Sudden Death fk-7

by William X. Kienzle

  Koesler smiled. “There’s lots of things, Pat. I go back to the seminary, audit some classes. Bone up on some of the new theological trends. Spend a bit more time visiting ill parishioners. There’s a nursing home in our parish. I go there every once in a while. Those folks really need company. We’ve started a few prayer groups in the parish. And,” he paused and chuckled, “then there’s the Bible discussion group. . how’s the fish?”

  In response, McNiff freed a segment of scrod, dabbed his fork in tartar sauce, speared the morsel, introduced it to his mouth, and chewed, a smile indicating approval. “How’s the hamburger?”

  “Fine.”

  “How does it stack up against the hamburger in every other eatery in town?”

  Koesler grinned. Of course, being together as much as they were, McNiff would be well aware of Koesler’s penchant for ordering ground beef.

  “I would say”-hamburger was one of the very few secular subjects about which Koesler felt qualified to expertly pontificate-“this is only slightly lower in quality than that of the London Chop House. And considerably lower in quantity than that of Carl’s Chop House, but then, Carl’s is especially appropriate just before or after famine.”

  McNiff sipped his wine. “Nice.” He knew as little about wine as did Koesler. “So,” McNiff returned to the previous topic, “you joined a Bible discussion group. As the leader, I suppose.”

  “Nope; just a member. Not even first among equals.”

  “Not the leader! Then why in God’s green world would a priest join a Bible discussion group? The other members can’t all be priests!”

  Koesler smiled as he swallowed a morsel of potato. “No, they are by no means priests. As a matter of fact, they all belong, in one way or another, to that team we saw get beat this afternoon. As for the reason I joined, it probably has a great deal to do with my inability to say no.

  “All Cougars!” Three surprises in one mealtime were not good for McNiff s digestion. “Come on! Come on!” he gestured, fingers curling into his palm, “let it all out. You’ll feel better for it.”

  Koesler touched a napkin to his lips. “As I said, my parishioner, Kit Hoffer, asked me to join this discussion group. I’m not sure why. But I’ve got a hunch he feels a little insecure in that group for one reason or another. So he wants his friendly parish priest along.”

  “Well, one incredibility after another. Who’da thought that a pro football team would have a Bible group?”

  “Not that surprising when you get into it. It’s kind of an offshoot of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. . you’ve heard of them?”

  McNiff nodded.

  “They sponsor prayer meetings, especially on the mornings of game days. It’s a very active, nondenominational organization. Actually, there are three discussion groups among the Cougar personnel. But ours-we call ourselves the God Squad-is the only one of the three that has allowed in an outsider.” He paused. “I guess that’s not so odd when you look at the disparity of our members.”

  McNiff s expression invited amplification.

  “There’s Kit-and me, of course-Jay Galloway, Dave Whitman, Jack Brown, Bobby Cobb, Niall Murray, and Hank Hunsinger.”

  McNiff whistled softly. “What a conglomeration! The owner, the general manager, the trainer, a priest, and four players. How did-”

  “I’m not sure. I think it was organized by Brown, the trainer. As for his motive, I can only guess at it. For one thing, I think he wanted to bring management and player personnel together. Management is certainly represented by Galloway and Whitman. But why he singled out the players he did is beyond me. Come to think of it, he may have invited other players to join. In any event, I assume he picked Cobb because he’s the hub of the team. And Hunsinger is the most notorious-or should I say he seems to be most in demand as far as publicity is concerned. Murray, as an immigrant and rookie, and Hoffer, as a rookie and backup to Hunsinger, would have to be about the least secure members of the team.” He stopped, then added, “I’m not claiming that these were Brownie’s reasons. But it’s the best scenario I can come up with.”

  McNiff finished his entree and was sipping coffee while being very thoughtful. “The one who seems most to stick out like a sore thumb in that group is Hunsinger. If you can believe what you read in the papers, the guy’s an out-and-out hedonist. And, on top of it all, I think I read that he’s a Catholic!”

