The Curiosity

by Stephen Kiernan

  “What?” Gerber yelps. “Fifty cents? Do you have any idea what today’s tickets cost?”

  People up and down the car look at us, then studiously turn away. It’s one of my favorite things about mass transit, how people fake like they aren’t listening. It’s the same in New York subways, BART in San Francisco, the D.C. Metro, everywhere the experts in eavesdropping.

  “I can’t imagine. Four dollars? Six?”

  I just laugh, I can’t help it. “Not quite, Frank.”

  Gerber cackles, too. “Try nine hundred.”

  “I beg your pardon? That’s impossible. Why, in my time the players only earned perhaps three thousand a season.”

  “Well, bub, now they get a thousand times that much,” I say. “Or more.”

  That sets him off again, this time about all the special players in the great season of 1903. “That year was the first World Series, you see, to settle the feud between the American and National leagues. Pittsburgh went ahead of the Red Sox by three games to one. The pitching was amazing, blistering speed, even though the leagues had moved the mound back a few years before because no one could get a hit off Amos Rusie. Oh, it is all coming back to me now.”

  “I can tell,” I snore at him. “How wonderful for you.”

  There are plenty of buffs out there who dote on dusty baseball lore, but not me. Sure, when yours truly covered the legislature, I knew every committee chairman and which lobbyists bought him the most drinks. When it comes to sports, though, all the numbers wreck it as bad as a rainout. Just tell me who’s in first place, and if it isn’t the Yanks then how many games back are they, and how long till the play-offs. When people carry on about early baseball, I can feel myself growing cobwebs.

  We reach the Fenway stop and move with the crowd toward the stairs. Frank’s mouth is running like a lawn mower.

  “Buck Freeman, he was first baseman. Jimmy Collins—oh, he was a quick one. He played third, and was also team manager. But the real strength was Bill Dinneen, the pitcher. Of course we had Cy Young, too, the greatest hurler ever, but he was older by then. Also Iron Man McGinnity, who pitched three doubleheaders all by himself that August. At any rate, the Red Sox came back from that three-to-one deficit to win four games straight and take the first World Series.”

  At that, an old man next to us turns from climbing the stairs. “And it was big Bill Dinneen pitched three of those four comeback games,” he wheezes. He’s wearing an ancient Sox cap that fits his noggin like a second skin.

  “That’s correct,” the judge says, like they’re instant brothers. “Exactly correct.”

  One more second of this gung ho gullyrot and I’m going to slap somebody. I bend away toward Yawkey Way, the alley beside the park. I know what will cork him.

  Sure enough the vendors are out with their carts, hawking T-shirts and hats. I dicker with one for half a minute, and come back a few bucks poorer but with a nice fresh cap, blue with a red B on the front, and pop it on old Frank’s head.

  “Now you’re a legitimate fan,” I say.

  Gerber points at him. “Why, look. Isn’t that man a Royal Rooter?”

  The judge stops right where he’s standing, takes in all the people wearing ordinary clothes for a game, ball caps and T-shirts and not a top hat in sight. Then he adjusts the lid, and puffs his chest out like an old-time bodybuilder. “I smell victory.”

  “Nah,” I say, leading him in. “They’re just boiling the hot dogs.”

  The TV crew is waiting, along with a guide from the stadium. We get a complete tour of the downstairs. We meet the team owner, a white-haired guy with a tan so perfect it would make a movie star give up sunblock. The judge shakes hands with everyone, a big sincere “hello there,” I don’t care if it’s a janitor with his mop and bucket. The camera guy leans in constantly to get his angle. Frank and the owner both seem oblivious. I just try to stay out of the lights.

  Finally one of the handlers leads us through a maze of halls toward the field, pausing in the last bit of shadowed doorway as if to build suspense. Grass and light beckon from beyond. I’m thinking it’s corny to hesitate there, until a second later when we march into the reality of the park. Now, I don’t care which team you like, dammit, or what century you were born in, coming out of the door onto that giant lawn and the summer sun and the rows of seats rising all around you, I tell you that is something, really something.

  “What do you think of that, old Frank?”

