by Bill Branger
— This sounds good, but I don’t see it (Orestes said). Look at our hotel. There are naked babies in the lobby, fat women sitting around with nothing to do all day, there are prostitutes and old men and I swear on my father’s grave there are drug addicts everywhere. You call that freedom?
— Sere it’s freedom. They’re free to fail, I said.
— Some freedom. That’s freedom with no purpose. You say this says to come to America from wherever you were from because you got nothing where you were from and you can have nothing here just the same.
Orestes was just looking for an argument, I knew that, but I hated to come out second best when I am in the process of defending the American way of life, especially to a half-smart catcher from Cuba who is on the punk side of twenty-five years of age.
— Orestes, being free means being free. It says no one will stand in your way. You can get an education and go out and make something out of your life. It says that no matter who you are or where you came from or who your daddy is or even if you got no daddy at all to speak of, you can be anything you want to be as long as you’re willing to work hard for it.
— Señor Shawn, that is so much shit of the bull. I may be young and I may be an ignorant peasant, but I know the smell of the shit of a bull when. I see it.
—- You saying I’m full of shit, Orestes?
— You’re full of shit.
“How’d you like to chew your teeth, you little Commie shit?” I said in English.
— Señor, Señor. Don’t get into a fight with Orestes over nothing (Raul said). Come on, let’s go back to the boat, it’s freezing here.
— It isn’t over nothing, he said I was full of shit. Raul shook his head.
— Act your age, Señor.
He had a point. What was I doing this for except to be a good fellow with the kids and sort of let them settle into New York a little more, make the place seem more like home?
I had thought about it on the road trip, watching the kids write their letters to moms and wives and sweeties, thinking how it had been tough on me the first year with the Yankees. The married players all lived in the suburbs, up in Scarsdale and like that, and the unmarried ones were for partying every night down in the Village or SoHo. Me, I just crawled into a TV set in my room in the El Dorado Hotel every night and drank a six-pack of beer watching John Wayne or old Clint or Jimmy Stewart do the right thing. I was a little shy about partying with so many girls hanging on each arm, reaching into my pocket for their champagne bills.
To me a good time is taking a girl out to a two-step bar and listening to a little country music on the stage and drinking beer and eating peanuts. Or going to a pig roast in someone’s yard or getting in my Buick and driving down to the Gulf Coast for no other reason than that it’s there.
I know that makes me sound dull but I’ve begun to think it’s my natural color. You can’t shine shit, you know.
The ferry took us back to Manhattan and it was time for the afternoon rush hour, which gave Julio plenty of time to regale us with stories of old New York and how the Anglos had cheated the Indians and, later, cheated the Puerto Ricans. We ended up back at the hotel after hearing a long, stirring argument in favor of Puerto Rican independence, which I, for one, had come ‘round to supporting just from listening to Julio’s playful grievances all afternoon.
I signed the driver’s slip and agreed on the time and slipped him a twenty as a tip, which he didn’t think was enough.
“This is an insult,” Julio said.
“Fine,” I said. “Give it back, then.”
Julio, insult intact, slammed the door in my face and took off for parts unknown, I myself was tired enough of the team by now to wish for my robe and slippers in my little studio apartment in Fort Lee. But Raul pulled my sleeve.
— What do you do now, Señor?
— I disappear.
— Where do you live?
— Over there in New Jersey,
— You are not married.
— No, I’ve escaped that. Just seriously in love, but I keep it under my hat.
— It is terrible to be in love and not be married.
—- The cure is to get out of love. Or get married, same thing.
— I would rather die of my affliction than be cured of it. (Raul smiled.). Now, that’s what I mean. That was a sweet thing and it was well said, the
way these Cubanos could do when they put their Castilian tongues to it. I may not be able to speak Spanish that well, but I’m a big fan of the language. I gave Raul a smile then that was probably just a tad too middle-aged and cynical, but that was the way I was suddenly feeling.
