Once I brought my daughter Tara to one, and when the auctioneer nodded at her, she politely nodded back. Back and forth it went. He nodded and she nodded until he slammed the gavel down and yelled, “Sold to the young lady in the blue coat—is she with you, Sky?”
I said, “She is,” and then I told her not to nod at anyone but me for the rest of the day.
I never had that problem with Ben. He knew what he wanted to buy and what he was willing to pay, and he usually left the auction with what he wanted. Some guys just have a knack for it, and Ben was one of them.
———
The last time Ben and I went to the auction was when I got my Outback. I used to go more often, partly to be with Ben and partly to keep an eye on him, but lately I’d been too busy. Besides, sometimes I’m better off not knowing. I know full well the dark side of humanity, but rarely is it on display in such proportion as it is at a car auction. You might think there would be a kind of honor among thieves, so to speak, but you’d be wrong.
A few years ago on a cold January morning, Ben and I were walking the back lot at the auction prior to the sale to see if there was something we wanted to bid on. I spotted an older Subaru wagon that I thought might be a good car for Kate to drive to college. It had some miles on it but otherwise looked to be in good shape. I got in the driver’s seat and tried to start it, but it had a dead battery. I said to Ben that if we could get a jump, I’d like to take the car for a test drive.
“No need,” he said. “It’s junk.”
“How do you know it’s junk?” I said. “You haven’t even heard it run.”
“Don’t need to,” he said. “It’s got bad valves.”
“And how do you know that?” I asked.
“Look, bro,” he said. “Let me take you to school. Come on, follow me.” He turned and walked inside where Jim Fisher from Quality Cars was standing. We exchanged greetings and made a little small talk. I used to wholesale Jim some cars when I was more involved in the dealership.
Then Ben said, “Say, Jim, if you saw an older Subaru out on the lot with 125K on it and the battery was dead, what would you think?”
“I’d think it had bad valves,” he said.
“Me too,” Ben said. “Me too. Cold valves are quiet valves.” Then he and Jim laughed. Later he explained to me that the guy selling it intentionally left the key on when he parked it to run the battery down so you couldn’t pre-drive it and warm it up.
“You’re just too trusting, Sky,” he said. “Remember that Baptist preacher with the 220D?”
“I remember,” I said.
“Well, if you can’t trust a Baptist preacher, what makes you think you can trust a bunch of used car dealers?”
Back in the day, this Baptist preacher came in and wanted to buy a used Audi we had on the lot, and he had this old 220 Mercedes diesel he wanted to trade in with 106 thousand miles on it. We went back and forth on price a little, but eventually we put a deal together taking the 220 in on trade. It had a few dings and a chip in the windshield, and it was barefoot, which is to say the tires were bald, but it ran great, so we sent it out to be cleaned and painted and serviced and put it on the lot. A couple weeks later a guy named Charlie came in and wanted to buy it really cheap, so we sold it to him “as is,” which is to say with no warranty.
We didn’t hear from him again for a couple of months, but then one day Charlie came marching in my office all red-faced with his attorney in tow, demanding his money back. He called me a cheat and a liar and threatened to sue.
I got up, closed the door to my office, and said, “Calm down, Charlie. Why don’t you just tell me what this is all about?”
He jaw-jacked me a while, and then he said that the 220 was burning some oil, and when he took it over to German Auto Werks they recognized the car. They checked their service records and said that it had 206 thousand miles on it, not 106. He then said he called the Baptist preacher and he confirmed it.
“Hold on a minute, Charlie,” I said. “Let me check the file.” When I checked, I had an odometer affidavit signed by the good pastor, and it clearly said 106,042 miles on it.
“Well, somebody’s lying,” Charlie said, “and I want my money back! And I expect to be reimbursed for what German Auto Werks charged me too.”
“And you’ll get it,” I said. “But first you’ve got to help me nail that lying Baptist, okay?”
