Easy and Hard Ways Out Read online

  Next to him in the front seat, Dorfman was reading the Wall Street Journal and eating his morning unusual food. Dorfman was a man of medium height, gray eyes, and brown hair that he combed forward; though he was thirty-six years old, a normal person could not tell whether he was twenty or fifty.

  “Hey, Dorfman,” said Potamos, finally, after half an hour. “What shit are you eating today?”

  “What I’m eating today is not shit,” said Dorfman precisely, turning to the bond transactions. “It happens to be feta cheese, from Greece.”

  “From Greece,” mimicked Potamos. “From Greece. Why the hell can’t you eat American food for once, for chrissake? Every goddamn day you gotta have something different. In fact, why must you eat at all, huh? This is a car, for chrissake, not a restaurant. Every weekend I gotta clean out your lousy foreign crumbs.”

  Dorfman did not look up. “Simply because your diet is so terribly mundane is no reason why I shouldn’t enjoy the foods appreciated by people whose taste buds aren’t vestigial. And as far as your car is concerned, I think it’s quite clear that I’m getting the worst of the deal considering what I drive and what I have to ride in.”

  Potamos was about to respond when the man in the back interrupted.

  “I think George has a very nice car, Sheldon,” he said. “It’s not what you’d call luxurious, but it starts, it runs, it does the job, and, uh, what did this little honey cost you again, George?”

  “Three-fifty.”

  “And it cost only three hundred fifty dollars. I mean, if you buy a new car for four thousand and you hold on to it for—”

  “Cohen,” said Dorfman, “all right already. We’ve all heard your used-car spiel. Enough.”

  “He wants to eat his yak cheese in peace,” said Potamos.

  “Sheep cheese,” said Dorfman.

  Cohen leaned back in the seat and watched the great suspension towers of the Throgg’s Neck Bridge loom up in the distance. Like Steinberg, he was a physically small man, only in his case his size seemed to be a way of concentrating a great energy rather than, as with the other, the end product of a grinding operation on a formerly larger being. His black hair sat in a neatly sprayed pompadour atop his head, and his bright, feverish eyes darted incessantly in all directions. He was handsome, straight-nosed, nattily dressed, a little-boy-sized man with shiny shoes.

  “I think you made a wise choice with this car, George,” he said.

  “At least someone appreciates it,” said Potamos.

  “He’s patronizing you, you asshole,” said Dorfman.

  Potamos said nothing. Dorfman folded his paper, noticing the bridge for the first time, its steel cables gleaming in the morning sunshine like a giant harp. “How come you took the Throgg’s Neck instead of the Whitestone?” he said to Potamos. “The Whitestone is faster.”

  Potamos slowed as they approached the toll booth.

  “You could’ve saved ten minutes if you’d taken the Whitestone.”

  Potamos said nothing.

  “The Whitestone is empty at this hour.”

  Potamos spoke deliberately. “Do … one … of … you … engineers … have … a … fucking … quarter? Hmm? Or do I turn this fucking bomb around?”

  “I’m out of change,” said Cohen.

  “Here,” said Dorfman, reluctantly fishing two dimes and a nickel from his pocket and handing them to Potamos. Potamos paid the toll and proceeded onto the bridge.

  Cohen said, “You know, Sheldon, if it really were true that one bridge was significantly better than, the other, word would soon get out and everyone would take it. Then it wouldn’t be better.”

  “I’m telling you from experience that it’s better,” said Dorfman, pulling a map from Potamos’s glove compartment and beginning to read it.

  Cohen smiled. Potamos said nothing. Fifteen minutes later, they passed Steinberg on the highway. Potamos gave two short blasts on the horn, but Steinberg did not respond.

  “He can’t see,” said Dorfman. “Tunnel vision.”

  “Your supervisor is a real winner,” said Cohen. “Wait, you’ll see, the F-Twenty-four will have a radar that locates the enemy only if he’s straight ahead.”

  “But you’ll be able to control the window openings to thousandths of an inch,” said Dorfman.

  “Actually,” said Cohen, “I hear he does a very adequate job with the resources available to him.”

  They both laughed.