— Come on, Señor. Come have a beer with me before you go home. You cannot go anyway while the traffic is like this and I have found a nice place.
— I thought you didn’t have time for anything except writing to your girlfriend.
— My intended.
— Your fiancee, then. Romero know you cruising around the Apple, looking for fun?
— I look for a place like home. To hear my own voice speaking.
— You found one?
— I found one.
He looked at me, waiting. The city throbbed around us, unaware of us, our Spanish-speaking voices just one more bit of garlic in the stew. Or jalapeño.
Sure, I thought. What the hell?
It was an interesting decision on Ryan Shawn’s part, in light of what happened next and next after that.
23
While the kids scattered, some to their rooms and some down the street to the McDonald’s, I went with Raul. I went not because I needed a buddy and not because I longed to keep on trying to speak Spanish in a civil way but because I was curious as to what Raul had found on his own in New York City and what he thought was a nice place.
Turned out to be a bar on Third Avenue called Tapas. I guess I must have walked by it a hundred times and never saw it.
It was in a storefront with the bottom half of the window painted black. “Tapas” was written in orange neon in the window and that was the only light coming from the place. We stepped into the foyer and there was a heavy black curtain that opened into the main — and only — room.
The bar filled the south wall — mirror and bottles behind and drinkers and glasses in front. There was a jukebox and it was wailing some kind of foreign shit, guitars and such. Not country-western and not anywhere near Waylon.
It was dark and smoky.
The voices were in Spanish. On the north side of the room were tables with white paper table covers. On the faded, yellowish wall were posters of bullfights in places like Sevilla and Barcelona and Madrid. I followed Raul to the back of the dining room where there was a regulars’ table. Every good joint has one — a table without a covering, usually round, usually full of the usuals.
They greeted Raul with laconic enthusiasm, sort of the Spanish-speaking equivalent of “how ya doin’.” Raul was offered a chair but he stood and I realized he was going to introduce the gringo.
— This is Ryan Shawn, the manager of the Yankees.
They looked up at me. One was heavyset with clear blue eyes and a dark suit. His tie was neatly affixed to the top of his white shirtfront and he wore a jeweled tie clip. The second man was going bald on top and had large hands with a lot of calluses on the fingers and palms. The third dude was younger — about thirty — sort of hidden back in the shadows of the lamp lights.
“Hey,” I said in English. I didn’t stick out my mitt in the all-American greeting because it didn’t seem to me anyone wanted to extend himself to reach forward.
— He wants to follow you to see if you are in touch with the counterrevolutionaries? (said the man with the tie clip).
— Tell him the Irish bar is at the end of the block. He can celebrate St. Patrick’s Day there.
This came from the younger guy in the shadows. There was a mean edge to it.
I didn’t say a thing, Raul said:
— I invited him to have a drin
k with me.
— You should make him pay, Raul. He makes much more money than you do, by spying on you.
— Castro’s pet.
I didn’t know who said the last thing. I just smiled in my lazy, Clint-Eastwood way, not taking offense, and I said:
— Raul, I ain’t welcome. You have your beer with your friends and I’ll just go home to Fort Lee.
— Suburbanite.
This came from the tie clip.
— Yeah, well, we can’t all afford to live in the Big Apple.
— You can (Tie Clip said).
— Not me. I’m just a country boy, got to go to sleep with the cows.
— He sleeps with cows.
This got a laugh, even if it wasn’t such a nice laugh. It broke the ice. But Raul wasn’t having any of it.
— He is my guest.
Raul said this exactly the way Errol Flynn might have said it before slicing up the Sheriff of Nottingham or something.
— Sit down, sit down (Tie Clip said, gesturing to empty chairs). Any friend of Raul’s is welcome here. Have you been here before, Señor Shawn?
— Not really.
— You like Spanish food? I sat.
— Oh, tacos and shit like that, yeah.
