'Jerry Baker was assigned to it. He said they blew up some cars.'
'Yeah, on the Detroit side, off the bridge. We heard about it but didn't see it. We had to go past on the Canadian side. This's a big boat, holds a hundred and fifty people.'
'Jerry said it took all day to film the one shot. They built a ramp so the car would go flying off the bridge up in the air. They film guys shooting at the car with machine guns one day, then film the car exploding the next day. Jerry said most of the time all you do is stand around.'
'We didn't see any of that,' his dad said. 'We cruised past the riverfront, checked to see if the Renaissance Center was still there, went down as far as Joe Louis Arena and came about. It was nice, they served the buffet, they had roast beef, chicken. . . . This guy, this jerk I mentioned'd drink his martini and throw the glass over the side? This guy, all by himself, sits down at the buffet table, people trying to get around him, and eats off the serving platters. Pushes the salad around with his fork, finds a tomato, reaches over, spears a few shrimp, pulls the platter of smoked fish practically right in front of him. Unbelievable. You imagine? Who wants any salad after this guy's been eating out of the bowl? People have to walk around him--nobody says a word.'
'I'm surprised you didn't.'
'I almost did, I came close. Esther wouldn't let me. I'm telling you the truth, this guy must've had twenty martinis. One right after the other. Stopped to mess up the buffet table and went back at it. I don't know why he wasn't laid out on the deck.'
'Fun on the river,' Chris said.
'We had a nice time. . . . The guy was harmless, I shouldn't let it bother me.'
'Who was he, you know?'
'No, and I see all these people coming up to him, shaking his hand, being very pleasant. This guy gives 'em a stupid grin, like he has no idea who they are. Acting goofy. I ask Esther, she can't believe I don't know who it is. So she tells me his name. . . . Now I can't think of it. Buddy? No, that's not it. I said to Esther, 'Where've I been? I must've been out blacktopping parking lots all my life, I never heard of this guy.' I said, 'What's he known for, outside of being a horse's ass?' Esther says you have as much dough as this guy you can do just about anything you want. Well, you can't argue with her there, you see the way these rich guys park in front of the Detroit Club. You or I, we double-park in front of a Coney, run in for a hot dog, it costs us forty bucks. And this guy also I find out never worked a day in his life. Anyway, what'd you do yesterday? You break down and call Phyllis?'
'That's over with.'
'You feel okay about it?'
'I'm fine. I brought some case files home with me. Start reading up on sex crimes.'
'How's it look?'
'There some weird people out there.'
'Woody,' his dad said, 'that's the guy's name, Woody something.'
Sunday afternoon Robin sprayed a circle around the Ricks brothers on the wall and began to fill it in, sweeping the surface with layers of red paint, gradually closing in on the names to take out WOODY first, then paused to look at
MARK
in the white center. Mark in the bull's-eye. The new Mark revealed last night at his brother's weird swimming party.
Mark doing lines at poolside in his wet silk undies. Mark getting high, talking about Goose Lake, playing tapes of groups they used to listen to in the sixties and early seventies. That was still the old Mark. The new one emerged as Mark came down from his high, sort of crash-landed and began to whine and roll his eyes, Mark trying to dramatize what it was like to have an idiot for a partner. (Interesting, Woody was an actual partner.) Robin, at ease in her black panties, began to frown and sympathize.
'But Mark, you're the one who makes it happen. You're the name, the star.'
Of course he was, he admitted it, glancing at her breasts, telling her what it was like to feel his talent smothered. 'What a waste,' Robin said, noticing that as she continued to sympathize, Mark's gaze remained on her breasts. Before long he seemed to be speaking to them as Robin listened, telling her breasts he could be doing rock concerts at Cobo Hall and Joe Louis Arena. The money was there, all kinds of it. The problem was the immovable 250-pound moron sitting on it. Mark, before her eyes, presenting a new possibility, a different approach.
Monday afternoon Skip phoned from the bar in the Yale Hotel, Yale, Michigan.
'This town, I don't think it's changed a bit, except I couldn't find the goddamn dynamite place. I drove up and down M-19, I came back, went in the feed store and they said, Yeah, that's where it is, how come you couldn't find it? Shitkickers love to get smart with you, if you don't look like one of them. See, there isn't any sign on the place. I guess the house is the same, but there are a lot more trees than I remember and they have a big new red barn with a white roof.'
'Trees grow,' Robin said.
'Is that right? Well, see, I didn't know that. So I got the guy's phone number and called, but nobody answered.'
Robin said, 'You're not going to buy it, are you?'
'No way. Michigan, I find out, you have to get permission from the State Police. No, I'm gonna wait till some farmer with ninety dollars and stumps to blow comes along and buys a case. He gets it home, then I'll lift it off him. Otherwise, if nobody comes along by tomorrow evening I'll have to bust into that barn. It's riskier, but then I know I'll get exactly what we need.'
'Tomorrow,' Robin said. 'You're going to spend the night in Yale?'
'I don't have a choice. I don't want to drive all the way back to Detroit, I'm tired. We worked late to finish, then had to pack up. I'm suppose to go to the wrap party tonight but I'll be right here at the Sweet Dreams Motel. Honest, that's the name of it.'
Robin said, 'So I probably won't see you till tomorrow night.'
'The latest. But it could be anytime, if the dynamite guy ever gets a customer.'
'Whenever it is,' Robin said, 'call me here. Then I'll meet you at Mother's.'
'You gonna stay with me?'
'You know I can't.'
'Man, it's gonna be lonesome.'
'Skip . . . ?'
He said, 'Uh-oh. What?'
'Nothing's wrong. Listen, we may change our game plan. I ran into Woody.'
'I was gonna ask you.'
'I even got invited to his house. It looks exactly the same, all the heavy furniture, the life-size painting of Mom in the front hall, the only time she's ever appeared sober. . . . You know what we did?'
'I'm dying to hear.'
'We went swimming. Woody makes you take your clothes off and go in the pool before you can have a drink or a line or whatever you want, he has everything. He cranks the stereo way up and everybody gets zonked. Donnell sort of lurks, the way their mom used to.'
'Well, did you get Woody aside?'
'It wasn't the right time. The whole scene, it was too loud, confusing. Woody disappeared after a while, I don't know what happened to him.' Robin paused. 'I think we'll be taking a different approach anyway.'
'Like what else you getting me into?'
'I have to work it out. But I will, don't worry.'
'I'm not worried,' Skip said. 'I'm up here in Yale, Michigan, trying to rip off a case of dynamite in a rented Hertz car. What've I got to worry about?'
'I'm just about convinced we should go after Mark.'
'He was there, huh?'
'Mark and Woody were together, but I don't think it was Mark's idea. Mark puts on his suave act, he still does that, wants you to think he's cool. And Woody still comes off as the lout, sort of an offensive Poor Soul. Only now Woody's got Mark by the ass for the rotten way Mark used to treat him. I have a hunch Mark even pimps for him.'
'Well, you said Woody's got all the dough.'
