The Last Open Road

by Burt Levy

  I wasn't about to start arguing with him. At least not on my first day back. And especially seeing as how I wanted to talk to him later about how I saw things and my plans for the station's future. Still, it didn't make much sense to me. I mean, we could charge good money—and I mean real good money—for an engine overhaul on Big Ed's car, and you had to wonder if the out-of-work meat cutter with the broken-down Nash could even pay his bill. He was one of those down-and-out types who always want you to do a Basic Butcher patch job (even if you know it won't hold up) and, if you absolutely insist they pay the price of a brand-new muffler, they inevitably want you to hook it up to the rusty old pipes that are already there, just so they can put off paying you the other five or ten bucks that they're going to wind up paying you anyway—and then some!—just a few short paychecks down the road. I used to sympathize with people like that, but that's a weakness you just have to outgrow if you're ever going to make anything of yourself in the world of automobile mechanics. "I'm afraid poor people make poor customers," was the way Colin St. John phrased it.

  I came to realize that he was right, because people like that never want to pay for anything except the cheapest spit-and-baling-wire repair that will get their wheezing old heaps clattering down the road again—engines sputtering and egg-shaped wheels wobbling in four different directions—under some semblance of their own power. Not to mention they often brought their own parts (so you couldn't make a reasonable markup on the discount you got from the parts store) and lots of times they were wrong or no good or cut from some junkyard wreck that was maybe not the same exact year or model. And then it was your fault when the damn things didn't fit. The sad truth was, if you allowed yourself—out of decent human charity—to do business with poverty cases, you inevitably wound up trying to figure and fight your way through the scummy, illogical residue of Band-Aid repairs made one on top of the other by the cheapest, dirtiest, worst damn butcher mechanics in town. And none of them more than once. So you always lost money. And sometimes you even got threatened with a baseball bat.

  None of that bothered Old Man Finzio. He loved doing business with folks who were down on their luck, because it just about guaranteed him a chance to be mean and belligerent above and beyond the call of duty. It would always come to a head when the car was done and the poor sap came to pick it up. That's when the Old Man presented the bill, and it was always more than the original estimate. That went without saying on most every job, but it was a lock when you worked on one of those raggedy heaps because it always took longer and got you dirtier and more frustrated than any car a Solid Citizen might own. And of course the poor sap would wail and moan and argue like hell on account of he really didn't have the extra five or ten bucks floating around in his pocket to cover the difference. And that's when Old Man Finzio would come out from behind the service counter and stick his grizzled, bony chin with its four-day growth of stubble right up in their faces—usually with the glowing tip of his latest Camel leading the way as a sort of Advance Guard—and inform the poor bastard that he was holding the car hostage until the ransom was paid. It was the same damn thing he pulled on Cal when we brought his wrecked TC in after the mess at Bridgehampton back in May. And, just like Cal, those people'd fume and fuss and threaten to sue and even cuss the Old Man out until they were blue in the face. But Old Man Finzio would just stand there serenely and enjoy it, basking in their anger like he was sunbathing on the beach. I swear, he'd even roll ever so slightly from side to side now and then to make sure he got a nice even tan.

  But eventually, after all the screaming and yelling and cussing and pleading, the deadbeats who owned those poor old cars would have to go break their kid's piggy bank or put the touch on the relatives—again—or maybe go in for an eight-hour shift of cheap day labor or sell a couple pints of blood, but whatever happened, they inevitably came back to the station with a furious, humiliated look in their eyes and their tails dragging between their legs and paid the damn bill. And that's when Old Man Finzio would give them the keys and throw them off the property. "And don't come back! " he'd yell after them, his eyes dancing.

  "You don't hafta worry about that, asshole!" they'd yell back as they drove away with their middle fingers extended like Fourth of July flagpoles. "You don't hafta worry about that at all! "

  Then Old Man Finzio would smile a thin, bright smile, light himself up another bent-up Camel, and just kind of stand there by the cash register for awhile, swaying ever so gently from side to side, savoring the moment.