He looked at his attorney, and after he gave him the nod, Charlie said, “Sounds like fun to me,” and the game was on. I hooked up a tape recorder to my phone and had Charlie call the preacher again to confirm that the 220 really had two hundred thousand on it when he traded it in. He must have smelled that something was fishy, so he was reluctant at first, but Charlie kept after him, God bless him, and finally he got him to say it. Then I grabbed the phone and said, “I’ve got you now, preacher! Either you bring me a check for what I just paid ol’ Charlie here, or I’m going to call Channel 4 tomorrow and expose you for what you are.” Then I hung up, feeling quite proud of myself.
The next day I got a phone call from the preacher’s attorney informing me that they would not be bringing us a check, and in fact they were suing us for slander.
“Sue all you want,” I said, “but I’ve got your client on tape.”
“Yes, well, that may never make it into court,” he said. “And even if it does, it’ll be a while. We’re prepared to drag this out for a long, long time, and meanwhile I’ve asked the judge to put a gag order on this. You won’t be able to say a word to the media, and with the recent litigation involving Cascade Cadillac, who do you think is going to look bad when it gets out that you, a car dealer, and my client, a well-respected Baptist minister, are going to court over an odometer dispute? If I were you, I’d check with your attorney before you do anything stupid.” And then he hung up.
I was so mad I could spit. Immediately I called Dirk Hathorne of Hathorne, Hathorne, and DeJong.
“I want this Bible thumper’s head on a plate,” I said. “The bloodier the better. I want him to hurt.”
“Hold on,” said Dirk. “You better explain what you’re talking about.” When I did he said, “His attorney is right. You can’t ignore a gag order, and I know this guy, he’s good, he’ll drag it out for a year or two, and meanwhile it’ll cost you guys a lot of business.”
“I don’t care what it costs,” I said. “I want to brand that sucker. I don’t want his money, I want his reputation.”
“That may be,” Dirk said, “but you’ll spend more with me than the car is worth. If I were you I’d be thinking less about what this could do to his reputation and more about what it could do to yours. Maybe you’d better talk to Al before you do something stupid.”
He was right and I knew it, but hearing him say it pricked my balloon. “You may be right,” I said, “but it isn’t fair.”
“Who ever said the law was fair?” Dirk said. “Call me tomorrow and let me know what you want to do.” With that he hung up.
I talked to Al, and eventually we decided the best thing was just to cut our losses, and that’s what we did. I wanted to go slash the guy’s tires or superglue his door locks, but I didn’t. I went back to selling cars and he went back to preaching, and I took some comfort in the fact that someday we’d both have to answer for what we did.
———
Here it is: there are crooks in any business, but most car dealers I know are pretty straight. I’m not saying they’re choirboys, but they’re not turning speedometers back or packing bad transmissions with bananas to keep them quiet. That stuff went out with AM radios and whitewall tires. But when it comes down to feeding their families, sometimes they stick their toe over the line. And that’s where Ben was.
Mary Alice, Ben’s ex, spent money like they were printing it in the garage, and neither one of them was willing to live on a budget. It was like a contest. If Ben spent money on something like a battery for the lawn tractor, she’d go out and spend an equal amount or more on something she wanted.
<
br /> Ben was having one of those kinds of months when he sold the five-speed that wasn’t. It was August, and the new models were coming out in a few weeks. We had some of last year’s models in stock, but we’d spiffed them, which is to say we paid an extra two hundred dollars to the salesman for every one he rolled, and they were going fast. Ben had a customer who wanted a rojo red two-door Rabbit, but it had to be a five-speed, and they were hard to get. The rule in the car business is that when you can’t sell them what they want, you sell them something you can get. It’s called a flip, and Ben was good at it, especially with women. He’d flash that million-dollar grin of his, give a little wink, and before they knew what happened he’d have moved them from a two-door to a four-door, or from a red one to a green one, or in this case, from a five-speed to a four-speed. So he walked her through a buy like we had a basement full of red five-speeds.