— This is not tacos and ‘shit’ like that. (This was from the young guy in the shadows.)
Tie Clip gave the young guy a look and then turned to me.
— You speak Spanish.
— Come from Texas.
— I thought so. Mexican accent.
— And you speak like a Cuban.
— Bravo. I am Cubano. My name is Jose Marti Riccardo.
— Any relation to Ricky Ricardo?
That stopped up the conversation a moment and then Tie Clip smiled. He had a weary face and bright eyes and he leaned forward and took my hand without me realizing it was ready to be taken. We did a shake. His hand was soft.
Introductions all around. The young guy was Estavar something and it turned out he was an interpreter at the United Nations, rendering into Spanish things said in English and Italian. The other guy with the big, calloused hands and the hair going to bald was another Jose, this time named Martinez and he was a limo driver who hustled as an illegal taxi on the side. He gave me his card and said he knew where Fort Lee was and he wouldn’t complain about taking me there. This was a good thing to know and I thanked him.
I had beer and it was San Miguel, which is not the same as Miller GD but had its own cool. Raul had a beer and then there was a plate full of things like octopus or scampi and other things like that. I am not much for fish that looks strange but. I thought I should dip in, even if I was going to get poisoned by it. The others were into their cups — Jose Marti Riccardo was into rum and Coke and the other Jose, the driver, was drinking Tio Pepe brandy — and we weren’t going to catch up with them.
— Señor Shawn is the one who came to Cuba to get us to play for the Yankee team, Raul said.
— I know. You forgive them, Señor, they are not baseball fans here but I read the baseball news every day in the Daily News, (This from Señor Riccardo.)
— Football, huh?
Estavar said, in cold, precise English, “I suppose you mean American football but that’s a stupid, barbarian game. I mean football.” “Soccer,” I said. “Football,” he said.
— Call it what you want.
— You should speak English, you don’t speak Spanish very well.
— What do you do in your spare time, Estavar? You a diplomat? That got a smile from the other two — not a laugh, not near a laugh, but
a smile — city, clashing with security forces in the biggest and Estavar leaned into the light a little and I could see his face. Why is it I know every punk’s resentful face and why do they all look the same? He could have been a beered-up pickup truck cowboy on the road to Galveston looking for a pool cue fight just as well as he could be a UN translator sitting in a Spanish bar on Third Avenue.
— Ignore Estavar, Señor. I love baseball, I am a Yankee fan for thirty years since I came to New York. I once caught a Reggie Jackson home run with these bare hands.
I liked Tie Clip. He was sprawled back in his wooden armchair, enjoying the booze and the smell of cigarette smoke forming brown clouds over the tables. There were a few eaters, but I found out the rush came around nine at night. This was a Spanish place and it was a shabby bit of old España, trying to keep alive thoughts of home, even if the customers came from different homes in the Spanish-speaking world. I bought a round when the girl came again and no one turned it down, not even Estavar. Everyone saluted and we laid it back into our throats.
— Señor (began Jose Riccardo), are the Yankees very good this year?
— I don’t know.
Raul looked at me then.
I looked at him. “I dunno,” I said in English. I looked at Riccardo. “Trouble is, everyone feels their way the first forty games of the season. Everyone is trying to figure everyone out. Teams change every year. Players who are dipshit in one league find a new life in another league. Trades and combinations. Not to mention twenty-four brand-new ballplayers on the Yanks that nobody ever saw play outside of Havana.”
“The element of surprise,” Jose Marti Riccardo said thoughtfully. “Yes. I see that.”
Raul said:
— No, no. Much better than just a surprise.
— You, Raul, are the greatest surprise of all (Riccardo said). What a beautiful hitter, I want to cry when I see you hit the ball.
I pulled tickets out of my wallet, good box tickets of the kind that are a manager’s perk. I threw them casually on the table.
— Come on out and see us.
— Much thanks, Señor.