  Later, when they’d all been at work several hours, Potamos left his drafting table, sneaked through the corridors to the library, flung open the dictionary, and searched diligently for the exact meaning of the word “patronizing.”

  d. Second in Command

  Rocco Capobianco was one of the two people who started out for work at Auerbach Labs before six forty-five in the morning. Rational explanations for this were that his job as second in command of the Maintenance Department required him to be there early, he lived far away, and he did not own a car. These explanations were wrong. Rocco Capobianco started out early because that’s how he was. That’s how he’d been for forty-five years, regardless of the job or its requirements.

  His son, daughter-in-law, and grandchildren were still asleep when Rocco gently closed the door of the frame house on 102nd Street in the Corona section of Queens. His breath looking like smoke signals in the light of the street lamps, he began the daily eight-block walk to the subway, clutching his lunchbox in the one hand still left him. He wore a new hip-length suede jacket that did not fit well, and his hair was thin and cut very short. His face was flattened and pockmarked; eyeglasses with clear plastic frames rested heavily on a small but wide nose. He began to whistle.

  As he walked, his gaze caught on imperfections, on things neglected: chipped paint on the side of a house, crumbling cement in a driveway, a patch of coarse grass in a lawn of Merion Blue, a light fixture eaten away by rust. Mentally, Rocco repaired them all, the fixing operations forming a lightning montage in his brain. Mixing base and pigment, pouring sand, digging up roots, twisting wires. He imagined these activities down to the last detail; he could feel the wire cutting into his thumb, smell the paint, the earth, the grass. The muscles of his arm rippled uncontrollably.

  He was eager to get to work, to get the day going, to show them once again that he could do a job. It had been his life, this showing people, this proving again and again that he was capable, and he understood, now, that this was life, that you could never hope to sit back and be accepted. He would go in today and demonstrate, as always, that a sixty-three-year-old man could perform any maintenance operation required in a large industrial plant. He would prove it as he’d proved that a determined sixteen-year-old boy could make it to America by himself, that a man who’d lost an arm in World War II could build a house, that a widower need not be a burden to his son and his son’s wife. He would walk to the station, take the subway to Woodside, take the Long Island Railroad to Hicksville, and be picked up by Bill Murphy, his supervisor, and driven to the plant. He would do this today as he’d been doing it for three thousand days before this, and tens of thousands in other places and times. He whistled even louder and picked up his pace.

  e. Metamorphosis

  One morning Elton Wizer awoke in his bed to find himself changed into something monstrous—a radar technician. That was twenty years ago, when he’d been in the Air Force. Now, as he rode to work, he wondered what his life might have been like had he taken another type of training in the service, or if he hadn’t joined up at all. Probably just a different quagmire, he decided. That was the only option you really had—to pick a quagmire of your own choosing.

  The sky was still pitch-black as Wizer rode through the streets, his body shifting rhythmically from side to side as he pumped the pedals of his racer. He down-shifted as he came to a hill, and his muscular thighs pushed a bit harder against the gravitational force. “Why don’t you get a car?” people always asked him. “Ah don’t need one,” he’d reply in his soft North Carol
ina accent, but what he meant was he didn’t want one. So what if it took him over two hours to get to work? So what if he arose before 6 A.M.? He was an early riser anyway. What would he do around the house, wait till Rita got up and listen to her complaints? No, he was better off riding his bike. Passing the time. That was the key to the worth of an activity, thought Wizer. How it made the time go.

  Wizer was a thin, wiry man, forty-three years old, hair just beginning to turn gray, shoulders just beginning to droop. In a pack strapped to the seat he carried an air pump for his tires, a chain with a combination lock on the end of it, an apple, and a book of Haiku poetry. The latter was a carry-over from his Oriental period, when he’d thought Zen might be the answer to his unhappiness, then Confucianism, Taoism, Hatha Yoga. But the only thing he’d learned was that Orientals could be as obscure as Occidentals, as pompous, silly, childish—and lost. He turned to other things, the philosophy of religion, Judeo-Christian ethics and origins, the work of Spinoza, Martin Buber. And still, life droned on in its clockwork misery, empty seconds sliding silently into oblivion, nothing helping him, nothing helping.

