The Detroit Electric Scheme (5 page)

“It will. An electric that'll go a hundred-plus miles between charges? They'll sell themselves.” Elwood put a hand on my shoulder. Even though he was only a few years older than me and I was the son of the company's founder, he was the authority, with a breezy self-confidence that was contagious. “Two hundred and two miles tomorrow—minimum. And be here at five, no later. As soon as Dr. Miller arrives, we'll get you on the road.”

A large white bandage was taped across the bottom of his forearm. I took hold of his wrist and raised his arm so I could see it. “What'd you do?”

He hooked a thumb over his shoulder at the acid tank. “Going too fast, you know me. Got me a splash of sulfuric.”

“Maybe that'll get you to start paying attention.”

He grinned and gave me a playful shove toward the door. “Get outta here. But don't be late tomorrow.”

“Yeah, yeah. I'll be here. You have the Edisons nice and toasty for
me.” I limped down the stairway and out of the garage, heading toward Gratiot and the J.L. Hudson Department Store. My ankle was loosening up, and the rain had stopped, but I was exhausted. Even the sun peeking out above Windsor's skyline failed to warm my spirits.

Hudson's had a huge selection of hats and caps, and also had the advantage of being an extremely busy store, so I thought it unlikely my purchase would be remembered. I bought a brown herringbone touring cap in the same style as the one I lost at the factory, just a shade or two darker. I couldn't explain away the loss of the cap I wore most often, and hoped this would be a passable substitute.

With my new cap tucked away in a bag, I hopped a streetcar back up Woodward. The trolley was packed, like it was every weekday morning. I had to fight for a spot hanging precariously off the back steps, which was as good as it usually got anyway.

I got off at the stop near Peterboro and was heading up the walk to my building when Wesley McRae bounded out the door. He was turned out perfectly, as he always seemed to be, in a pair of striped blue trousers and a blue jacket with an ivory silk cravat and matching porkpie hat. A folder bursting with sheet music was tucked under his arm. Energy seemed to radiate from him. Though we were around the same age, I didn't have one-tenth his vigor.

“Good morning, William,” he called out.

“Morning,” I muttered.

He put out a hand and stopped me. “Are you all right?”

“I'm fine.”

He bit his lip and looked at me with narrowed eyes. “All right . . . If you say so. Well, I'm off. Crowley Milner noon till four, the Comet motion picture house until eight, and then it's off to the Palace Gardens Ballroom until the wee hours.” He swept past me.

I unlocked the door and climbed the stairs to my apartment, my mind on nothing but sleep. With a little sleep I would be able to help Elizabeth and puzzle my own way out of this mess. I opened the door to my apartment and stopped in my tracks. A white envelope lay on the floor just inside. Typewritten on the front was
WILLIAM C. ANDERSON, JR.—OPEN IMMEDIATELY!
I brought it into my study, sat at the desk,
and slit the top with my letter opener. A single piece of paper was inside. I flipped it open, and as I read, my heart began to thump faster.

Mr. Anderson,

I know you killed John Cooper. I saw you leave the factory and throw away your clothing. You will not be pleased to know that your shoes, trousers, stockings, and garters, covered with John Cooper's blood, are now in my possession, and that I would be an unimpeachable witness should you happen to be arrested.

I'll be in touch.

 

With shaking hands, I dropped the note on my desk. I was going to spend the rest of my life in prison. In a daze I wandered to the kitchen, poured myself a large bourbon, and sat at the table. A chill of fear started at the base of my spine and shot up my back as an image filled my mind.

The Michigan State Prison in Jackson: fourteen-foot stone walls, cold dank cells barely seven feet long by three feet wide, hard labor, and worst of all, the most notorious and depraved reprobates in the Michigan penal system. For the first time I wished Michigan had the death penalty. The electric chair would be preferable.

I had to focus. Who could have written this note? He had been at the factory and followed me home. I tried to remember faces from the streetcar, but they were all a blur. My head buzzed, and it was getting difficult to keep my eyes open. Just an hour or two of sleep, and I'd be able to think. My mind was sluggish, but one thing was clear—I had to talk with Frank Van Dam. If anyone other than Elizabeth would know what John was up to, it was Frank. I'd telephone him and see if I could figure out who had written the note. Then I'd go to Elizabeth's, try to talk some sense into her. I stripped off my suit and climbed into bed.

John Cooper stood over me, flattened, two-dimensional. He jerked a gun from his belt, stuck it in my face, and thumbed back the hammer. His eyes narrowed, and he said,
It's time for you to pay, Willie-boy
.

I sat bolt upright in bed, sweat pouring down my face. The moon, just a tick past full, beamed through the window, lighting my bedroom to ghostly grays.

A dream. It was a dream. I jumped out of bed, switched on the lights, and glanced at the clock. Two thirty in the morning. Some fourteen hours of sleep. Fear is exhausting.

I had slept through yesterday's opportunity to telephone Frank or do anything for Elizabeth, and the cloudless sky outside pretty well ensured I'd be tied up with the mileage test until late at night. I had to keep up the pretense of normalcy. Anyway, I couldn't skip the test and have any hope of remaining employed. Other than the endurance runs I'd made with the Victoria, my job performance was pitiful at best. My father had told my supervisor, Mr. Cavendish, that I was to be treated like any other employee. Had that been the case, however, I'd have been fired long ago, given that every morning I was either hungover or still drunk. But Cavendish seemed near the breaking point.

Frank and Elizabeth were going to have to wait. I hoped Elizabeth could.

Like every day, the first thing I did was make my bed. It was a point of pride that my apartment was neat, particularly since I'd let my maid go shortly after Elizabeth broke off our engagement. The empty liquor bottles were simply too embarrassing.

