For a moment, everyone sat in silence. “Can he really do that?” Pisby asked, finally.
Lucco rolled his eyes. The others stared down at the floor, out the open doorway, up at the ceiling. Hasslebrow had stepped away from his manager, straightening his rumpled jacket and shirt.
He cleared his throat then and whacked the blackboard with the side of his fist. A jagged crack opened across the crudely sketched diagram, as if the field Hasslebrow had drawn were situated on the San Andreas fault. All eyes were back on Hasslebrow.
“The truth is that in the real world, money talks,” Hasslebrow said, his gaze burning out at them. “And Colden Battey has plenty of that. But one thing he doesn’t have is heart.” Hasslebrow pounded his chest. “I want you boys...and girls...girl...oh the hell with it, you know what I mean. I want you to go out there tonight and play like gods. I want you to pummel the living crap out of the Mice and insure that we draw a few people into this park so you don’t have to go to work for one of the richest men in America. Does that make sense to you?”
“SAY HEY!” shouted Minoso, leaping up from his chair with his fist upraised. Everyone else stared at him in astonishment. Even Hasslebrow seemed startled.
“Well, that’s all,” Hasslebrow mumbled. Then he turned and left the room.
Moments before game time, just as the PA announcer was beginning a search for a recorded version of the national anthem, the long-absent Hamilton finally arrived, rolling up in a converted Greyhound bus bearing the legend “Smokin’ Joe Revue” in bold red script along its sides. He wore a tight-fitting khaki suit with vest, and a navy shirt studded with sequins that reflected the light as he did a little dance step in the dim walkway. “Gonna sing that anthem, my man,” he told Hasslebrow enthusiastically.
When Hamilton’s gaze fell on Buck, he stopped short. “Who is this?” he asked, shaking his head. “Black Moses?”
Before Buck could reply, Hamilton was off, shaking his head at the ignorance of the white man. Four women molded into sequined dresses had scurried down from the bus, following Hamilton down the walkway toward the field, humming an unrecognizable chorus. Hasslebrow stared glumly after them. The owner gave Buck a hapless look, then crossed himself and shuffled off toward his own box, mumbling as he went.
Lucco herded the players into the dugout and cleared his throat, ready to add his own words of wisdom. Just as he opened his mouth, there was a commotion behind him and Sharon hurried in from the locker room.
Though she had kept the regulation shirt, adding only a bit of strategic tailoring through the chest, she had converted the trousers to a thigh-hugging pair of shorts. Buck watched the long legs flash like scissors as she strode toward them, and his arm went weak for a moment.
“Sure hope you don’t have to slide,” Wattles whispered, grinning.
“I hope you don’t have to run very far,” she answered, pointing at the straining buttons on the centerfielder’s stomach.
“Could we have it quiet now?” Lucco asked, a bit of the old authority back in his voice. Sharon glared, and Lucco looked down at a notecard in his hand.
“All right. You know who’ s going to start. Like the paper says, we got age on the mound and beauty at second, and everything else as usual.” There was laughter and shouting then, and even Sharon smiled as the heads swung her way. Lucco motioned for quiet, then went on, his voice more serious. “But this is no exhibition game. We’ll see how things go. Everyone will hold his, I mean, uh, their, position as long as they do the job.” Here his eyes rested upon Buck and then upon his ex-fiancée. “Anyway, I think you people ought to go out and win it, just like Hasslebrow says, start the season the way it ought to be, and I’ll make the changes just as soon as we need to. Now I think we ought to go out and give it a real shot, whattaya say!”
“We’ll nail ’em!” Wattles called.
“Good field, good hit!” Minoso added.
“It’s the American pastime,” Sharon whispered to Wattles and Buck as everyone moved toward the field.
Buck took his warmups along the third base line–four pitches, no more, no less. Pisby caught, since Wattles needed to go over the last minute plans for the post-game dance with Hasslebrow and Hamilton. The stands, surprisingly enough, were respectably full as a result of Wattles’ advertising campaign, which included a fair number of giveaway schemes, and there were a few oohs and aahs as Buck steamed his pitches to the boy. His arm still ached, but the power was pumping with each touch of the ball. He was sure he could throw well enough, if he were careful to hold back a little.