  But regardless of the pleasure he took from it, doing mechanical work for people like that wasn't good for business. It was one of the things I wanted to talk to him about changing. Especially after I saw he wasn't taking his usual measure of joy out of Presenting The Bill or throwing that poor out-of-work meat cutter off the property when he came back a few hours later to pick up his stinking lousy piece-of-shit Nash.

  Fact is, the Old Man wasn't looking his old self much anymore. He could still get mad as hell at the drop of a hat and screech until the turkey-neck skin over his collar turned damn near purple. But he couldn't sustain it anymore. At least not more than a few minutes, anyway. And he wasn't moving right either, kind of shuffling around the office and out to the pumps like a windup toy with the spring running down. But the biggest change was that he really didn't seem to care much anymore. Not about anything. So when I went up to him later that afternoon and told him about my ideas for the station, he just sort of nodded and shrugged and looked out the front window like he was staring at the ocean. Then he sighed and said, "Sure. Why not. You do it any damn way you want. Any way at all," and got up, went out the overhead door, climbed into his tow truck, and drove off down Pine Street. Just like that.

  He was gone all afternoon. And I was in business!

  My first big sports car job at the Sinclair was Big Ed's blown-up Jag, and I had to grab a few passers-by to help me push it into the service bay for a postmortem diagnosis. But then the phone rang and it was some tax accountant about the starter motor on his Hudson. So I set him up a service appointment and made a note that somebody had to pick up his car when the tow truck came back. Then I went back to work on the Jag, but right away a lady in a DeSoto pulled in for a fill up, and I noticed one of her tires was almost flat on account of it'd picked up a nail, so I had to fix that before I did anything else. Except run the pumps and clean the windshields and do an oil check on two more cars that rolled in off the street and answer the phone a couple more times.

  One of the calls was Carson Flegley, about maybe doing a little hush-hush speed tuning on his MG. He'd read some article in Road & Track magazine about hopping up MGs, and he was all excited about doing it to his car so he could go down to that SOWEGA race in Georgia and maybe finish all the way up in midpack for a change. Personally, I thought he was crazy for even thinking about it. I mean, the biggest problem with that car—as Cal had proved beyond any doubt—was the loose nut behind the steering wheel, and it didn't make sense to start hot-rodding the engine and getting it too high strung for normal street duty when he couldn't get near all the potential out of it bone stock. But Carson had fallen victim to "The Bumper Syndrome," which happens when a would-be racing driver sees another car's bumper out in front of him during a race—like a carrot dangling off the end of a stick—and he can't do a damn thing except follow it around. Nine times out of ten, that driver will daydream all day and lay awake nights trying to figure out how to turn that rear bumper ahead of him into a front bumper in his rearview mirror. And he will go to some pretty ridiculous lengths to make it happen. He will also spend a lot of money, and that's why I told Carson I thought it was a swell idea and I'd be happy to help him out. Only he'd have to give me a deposit for parts and leave the car for a couple weeks. "How much do you want?" he asked without skipping a beat. Like it was nothing, you know?

  "Oh, I dunno," I told him, trying to figure out some kind of plausible number, "maybe seventy dollars or so. . . ."

  "How a
bout a hundred? I'll drop it off tomorrow."

  "Uh, sure. That'll be fine."

  So now I had two major racing projects lined up and some guy in a pickup out by the pumps waiting for gas and that DeSoto lady's tire to finish (not to mention a speedo cable job on a Mercury that had to be ready by five o'clock) and somebody in an Oldsmobile with Ohio plates pulling in to ask directions. And then who should swoop in but Big Ed Baumstein. And you should've seen what he was driving! He'd made a deal with the local Cadillac agency to get the very first '53 Eldorado convertible in New Jersey—creamy white with a red leather interior, natch—complete with chrome wire wheels and that new panoramic windshield that was exclusive to Eldorados that year. Why, it was about the most beautiful hunk of homegrown Detroit machinery I'd ever seen. "Hey, how'ya doin'?" Big Ed grinned around his cigar. "Good t'have ya back in Jersey."

