'Hey! You two like me to leave?'
'No hurry.' The ex-Marine produced a pipe and lit it. 'You want to hear about parts?' He glanced at Elsie. 'Not yours, baby.' Plainly he meant: Those are for me.
'Auto parts,' Brett said.
'Right.' Kreisel gave his twisted grin. 'Worked in an auto plant before I enlisted. After Korea, went back. Was a punch press operator. Then a foreman.'
'You've made the big leagues fast.'
'Too fast, maybe. Anyway, I'd watched how production worked - metal stampings. The Big Three are all the same. Must have the fanciest machines, high-priced buildings, big overhead, cafeterias, the rest. All that stuff makes a two-cent stamping cost a nickel.'
Hank Kreisel drew on his pipe and wreathed himself in smoke. 'So I went to Purchasing. Saw a guy I know. Told him I figured I could make the same stuff cheaper. On my own.'
'Did they finance you?'
'Not then, not later. Gave me a contract, though. There and then for a million little washers. When I'd quit my job I had two hundred dollars cash. No building, no machinery.' Hank Kreisel chuckled. 'Didn't sleep that night. Dead scared. Next day I tore around. Rented an old billiard hall. Showed a bank the contract and the lease; they loaned me dough to buy scrap machinery. Then I hired two other guys. The three of us fixed the machinery up. They ran it. I rushed out, got more orders.' He added reminiscently, 'Been rushing ever since.'
'You're a saga,' Brett said. He had seen Hank Kreisel's impressive Grosse Pointe home, his half dozen bustling plants, the converted billiard hall still one of them. He supposed, conservatively, Hank Kreisel must be worth two or three million dollars.
'Your friend in Purchasing,' Brett said. 'The one who gave you the first order. Do you ever see him?'
'Sure. He's still there - on salary. Same job. Retires soon. I buy him a meal sometimes.'
Elsie asked, 'What's a saga?'
Kreisel told her, 'It's a guy who makes it to the end of the trail.'
'A legend,' Brett said.
Kreisel shook his head. 'Not me. Not yet.' He stopped, more thoughtful suddenly than Brett had seen him at any time before. When he spoke again his voice was slower, the words less clipped.
'There's a thing I'd like to do, and maybe it could add up to something like that if I could pull it off.' Aware of Brett's curiosity, the ex-Marine shook his head again. 'Not now. Maybe one day I'll tell you.'
His mood switched back. 'So I made parts and made mistakes. Learned a lot fast. One thing: search out weak spots in the market. Spots where competition's least. So I ignored new parts; too much infighting.
Started making for repair, replacement, the 'after market.' But only items no more than twenty inches from the ground. Mostly at front and rear. And costing less than ten dollars.'
'Why the restrictions?'
Kreisel gave his usual knowing grin. 'Most minor accidents happen to fronts and backs of cars. And down below twenty inches, all get damaged more. So more parts are needed, meaning bigger orders, That's where parts makers hit paydirt - on long runs.'
'And the ten-dollar limit?'
'Say you're doing a repair job. Something's damaged. Costs more than ten dollars, you'll try to fix it. Costs less, you'll throw the old part out, use a replacement. There's where I come in. High volume again.'
It was so ingeniously simple, Brett laughed aloud.
'I got into accessories later. And something else I learned. Take on some defense work.'
'Why?'
'Most parts people don't want it. Can be difficult. Usually short runs, not much profit. But can lead to bigger things. And Internal Revenue are easier on you about tax deductions. They won't admit it.' He surveyed his 'Ford liaison office' amusedly. 'But I know.'
'Elsie's right. There's a whole lot you know.'
Brett rose, glancing at his watch. Back to the chariot factory! Thanks for lunch, Elsie.'
The girl got up too, moved beside him, and took his arm. He was aware of her closeness, a warmth transmitted through the thinness of her dress. Her slim, firm body eased away, then once more pressed against his. Accidentally? He doubted it. His nostrils detected the soft scent of her hair, and Brett envied Hank Kreisel what he suspected would happen as soon as he had gone.
Elsie said softly, 'Come in any time.'
'Hey, Hank!' Brett said. 'You hear that invitation?'
Momentarily the older man looked away, then answered gruffly, 'If you accept, make sure I don't know about it.'
Kreisel joined him at the apartment doorway. Elsie had gone back inside.
'I'll fix that date with Adam,' Brett affirmed. 'Call you tomorrow.'
'Okay.' The two shook hands.
'About that other,' Hank Kreisel said. 'Meant exactly what I told you. Don't let me know. Understand?'
'I understand.' Brett had already memorized the number on the apartment telephone, which was unlisted. He had every intention of calling Elsie tomorrow.
As an elevator carried Brett downward, Hank Kreisel closed and locked the apartment door from inside.
Elsie was waiting for him in the bedroom. She had undressed and put on a sheer minikimono, held around her by a silk ribbon. Her dark hair, released, tumbled about her shoulders; her wide mouth smiled, eyes showing pleasurable knowledge of what was to come. They kissed lightly.
He took his time about unfastening the ribbon, then, opening the kimono, held her.
After a while she began undressing him, slowly, carefully putting each garment aside and folding it. He had taught her, as he had taught other women in the past, that this was not a gesture of servility but a rite - practiced in the East, where he had learned it first - and a mutual whetting of anticipation.
When she had finished they lay down together. Elsie had passed Hank a happi coat which he slipped on; it was one of several he had brought home from Japan, was growing threadbare from long use, but still served to prove what Far Easterners knew best: that a garment worn during sexual mating, however light or loose, heightened a man's and woman's awareness of each other, and their pleasure.
He whispered, 'Love me, baby!'
She moaned softly. 'Love me, Hank!'
He did.
Chapter 14
'You know what this scumbag world is made of, baby?' Rollie Knight had demanded of May Lou yesterday. When she hadn't answered, he told her.
'Bullshit! There ain't nuthun' in this whole wide world but bullshit.'
The remark was prompted by happenings at the car assembly plant where Rollie was now working. Though he hadn't kept score himself, today was the beginning of his seventh week of employment.
May Lou was new in his life, too. She was (as Rollie put it) a chick he had laid during a weekend, while blowing an early paycheck, and more recently they had shacked up in two rooms of an apartment house on Blaine near 12th. May Lou was currently spending her days there, messing with cook pots, furniture and bits of curtaining making - as a barfly acquaintance of Rollie's described it - like a bush tit in the nest.
Rollie hadn't taken seriously, and still didn't, what he called May Lou's crapping around at playing house. Just the same he'd given her bread, which she spent on the two of them, and to get more of the same, Rollie continued to report most days of the week to the assembly plant.
What started this second go around, after he had copped out of the first training course, was in Rollie's words - a big Tom nigger in a fancy Dan suit, who had turned up one day, saying his name was Leonard Wingate.
