The Detroit Electric Scheme (6 page)

“You figure the murder was personal,” Joe said, “or something to do with the Employers Association?”

Elwood nudged Joe, who turned and looked at him with knit eyebrows. “What?”

With a quick shake of his head, Elwood ducked back into the battery compartment.

My stomach suddenly hurt. I turned back to Joe. “John was engaged to Elizabeth Hume, my old girlfriend.”

“Oh. You never said.” Joe was quiet for a moment. “What'd he do at the EAD?”

“He ran security for the labor bureau.”

Joe looked at me blankly.

“He called it ‘hiring strikebreakers and whopping troublemakers,' ” I said. “He took care of both of them.”

“Shit.” Joe shook his head. “Cooper hired scabs
and
broke heads. The AFL would want to crucify him.”

Elwood finished connecting the wires to the battery. I forced a smile and said, “Are we ready?”

“The batteries are fully charged and all warmed up.” Elwood grinned and gestured toward Joe. “But I can't speak for the rest of it with this grease monkey running the show.”

I turned to Joe. “Everything good?”

“Yessiree. Outside of the batteries, which Mr. Screw-loose here has undoubtedly bungled, everything on this sweetheart has been cleaned, tightened, oiled, or greased. It's perfect.”

“Sounds good,” I said. “But let's go through the list to be sure.”

Joe nodded, and we ran through the various lubrications and adjustments he had performed. He was thorough. The Victoria was ready.

Dr. Miller, our official observer, arrived a few minutes later, dressed in tall boots and a gray three-piece suit with a matching cap and oilcloth duster. A kind man with a full beard and keen eyes behind pince-nez glasses, the doctor was well known for his sterling character and would be an impeccable witness. On the surface he was the ideal observer. He was my doctor, a friend of my father, and the owner of a 1910 Detroit Electric coupé. My father had suggested him for the role. I wanted to tell him no but couldn't do that without telling him why. To my parents, I'd explained the broken engagement as a loss of love between Elizabeth and me, a widening of our differences as we grew older.

I would never tell them the truth.

Dr. Miller rushed up to us, grinning with delight like a small child. “Are we going to set a world record today?” He pushed his goggles up onto his forehead.

“No question about it,” I said.

A few months before, Baker Electric had established a record of 201.6 miles on a single charge. We were aiming to beat them. I had to concentrate.

Dr. Miller shook my hand vigorously. “That's what I like to hear. Chip off the old block.”

He apparently had memory problems.

Joe showed Dr. Miller the certification for the new odometer, and he and Elwood gave us their blessings. I was relieved my father had not come down to send us off. The less I had to think about the Cooper mess, the better the day would be.

Unfortunately, we had no more than buttoned our dusters and pulled our goggles over our eyes when Dr. Miller said, “I heard about the murder at your father's factory. Did you know the man who was killed?”

I nodded and climbed into the Victoria.

Dr. Miller hopped in, and we began the descent to the first floor. “Did you know him well?”

I nodded again and looked away.

He patted me on the knee. “Don't want to talk about it? I understand.”

“Thanks.” I knew if I told him about John and me, and especially about John and Elizabeth, I wouldn't be able to get off the subject all day.

The elevator clunked to a stop. Joe and Elwood had taken the stairs and were already sitting in the blue Model T that would serve to confirm our odometer reading.

I twisted the key in the end of the controller stick to start the auto, and ticked the amp and volt meters with a finger to be sure the charge was full. Everything was perfect. I pulled the steering lever down in front of me and pushed the controller to first speed. We crawled through the garage, Joe and Elwood following behind. I turned left up Woodward. It wasn't yet five thirty and still quite cold, in the thirties. A
streetcar approached, rattling down the tracks toward the ferry docks. When it passed, the street was nearly silent. I could feel, more than hear, the hum from the Victoria's electric motor. I took a deep breath, determined to enjoy this day. It might be the last attempt I'd ever make for a world record, or, for all I knew, the last time I'd ever drive a car.

Dr. Miller tapped my shoulder. “Isn't it awfully cold to be doing this? Won't the batteries suffer?”

