Fire Sale

When we’d tapped our high-heeled way across the lot to the entrance, it was clear that the building’s utility stopped at its shape. It was constructed from some kind of pale gold stone, perhaps even marble, since that seemed to be what covered the lobby floor. The lobby walls were paneled in a rich red-gold wood, with amber blocks set into them here and there. I thought of the endless rows of snow shovels, flags, towels, ice-melt in the warehouse on Crandon, and Patrick Grobian, hoping to make the move out here from his dirty little office. Who could blame him, even if it meant sleeping with Aunt Jacqui?

This early in the day, no receptionist sat behind the giant teak console, but a sullen-faced guard got up and demanded our business.

“Are you Herman?” I asked. “Billy the Ki-young Billy Bysen invited me up for the morning prayer meeting.”

“Oh, yes.” Herman’s face relaxed into a fatherly smile. “Yes, he told me a friend of his would be stopping by for the prayer meeting. He said you should go straight to the meeting room. This lady with you? Here, these passes are good for the day.”

He handed over a couple of large pink badges labeled “Visitor,” with the day’s date stamped on them, without even asking for photo IDs. I didn’t think Herman’s sudden friendliness was because we knew a member of the family, but because Billy the Kid made the people around him happy and protective-I’d seen the same reaction in the truck drivers who’d been teasing him on Thursday night.

Herman also handed us a map, marking the route to the meeting room for us. The building was constructed like the Merchandise Mart, or the Pentagon, with concentric corridors leading to labyrinths of cubicles. Although each corner had a black plastic tag identifying its location, we kept getting turned around and needing to retrace our steps. Or I kept getting turned around; Marcena stumbled blindly in my wake.

“You going to pull yourself together before we meet Buffalo Bill?” I snarled.

She smiled seraphically. “I always rise to the occasion. This one just doesn’t seem to need my best effort yet.”

I bit back a retort: I couldn’t win at any sniping interchange.

I knew I was on the right trail, or corridor, when we started meeting other people heading the same way we were. We got a lot of stares-strangers in the midst, women, to boot, in the midst of a sea of gray-and brown-suited men. When I double-checked that we were going the right direction, I found people assumed we were vendors from outside the company. I wondered if morning church was a required ritual for doing business with By-Smart.

As we looked around for seats together, a woman whispered to me that the front row was reserved for the family and for senior officers of the company. Marcena said that was fine, the farther from the center of the action the better. We found two chairs together about ten rows back.

When Billy the Kid had invited me to the prayer meeting, I’d pictured something like the Lady Chapel at a church where a friend of mine is in charge-statues of Mary, candles, crucifixes, an altar. Instead, we were in a nondescript room in the interior of the fourth floor, windowless except for the skylights. I saw later it was a kind of multipurpose room, smaller and less formal than the auditorium, where employees could hold exercise classes or other activities that weren’t exactly work related.

This morning it was set up with chairs fa

There were a few women besides Marcena and me; one of them arrived in Bysen’s entourage. She appeared both deferential and self-assured-the perfect personal assistant. Her face was flat, like a skillet, and covered in heavy pancake. She was carrying a slim gold portfolio that she unzipped and left on the desktop, open so that both she and Bysen could see it. It was she who sat at Bysen’s right hand as the i

Morning service seemed to be where Bysen held court. Before the prayers started, a number of people came up to hold low-voiced conversations with him. The skillet-faced woman paid careful attention to them all, jotting notes into the gold portfolio.

Besides the pastor and Billy the Kid, there were four other men at the table; people waiting for their moment with Bysen would engage with one or another of those four, but everyone, I noticed, had a smile and a quick word with Billy. At one point, he happened to catch sight of me in the audience; he gave his sweet shy smile and a little wave, and I felt momentarily cheerier.

After about fifteen minutes of attending his vassals, Bysen nodded at the woman, who put away her portfolio. This was the signal for everyone to get back to their chairs. Billy, blushing with importance, got up to introduce the pastor from Mt. Ararat, with a few words about his own involvement in South Chicago, and how important church life, and Pastor Andrés’s work, were for that community. Andrés gave an invocation, and Billy read a passage from the Bible, the bit about the rich man with the unfaithful steward. When he’d finished, he took a seat near his grandfather.

We started with prayers for everyone involved in By-Smart’s far-flung enterprises, petitions for the wisdom of management to make good decisions, petitions for the workers here and abroad, for the strength to do what was required of them. As Pastor Andrés moved into his address and the rest of us dozed, Bysen kept his attention fixed on the minister, his heavy brows twitching.

I was dozing myself when the tempo of Andrés’s voice picked up. His voice became louder, more declamatory. I sat up to pay attention to his conclusion.

“When Jesus talks about the steward who has misused his master’s gifts, He is talking to us all. We are all His stewards, and to those whom the most is given, from them is the most expected. Heavenly Father, You have bestowed on this company, on the family who owns it, very great gifts indeed. We beseech You in Your Son’s name to help them remember they are Your stewards only. Help everyone in this vast company to remember that. Help them to use Your gifts wisely, for the betterment of all who work for them. Your Son taught us to pray ‘Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.’ The success of By-Smart leaves much temptation in its path, the temptation to forget that many who labor are heavy-laden, that they will present themselves to Your Son with many, many tears for Him to wipe away. Help everyone who works here in this great company to remember the lowest in our midst, to remember they have the same divine spark, the same right to life, the same right to a just return for the fruits of their labor-”

A loud clatter startled me. Mr. Bysen had pushed himself out of his chair, shoving his walking stick so that it had bounced on the floor. One of the gray men at the table jumped to his feet and took the old man’s arm, but Bysen shook him off angrily and pointed to the stick. The man stooped for it and handed it to Bysen, who stumped toward the exit. The skillet-faced woman quickly slid the gold portfolio under her arm and followed him, catching up with him before he reached the door.