That’s what I think.”

“What the hell’s that? I don’t know what that is.”

“Then you must’ve been pretty skillful all your life, Henry. That’s great, though. It’s what I strive for.”

“How old will you be next birthday? You said you had a birthday.” For some reason Henry is gruff about this subject.

“Thirty-nine, next week.”

“Thirty-nine’s young. Thirty-nine’s nothing. You’re a remarkable man, Frank.”

“I don’t think I’m that remarkable, Henry.”

“Well no, you’re not. But I advise you, though, to think you are. I’d be nowhere if I didn’t think I was perfect.”

“I’ll think of it as a birthday present, Henry. Advice for my later years.”

“I’ll send you out a leather wallet. Fill it up.”

“I’ve got some ideas that’ll do just as good as a fat wallet.”

“Is this this Vicki trick you’re talking about?”

“Right.”

“I agree wholeheartedly. Everybody ought to have a Vicki in his life. Two’d even be better. Just don’t marry her, Frank. In my experience these Vickis aren’t for marrying. They’re sporting only.”

“I’ve got to be going now, Henry.” Our conversations often tend this way, toward his being a nice old uncle and then, as if by policy, making me want to tell him to go to hell.

“Okay. You’re mad at me now, I know it. But I don’t give a goddamn if you are. I know what I think.”

“Fill your wallet up with that then, Henry, if you get my meaning.”

“I get it. I’m not an idiot like you are.”

“I thought you said I was pretty remarkable.”

“You are. You’re a pretty remarkable moron. And I love you like a son.”

“This is the point to hang up now, Henry. Thanks. I’m glad to hear that.”

“Marry my daughter again if you want to. You have my permission.”

“Good night, Henry. I feel the same way.” But like Herb Wallagher, Henry has already hung up on me, and never hears my parting words, which I sing off into the empty phone lines like a wilderness cry.

      Vicki has indeed gone to sleep in her chair, a cold stream of auto lights below, pouring up Jefferson toward the Grosse Pointes: Park, Farms, Shores, Woods, communities tidy and entrenched in midwestern surety.

I am hungry as an animal now, though when I rouse her with a hand on her soft shoulder, ready for a crab soufflé or a lobsteak, amenable to à la carte up on the revolving roof, she wakes with a different menu in mind—one a fellow would need to be ready for the old folks’ home to pass up. (She has drunk all the champagne, and is ready for some fun.)

She reaches and pulls me onto her chair so I’m across her lap and can smell the soft olive scent of her sleepy breath. Beyond the window glass in the starless drifting Detroit night an ore barge with red and green running lights aglow hangs on the current toward Lake Erie and the blast furnaces of Cleveland.

“Oh, you sweet old sweet man,” Vicki says to me, and wiggles herself comfortable. She gives me a moist soft kiss on the mouth, and hums down in her chest. “I read someplace that if the Taurus tells you he loves you, you’re s’posed to believe it. Is that so?”

“You’re a wonderful girl.”

“Hmmmm. But …” She smiles and hums.

I have a good handful of her excellent breast now, and what a wonderful bunch she is, a treasure trove for a man interested in romance.