He had me appraise her trade, told her five-speeds cost more and didn’t really get that much better mileage, and tried to move her to a four-speed on the floor. But she wouldn’t budge. Her boyfriend had told her that Road and Track tested the five-speed and said it was faster and smoother, and with a lot of highway driving it would pay for itself. Ben tried everything, but she just kept saying, “My boyfriend says . . .”
Finally he wrote her up for what she wanted and took a deposit. Of course Ben knew we didn’t have a chance of getting one, but he also knew that the more people she told that she’d just bought a new car, the harder it would be for her to back out when and if he had to flip her.
We searched the locator, but the only one for five hundred miles was Jim Morran’s demo. Jim was on vacation, but he was coming home on Friday, the 29th, so Ben decided he’d flip her into that. He called her in, explained the situation, and after a little banter, he wrote it up for three hundred less than their original deal and told her she could pick it up on Saturday the 30th.
The problem was that somebody’s grandma backed her Buick into the side of Jim’s demo while they were camping at the state park, and when Ben pulled in on Friday, his heart sank. He needed that car to make his month, but he also needed more than a day to pull out the fender, put a new door skin on it, and get it painted. He called Larry the body shop manager, but he said there was no way to do all that by Saturday morning. That’s when Ben put his toe over the line again.
He called back to Donny in the wash bay, told him to go over to the parts department, get a five-speed shift knob, put it on the red two-door demo that Mary Alice had been driving, and get the car cleaned up for delivery. The car was a twin to Jim’s except it had premium sound, a couple thousand less miles, and a four-speed.
On Saturday, paperwork-wise he sold her Jim’s demo, but he delivered Mary Alice’s. He told the customer that the radio was his mistake and he’d eat the cost of it, and the fact that it had less miles was simply a bonus.
“Oh, and one more thing,” Ben said. “Don’t try to put it in fifth gear until after the break-in period at the five thousand mile inspection.” He figured he’d drive Jim’s car until she brought it in for the five thousand mile service, switch the two out then, and no one would be the wiser.
It would have worked all right except for the boyfriend. He couldn’t wait to drive it, and when he couldn’t get it in fifth gear, he pulled it up to the shop and asked Marty, the service manager, to take a look at it. Marty spilled the beans, and within minutes the boyfriend and the girl were in my office. I told him to calm down, that I didn’t know what happened but somehow we’d make it right. Then I went out and talked to Ben. At first he was mad at Marty for not covering for him.
“What was he thinking?” he said. “It had our badge on the back. Before he said anything he should have come and talked to me.”
“Don’t try to push this off on Marty,” I said. “He was just doing his job. This is on your head, and you’re going to go in there, tell them what happened, and try to make it right.”
The two of us went back in, told them what happened, and offered to put them in Jim’s demo and give them a five hundred dollar service and parts credit for their trouble. As always, Ben gave them the smile and a little wink, but the boyfriend wasn’t having any of it.
“We’re going to sue,” he said. “You guys are crooks! We want our money back and our trade-in back, or we’re going to the cops.”
“Hold on,” I said. “Ben stepped over the line here, there’s no doubt about that, and I’ll deal with him later, but I found out about this when you did, and I didn’t try to cover it up. I came in here and laid my cards face up on the table, and I’m now willing to do whatever it takes to make this right.”
I told Ben to leave us alone, and after a few minutes the boyfriend calmed down some. I offered to order them what they wanted in next year’s model at no additional cost, and I said that they could continue to drive the demo until their new one came in.
“What about the bank?” he asked. “All the paperwork is wrong.”
“I’ll take care of the bank and the state,” I said. “Give me a chance to make this right.” Eventually they agreed, and once again, I’d bailed Ben out. When I told Al, he thought it was funny, but I wasn’t laughing.
Nowadays, when someone says to me, “Do you ever miss the car business?” I think about days like that and I say, “Not very much.”
———
For a while we drove along Oceania Drive in silence as I was thinking more about what Ahbee had said. Lately, it seemed, I’d been so busy reading the Bible looking for the answers to the questions that people ask me every day that I’d stopped asking questions of my own. It had become a duty instead of a privilege, a have-to instead of a get-to, and that had to change.