  "Hey, thanks," I told him, running my eyeballs down his new Caddy. "Nice car. When d'ja pick it up?"

  "Just this morning. It's still in the wrapper."

  "Yeah, I can smell it." There's always that special smell to new cars.

  "Yep, she's cherry all right. But I'll fix that soon enough. Get a few miles on 'er. Let her hump the road a little and develop herself some personality."

  I knew exactly what he was talking about. Cars get their guts and bodies on the assembly line, but they get their souls from the roads they travel. "So," I asked him, "how does she drive?"

  "Aw, nothin' like my Jaguar. That's my baby. But y'cant beat a Caddy convert when it comes to cruisin' around town or oozin' down the highway."

  "Especially a brand-spanking-new one," I agreed.

  "Yeah. And a special edition, too. They ain't gonna make many of these babies."

  I could see the DeSoto lady was starting to pace up and down like people do when they're politely trying to tell you that you're ruining their entire day. "Look," I told Big Ed, "I'd love to chew the fat some more, but I got a lotta stuff to take care of and I'm here all by myself."

  "Where's that rat-bastard Finzio?"

  "Dunno. He took off in the tow truck a couple hours ago."

  "Well, you tell the sonofabitch I said hello."

  "He won't care."

  "I know he won't care. That's not the point. I'm tryin' t'be nice, see?" Big Ed pulled the cigar out of his face and flashed me a fake grin. "It's important t'be nice in this life. It gets you places."

  "I wouldn't know," I told him, and we had a good laugh off it.

  "Say," he said as he got ready to pull away, "what's the late word on my Jag, anyway?"

  "I just started on it a couple minutes ago, and I won't know what all's involved till I get it torn down. But I do know this." I looked him square in the eye.

  "What?"

  "It's gonna be pretty expensive. You got a connecting rod right through the block."

  "Hey," he said with a helpless laugh, "anything worth doing is worth doing all the way, right?"

  "Yeah, I guess so. By the way, what'd you rev that poor thing to?"

  "I dunno," Big Ed shrugged. "I wasn't exactly watching the tach, you know?"

  "I'd say that's pretty obvious—judging from the hole in the crankcase, anyway...."

  "Say, you need any money for parts or anything?"

  "Oh, I probably will when I get some idea what we're up against."

  "Nah," Big Ed told me. "You take something now. That way you can get started right away and get the damn thing fixed."

  "Don't you want an estimate first?"

  Big Ed looked at me like I'd hurt his feelings. "I don't need an estimate. Not from you, Buddy. You just take a little down payment here"—he reached into his pocket and pulled out a fat wad of bills— "and let me know if and when y'need any more." And just like that he peeled off two hundred dollars in twenties and fifties—two hundred dollars!—and handed it over. Like it was nothing!

  "S-Say," I gulped, "you need a receipt or anything?"

  "Take that receipt and wipe yer ass with it," Big Ed laughed as he slipped his brand-new Eldorado into drive and wheeled away from the pumps with its virgin whitewalls squealing. And that's when I noticed the phone was ringing again and that the DeSoto lady with the flat tire wasn't looking nearly so polite and quietly desperate anymore. In fact, she was starting to look very genuinely pissed off.

  So I answered the phone and made an appointment for a tune-up on some guy's Ford and got the lady with the tire squared away and took another quick look under the hood of Big Ed's Jag and filled up a Buick wagon at the pumps and realized I'd better get busy on that Mercury speedometer cable before the owner showed up and found it sitting right exactly where he'd left it. People hate that.

  The Old Man finally rolled in around 4:30 wearing an even more far-off look than when he left. I told him about the Hudson with the bad starter motor that needed to be brought in and explained as how I really couldn't get much done with all the damn interruptions. "Where'dja go, anyway?" I asked him.