When Sharon trotted onto the infield for practice, a riot of whistles erupted from the stands, and she waved her glove in acknowledgement. She fielded several shots cleanly and showed a fair arm, even on relays to the plate. The crowd applauded as she ran back to the dugout, where she hugged Buck and smiled at Wattles.
“I forgot how much fun it was,” she said. Buck felt an ache below the team insignia at his chest, then looked past her to see Lucco turn away. Wattles punched her arm lightly. “Almost a full house and it’s still twenty minutes to game time,” he said, beaming. “How’s the arm, Pops?”
“The arm will do well,” Buck told him, though he felt another twinge even as he spoke. He closed his eyes with the sharp pain and suddenly saw himself alone in an abandoned mine, timbers cracking, a coalveined ceiling caving in about him. He snapped his eyes back open, feeling sweat spring up on his brow.
“Hey. You sure you’re okay?” Sharon was staring anxiously at him.
But Wattles broke in, putting his arm around Buck, patting her cheek with his free hand. “Hell yes, this pitcher’s okay. The boy’s just got a little stage fright, that’s all.”
Though he recalled ducking into the dugout for his glove and a brief rubdown of his arm from Wattles, Buck could not recall actually walking out to the mound. Surely he had, for there was the resin bag at his feet, the umpire hunched down behind the catcher, and the first batter for the Mice thumping his bat menacingly on the plate. But his head was whirling and the noise of the crowd faded and grew with the pounding there and the dull throb at his arm.
Buck wiped the sweat from his eyes and looked more closely at the catcher, who looked vaguely familiar, but who was surely not the regular backstop. “Cogsill got called up by Hartford this afternoon,” came the familiar growl from behind the mask, and Buck realized then that it was Lucco. “I didn’t want to get the rest of them upset about being overlooked. But don’t worry about a thing. I’ll do fine.”
Lucco pounded his glove, the umpire bellowed, “Play ball!” and the batter dug in.
He could throw to Lucco as easily as he could to Wattles or Cogsill, Buck thought, looking in to the manager for the sign. He stared, shook his head, blinked his eyes and tried to refocus, but the scene remained the same. Lucco was pounding his glove, flashing the signal for a curve.
Buck thought that something had gone amiss, for he had thrown no curves in all of his practice, only fast balls and an occasional knuckler which he did not control well. His arm throbbed with renewed pain at the signal. He shook his head at Lucco, but the manager repeated the sign.
Very well, then, Buck thought, and wound up for his fastball. Lucco could fool around all he liked, but he would get what Buck gave. He kicked as high as his cracking leg would let him, and threw. The ball shot in, speeding directly at the batter’s head.
Buck caught his breath, the batter sprawled in the dust, the fans gasped, and, inexplicably, the ball broke sharply over the plate. The umpire’s right hand shot up, and his call of “Steeeeeee-rike!” brought the batter’s head up from the dust in astonishment.
“A hell of a curve,” Lucco called as he fired the ball back to Buck, who stood openmouthed himself. The pain had left his arm. Lucco was down again, flashing for the curve. Buck shrugged, wound, kicked, and threw. The player hesitated for an instant as the ball beamed itself toward his shoulder. Finally he flinched, ducked his head, and hopped backward in the box. The
umpire called a second strike as the ball broke sharply to Lucco’s glove, and again the crowd roared its approval. Buck turned to the field to see the reaction of his teammates, but the sweat was pouring from his brow, and he could make out only vague golden shapes in the glare of the bright banks of lights. When he swung back to the plate, Lucco flashed a sign that Buck could not interpret.
“But it does not matter, clearly,” he mumbled to himself and took his usual windup. The ball fluttered toward the plate as softly as a butterfly, and the batter twisted himself into a knot before the pitch was halfway home.
Buck retired the next two batters in the same fashion, the ball acting without regard to his intent, obedient, so it seemed, to the strange signals of Lucco. When he found himself back on the bench, he tried to explain it to Wattles, who was not concerned.
“Hell, I dunno, Pops. But then, I never asked why you could even throw the ball, old as you are. Didn’t you ever wonder about that?” Wattles was grinning as he picked up a bat and headed out of the dugout.