  He rotates in a slow circle. “Why do you call me that?”

  “No reason,” I say. “It’s an old joke.”

  “My name is Jeremiah Rice,” he replies absently, taking in the whole scene. “We might see ten thousand people attending a game, in my time. Today must be three or four times that sum.” He keeps turning. “So much humanity.”

  The stands are nearly filled, batboys and old-timers hanging around the dugouts, out-of-towners posing for snapshots, the general excitement before a ballgame. There’s a good half hour of folderol, what with baseball being all about a long windup before the pitch, if you know what I mean. Then the announcer calls forward an a cappella group from Tufts University to sing the national anthem.

  “I know that college,” the judge says. “I went there.”

  I stir the air with one finger. “Whoopie.”

  The kids have decent voices. A tall guy, skinny as an oar, sings incredibly low. One soprano with big red hair has a terrific set of knockers. Attagal.

  When they reach “the land of the free,” and hold that note, damn if our Frank doesn’t knuckle at one of his eyes. What the hell? As they finish and the crowd cheers, Gerber leans over. “You all right?”

  He nods. “I had forgotten.”

  What an odd duck, I swear. Then they announce that a special guest will throw today’s first pitch. At the name Jeremiah Rice, a big cheer goes up. He marches to the mound, an umpire and the team owner at his side. Before he arrives, though, a chorus of boos comes from somewhere, too. There it is, one moment capturing the world’s regard for the judge: fair to partly cloudy.

  The ump hands a ball to Frank. He weighs it, feeling the laces. He does the damnedest thing then, shucks off his coat to give his arms more freedom. But he needs somewhere to hang it, and while he’s looking around the whole stadium is waiting. It’s only the opening pitch, pal.

  That’s the moment the team owner gives a go-get-’em swing of his fist and says, “Let ’er rip, Jeremiah.” The judge turns, sees the guy’s outstretched arm, and hangs his jacket on it. Half the stadium breaks out laughing. The owner keeps a good friendly smile on. Maybe he’s not oblivious to the camera after all.

  Our Frank’s face is as serious as if the whole pennant race hangs on this pitch. He stares down the catcher, who holds his glove fat and forward like a ten-year-old couldn’t miss. Frank cranks his arm back, lifts a leg high, snaps down like a whip, and hurls that pill like nothing I would have expected: a hot line for the plate, zooming high and left, only to slice down in the last few feet, drop like a rock, and hit the catcher’s unmoved mitt with a satisfying smack.

  The place goes nuts. Frank takes his jacket back, thanks the owner, and shakes everybody’s hand all over again. The fans eat it up. He tips his brand-new cap. This is one adaptable freak, I give him that: from I-need-a-top-hat to curve-into-the-strike-zone in less than ninety minutes.

  The seats were ridiculous. Fourth row, just off the plate, so we looked down the third-base line. I convinced Frank to take off his jacket, but when I reached for the tie he jerked back.

  “Oh, no,” he says. “Certain standards must be maintained.”

  The cameraman sets up below us, and we forget he is there in about two beers’ time. Gerber tells the kid working the stands with cold ones to stay close and keep them coming. The first one goes down like air. The second has all the coolness to make a sunny day lie down like a dog baring its belly.
Our Frank takes a beer like a good lad, but after one sip he makes a face.

  “What’s the matter now?” I wipe foam from my lip.

  “No flavor,” he says. “It is perhaps the only sense my body hasn’t regained. Things don’t have as strong a taste.”

  “Maybe it’s not you,” Gerber says.

  “Whatever do you mean by that?”

  “Maybe the stuff we’re drinking today is really just overpriced piss.” He smiles and takes a big gulp. Frank considers his cup sideways, then sets it down beneath his seat.

  It turns out to be a pitcher’s game, strikeouts and brushbacks and no one on base. In other words a typically dull baseball game, one of the finest things on earth. I buy our Frank a program so he can handicap the batters. He has this theory that doubles are the indicator, that ever since Honus Wagner, the guys with the most doubles also have the best averages. I say that’s BS, till he shoves the program in my face and proves it, player after player right down the roster.