  "Hadda go see my stupid quack doctor," he snorted, spitting on the ground. "Gotta go see the sonofabitch again next Monday." That sounded like trouble, on account of Julie was only coming in on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and there was just no way I could get anything done in the service bay if I had to shag phone calls and tend the pumps and take care of every rube asshole who dropped in off the street.

  "Look," I told him, "I'm gonna need me some help in here if I'm gonna make us any money on the repair side."

  Old Man Finzio looked at me like I was threatening him with a straight razor. "Look here, sonnyboy," he started in (and I always knew it meant trouble when he started in with that "sonnyboy" stuff), "I can't hardly earn enough off the damn pumps to make ends meet as it is, and now you wanna go out and hire somebody?" He shook his head like I was some kind of prizewinning idiot.

  "Listen," I tried to explain, "the real money is in fixing those English sports cars, see. We can raise up our rates a dollar an hour on those things. Easy. Maybe even a dollar-fifty. The guys who own 'em will be happy to pay it, just so long as I do good work and get the damn cars finished on time. . . ."

  "Finished on time? " he sneered, as if I had uttered the unspeakable. After all, failing to meet delivery promises was something of a sacred canon in the car repair business. Not just down at Westbridge, but everywhere else, too. Although you had to admit Barry and Colin St. John had raised it to an art form.

  But then I showed the Old Man Big Ed's two hundred dollars—cash money!—and all of a sudden his face softened like wax melting down off a candle. "Aw, what the hell," he grumbled. "Y'run the damn place any way you see fit. I just don't much care anymore." And without another word, he headed out the door and down the street toward the liquor store on the corner.

  He didn't even take the two hundred bucks.

  After that I started spreading the word that I was officially in the foreign car repair business at the Sinclair, and it didn't take long before I had more damn work than I could handle from all the S.C.M.A. racer types and their lah-de-dah sports car friends (many who'd sworn they'd never go back to Westbridge again, not even on a bet). They'd learned it took a little talent and experience to do things properly on those cars, and it was not the sort of thing you found at your average street-corner filling station or back-alley repair shop. But I couldn't count on the Old Man much because he was always running off to see his damn doctor (and even when he was there, he wasn't much good except for pumping gas and pissing off customers) so I asked Julie if maybe she could come in a little more often to take care of the phones and the office stuff. But she was making pretty good money over at the Doggie Shake, what with tips and everything, and there was just no way I could offer her that sort of deal at the Sinclair.

  And that's when I had a brilliant idea. I called up old Butch Bohunk to see if he'd like to get his ass into the gas station business again. " Me? " he damn near gasped. "You want me to come back to the station?"

  You could tell he was pretty interested. To say the least.r />
  So I explained to him how weird the Old Man was acting and how I couldn't get the damn cars fixed—and I had 'em lined up, for God's sake!—on account of all the damn interruptions and other piddly bullshit I had to take care of. "Hell yes!" he shouted into the receiver. "I've about gone buggy just sittin' around this friggin' house with my dick in my hand."

  "Can you get yourself over here tomorrow morning?"

  "Sure as hell can, Buddy. I'll have Marlene drop me off."

  "That'd be great," I told him. Then something else occurred to me. "Uh, Butch?"

  "Yeah?"

  "We, uh, see, the fact is, we can't afford to, um, to pay you very much. At least not right away."

  "Aw, that's okay," he said, not the least bit upset. "I ain't worth very much these days, anyway. . . ."

  And that was the beginning of my stint as Chief Operating Officer and occasional Parts Washer and Floor Sweeper at the Old Man's Sinclair. Hiring Butch turned out to be a real stroke of genius, because he knew how to order the right parts over the phone and he could even get around good enough to handle the pumps now and then once I made a little wood ramp to get his wheelchair down the little concrete step outside the office. He'd pretty much given up on those crutches once he realized his legs were just not about to get any better. But he'd made some real improvement in what he could do with his decent left hand and that fingerless lump on the other side. Why, he could do bench work like carb rebuilds and distributors right there in the office, and he'd gotten to where he could wield a welding torch left-handed and still lay down about the prettiest damn bead you ever saw.