Buck sat pondering the boy’s question as the Mice pitcher completed his warm-ups. He could hardly tell Wattles that he had assumed from the first it was the working of Fate, or the cosmic reward which he certainly deserved. He had no other explanation for the strange behavior of the curving ball this night, which maintained itself throughout the march of the innings. Lucco flashed the signals, which might as well have been the orchestrations of a voodoo hex, and Buck simply nodded and threw.
The Mice, meantime, were baffled. In the fifth inning, after 12 strikeouts, two bloop singles, and three weak groundouts up the left side, the Manager of the Orlando team sent word to the Grouper dugout that the game was now being played under protest: “On the grounds of the league’s mandatory retirement clause,” the man had scrawled.
“That’s only for your maintenance crews and such,” Lucco said, wadding the note into a ball.
“Viejo es bueno,” Minoso nodded, invoking the memory of his fabled big league relative.
By the end of the eighth, word had spread of what was happening inside the Grouper stadium: the bleachers were full and others had overflowed down both foul lines–entire families spread on blankets, old men resting on canes, mothers cradling babies. Hasslebrow himself had come down to the dugout, apologetic for violating protocol, but rubbing his hands in excitement.
“Eight thousand!” he bellowed at the players. “Eight thousand proud fans out there, which this team hasn’t pulled since they had a drawing for a Cadillac and gave free uniforms to every kid. Keep it up, boys! You’ll bring the national pastime back to this town!” His cigar belched the smoke and sparks of a roaring steam engine.
“And the champagne’s on me if we win it,” he added, before returning to the stands for the top of the ninth.
Most of the players cheered as the owner left, and even Lucco managed a smile before he noticed that Wattles had left the dugout. The rotund center fielder had walked back to the foul screen behind home plate and was sunk in earnest conversation with Colden Battey. The manager uttered a low curse and was bearing down upon the pair when the umpire signaled for the inning to begin and Wattles turned back toward the field. Buck shrugged and shuffled toward the mound, though something in Battey’s aspect troubled him as well.
“Shut ‘em down one more time, pops,” called Wattles, as Lucco shooed him on toward the outfield.
“Come on, Mr. B. We’ll get you some support.” It was Pisby, pounding his glove and dancing nervously at shortstop.
“Good field, no hit. Not your fault,” Minoso consoled him, clapping his hand on Buck’s shoulder before they parted near the third base line.
Buck nodded agreement to the Cuban and walked toward the rubber by himself. The crowd gave him a warm cheer as he tipped his hat. True, he had notched sixteen strikeouts–two shy of the league record–and, aside from the two harmless bloopers, Minoso and Pisby between them had handled the other eight chances easily. But the Mice pitcher had been equally effective, mowing down 12 of the Grouper on strikes and yielding only one hit, a broken-bat single to Pisby in the Fourth. Buck himself, whose sight at the plate was bothered by the glare of the outfield lights, had been called out three times on strikes, each time on pitches he had never seen. Save for an occasional lapse of control (he had walked Sharon twice), the Orlando southpaw had been fearsome, and the board read goose eggs through the Eighth.
Buck toed the rubber as the umpire signaled, and the spectators settled into an expectant hush. The Mice batter dug in, Lucco flashed an inscrutable sign, and Buck threw. Three pitches later, he had his 17th K, and Hasslebrow himself had taken over the PA system.
“One more strikeout, and he’ll have the league record,” the owner’s voice boomed, and the crowd answered with a cheer. Several old men down the foul lines shook their canes in tribute, and a single, long-stemmed rose floated to the ground near Buck’s feet. Buck smiled, as he thought for the first time of entering history. One more strikeout and he’d have a line or two of his own in the National Register of Baseball. Not exactly the reward he’d expected, but then, perhaps this was only an omen, a prelude, to that great life ahead at Golden Village.