  “Right on both counts. He is a Catholic, though certainly not a practicing one. He alone of the group always seems rather cynical. I’m only guessing, but I think the reason he’s in this bunch is that he wants as few things as possible going on behind his back. I think he knows he’s nearing the end of his career. So any meeting that Kit Hoffer attends, Hunsinger is probably sure to be found there.

  “As for the rumors about his private life, I guess there must be some truth to them. Our meeting last Tuesday evening was at his apartment. Talk about a swinging bachelor’s pad! Until I saw the Hun’s place, I’d only read about things like that. Mirrors everywhere, especially in the bedroom-even a mirror on the ceiling above a bed that’s set up on a platform.”

  “What for-the mirrors, I mean?”

  “It enhances the sexual experience for some people. Or so I’ve been told.”

  McNiff pondered that for a moment. “You met on Tuesday. Do you always meet on Tuesdays? Weekly? Monthly?”

  “Weekly. And, yes, always on Tuesday evenings. Tuesday is sort of the football players’ day off. Next Tuesday we meet at Galloway’s home.”

  “Any chance they would allow another member?” McNiff would be so proud to tell his parishioners that he was rubbing elbows with and dispensing theological opinions to real professional football players. “After all, if I get myself a business manager, I’ll have a little extra time on my hands.”

  Inwardly, Koesler winced. He wished McNiff had not asked that favor. The group was already of a size where it was difficult for each one to fully express himself. And then, too, it was just not the sort of group wherein McNiff would be comfortable. With a lay bunch such as the God Squad, McNiff would inevitably attempt to enforce his interpretation of Scripture. Except that it wouldn’t work with these men.

  “Tell you what, Pat. The first time there’s a chance to bring this up with the group, I’ll do it. But I wouldn’t hold my breath if I were you. I don’t get the impression they would let anybody else into the group. As it is, it’s a bit unwieldy. But I will give it a try.”

  Koesler meant what he said. McNiff seemed satisfied with the promise.

  Meal completed, they settled the bill, going Dutch.

  McNiff had met Koesler in the restaurant parking lot before the game. Koesler had driven them to the stadium and back. They now parted, each taking his own car.

  En route back to St. Anselm’s, Koesler thought about this odd Bible group. It certainly was composed of provocative but strikingly different personalities. He had gleaned a few new insights about the Bible from the group’s discussions. But, being a student of human behavior, he had learned a great deal more about the men who participated. Each was interesting in his own way. Especially interesting was their interrelationship.

  It was Koesler’s understanding that Galloway and Whitman had grown up together in Minnesota. He would have expected theirs to be a more fraternal relationship. It didn’t appear to be. Neither seemed to hold the other in much respect.

  Kit Hoffer was, of course, Koesler’s parishioner. But he was surprised at Hoffer’s attitude during the meetings. He seemed to resent Hunsinger, which, given Hoffer’s position on the bench behind the Hun, was natural enough. But Hoffer’s resentment appeared to spread to both Galloway and Whitman, as if it were their fault he spent so much time on the bench.

  Niall Murray, fresh from Ireland, was obviously not entirely at ease in a strange land and in a mostly foreign game. Outside of kicking a ball, he knew little of the refinements of pro football. And he seemed somehow oddly dependent upon Hunsinger.

  Just fro
m his interpretations of Scripture, it was clear that Bobby Cobb needed to control any situation in which he found himself. A practical attitude for a quarterback. The fly in Cobb’s ointment was Hunsinger, who was not one to be heavily influenced, let alone controlled.

  The trainer, Brownie, seemed the catalyst. Frequently, he bridged the gap between management and employees as well as between the players. This did not surprise Koesler, since it was Brownie who had initiated the group.

  Finally, there was Hunsinger. One of the more interesting and flamboyant characters Koesler had ever met. It seemed likely that the Hun was doing his best to negate his Catholic upbringing. Koesler had known a few people like that, but none to compare with Hunsinger. He seemed the least likely of any of the members to be part of a Bible study group. Why had he accepted Brownie’s invitation to join?

  As he had explained to McNiff, Koesler believed that the Hun realized he was nearing the end of his physical ability to compete and couldn’t afford to have anything going on behind his back. Especially anything that he might even remotely construe as potentially threatening to his position. Particularly with a group that included his employers, his quarterback, and his probable replacement. In this, the Hun resembled the slow-witted person whose eyes are in constant motion because he cannot afford to miss anything.