  He pedaled more slowly, not because he was tired but because it would take him longer to get to the labs. No sense getting there early and sitting around. Bad enough he hated the work, why should he be on the premises any longer than necessary? Hated—no, wrong word. Hate at least implies some interest, some passion. No, he didn’t hate work. It was beyond that. He had an absolute absence of feeling for it, a nullity of response to it that was ten levels beyond boredom. There was no word for it, a Zen concept. One either understood, or not.

  He’d been at Auerbach Labs for seventeen years and he’d witnessed many things, had seen many people come and go. Hotshot engineers, Ph.D physicists in isolated glass cages, personnel men who were going to change things, wise-guy draftsmen, techs who fixed television sets on company time—they came and went, he stayed. A signpost, he thought, by which other people measure their progress. “You still there, Elton? Holy cow, I’ve been in three places already since I left, just got a job as a foreman. Elton, you can’t get anyplace unless you move.” And always the crises, perpetual crises, deadlines, proposals, competition, life-or-death jobs (but never really death)—that was what the aerospace industry was about, ever faster running on treadmills. Pressure. Pressure. And now this new thing, this rumor. The techs always got the rumors early because they flirted with the secretaries who got them first. The techs also started many rumors. But this one, this was real, a real new, artificial crisis. The F24BZ. Problems. Problems with the Air Force. Delivery. Performance. Testing. Accusations. Promises. Crises. Rumors.

  We’ll see, thought Wizer, searching for some light in the sky. We’ll see. In the evening, he’d pedal home in blackness too, pedal slowly, to minimize his time with Rita and her unhappiness. And his daughter, Beth, and her unhappiness. Pedal slowly, that was the key. Push one foot, then the other. Lean, lean. Pass the time.

  f. Magnificent Obsession

  Big Saul. Lincoln Continental. Red velvet upholstery. Walnut paneling. A portly man with a leonine head of executive-gray hair. His pudgy, corporate hands on the wheel showed fingernails manicured to perfection, his shave was incomparable, his overcoat and suit were British, magnificently tailored. Tasteful, restful stereophonic music came from a set of rear speakers. The car was so smooth, it could have driven itself. The man’s bearing was quintessential presidential, although strangely, he was only a vice-president. His sole nonperfect feature was a slightly bent nose, but even that seemed to suggest a kind of craggy, Lincolnesque dynamism that only brought him closer to the masses. He’d been approached by people wanting to use his picture to persuade others to buy insurance, to lure executives into sending résumés, to sell pain relievers. He seemed oblivious to the stops and starts of traffic, his massive mind immersed in other, more important things. This bearing, this overpowering dignity, had reduced lesser men to sniveling wretches in his presence, had lent board-of-directors—type power and backing to even his most casual actions. He was Saul Rupp, the Saul Rupp, Vice-President of Engineering for the entire Auerbach Labs.

  Normally at this hour his thoughts would dwell on the challenges of the coming day, the coming week. On pressuring the model shop to get a working system out and ready for the Air Force. Pressuring Ardway for more new components, but less money spent on R and D. Fending off Lingenfelter in Sales, who kept trying to usurp policy decisions that belonged to Engineering. Fending off Marchese in Manufacturing, who criticized Engineering in front of A himself. Explaining to A why this trouble arose with the F24BZ and how they would solve it before the Air Force could find out. Leaning on Brine in Security to find the one maniac who was stealing from the plant and the other maniac who was disrupting the paging system. Pressuring the shop to finish machining the special parts for his private boat. Challenges. What he was being paid for. And normally, what he would be thinking of.

  But this morning was different. Even where his fifteen-year-old daughter might be sleeping didn’t occupy his thoughts this morning. Instead, a deeply religious man, he was lost in prayer. Prayer for his beautiful wife, and prayer for the latest ingenious mirror system he’d spent the weekend rigging up in his house, and which had the power to give him the one triumph that had eluded him for eighteen years.

  “Please, God,” murmured the Vice-President of Engineering for the entire Auerbach Labs, “please let me get just one glimpse of that bitch in the nude. One glimpse. That’s all I ask.”

