel cleared his throat. He was looking at me with arched eyebrows and making a “hand it over” gesture.

  “Edsel? You smoke?”

  “Sure.” He sat back, studying his fingernails, trying to look casual. “Usually it’s Sweet Caporals for me.” Raising his eyebrows again, he said with mock seriousness, “Sweet Caps. The purest form in which tobacco can be smoked.”

  Wesley laughed. “Maybe you ought to work in your dad’s advertising department.”

  I held out the cigarette case for Edsel. After he chose one, I lit it for him and snapped the case shut. “Wouldn’t your father skin you if he caught you smoking?”

  “Oh, we’ve got an understanding.”

  I laughed. “You’ve got an understanding about smoking with Henry Ford. Sure thing.”

  He blew out a smoke ring and let his arm drape over the back of his chair. With a grin, he said, “Well, perhaps an understanding isn’t quite the way to describe it.”

  I was taking a swig of ginger ale when Edsel said, “Oh, shit.” He stubbed out his smoke and looked away.

  A big man stumbled into the back room and looked around before going up front again.

  “What’s wrong?” Wesley said, turning to try to see what we were looking at.

  I ducked my head. “Horace Dodge.”

  “And wherever goes Horace, so goes John,” Edsel said. “You’d think they’re Siamese twins. Could be entertaining, though.”

  “So long as they decide to pick a fight with someone else.” I nudged Edsel. “They don’t have a problem with you, do they?”

  A lopsided smile appeared on his face. “Even drunk, I don’t think they’d pick a fight with the son of the man who’s making them rich.”

  “What the hell are they doing here?” I said.

  Edsel shook his head. “I’d guess this is the only saloon in town they haven’t been thrown out of yet.” He shot his sleeve and looked at his wristwatch. “But the night is young.”

  The noise level in the front rose appreciably with the arrival of the Dodges. It was common knowledge in automobile circles that, sober, the Dodge brothers were obnoxious. It was better known, from the frequent newspaper articles detailing their brawls, that drunk they were dangerous. My father called the Dodges an enigma. They were sharp, if not brilliant businessmen, knew machining as well as anyone, were excellent negotiators, and were dogged and driven—perhaps as driven as Edsel’s father. Like Henry Ford, they would work at a problem until it disappeared, a trait that unfortunately carried over to their personal lives, where they solved those problems with their fists and feet. Success hadn’t changed them, though perhaps they were still adjusting to their newly won riches.

  Regardless of Edsel’s opinion, we needed to steer clear of these men. But there was at least one benefit to them being here. The Dodges were certain to become the center of attention, keeping the focus away from the alleged murderer hiding in the back.

  Around ten, Edsel excused himself to answer the call of nature. At that moment, John Dodge walked out from the front of the saloon. “Hey, Edsel,” he said. “Edsel Ford! How you doing, boy?” Dodge was in his mid-forties, a round-headed man leaning toward fat, with thinning red hair parted on the side and the swollen face of an alcoholic.

  Edsel answered him in a voice too quiet for me to hear over the raucous sounds of the saloon. Dodge moved in close, his face only a few inches away from Edsel’s. When Edsel excused himself and turned to walk into the restroom, he stumbled over Dodge’s foot. The leather sole of his shoe slid forward on the sawdust. His feet slipped out from under him, and he fell, unceremoniously, onto his backside.

  Dodge helped him up, apologizing all the way. Edsel was facing us and glanced at me with a smile. Dodge kept talking. Every time he’d look away, gesticulating toward the front room or staring up at the ceiling, Edsel mugged with wide eyes and exaggerated smiles or grimaces, stopping just as Dodge would look at him again. By the time Edsel was able to extract himself and retreat to the restroom, I was laughing so hard I was practically on the floor, and Wesley was holding his ribs while he whooped out laughs.

  John Dodge turned and looked at us, head cocked, before strolling over. “Who you laughing at?” he said, speaking slowly, trying to enunciate—definitely drunk.

  Wesley straightened up in his chair and smiled at him, no hint of alarm on his face. “No one. Just enjoying a joke.”

  Dodge turned to the front and called, “Hey, Horace! Horace!”

  A few seconds later, his brother joined him, a quizzical expression on his face. He was also a chunky man, but thinner than John and better looking. He seemed every bit as drunk, however. “What?”

  “These sonsabitches think Edsel Ford is a joke.”

  Horace narrowed his eyes and leaned over the table toward me. “You think Edsel is a joke?”

&nbs
p; “No, no, you’ve got it all wrong,” I said. “Edsel is our—”

  “Whoa,” John said. “I’m wrong?” He glanced at his brother before grabbing me by the front of my shirt and lifting me partway out of the chair. “I’m gonna . . .” He squinted, trying to focus on my face, and abruptly dropped me. “Well, hell. I was just about to pound a celebrity.” He looked at his brother and gestured toward me. “This here’s the Anderson kid, the killer!” He plopped into Edsel’s chair and waved toward the waitress. “A round over here!” he shouted. “I’m buying one for my friend, the ’lectric esha-cutioner.” He put his arm around me and pulled me close. “I owe you big.” His whiskey breath poured into my face. “Finally, someone in the car business with a worse reputation than mine.” He pounded on the table. Both he and his brother roared with laughter.

  “We should probably be going,” Wesley said, and began to stand.

  Horace shoved Wesley back down in his seat and stood over him. “Didn’t you hear John? He’s buying.”

  Wesley winced, surely feeling it in his ribs. He held his hands up in front of him. “Fine, fine. We can have one more.”

  Still with his arm around me, John stared at Wesley, then turned back to me. “Looks like you guys been volunteering as punching bags!” He and Horace bellowed out another round of laughter, and John pounded the table with his free hand.

  I lifted his arm from my shoulders and stood. “Come on, Wes. Let’s go.”

  John Dodge grabbed my arm and tried to jerk me back into the chair. When I resisted, he stood and leaned in close to me. “You ain’t going anywhere. I’m buying you a friendly drink.”

  Wesley threw an elbow into Horace’s midsection, doubling him over, and stepped around the table, staring into John’s eyes. “We’re leaving.”

  With a grin on his face, John let go of my arm and began rolling up the sleeves of his shirt. Horace, a hand still over his solar plexus, straightened and took a step toward Wesley.