  If there was a common denominator to this group, it was that the feelings of everyone, with perhaps the exception of Brownie, toward the Hun ranged from dislike to contempt. This negative atmosphere bothered Koesler greatly. He had the premonition that something evil would come of it.

  The black Continental glided almost silently through the dark, narrow maze of streets. It was almost as if whoever had laid out the city of Grosse Pointe Farms had wanted to make it difficult for a stranger to find anything. Perhaps that had been the intent.

  Bobby Cobb, however, knew where he was going. He’d been there many times. Usually, as was the case now, for a postgame party. It didn’t much matter whether the Cougars won or lost; there were postgame parties virtually all over the Detroit area. The prestige of these parties could be measured by the quantity and quality of real-life football players in attendance. Obviously, it was the fate of most parties, given the relative paucity of players, to remain plebeian.

  The Continental began encountering a solid series of parked, mostly luxury cars. He was nearing his destination.

  Several attendants blocked the semicircular driveway at the Lake Shore address. They were there to block entry to anyone but the arriving Cougars and to park their cars. Nonplayer guests might have to park quite a distance away. But the players had run as far as they would be required to for this day.

  Cobb slid gracefully from his car, leaving the motor purring. A young attendant, newly hired for this job, held the door for him. Admiration was evident in the attendant’s eyes. Quickly, he studied Cobb as thoroughly as possible. It would be his responsibility to describe the famous quarterback to his fellow students at the University of Detroit Dental School tomorrow. They would want to know all about Cobb. And the attendant would tell them. About Cobb’s sharply chiseled features; his chocolate-colored face and hands; his closely cropped, kinky black hair with the trace of gray at the temples; the blue turtleneck, maroon blazer, and gray slacks, none of which could hide the rippling muscles beneath; and those huge hands, which, when wrapped around a football, made it appear to be no larger than a grapefruit.

  Cobb was aware in general of what the attendant was thinking. It was not an uncommon reaction to his presence. In a few moments, the same sort of phenomenon would occur at the party inside this mansion.

  Cobb understood the phenomenon. He not only understood it, he utilized it. As he did with almost everything else that suited his purpose.

  Professional football players, particularly the stars, or, as they were more commonly called in the game, pheenoms, were celebrities. Their photos appeared in the newspapers. They were interviewed on television. Stories were written about them in magazines. Most important, on Sundays, occasionally on the other days of the week they performed.

  Detractors tried to disparage their work by claiming they were paid extremely well simply to play a child’s game. Further, that their IQs qualified them for little more than children’s games.

  There was no denying that some, the pheenoms, were paid exceedingly well. But their profession had developed into a science of precision and perfection, with physical and mental rigors that few with smug intellects could have met.

  In any case, they were certified celebrities. Their fame was equaled by few aficionados of their sport. And those few fans who could match the players press clipping for press clipping nearly always lacked the players’ physical presence. The players, almost all of them, lived up to the description “bigger than life.”

  All of this subliminal self-awareness accompanied Bobby Cobb as he entered the mansion.

  “Hey! Hi, Bobby! What’s happenin’?”

  Damn! He couldn’t see who had greeted him. He couldn’t see a thing. Long ago someone had decreed that to be intimate, luxurious and stylishly pretentious rooms had to be kept so dark that it required half an evening for one’s eyes to grow accustomed to the dimness.

  “Yeah,” Cobb responded blindly, “how’s it goin’ with you?” He hoped there was no hand raised for a high five. If there was, he certainly could not make it out.

  Cobb remained near the door, waiting for his vision to adjust, and noncommittally returning salutations to blurry figures, all of whom seemed friendly. Gradually, he was able to see sufficiently to chance leaving his island of security.

  An arm fell heavily across his shoulders. Cobb tensed instinctively but briefly, then smiled. People shouldn’t do that to an athlete, especially during the playing season. If Cobb had been a lineman or a linebacker, the gentleman standing next to him might be flat on his back nursing some broken part of his body. All a matter of conditioned reflexes.