I shook my head. “It doesn't really matter how cold it is outside, so long as the batteries are warm. Mr. Crane got them nice and toasty, and when they're working they stay warm. We'll be fine.”

He nodded.

I took advantage of the nearly empty downtown streets, driving with the lights off to preserve the batteries. The electric street lamps lit the way well enough. Even in the dark, the majesty of this city, “the Paris of the West,” was clear. We passed skyscraper after skyscraper—the Penobscot, Majestic, and Hammond Buildings, the Ford, and the Dime—brick and stone edifices disappearing into silhouettes lit by the bright glow of moon and stars. The empty lots that had peppered the area when we moved here were gone. Buildings of all descriptions—offices, homes, stores, factories, warehouses, showrooms—had sprung up everywhere.

We looped through the downtown area, alternating between the two most efficient speeds—second, which ran at eight miles per hour, and fourth, which pushed us up to seventeen. Even though the city speed limit was ten, it was worth the risk to try to get the record in a single day. And a speeding violation seemed much less significant than it would have a few days ago.

I could hear snatches of conversation between Joe and Elwood over the
putt-putt-putt
of the Model T behind us, but Dr. Miller and I were quiet. I was lost in my thoughts, and he seemed satisfied to just enjoy the ride. It was a relief he hadn't yet brought up Elizabeth. I hoped it stayed that way.

Thinking I'd run past Bennett Park, the home of the Tigers and my favorite summer locale, I turned down Trumbull and headed back toward the river. Trumbull was one of the few streets that still had the old
Edison light towers, 125-foot-tall monstrosities that had been in most of the downtown area when we moved here in 1895.

“Don't you live around here somewhere?” Dr. Miller said.

“Five or six blocks that way.” I waved vaguely toward my left. “On Peterboro.”

I left the lights off, though the Edison towers were widely spaced and did a better job of lighting the sky than they did the street. With the headlights of the Model T trailing us, I thought I could still see well enough.

“Funny, that,” Dr. Miller said, pointing across me to a fallow cornfield that took up a city block, the only remaining vestige of the rural roots of the area.

“Farmer named Parker,” I said. “Land speculators have been trying to buy him out for years. Stubborn old cuss.”

The doctor nodded and shoved his hands in his pockets.

Just before the intersection at Temple, I pushed the controller to fourth speed for the long straightaway.

Suddenly a two-foot-high barrier loomed in front of us.

 

Cursing, I jammed on the brake pedal, shoved the steering lever away from me, and yanked back on the controller stick. The brakes squealed. The car jerked hard to the left and tipped right, the tires on my side a foot off the ground before the Victoria crashed back down to the cobblestones. Dr. Miller bounced off the leather interior of the automobile and slammed into me. I grabbed hold of him and helped him sit up. “Are you all right?”

He pushed his goggles onto his forehead and blinked a few times. “Yes, I think so.” He stretched his arms and legs. “No harm done.”

We both looked over the passenger side of the Victoria. A brown horse lay in the middle of the street.

“Damned horses,” Dr. Miller said. “They're nothing but a nuisance.”

A dead horse in the street wasn't an unusual sight, what with the thousands of them working in the city every day, but this one had scared the hell out of me. I took a deep breath and looked at the odometer. Our run had almost ended at nineteen miles.

Joe and Elwood appeared simultaneously on either side of the Victoria. After making sure we weren't hurt, they quickly inspected the automobile and waved us on.

I pushed the controller stick forward again. The Vicky seemed fine, but I kept it in second speed with a close eye on the road until the sky
began to brighten. When I could see well enough, I pushed the controller up through third to fourth.

Dr. Miller pointed at a steaming pile of horse manure in the middle of an intersection. “I thought the automobile was supposed to solve
this
part of the pollution problem.”

I shrugged. “Maybe someday.” Even now, deep into the “horseless age,” there were still easily fifty horses in the city for every motorcar.

“Well, I can't wait for that day,” he said. “Oh, for a clean breath of air.”

I nodded my agreement. Depending on the time of year, we breathed either coal smoke or horseshit. In the winter, the air was hazy with smoke, and snow turned gray within a day. During the summer the pungent odor of fresh manure filled the city. Worst of all, when the wind was up during a hot stretch, horseshit fine as dust blew in through the windows and coated the insides of every home and business.