  It seemed to him an eminently reasonable request.

  g. An Unreasonable Sense of Well-Being

  As usual, Rocco had waited nearly a half hour at the railroad station before Murphy showed up in his rusted-out station wagon. Murphy’s right hand was bandaged.

  “Changin’ my plugs,” said Murphy, who never apologized for being late. He pointed to the hand. “The fuckin’ wrench, she flies right off the fuckin’ plug and smack inta my knuckles. I’m tellin’ ya, the tool manafacturers these days just screw the shit atta you.”

  Rocco nodded and got into the wagon. This was Murphy’s usual weekend injury speech, and Rocco had heard it a thousand times before. The tool manufacturers, the appliance manufacturers, the auto manufacturers, the man at the hardware store, his assistant, the staff of Sears Roebuck—all spent their entire lives in an intense, focused effort to screw Bill Murphy on weekend repair jobs. In the middle of the week, he was screwed by other things, usually inanimate objects. Rocco, a craftsman, a natural at solving all mechanical problems, could not begin to imagine how this oaf with the manual dexterity of a rock could possibly have risen to the position of head of Maintenance.

  They arrived at the building first, except for A himself, who was always there before anyone and left after anyone, no matter how late they worked. As’ magnificent Cadillac crouched in its space; a light could be seen in A’s office. Murphy parked in his spot near the side of the building, and he and Rocco got out of the car and walked around to the front. Murphy used his key and they entered, not worrying about the tricky security alarm system which A always turned off when he arrived, using the secret four-step process. In the lobby, Murphy walked over to the circuit-breaker box and flipped up the switches to turn on the lights. Rocco used his key to open the inner door. They proceeded in this manner through the corridors, heading in the direction of the Maintenance area, opening circuit breakers and unlocking doors as they went. While Murphy continued on, Rocco detoured to the Accounting men’s room, and entered to turn on the lights and blower motors. Inside, however, he found the lights already on and the motors humming steadily. He was puzzled. Had he left them on all weekend? Impossible. He’d made special note the last time, a special mental mark. Open breakers in Accounting men’s room. How could he have forgotten? Unless A turned them on for some reason. But A had his own private bath adjoining his office. But maybe he’d stopped in on the way up. Even A had certain urgent calls that wouldn’t wait. That must be it, thought Rocco. Tha
t must be it.

  Johnson, the front-door guard, was the next to arrive at the building; he immediately took up his post behind the tiny table that he called his desk. A few early birds from Manufacturing drove up, and then some cafeteria staff members who were supposed to prepare breakfast for those who wished to eat in the company lunchroom. José, from Shipping and Receiving, arrived. Van Lamm from Purchasing. Wild Man Plotsky, a draftsman. More people from Manufacturing, machinists from the Model Shop, technicians from Test Maintenance, Production Control, Quality Control, Customer Service. Secretaries arrived; Barbara, senior supervisor, Carol at the switchboard, Mavis in Accounting. Security Chief Brine showed up and checked in with Johnson at his post.

  “Anything suspicious, George?” he asked. “Anyone forget their badge?”

  “No suh,” said Johnson. “Ah been checkin’ ever’ one of ’em.”

  Brine scanned the parking lot, now almost a third full. Four hundred cars, he thought, each carrying one or more potential threats to the safety of the United States of America. And it was his responsibility to stop them, “them” being the assorted spies, provocateurs, saboteurs, and people who forgot their badges.

  “Just keep your eyes open, George,” he said. “Don’t relax for a second. Remember, no briefcases in or out without inspection. And no exceptions, got that? None.”

  “None,” repeated Johnson.

  Brine walked inside and Johnson slumped back in his chair and relaxed.

  Even pedaling slowly, Wizer arrived fifteen minutes before he was due. He hitched his bicycle to a water pipe, removed his Haiku book and apple from his pack, and trudged inside, showing his badge to the guard. Wizer looked at the picture, taken ten years ago, the plastic protecting it grown murky yellow and cracked. It was a picture of someone younger, much younger, and yet, even then, something had faded around the eyes, some look of youth had disappeared forever behind the plastic.

  “You could use a new one,” said Johnson. “Mistuh Brine likes the employees ta have clear snapshots.”