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it?”
    â€œWhoa! I can’t believe you got one. When’d you get it?” Mike said as he looked the car over.
    â€œThey delivered it yesterday. Man came out from the factory, all the way from Lansing, Michigan, to show me how to drive it, do the maintenance, that sort of thing. Nice fella.”
    The Olds gleamed. It was bright red with yellow pinstriping. Oldsmobile was painted in gold script on the side. The tires were white and the wheels were wire, like a bicycle’s, only wider. The seat was high and good for two, three in a real pinch. In front there was a curved dashboard, much like a sleigh’s except a bit lower. For steering there was a curved brass tiller, gleaming in the electric light. “Motor’s under the seat,” Tom said. “Single cylinder, seven horsepower.”
    â€œSeven horsepower! For this little car. Must go like the devil.”
    â€œFactory says to break it in a bit,” Tom replied while climbing up onto the leather bench seat. “I haven’t driven it much yet, but they’re supposed to do a good thirty miles per hour once you get ’er up to speed.”
    Ever since the year before when two men in an ’03 Marmon had driven across the country, Tom had dreamt about owning an automobile. He couldn’t justify spending more than $2,000 for one of the big Packards or Marmons, a sum only a wealthy man or a true spendthrift would consider. But when an Oldsmobile made the trip from San Francisco to New York just a few weeks after the Marmon, Tom figured that was the car for him. Much smaller than the Packards, Marmons, or Stanleys, the Oldsmobile was also only $650 dollars, expensive enough, but not extravagant. It was perfect for him and Mary, as stylish in its way as any coach-and-four and far more modern.
    â€œHow d’you start the thing?” Mike asked as he looked over the various levers. “Crank start, right?”
    â€œYeah,” Tom said. “Over on the side. You give it a couple of good turns and it starts right up. Of course, the driver has to set the clutch and spark and activate the speeder. It’s a little complicated.” Tom showed Mike how the crank was inserted and the starting sequence. “Only takes about twenty seconds once you get the hang of it, leastwise that’s what the factory fella said. Takes me more like a minute or so.”
    â€œLet’s give ’er a go! Whadya say?”
    Tom shook his head with a wry twist of his mouth. “Can’t start her up in here. Scares the horses. I gotta have them push it out.”
    â€œThat’s okay. We can push it. What’s it weigh? Not much I’d guess.”
    â€œâ€™Bout seven hundred pounds,” Tom said. “But I think we should be getting back anyway. Ma’ll start to worry.”
    â€œNah,” Mike said, checking his watch. “We’ve only been gone a half hour.” He was dying to get behind the tiller.
    â€œReally?” Tom kicked one of the tires. “Truth is, I’m a little leery of taking her out at night. Don’t feel sure enough at the tiller. Hell, I only drove the thing once yesterday. Give me a week to practice, really get the hang of it. Then we’ll go for a good long ride, out to Prospect Park or something, race the El up Second Avenue, have some fun.”
    Mike hesitated. He’d wanted to go roaring off into the night. He looked at his father in the dim light of the overhead bulbs, suddenly noticing how the shadows made his eyes seem hollow, the creases in his face like a road map. His hair in that light looked thin and wispy and entirely gray. There had been a time when Tom wouldn’t have given it a second thought either, would have been like a boy with a new puppy. It was as if he’d aged years in the space of an evening.
    Tom picked up on Mike’s look, but then gave him a wicked grin and the old Tom was back, the man who’d stood his ground at