More people now were heading to work. Soon the intersections would clot with horses, wagons, bicycles, pedestrians, and automobiles competing for the right of way, so I headed up Woodward out of town. We passed the “Crystal Palace,” Ford's new plant in Highland Park. I'm sure the esteemed Dr. Freud would have a few things to say about Mr. Ford, or Albert Kahn, the architect. Five massive smokestacks towered a hundred feet over the factory in a gigantic phallic display, billowing great gray plumes into the blue November sky.

At Six Mile Road, the pavement changed from red brick to concrete—the first mile of concrete road in the country, not surprisingly located directly in front of the exclusive emerald links of the Detroit Golf Club. I turned right on Seven Mile and then headed back into town through Hamtramck.

“My Lord,” Dr. Miller said. “Look at this place. Last I was here, there was nothing but farms.”

Buildings had been thrown up everywhere, filled with shops and businesses, most with signs scrawled out in some Eastern European language. Men, women, and children filled the wooden boardwalks, chattering and shouting, none in English. They were bustling about everywhere—to shops, to schools, but most of all to the four-story concrete and glass Dodge Main Assembly Plant that had recently risen in a matter of only a
few months. Practically overnight, Hamtramck had gone from a sleepy farming community to an immigrant Mecca.

I nudged the doctor. “You know the Dodge brothers give their workers free beer?”

He snorted. “Those louts. I'm surprised they don't drink it all themselves. It's a wonder they can even run a business.”

“They may be drunks, but they're serious about their business. Everyone else was running away from Mr. Ford after his other companies failed. They saw something no one else did, and it's worked out pretty well for them.”

Dr. Miller gave a grudging nod. John and Horace Dodge were infamous for their boorish behavior, and a man like the doctor had a hard time getting past that to see their genius. He looked up at the building as we drove past, chasing the glittering sun sparking across the wall of windows. “What do they make for Ford?”

I laughed. “Almost everything. Ford's men don't do much with the T except slap them together.”

He shook his head. In his world, successful men were, for the most part, gentlemen. In the new world of automobile manufacturing, the tycoons—Ford, the Dodges, Leland, Durant—were mechanics.

At noon the odometer read 86.3 miles, and according to the meters the batteries still had better than sixty percent of their capacity remaining. There was a long way to go, but we had a good chance. In need of a break, I drove down to Preemo's saloon. Over a couple of beers and the free buffet lunch, Elwood, Joe, Dr. Miller, and I discussed the state of the electric automobile business (growing), the gasoline automobile business (growing exponentially), and the steam automobile business (fading fast).

For the first time since I found the body, I could focus on something other than the image of John Cooper crushed in a press.

After lunch Joe filled the gasoline tank of the Model T, and we drove out through the stately neighborhoods of Grosse Pointe and then back again to Jefferson and East Grand. As I drove across the bridge to Belle Isle, I felt a deep pang of regret. Elizabeth and I had spent many nights
leaning on the railing of this bridge, looking over the river at the skyscrapers of Detroit on the right and the village of Windsor, Ontario, on the left. We talked about our future—marriage, children, someday grandchildren.

Shit.

We spent the rest of the afternoon on Belle Isle. The road encircling the island was pristine and nearly deserted this time of year—at least until evening, when the casino's business began to pick up. On a fine sunny day such as this, even the repetitive drive was enjoyable. The temperature was hovering near sixty degrees, and we stripped off our dusters and enjoyed both the view and the fresh air coming off the water.

Dr. Miller tilted his face up toward the sun. “Ever been to Central Park in New York?”

“No, sir.”

“Ah, you should see it. Magnificent. Many parallels here, of course. Designed by the same man, Olmstead, you know.”

Leaves fluttered down from majestic maples and oaks as we drove past picnic grounds, walking paths, baseball diamonds, and buffalo grazing in a grassy pasture. The Model T had fallen back a hundred yards or so, and its engine's irksome farting had faded into the background. Water lapped against the shores with a gentle
shhh, shhh, shhh,
interrupted by the occasional laughter of children on a playground and hum of conversation from couples on a bench here, in a canoe there.