I made a cold beef sandwich and a pot of coffee, and sat at the kitchen table trying to force my mind into gear. The sandwich and two cups of coffee later, the haze started to lift. I tried to puzzle out the identity of the presumed blackmailer. (Even though he hadn't asked for anything yet, it seemed inevitable.) It could be a policeman, but that seemed unlikely. Though “Detroit policeman” and “blackmailer” were by no means mutually exclusive professions, I was sure I had lost them at the factory.

The only people who knew I was out that late were Ben Carr and Wesley McRae. Ben could have followed me from the garage, but I
couldn't imagine why. And Wesley could have seen me dump the clothing, but he was home when I got back. I couldn't think of any way he would have even heard about the murder. It seemed possible the killer had written the note. He had been at the factory and could certainly have followed me home. But it would make more sense for him to just give the clothing to the police. No one else would have a stronger reason to see an innocent man convicted of the murder.

The idea that
any
man would be able to overpower John Cooper seemed ludicrous. Even armed to the teeth, the murderer couldn't have persuaded him to climb onto that press, and if John was unconscious, few men could have lifted him high enough. A gang, perhaps? According to the newspapers, there were enough of them around, though mostly groups of teenage hoodlums. This didn't seem like the work of boys.

The roof press wasn't complicated to run, but it seemed likely the killer had been familiar with it beforehand. A union man made sense. The unions would do anything to get a foothold in an automobile company. Once they got their claws into the first one, they would have the leverage they needed to break others. What better way to make a statement than killing the man causing you the most trouble, and framing me, the son of the owner of an open shop, for it? They get two for one.

It was probably one of the unions in the American Federation of Labor. They'd been making runs at my father's company for more than a decade. John and his predecessors' planted men had identified many union organizers over the years. They were fired without comment.

The Industrial Workers of the World were another possibility but seemed less likely. The Wobblies were relatively new, particularly in Detroit, and were concentrating on unskilled workers, the ones the AFL disdained. In the automotive industry, that was a tiny percentage of the workforce. I doubted John had run afoul of them.

I wondered if I should call the police and explain the whole situation, but quickly decided against it. What would I tell them? That I was being blackmailed for the return of my blood-soaked clothing? I could just as easily drive myself to prison. But I would make sure Riordan looked at the AFL.

Until I could get Frank's take on this, I didn't see any alternative to
waiting for the blackmailer to make his next move. In the meantime I had to help Elizabeth, to make whatever amends I could. Something was seriously wrong with her, that much was certain. Her behavior was so peculiar. How could she have so little reaction to the news of her fiancé's death? Could her behavior be explained by drugs? By some sort of brain-damaging poison? Or could she have changed so much in a single year?

John didn't say she was in danger, he said she was “in trouble.” Pregnant? Given her appearance, it didn't seem possible. “Trouble” could mean danger. It could mean almost anything. I had to find out. If her trouble proved to be related to John's murder, I might be able to piece something together that would also help me. But there wasn't much room for hope.

As soon as I was able, I would go back to Elizabeth's house. If she refused to talk to me, I would speak with her mother. If that failed, I would try to get her father to listen to me. One way or another, I was going to help her.

 

At four o'clock I dressed in my motor toggery: a loose-fitting dark gray sack suit, calf-length leather boots, gloves, goggles, my new cap, and my tan cotton duster. I roughed up the cap in the dirt of the backyard before catching a streetcar to the garage. My ankle was nearly back to normal, but still I shuffled the last hundred feet. I wasn't eager to see Ben Carr again.

He wasn't in sight when I entered the garage. I whispered a prayer of thanks and hurried up the steps to the second floor. The Victoria sat on the automobile elevator. Elwood and Joe Curtiss, Detroit Electric's head mechanic, both in gray coveralls, were bent over the front battery compartment. The empty battery lift hung over them. Other than their murmured conversation and the hum of electricity, the shop was quiet.

I joined them at the automobile. “Morning, Elwood, Joe.”

They both straightened and greeted me. Joe was an older and shorter version of Elwood—light brown hair, brown eyes, and a gangly build—but a little more filled out from his two decades as a mechanic. Joe and
Elwood were my best friends at the company. I suppose, given that I'd lost touch with just about everyone else, they were really my only friends.

Elwood grimaced. “Tough about John Cooper, huh?”

I nodded. “Yeah, it's horrible.” I could hear my voice tremble. The news had likely spread across the city by now.

“Cops figure anything out yet?” Joe said.

“Not that I know of.”

He leaned back against the Victoria. “Did you know Cooper?”

“I did. We went to college together.”

They both offered their condolences. Joe said, “He was the football player, right? The huge, good-looking guy?”

I grunted out a laugh. Huge? Good-looking? John was Michelangelo's
David,
except six-five and thickly muscled. “I suppose you could say that.”

“How did you know him?”

“We boarded at the same place in Ann Arbor.” The memory of our first meeting put a smile on my face. I hadn't thought of it in years. “The first time we met we were freshmen. I recognized him from the football games but was sure he didn't know me from Adam. One of the sophomore football players cornered me with a pair of sheep shears and was about to give me the ‘freshman haircut.' ”

Joe frowned. “The what?”

“Oh, it's a wonderful tradition. You corner the kids who are already scared to death of the older men, and you whack off their hair so they look like they've just escaped from a mental institution.”

Elwood shook his head. “It's a good thing college is for you intellectual giants. I don't think I'm smart enough to figure out stuff like that.”

“Real funny. Anyway, John recognized me from the boardinghouse and gave the other guy a thump on the head. That was the last time anybody tried it. Come to think of it, it was the last time anybody at the U of M physically challenged me in any way.”