had he created here? And what on Earth was I supposed to charge these people? And where would we put them all?
"Don't worry," Kern said in reply to my concerns, seeming to read my thoughts. "Tell them that because they're sharing, they get charged individually, but at a discounted rate. Tell them they're being charged limousine rates, which are the lowest rates allowed by law. And it's five apiece for the students, seven to the Inntowner and ten to the Radisson."
As I was about to get back behind the wheel, I glanced at the crowd that stared longingly at my cab. In Constantanople, the mob had killed the ox-cart driver in the process tipping over the wagon. A wheel broke, rendering the wagon useless. The ox bolted and broke a leg when the mob chased it into a ditch.
"Can you send more cabs?" a haggard-looking old woman pleaded, a pile of luggage at her feet.
"Of course," Kern replied. "Okay, we need two in the front, two in the back." He looked at me. "This cab has a bench seat so you can legally take five passengers, but you gotta have two up front." Kern directed the two men to sit in front with me, while he sat in back between the two women.
"Oh, and Count," Kern said as we left the airport, "hit your LoQ and tell the dispatcher there's action at the airport. Always let the dispatcher know if there's action at the airport. Just make sure you wait until after you leave. You don't want to attract too much attention to the situation untilafter you've got your split."
****
Kern spent most of the ride conversing with the two women. Even without his attention, all the transactions were completed smoothly. The meter ran $15.00, but the cash collected totaled $33.00, $27 in flat-rated limo fares and six dollars in tips. Holy Grail indeed!
Afterward, Kern had me take him home. I tried to share some of my good fortune with him, but he would have none of that.
"Just go out there and make some money," Kern said, "now that you know how. And don't make me have to retrain you again."
Still, one question remained.
"Why was this manner of training so dramatically different from our previous session? Are you trying to tell me that being a good cooperative member and making money are states of conflict and contradiction?"
"Hell, no, Count. Like I said, the co-op wants you to make money. If you don't make money, the co-op doesn't either. It's just that during training, we gotta cover the basics, and we gotta make sure everyone drives safe. Again, I'm not telling you to not drive safe, but you could drive just a smidgen faster. See, again, the co-op wants you to make money, but I can't exactly tell you all the finer points of making money while in my official capacity as a trainer.
"That's why I don't train on Sundays. That's the big day at the airport and the bus stations. Hell, makes it hard to demonstrate how to be a good cooperative member if I ignore the board and dead-head to the airport all the time. Besides, other veterans get pissed if I let out too many secrets to a rookie. After all, we need rookies to run calls that allow us airport rats to do what we like best."
"And what's that?"
"What you just did. Now, get outta my hair, Count. Buy me a few beers sometime. You owe me."
****
At first, Kern had just seemed ridiculous, then selfish, then finally he revealed himself to be a combination of all the possibilities, almost a microcosm of the cooperative itself and all its seemingly diametric contradictions, simply demonstrating that a cooperative is a rather peculiar organism of a whole comprised by many individuals, attempting to balance the interests of the many with those of the one.
Kern's message, however, eventually became clear; the best thing a driver can do for him or herself and the cooperative is to make money. And, thanks to Kern, that was exactly what I began to do. He had been correct in his assessment of my performance, and with his help those bimonthly paychecks began to increase steadily, albeit with certain peaks and valleys.
In my first three months, thanks to Kern's advanced instruction and bitterly cold weather in January and February, I managed to save about two thousand dollars, which then went into a reliable mutual fund. Long-termMadison residents commented that it was the harshest winter experienced in a