Chapter 22

I looked at the clock when the phone rang. It was 7:10, and it was raining.

"They may cancel the game," Mrs. Jepperson said.

"Good morning," I croaked, tried to clear my throat. "What did you say?"

"The league may cancel the game. We received a fax." She read it to me, "Since the outcome will not affect the playoffs and so on and so on."

"Hm, damn, sorry," I said, still trying to get my brain in gear.

"I want you to know that I consider it done," she said with a lilt in her speech. "I'm proud of you."

"Beg pardon?"

"You got them out of last place."

"Uh huh. But we didn't stay out very long."

"I've talked with Ambrose. We're going right to the third step of your contract and give you four times what you are making. Does that suit you?"

"Four times?"

"Right. Exactly." And she hung up.

I sat on the side of my bed and looked out at the rain. Maybe I could buy a home. For some reason, I thought about cleaning gutters, something I had not done for a long time.

When I got to the stadium, the tarpaulin crew was huddled in the rightfield runway, all wearing their yellow slickers and floppy hats. I talked to the head grounds keeper, and he assured me that the field would be playable if it stopped raining pretty soon. We both agreed that the old field drained well and that sky was a bit lighter to the north. It was not coming down very hard, just a steady, cold, gray drizzle. The weather guy on TV called it an occluded front and said it could hang around into the weekend.

"We want to play. Do what you can," I told him.

He nodded, tight-lipped. "You done good. We'll do our part."

I shook his hand, waved at the others, and went to the locker room. It looked like most of my players were dressed, but we were not going to get any fielding or batting practice on this day. A couple of men were playing checkers; most were just chatting, working on their gloves and watching the clock and the TV set. Bob Philips from the Post and a new guy from the Times were waiting for me. The three of us squeezed into my office, and I flipped on my Mac, a newly acquired habit.

"Gonna be a game?" asked the Times' reporter.

"Hope so," I said.

"Gregory?" asked Philips.

I nodded. "And everybody else. This is it, you know."

"How come you're working so hard here at the tag end of a bad season?" the Washington Times' man asked.

"That's how we play baseball. Only way to do it. Nobody jakes. We run out every hit. We want to win every game; think we can too."

Philips nodded, but the young reporter lifted an eyebrow and wrinkled his forehead. "You're going to end up last or next to last, so what difference does it make?"

I was tempted to tell him about the Vegas line and the attempt to buy one of my players, but I resisted the impulse. The league office had been silent except to say that gambling was involved in both the banning and the suspension and that an investigation was ongoing. Charley Freeman was, naturally, suing and howling. His endorsement clients were disappearing fast.

I just smiled. "We've got one more to play," I said, trying not to sound pompous or something. "It makes a big difference to me, to all of us, not being in the cellar. We're going to win. Write it down."

Somebody yanked open the door and yelled, "They're taking off the tarp." I glanced at the clock, forty-five minutes to game time. The locker room was getting noisy.

By one o'clock that Sunday afternoon some six or seven thousand of what the reporters called "hardy souls" were huddled in the stands as a cool wind blew intermittently and dark clouds scudded overhead flapping the sodden flags. The lights were on, of course. If Lucy was there, I could not see her when we got started, but then most fans were back under the upper stands where there was some cover. After the umpiring crew chief lectured us and officially warned us again, the Marlins' manager and I shook hands and wished each other luck.

Unfortunately it was one of those days, perhaps in part because of the weather, when Gregory's knuckle ball was less than effective. In the fourth inning, the Florida boys started banging him around, and by the time we got a reliever in, we were two runs down. George apologized to me, shaking his head and slumping down on the bench. I patted his thigh. All pitchers have days like that.

Amberson was young, eager and had done some throwing on both Friday and Saturday so I walked down the line to the place where he sat among the other pitchers, the clipboard on his thighs.

"How's your leg?" I asked with a smile.

He nodded and looked up at me. "I'm all right."

"You go a couple or three?"

"Think so," he said, nodding and biting his lip. "Sure. I feel strong."

Jose Madona, who was sitting beside him, said, "I can do a few."

"You sure, on one day's rest?" I asked, holding my own elbow.

"Long time to recuperate after today." He smiled.

"Okay," I said to him. "Thanks. The kid gets the fifth and sixth; you've got the seventh and eighth. Get out to the pen and loosen up soon as you can."

Between innings they hurried away while I used a couple of pinch hitters. We manufactured a run with a walk, a good bunt from Frank Smith that he almost beat out and Skeeter's choked down and humpbacked hit to right that made Magruder let lose a rebel yell of sorts. It was the ugliest hit of the year, more like a badminton serve than a tennis volley. The play at the plate was close, and I briefly tasted bile. Skeeter moved to second on the throw, but they brought in their big set-up man, and Zeke and Bigger could not bring the runner around.

In loped Amberson, a bit stiff-legged, and the boy did us all proud. He mowed them down, clipping the corners and throwing eye-high fastballs that looked too good not to swing at.

Unfortunately, we were still futile at the plate, and at the end of six they led 2-1, and my stomach was getting very unhappy.

Jose Madona did not have his usual zip, but he oozed confidence and threw hard, clipping corners. His mechanics were wonderful as always, reminding me of Jim Palmer in his salad days. He walked one and struck out two in holding them scoreless for two more innings. We were running out of outs, and I had nearly cleared my bench except for the minor leaguers up for an end-of-the-season visit. They all avoided my eyes.

I asked Jose if he had one more in him. He smiled and shook his head. "Nope," he said, "That last curve pulled something loose I think. Not the elbow, up here." He grabbed his shoulder and kneaded hard.

I called in a lefty from the bullpen, the best I had available, and he walked the first batter on four pitches. I took several deep breaths, wondered if I would be happier driving a delivery truck, called time, found my glove, yanked down my hat, spat and stalked out to the mound, carefully stepping over the foul line as usual. You do not want to tempt fate at a time like this. The kid tossed me the ball and sniffed. I patted his back, nodded to Bigger and dug a small trench in front of the rubber, emptying out my mind as I did.