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said.
     
    “Amen,” said Broadhead.
     
    “Represent,” said Fanta. She straightened in her seat. “Oh, too cool. Wicked.”
     
    Valentino had slowed in front of The Oracle.
     
    He’d given his new young acquaintance credit for making her case with logic and sympathy for the opposing side. Now he assigned her extra points for her ability to see past the superficial. The old building was too cool, and wicked besides; but it required a special gift to disregard the ravages of time and criminal neglect to recognize its original glory.
     
    Gone was the fabulous marquee, condemned as structurally unsound sometime between its brief Bohemian renaissance as a venue for screening obscure art films and the descent of the hippie hordes, whose unshaven armpits and community bongs had left their stench. Subsequent showings of XXX smut and blaxploitation tripe had emboldened its neighbors to obscure the Deco fluting and baroque flourishes beneath a palimpsest of spray-painted gang symbols and schoolboy obscenities. Plywood covered the box-office windows.
     
    “If we close our eyes, we might convince ourselves we’re attending the premiere of Gone With the Wind,” Broadhead said. “But only if we close our noses, too. What is that smell?”
     
    Valentino said, “Animal-control officers raided the place next door for breeding fighting dogs. It isn’t permanent.”
     
    “Hooray for Hollywood. I wonder if Garbo will make an appearance.”
     
    “Get a clue, Professor. He hasn’t taken possession yet.”
     
    Valentino could have kissed her, if he didn’t think she’d sue for harassment. He looked for a place to park.
     
    **
     
    “I’ve seen worse, believe it or not,” Broadhead said. “In Detroit, they turned one of their premier showcases into a parking garage. They ought to reinstate the death penalty for that if nothing else.” He lit his pipe, mingling the scent of his apple-scented tobacco with the incense and patchouli still lingering from the Age of Aquarius. He left footprints an eighth of an inch deep in the dust on the linoleum that covered the mosaic in the lobby.
     
    Valentino, recognizing his friend’s attempt to alleviate his former negativity, swallowed his resentment. A creature of indeterminate species, possibly a bat, had marked its territory inside a glass case that had once contained an assortment of Baby Buths and Cracker Jacks. “It’s a challenge,” he said. “I expect to establish a lasting relationship with the Bank of Bel-Air.”
     
    “Worth every penny.” Fanta caressed the plate glass preserving a letterpress poster advertising a 1979 showing of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, demonstrably the last feature that had played the location before a secession of fly-by-night retail shops had taken over the ground floor. She left a leopard-print impression of her fingerprints in the soot. “You should host a grand reopening with a Halloween showing of Nosferatu.”
     
    “I’m going to live here, not curate a museum.”
     
    “Let’s brave the stairs,” Broadhead said. “I’m feeling lucky today.”
     
    Valentino had thought to bring a flashlight; the light was fading, and the projection booth was dark enough to show a feature. The beam made shadows conducive to the appearance of Max Fink’s sad ghost.
     
    “Greed? You’re kidding me, right? Faculty doesn’t usually take part in sorority initiations.” Fanta studied one of the film cans in the pale orange glow.
     
    Broadhead snatched it from her hands. He ran a thumb over the label. “Stenciling looks genuine. There’s some adhesion here; they used to ship the posters stuck to the cans. Pity. An original poster for Greed could finance most of the renovation.”
     
    “You’re killing me here,” Valentino said. “You’re the one who told me Hitchcock was a sadist.”
     
    “That was a compliment. No one who considered himself a master of suspense could be anything but. However, I’m not going to open them in