“We’ll protest!” The Mice manager’s shout broke in upon his reverie. “We’ll put an asterisk on that record!” Buck’s eyes flickered toward the enemy dugout, visions of the maligned Roger Maris and his asterisked record suddenly dancing in his head. He felt a quick twinge of pain shoot from his shoulder, down through his arm. Then he saw Colden Battey moving into his line of sight above the dugout, waving and pointing, first at Buck and then at his own chest. The pain, just a nudge at first, sprung up full force, and Buck felt his legs give. He held up his good hand for time and stepped back off the rubber. Wattles rushed in from center.
“He’s just trying to tell you he wants you,” Wattles whispered as he massaged Buck’s arm. “Battey’s moving the Grouper to the Slo Pitch League.”
“Softball?” Buck’s eyes flew to the player’s face. His arm was singing an electric pain. “I don’t understand.”
Wattles patted his shoulder soothingly. “Publicity. He’s gonna enter the whole baseball team in a professional softball league.”
“All of us?” Buck swung his eyes to the man, who smiled and tipped his glasses slightly in recognition.
“Well…” Wattles paused, digging his toe in the dirt. “Not exactly everybody. You, for sure. You’re great box-office. Me, of course. I’m his consultant on the deal. And Sharon, maybe. The important thing is the gimmick, see. The Professional Slo Pitch League is kind of like the World Wrestling Federation was at the beginning. It’s going to be big, but it just needs a boost. Identification. Cash flow. TV coverage. Respectability. Fast pitch goes Slo Pitch. Old meets new. Get it?”
“A gimmick?” The pain in Buck’s arm was pulsing, now.
“Colden Battey knows how to make money, you can count on that. We’re gonna revolutionize the American pastime, Mr. B.” Wattles gave him a last clap on the back and then trotted off into the glare of the deep centerfield lights.
Buck wanted to call after him, but the umpire shouted, raised his hands for play, and Buck turned reluctantly to the batter, number four in the Mice order. The man in the floral shirt had moved, and stood grinning behind the foul screen in back of home plate.
Lucco growled something at Buck, spat, then flashed for the fast ball. Buck was lightheaded with the pain, but wound up and kicked regardless. When he heard the crack and the gasp of the crowd, his head was still lowered. But he knew very well what had happened.
He turned slowly to see Wattles jog a few feet back toward the fence, then stop to throw his hands up in despair, his feet hidden in a ground fog that had begun to creep in. The scoreboard posted its first run of the evening, and the crowd groaned.
“S’okay,” Minoso yelled.
“Hang in there, Mr. B.” Pisby’s voice seemed to quiver in the unusually damp air.
“Shake it off,” Sharon called. “
Smoke it in there, now.”
But Buck knew there was trouble. His arm pulsed with the pain, which seemed to increase with each glance at Colden Battey, the man who would turn his team into clowns. It was surely a mistake to have begun all this, he thought, and now he was caught in the glare of spotlights, a sizzling fish on a hot griddle. One minute, on the brink of a line in the record book–with sure immortality, and who cares about asterisks– the next minute, disaster and ridicule. Already fans were leaving their seats, and isolated catcalls floated onto the field. One disgusted old man tried unsuccessfully to snap his cane over his knee and another jumped feebly up and down on his hat.
“Let’s go,” called the ump, and Lucco raised his glove, indicating the knuckler this time. The Mice batter wagged his bat menacingly, and his dugout shouted encouragement with fresh enthusiasm.
Buck tried to push the fear from his mind as he wound up for the pitch. He set his jaw, kicked, stumbled on the rubber, and nearly fell as he made his release. The ball wobbled pitifully in, a roasted bird served up on a white dish. The batter grinned, waggled his bat, laughed aloud. Then he strode and smashed a rocketing liner toward second.
Sharon choked back a shriek, flinched, threw up her glove to protect her face, and howled as the ball crashed into her glove, spinning her flat onto her back. She was up immediately, however, proudly displaying the ball above her head, and the crowd cheered lustily.
“Say, hey!” Minoso shouted as they whipped the ball around the horn.
Sharon walked the ball back to Buck herself. She was still smiling, but as she neared, Buck could see the pinched lines at her mouth and the tears welling in her eyes. “Better make sure there’s no more of those, Mr. B. My hand’s broke.”
Buck spun immediately toward Lucco. “We’ll get a replacement,” he was saying.
Opening Day: Or, the Return of Satchel Paige Page 5