Highpockets (13 page)

Dean was interested. “I see. Then you’d throw to second first-off.”

“Wait a minute. Hold on now. It all depends. If the man on first tries for third and makes it safe, he’ll be able to come home on a deep fly, and effen the score is tied, that’s mighty important, that one run. But suppose there’s two outs, he can’t score on a fly to the outfield. So most likely he won’t try to take that extra base; he won’t risk it, especially when the game is close. You hafta think of this runner on first, and how fast he is, and how many bases he has stolen all year, and what the chances are of his taking off for third. Then you must judge how the wind is blowing, the speed of the ball that’s hit your way, and how it bounces on the grass. You gotta make all these calculations—the speed of the runner, the number of outs, the lead the man had on first, the wind that’s blowing sharp in your face; you must calculate all this in three seconds. Look, see here. Just get it on my watch ... one ... two ... three. That’s all the time you have. And that darn ball a-zippin’ toward you on the turf, and the fans a-yellin’ and a-screamin’ at you ...”

“Gee! I didn’t realize baseball was like that! It’s sure complicated, isn’t it? The way stamps are, when you get deep down. How d’you ever remember it all? Don’t you ever forget?”

“Boy, you better not forget. You better make the right guess; you better throw to the right base. ’Cause you won’t make the wrong throw many times. Effen you
do
, you’ll find yourself down in Roanoke, pretty darn quick, too. See, Dean, y’understand now? Get it? In baseball like in everything else, you gotta think. That’s what school does for you, it teaches you to think.”

Highpockets had never reasoned this way before but, after all, wasn’t that the real purpose of an education? You got it, you got it somehow; you got it either in school where it was easy to get, or else you got it the hard way, coming up through the minors, from Rocky Point to Boise to Fort Worth, where you learned by experience, by making mistakes and having to pay for them, by throwing to the wrong base and getting cuffed around afterward by the manager. But get it you did, one way or another.

He glanced over at the kid, who had a strange, far-off look on his round face. His big blue eyes were staring into space and he was paying no attention to those last sentences. Highpockets was slightly annoyed. Thinking about those darn stamps, most likely.

“Mr. McDade, will you do something for me? Will ya, please? Please, will ya?”

Now what? Now what’s he want? That two buck orange and black of the Mississippi River Bridge to complete his Trans-Mississippi set, probably. That’ll cost me plenty, that one will. Or perhaps he wants the 1897 Jubilee issue, to finish up that Canadian page. Shoot, I might as well say yes, if he really wants ’em. Stamps are an investment, they all tell you.

“Yeah, I will. Whatcha want, Dean?”

“You promise, will ya? When I get outa here tomorrow, I’d like for you to take me to a ballgame. One you’re playin’ in, Mr. McDade.”

E
ARLY
S
EPTEMBER, AUTUMN
in the night air, the days still hot and the pennant race the same, as the Dodgers took over second place and climbed slowly toward the league-leading Cards. It was a different gang of ballplayers, and this was evident in many ways. Even the sportswriters who traveled with the club were cheerful, always an excellent indication of the team’s morale.

Roy Tucker came into the clubhouse as they were dressing for the game, that wide grin on his face as usual. The room suddenly erupted into motion. In a second they were converging upon him, crowding around, slapping him on the back, shouting words of welcome. The Kid from Tomkinsville was needed on the squad both as a player and a friend.

Highpockets, lacing his shoes before his locker, listened to their tones, noticed the affection on their faces, saw Roy’s evident delight at being with them once more, his pleasure at returning to the club after his long stay in the hospital.

Why can’t I be like him? thought Highpockets. He loves folks and folks love him. See, they’re grabbing his hand as if they meant it, and they really do. They want him back, they want him out there in center again; they need him badly these last days of the season. Only it’s more than that. They wouldn’t be that way over Paul Roth or Shiells, no matter how good they were. They sure wouldn’t be that way about me. He’s different; they missed him, we all missed him. Yes, doggone, I missed him, too.

Then Roy sauntered across the room. He spotted Highpockets over by his locker.

To his own surprise, the rookie, who had finished tieing his shoes and was standing up, suddenly found himself moving toward the Kid from Tomkinsville with outstretched hand.

“Mighty glad to have you back again, Roy. I shore missed you out there next door. Boy, we can use you right now, with those Cards coming next week.”