  “Whaddaya know?” I say, and raise an arm to signal the kid selling hot dogs. He works his way over and I order four. “Frank, you have got to chow on one of these babies. You’ll think you died and came back to life.”

  Gerber bursts out laughing. “Dixon, you have really have a gift for tact, you know that?”

  “Relax,” I say, passing dogs along. “He knows what I mean.”

  “I do,” the judge chimes in. “And I believe I will try one of those.”

  “You will?”

  “I’ve had quite enough of Dr. Borden’s fortified oatmeal.”

  “Rebellion,” Gerber says, one hand cupped at his mouth like a mock yell. “Insurrection.”

  “Here,” I say, “try it this way.” I gob some ketchup and a big splooge of mustard down the length of his dog, then do the same on one of mine.

  Frank sniffs the result. “When in Rome . . .” And he takes a good fat bite.

  “Now, isn’t that the best thing you ever tasted in your life?”

  “Oh, my heavens,” he says with his mouth full. “It’s all salt.” He looks around for something to wash it down with, then reaches between his feet to hoist that beer and slugs a good bit back.

  “Now we’re talking,” I tell him.

  “How can you eat these things?” He takes another gulp.

  “Diligence,” Gerber says. “Practice, practice, practice.”

  Frank is quiet for the next few minutes, serious as a chess game. He works his way through that hot dog, though, an inch at a time, easing the job with plenty of beer.

  For a moment I entertain the idea that we might get the guy boozed today. I can’t say why that appeals to me so much, but it definitely does. Gerber must have the same notion, because the second the judge’s cup is empty he signals the beer kid for another round. When the frosties arrive, our Frank does the old beneath-the-seat again. Oh well, more for us, I guess.

  The innings pass, the Yanks go up by one, the Sox take the lead, back and forth, all short shots and tight play. Our Frank fixes so hard on the game he sometimes sits with his mouth open. But the pace is totally easy, afternoon stretching out like a cat sunning on a sofa. At one point he turns to me. “Would you explain something please?”

  “Sure. Shoot.”

  “Why do you wear those?” He gestures at my shades.

  “To protect our eyes from the sun,” Gerber says.

  “Ha. That is why neither of you is squinting. We could certainly have used some of those spectacles in the Arctic seas.”

  “He’s lying,” I say. “That’s not it at all.”

  Gerber chuckles. “Why do you wear them, then?”

  “So I can ogle women without getting caught.”

  “Of course.” Gerber nods. “The other major reason.”

  “Like right there.” I nudge Frank. “See that blonde down there?” A hot little miss is just then standing to straighten her shorts: extremely, wonderfully brief cutoff jeans which have ridden oh so sweetly up her nice backside. Peaches, peaches, peaches.

  “Oh, my heaven,” the judge says. “Is that attire allowed?”

  “It’s a matter of taste,” Gerber answers. “Some of us prefer a different kind.”

  He points with his chin at a rolling-thunder-thighs honey, squeezed into black tights about nine sizes too small, her arms jiggling, legs rubbing against each other as she waddles down the aisle.

  “Oh, my heaven,” Frank says again.

  “The prosecution offers Exhibit B,” I say, pointing to the absolute babe coming along the row, long hair pulled high, T-shirt cut from below to show her yummy tummy, with the sparkle of a piercing at her navel.

  “Oh, my heaven,” the judge says, shaking his head. “My wife wore more as undergarments.”

  “Yeah.” I wolf down the last of my hot dog. “Isn’t it great?”

  “The defense humbly requests that you all check out Exhibit C,” Gerber says, grinning like a man with a winning lottery ticket. He gestures toward a woman across the way, her belly as round as a barrel, her chest so huge it provides a platform for carrying sodas and hot dogs. “I’m in love.”

  “Oh, my heaven,” Frank utters again. He has one hand over his mouth.

  “Let us now give thanks for Exhibit D,” I say, “over there in the white shirt.” In fact this young lady’s chemise, which is as tight as the casing on a hot dog, leaves absolutely zilch to the imagination about her masterpiece boobs. Lettering on her front reads LOVE ME ORTIZ ME.