Riccardo palmed the tickets and then examined them and said again “much thanks.” He doled one out to the driver and offered one to Estavar.
— Baseball is a tedious game (Estavar said).
— It has its moments (I said).
— Why are you insulting me? (Raul said).
— I am not insulting you, Raul, I am insulting this gringo.
“Shit, hoss, you can’t insult me. I’m insult-proof.” Said it easy, just like it reads.
Estavar said, “You work for Señor Castro, the pig. You work for the CIA.”
“Hold on, I work for George Bremenhaven, which is even worse.”
“The pig who raped Cuba.”
“George gave these kids a chance to play in the Bigs.”
“Bigs?” said Riccardo.
“The major leagues,” I said.
Raul held up his hand.
— Let’s speak Spanish. Riccardo said:
— Is this a good man, Raul?
— He is doing what he has to do.
There was a shrug in that answer as well. I saw the way this was going. It wasn’t Raul’s fault but it was like the time that Pedro Quininos and I went down into this Billy Bob bar on the road to Galveston with me.forgetting he was a Mexican wearing a sombrero and the next thing you knew, we were playing Zorro with pool cues with half the cowboys in the place. Sometimes you forget where you are when you come out of the workplace and go down home.
— Raul, I’ve got to call it an early night. I appreciate the beer.
— No, no, Señor Shawn. I buy you a beer. I must, before you leave.
— And have this. It is octopus (said Riccardo).
I thought it was. But I took it anyway. It was chewy and I chewed. Sort of like Doublemint gum with all the sugar gone out of it.
More beer came. The juke played this woman singing in a falsetto and there were feet dancing on the record as well as that throbbing flamenco guitar.
“Whaddaya you do, Mr. Riccardo?”
“I am a courtroom interpreter,” he said.
“Like criminal court?”
“Yes. I am on call in the branches in Manhattan to interpret for the clients who do not speak English.”
“Lots of them, I guess.”
“Lot of them. W
e also have a Korean interpreter, Mr. Kimm Soo Long, and there is the Polish lady, Mrs. Gzenewski.”
“Polish? I didn’t figure on Polish.”
“You only think the lawbreakers are Spanish, is that it?” asked Estavar.
“No, I figured the Spanish speakers played ball for the Yankees,” I said. Little shit was getting me hot.
Raul leaned forward then. He fixed his eye on Estavar. He held it a moment, just like an actor. I swear his eye was going to do an Eastwood twitch, but he just held it there on Estavar, his strong wrists gripping the edge of the table.
“Mr. Shawn gave us his free day. To show us this city. He took us to many places. He didn’t take us to the courts.” He said this in careful and totally unaccented English. “We saw the Statue of Liberty.”
“Ah, the statue. Muy buena,” said Riccardo.
Estavar said, “He wants you to defect. Why don’t you defect and get it over with?”
Raul blinked. The language was too fast for him.
— Defect (repeated Estavar in Spanish). He is trying to lure you to defect. To show you how much there is in America and how little you have in Cuba.
— I will never defect. My fiancee. She is in Havana.
Riccardo appeared uncomfortable. He tapped the tips of his fingers together. He said:
— Please, please. This is a place for pleasant thoughts and pleasant words. Señor Shawn is not an agent provocateur. I have seen him play many times.
Now what the hell did that mean? Did he mean there was something about the way I pitched that said I couldn’t be whatever he said I wasn’t?
— Look. I don’t want anybody to do anything except play ball. We’re going to Texas next week and swing through the West Coast and all I want to do is play ball and get through this season.
— And win the pennant (Raul said). I looked at him.
He stared at me.
— Well, yeah. Everyone’s got a chance.
— We have more than a chance.
— You got a chance, Raul We ain’t anywhere near winning the pennant.
— Look at what we have done.
— Look at Suarez. He don’t pace himself as a pitcher. He’s throwing his arm out. He’ll be a cripple by July. Look at Tomas at short. He keeps getting surprised by the ball.