  “Bobby, how’re you doing?”

  “A little sore, sir. But I guess that’s to be expected.”

  Cobb recognized the voice instantly. Senior partner in one of Detroit’s most outstanding law firms. And important to Bobby Cobb, who was only a few scholastic hours and a bar exam away from becoming a lawyer.

  “Waiter,” the attorney beckoned, “get Mr. Cobb here a drink, will you? What’re you drinking, Bobby?”

  “Dewars on the rocks.”

  “Sure thing, Mr. Cobb.” The waiter hurried off.

  “That last series of plays this afternoon, Bobby, that wasn’t like you, keepin’ the ball on the ground.” The lawyer, arm entwined in Cobb’s, tried to steer him off into a corner.

  “I’m not the coach, sir.”

  “So it wasn’t your idea.” The lawyer seemed gratified.

  “No, sir.” Cobb tried to communicate the impression that he could take orders, which was the truth.

  “What would you have done if you were the coach? What would you have done if the coach had given you your head?”

  “Crossed them up. The Towers were bunched up tight. The last thing they were giving us was the run.”

  “So?”

  “We needed a play-action pass. Fake a run up the middle, flare out, and hit the S receiver along the sidelines. He could easily have gone all the way. Even if he hadn’t, the Towers would have been so deep in their own territory they could never have come back and scored.”

  “You’d take a chance on an interception?”

  “No, sir, I wouldn’t. Not as long as I was throwin’ the ball.”

  The lawyer smiled again. Cobb had demonstrated that he was a take-charge guy with plenty of self-confidence. Just the kind of personality one might want in one’s law firm.

  In Cobb’s plans for himself was a partnership in this prestigious law firm; building and enhancing his reputation. Then a jump to the political arena. Mayor of Detroit, if that were possible without a term on the city council. Then, bypassing Lansing, on to the House, and eventually t
he U.S. Senate.

  It was all well within the realm of possibility. He had the talent. All that was needed was promotion. He needed every headline, every moment on camera that he could get.

  His only competition for the limelight was that damned Hunsinger. The Hun with his strong local popularity. U of M to the Cougars. A playboy lifestyle that kept him in the forefront of everything from the sports pages to the nightly news to the gossip columns. Hunsinger could catch a football. Outside of that singular accomplishment, the Hun wasn’t worth a pile of crap.

  The waiter slipped Cobb’s drink into his hand, measuring the enormousness of that hand against his own. All this was so that tomorrow he could describe to his friends, with a little embellishment, the legend of a quarterback’s mitt.

  “You’re coming up for the bar pretty soon, aren’t you, Bobby?” The lawyer turned to face Cobb.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Listen, why don’t you come see me after the season? Just give my girl a ring. Maybe we can do business together. Would you like that?” He knew the question was rhetorical.

  “Yes, sir, I would. Very much.”

  “Hey, Bobby, c’mon over here!” One of the other Cougars was calling from across the room.

  “Would you excuse me, sir?”

  “Of course.” The lawyer patted Cobb’s arm and directed at him a benevolent paternal look that carried the unspoken bromide, Be good, but if you can’t be good, be careful. “Go on, now. Have a good time. God knows you paid your dues this afternoon.”

  Cobb inched his way across the room. With the wall-to-wall crowd, each person was a new obstacle. Almost everyone wanted to talk to him. Several asked about the conservative play of that last series. Each time, he passed the question off with a brief, flip explanation. The only person in the room entitled to a detailed explanation was Cobb’s future employer. And he had already received the full commentary.

  As he crossed the room, women, oblivious of their escorts, rubbed seductively against Cobb. He raised his eyes to heaven. So many women in the world and so little time. But he needed neither the complication nor any trouble with any of their companions. Like as not, some hotshot with too many drinks under his belt would seize the occasion to prove he could take the great athlete. And there he would stand with no pads, unprotected against some drunk who had nothing to lose but his teeth. With his luck, Cobb figured the best that might happen would be that he’d break a hand and be out for the rest of the season. So he graciously apologized to each woman who airily threw herself at him.