  “Oh, my heaven,” Frank murmurs once more. “What do the words mean?”

  “It’s a joke about a player’s name,” Gerber says. “And I give. I surrender to your argument, and throw myself on the mercy of the court. What is my sentence?”

  “For the rest of the day,” I intone, playing a judge myself, “Frank gets to wear your shades. And we’ll just see which he stares at more, your evidence or mine.”

  “Fair enough,” Gerber says, handing them over.

  “Instead of concealing my leering,” the judge pauses, hovering the glasses over his face, “let these protect me from both kinds of immodesty.”

  Which is how, in the papers the next day, any photo that is not of Frank’s monster of a pitch instead shows him hoisting a beer or laughing behind dark glasses.

  One thing I forgot about Fenway fans was their annoying tradition during the seventh-inning stretch. With any other self-respecting team, the crowd knows that TV stations are airing a bunch of commercials for beer and trucks. The fans stand a minute, jaw with people around them, or buy another pop.

  Not at Sox games, oh, no. Instead the PA blasts that Neil Diamond tune “Sweet Caroline,” and people howl along at top volume. It sounds as awful as you would expect from a choir of drunks. The judge looks left and right, trying to follow the words. I all but cover my ears.

  Old Neil gets to the line “Hands . . . touching hands,” and every Fred Fatso and Joe Six-Pack in the place raises whichever hand isn’t holding a beer high overhead. The judge does, too.

  “Whoa,” Gerber cries out. “That is trippy.”

  I lean toward him. “What is?”

  “I’ve seen that before.” He points at Frank’s outstretched paw. “But it was frozen.”

  Weird and true. There is the image from the Arctic video, the same hand making the same gesture. It strikes me what a distance we’ve come. What a long way from the man encased in ice. I want to ponder that a minute, but the damn song is too distracting.

  Look, I’m all for camp, irony and all the trimmings. But after the tune said “good times never felt so good,” everyone in the crowd grins and hollers “so good, so good, so good.”

  Enough. I elbow our old Frank. “Come on. I need to hit the head.”

  He does that oddball look he often gives me when I use figures of speech. Still, he always puzzles out what I m
ean, and he follows me right up the aisle. “Remember Section 37”—I point at the sign—“in case we get separated.”

  When we first hit the john he is on my heels. One look at the long row of piss pots, though, all with lines of guys waiting, and he draws back, putting one hand on the wall.

  “Don’t touch that,” I advise him. “They may not have cleaned it since 1922.”

  The judge jumps away like the wall is electrified, then looks down at his paw as if it is swarming with bugs.

  “Just do your business quick. You can give your hands a good wash around the corner.” I head to a different line. “I’ll meet you outside.”

  He shuffles off, not saying a word. Poor bastard, imagine being scared of something as ordinary as a public washroom.

  I have to wait for him, which is fine by me. Fenway has no shortage of first-rate tail that day, delectability on parade is what it is. I lean against a pillar and save all that loveliness from going underappreciated.

  Our old Frank staggers out at last, looking like he’d spent a week at sea. He is halfway to me when a woman intercepts, a short-legged jellyfish in a red tracksuit, carrying a pink purse big enough to hold a bowling ball. In two seconds she’s glommed onto him. I duck behind the pillar, cursing myself for not bringing a notebook.

  “I knew I would meet you eventually,” she is saying, her arm tangled in his like she is part octopus. “I just knew it.”

  The judge stops walking, trying instead to work his arm free and having no luck. She doesn’t seem like any danger, so I decide to let the scene play out.

  “How may I help you, madam?”

  “You already have.” She’s grinning like a shark. “You gave me hope.”

  “I’m delighted,” he says, pushing one of her hands down his sleeve.

  “It’s my husband. He died of pancreatic cancer nine years ago.”

  “My condolences—”

  “No, it’s fine. Because we had him cryogenically frozen, you see?”

  Her voice is overmodulated, like the soprano loudmouth of a church choir. She pulls old Frank’s elbow in a death grip until he bends down.