Free Edsel by Loren D. Estleman

the most like magic. At the end of the tour a red-and-white Fairlane glistening like water took on gas and burbled away, driven by an employee in white cotton coveralls with the Ford logo scripted across the back.
    Miss Sherman consulted her wristwatch, a man’s model with a big luminous dial. “Just short of two hours. We beat the regular tour by five minutes. You don’t ask many questions.”
    “I used to gig frogs here before the plant was built. When the last Model T rolled off the line I covered it for the Detroit Times. If there’s anything you want to know; all you have to do is ask.”
    “I don’t understand. I had a ton of letters to get out, and if I know the temporaries in this town most of them will be there waiting when I get back. Why did Mr. Zed assign me to shepherd you if you know more about the place than Mr. Ford?”
    “Ask him. I came here planning to go through with the suckers.”
    “I will. Believe me, I will. Are you hungry?”
    “Are you buying?”
    “Mr. Zed’s buying. I draw up his expense sheets. How about Carl’s Chop House?”
    “Janet, you are a corporate drudge after my own heart.” We left the place of miracles.

8
    T HAT S ATURDAY NIGHT I TOOK Agnes DeFilippo to see Woman’s World at the Fox. Clifton Webb played the president of an automobile company who invites three prospective vice-presidents and their wives to New York City for the purpose of identifying the pick of the litter. It was one of those TechniStereoScope jobs without a mountain range or a cast of thousands to justify the wide screen, so the actresses all wore big poofy skirts and the actors spent most of their time standing around large rooms with ten feet separating them hoisting martinis to use up space. The feature was sandwiched between a Coming Attractions trailer for The Creature from the Black Lagoon and a Popeye cartoon from the Roosevelt administration. Afterward we reported to the snack counter at Woolworth’s for hamburgers and coffee.
    “I thought you had an expense account,” Agnes said, wiping a patch of ketchup from the corner of her mouth. “I dressed for an expense account.”
    Her dress looked like crushed charcoal, with a full skirt and a tight top that left her collarbone exposed when she took off her shawl. It was a nice collarbone for fifty, including a brown mole on the left side. I had on a windowpane sport coat and a blue tie rashed all over with red fleurs-de-lis. We had been the only ones so attired in a theater full of sweatshirts and dungarees with the cuffs turned up. I wasn’t sure just when people stopped dressing to go to the movies, but it seemed to have happened around the time the first FOR SALE sign went up in front of one of the old motion-picture palaces. In another generation we’d be attending them in swimsuits. If we were attending them at all; the place had been one-third empty for the early-evening show.
    I blew across the top of my cup. “You’re not a client. When I’ve made my stripes I’ll buy you a house in Miami on Mr. Ford’s ticket, but right now I’m the new kid in school. What did you think of the picture? Personally I’m glad Van Heflin got the job, even though in real life he’d bankrupt the company with all those ethics. If I were Clifton Webb I’d have given it to Fred MacMurray.”
    “I liked June Allyson’s dresses.”
    “The hell you did. She looked like Shirley Temple with a thyroid condition. What did you really think?”
    “I’m wondering why you took me to see that particular film.”
    “I thought you’d like to see a woman’s picture for a change. You said you were sick of westerns.”
    “That’s not a woman’s picture. The men called all the shots. The women were either scheming shrews or simpering little ninnies. If that’s what Hollywood thinks women want to see, it’s no wonder movies are in trouble.”
    A pair of pimple-pocked youths in black leather and Brylcreem and their ponytailed dates were gallumphing through