'You figured that out in your head?'
'Stay with me. Can you win that much in court?'
'Not unless you break your back and you'll never walk again. You could even get a lot more.'
'But two-fifty, does that sound about right, being realistic, something he can handle without too much trouble? We split it, you still get back almost twice what he scored off you.'
'But when we take this direct approach,' Debbie said, 'and get thrown out on the street-'
'Okay, let's say I do slip and fall in his restaurant, injure my back.
We can begin by threatening him with a lawsuit. He says no to the two-fifty, we show him how he can write the entire amount off on his income tax.'
'Wait a minute how?'
'By making the check out to the Little Orphans of Rwanda Fund, a charitable write-off.'
She watched him take a sip of beer, from the bottle. 'You've been working this out, haven't you?'
'It's what priests do mainly, figure out how to raise money. Buy a new organ, repair the roof of the church--'
'He still won't pay.'
'Maybe--'
'I know he won't.'
'Let's talk to him and see what happens.'
'He'll sic the Mutt on us, that thug he's got working for him.'
Terry said, 'Now we're getting to what I know something about.'
It scared her a little, the way he said it.
Later on Terry left in Fran's car to pick up his suit. Debbie offered to take him, but he said he wanted to try the Lexus. He'd already tooled around in Mary Pat's Cadillac and thought they'd take it downtown tomorrow night to see Randy. Terry said he liked to drive.
Not having a license or knowing exactly where he was going didn't seem to bother him. He said don't worry, he'd find it, a giant mall on both sides of Big Beaver, fight? Debbie told him it was called Somerset Collection, very upscale, Tiffany, Saks, Neiman Marcus, no Sears or JC Penney… He said right and drove off. Confident.
No longer coming off as a simple soul. Confident in a very lowkey way, not trying to be cool and yet he was.
Debbie went in the kitchen and took one of Mary Pat's casseroles out of the freezer, in a hard-as-a-rock plastic bag, CHICKEN DELIGHT neatly handpdnted on the bag in green Magic Marker. Yeah, well, we'll see. Debbie turned to place the casserole on the counter and saw the machete lying there. This morning they'd brought Johnny out to the kitchen for a cup of coffee, Johnny still holding the machete, playing around with it, swiping it in the air. Terry told him he was going to cut himself and he laid it down. They stood sipping coffee and talking, Terry telling about the piles of machetes you'd see, hundreds that were confiscated: in the kitchen talking about the genocide the same way she and Terry had stood talking about it in her kitchen, last night. Terry telling about the guys, the Hutu thugs, in the beer lady's house… No, get it right, in the words she told him she'd never forget.
They were sitting at a table in the beer lady's house drinking banana beer and I shot them with my housekeeper's pistol.
Sitting there. He said not giving them a chance to make a move.
Just walked in and shot them? He said no, they exchanged a few words.
But I knew going in I was gonna kill them.
Telling her that in the same quiet way he had told her a little while ago:
Now we're getting to what I know something about.
She thought about it making herself a drink while hot water from the faucet ran on the plastic-covered casserole in the sink.
It scared her, even though there was no reason to think he'd want to do it again. Or that he liked doing it. Or the time would come when he'd have to do it. What bothered her was the fact he had lived for years among people who had killed their neighbors because they were told to and the victims had accepted being killed. He had said to her,
'How do you understand that…' Like saying it had nothing to do with reason. Why had he brought the machete home? He said as a memento. She told herself not to assume anything. She wasn't even that sure what he meant by 'getting to what I know something about.' It could mean talking his way out of a tight spot, the way he handled Johnny Pajonny, turning the situation around on him. Randy tries to get tough, Terry talks him out of doing anything drastic.
Except Randy wasn't like Johnny.
And Terry…
She heard the garage door open, raising automatically on its tracks, then heard it closing as the door to the kitchen opened and Terry came in pulling his new black suit out of the Brooks Brothers hanging bag, held it up for her to see, proud of it-she could tell--and asked how she liked it.
.. Terry wasn't like anyone she'd ever met in her life.
'You have to admit, Mary Pat knows how to cook.'
'Casseroles,' Debbie said, 'are easy. Throw a lot of stuff together and shove it in the oven.'
'How was the food inside?'
'For lunch, macaroni and cheese, cole slaw, rice pudding and three slices of plain bread. Everything looked alike.' She said, 'You didn't eat insects, anything like that, did you?'
'You only ate the ones flew in your mouth,' Terry said. 'Listen, I'm gonna call Johnny, see if he wants to go with us tomorrow.'
Debbie said, 'Why?' because there was no obvious reason to have him along.
All Terry said was, 'I think he'd enjoy it.'
15
RANDY BECAME A GANGSTER ABOUT two months after opening the restaurant, still into a Pierce Brosnan phase, customtailored dark suits and a hint of Brit nonchalance in his speech. His response to problems, a minor fire in the kitchen: 'Oh really? Why don't you see Carlo about that?' Carlo his manager-maitre d' with thirty years in the business and a small percentage of the restaurant profit as incentive. Randy loved being Randy's, always ready with car talk visiting tables, business trends he got out of 4utomotive News, motoring fun and gear ratios from tutomobile. That part, for a worldclass schemer, was easy. Being on his feet most of the day was the killer, but worth it. Randy's had opened big and was the place to be.
Hour Detroit magazine said: 'Filling the gap left by the old London Chop Housestill mourned by those who feel fine dining should allow fine diners to be seen to their best advantage-Randy's is clubby, polished and features a floor plan that encourages seating elitism.
Booth No. One is back downtown and, not incidentally, in a place unrivaled for fabulous food, pricey booze and a wine list that's the Yellow Pages.'
Randy had the review framed on the wall near the entrance. The rest of the walls were gathering caricatures of Detroit celebrities, most of them famous names who'd died or left town: Joe Louis, Gordie Howe, Lily Tomlin, Tom Selleck, Henry Ford II, Jeff Daniels, Iggy Pop… Carlo was responsible for refinements. The cigar room with its own bar. The personal lockers with nameplates for cognac and expensive whiskeys purchased by the bottle. Godiva mints in the dish by the entrance. Ice in the men's room urinals, newspaper pages from the business and sports sections taped to the wall above each one. 'So they can read while they piss,' Carlo said.
'These are busy men dine here.'
Randy said, 'But not in the women's?'
'Women don't read on the toilet,' Carlo said. 'They have hairspray on the sink and a colored woman helps