Ahbee pulled off the road and parked the Volvo on the rocks overlooking the sea. “Lunchtime,” he announced, grabbing the little picnic basket from the backseat. “We’re going Mediterranean. Hope you don’t mind.”
With that, he began to unpack the basket. It was full of coarse brown bread with nuts, dried cherries, yellow raisins and cream cheese, green olives stuffed with feta cheese, two small fish that had been breaded and deep-fried, some dried dates, and a small flask of sparkling white grape juice.
As we ate, he asked me a question. “Do you remember what Joshua said when they asked him what the greatest commandment was?”
“Yes,” I replied. “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind. And love your neighbor as yourself.”
“Very good! Now, do you do this?”
“I try.”
“That’s your problem: you’re trying too hard. Love is at its best when it’s simply an expression of who you are. Josh didn’t try to love the world, he just loved them, and that’s what you have to do. You need to stop trying so hard to fix people and just love them for who they are and where they are. When they see that, when they know that you really care, then they’ll be more willing to listen to what you have to say.”
His words went through my heart like a knife. “That’s not fair!” I protested. “Many times I have loved the unlovable for your sake. Most of the people I deal with are wrestling with demons of some kind. Their marriages are hanging on by a thread, or their addictions have got them by the throat, or their regrets are eating them up inside, and without me they’d fall off the precipices.
“And as for those who do fall,” I continued, “well, it’s not my fault if they don’t take my advice. Besides, most of them don’t really want to change. What they want is for me to baptize their stupidity. To tell them that what they’re doing is all right. I’m the last stop on the bus in their minds. A hoop they have to jump through before they do what they want. That way they can tell their friends they tried. I may not be perfect, but I’m a better Christian than most people.”
Who are you keeping from falling today?
“I agree.” Ahbee nodded. “You’re right, but most people haven’t had the education, the influence, or the opportunities that you’ve had. There’s no need for yo
u to get defensive. Being a Christian isn’t a contest where the best score wins. I know exactly what you’ve done. Like Moses, you’ve kept people from falling at times. But who are you keeping from falling today?
“Your words have been an inspiration to some, and your kindness has been a comfort to others, but there have also been those you have chosen not to love. You’re a selective lover; you don’t love equally, and you know it. And to be perfectly honest about it, sometimes you love sin more than you love me, and you know that too.”
“Has anyone ever told you that you reading their hearts can be very unnerving?” I asked, trying to turn the conversation in a different direction.
“Yes,” Ahbee said. “I’ve heard that many times, but we were talking about you, not me. You expect a lot from yourself, and that’s good. You have high standards. My standards. No one could say that you haven’t poured your heart and soul into everything you’ve done. I’ve heard your prayers for Ben, and for others, and I’ve watched you try your best to help him. But I’m afraid that sometimes you expect too much from the people around you.”
For a moment Ahbee paused, putting his hand to his chin as if he were thinking, and then he continued. “Florence was right when she said you should never miss the chance to make someone’s life better. But sometimes you do. I know you don’t mean to, but you do. You can be a little intimidating. It’s hard for others to stand in your shadow, and at times that’s been a source of pride to you, but it breaks my heart.
“Never have I told you to work harder,” Ahbee continued, “but many times I’ve said to love deeper. Do you have any idea what a word of encouragement from you could mean to Ben? I don’t expect you to save the world, but I do expect you to save those you can, and Ben is in that camp. Like so many others, he really struggles with self-doubt and insecurity. Whether you know it or not, he looks up to you. He always has, and so you need to work at being a little more gracious.
“What I want is to be able to welcome you home someday with the words, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant,’ and I know that’s what you want too. But I’ve got to tell you that the measuring stick in my kingdom is not what you have or what you’ve accomplished; it’s who you’ve helped. I’m much more concerned with people than performance, and this is your chance to make a difference.
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