Roy’s grip was firm and friendly, and there was the same warm grin as he answered. “Miss me? D’ja really? That’s good; that’s fine. But I dunno, you kids seem to be doin’ O.K. without me. Le’s see now, Highpockets. Yesterday was your twenty-eighth, wasn’t it? Twenty-eight straight games you’ve hit safely. Why, boy, you got a chance for DiMag’s record.”

“Shucks, Roy, that don’t mean a darn thing; you know how ’tis.”

He leaned, picked up his jacket, and moved toward the door. Only, hang it all, hitting in twenty-eight straight games does mean something, and nobody knows it better than Roy Tucker. He must have been following the club pretty carefully all the time he was in the hospital. Some guy, Roy is.

By this time the fans were coming out as much to see Highpockets hit safely in each game as to watch the Dodgers overtake the Cards. Sometimes he’d be passed a couple of times and only have two official at-bats. The crowd would watch in silence as he came down to his last raps toward the end of the game, and would rise cheering when he made a hit and kept his record alive. Each day the tension increased, the drama grew; each time he walked to the plate was an occasion.

The game that afternoon at the Polo Grounds was close and hard-fought all the way through. The only score came in the sixth, when Highpockets stepped in, and, as usual, the opposing infield shifted to the right for him. The shift was the same; so was the pitching, which was close to his fists as before. That day it was even closer than ever. The second pitch dusted him off and he fell backward from the plate, sprawling awkwardly in the batter’s box.

Highpockets rose, slapping his pants and rubbing off his hands amid cries from the stands, annoyed and angry, his face flushed. The next ball was a low, down-around-the-knees curve, and he tommy-hawked it. That ball went on a line straight for the stands in right field, a homer from the moment it left his bat. Landing in the sixth row of the lower seats, four hundred and fifty feet from home plate, it knocked in the crown of a man’s straw hat, while Highpockets circled the bases before the yowling thousands. Only this time the din had in it more approval than derision; this time it was in a very different key from the sounds he had been accustomed to hear early in the season.

Charlie Draper was waving his arms behind third as he passed, and the photographers were lined up on the first-base side of the plate, waiting for him as he came in. Others were there, too; Jocko, certainly Jocko was always there, not only because he followed Highpockets in the batting order, but because Jocko was Jocko. Only this time Jocko wasn’t alone. Spike and Roy Tucker, in uniform for the first time, and Bob Russell and Red Cassidy from the coaching box back of first, and Fat Stuff off the bench, they all came toward him as he neared home. He felt their bodies jostling his, the friendly contact of hips and thighs when he came across the plate, their hot paws extended to him, someone grasping his right hand, someone else his left. It was a traffic jam around the batter’s box. How different from the first of the year, he thought, as together they all trotted back to the bench. Now he was one of them, now he was part of the team.

That was the only score of the game, the only hit he made all afternoon, and the twenty-ninth game in which he had batted safely. He came up once more, to face the same ugly look on the face of the pitcher, the same fast balls dangerously close to his body, all but dusting him off again. He took two pitches inside and fouled a couple of balls upstairs. Then came a slider right at his head.

He turned, spun round, instinctively threw up his arm to protect himself. The ball struck him squarely on the outer point of his elbow. His bat clattered to the ground as he stood wringing his arm in pain.

Spike Russell was by his side like a shot, while Draper raced in from third and Steamboat Jackson, the plate umpire, stood by watching, a frown on his face. The blow hurt. Highpockets’ face was twisted in pain as Spike hastily massaged his elbow. Finally he walked down toward first. There was deep silence over the field.

The elbow hurt badly for a while, but he forgot it in the excitement of the next inning. In the last of the ninth, the Giants began to tee off on Chris Terry, the Dodger rookie. The first man beat out an infield roller. The second slashed a terrific drive to Paul Roth in deep left, who made a wonderful catch up against the concrete, almost into the visiting bullpen. The baserunner on first slid safely into second on the out.

One out, a man on second, the winning run at the plate. Burns, the Giant catcher, stepped up, while in right the Brooklyn bullpen went into action, Raz and Homer Slawson furiously working. Now the stands rose, yelling, screaming, clapping hands in unison to unsettle the young Dodger pitcher. It was a tight moment.

The batter was a man to whom you had to pitch. He fouled them off, one after the other, until on the three and two count he got hold of a curve and drove a hard-hit ball to deep right. Highpockets yanked down his sun glasses. Even in the excitement of the play he noticed that sudden, sharp pain in his elbow.

Back he went, back, sighting the ball as he ran, back until he almost reached the fence. He was nearing it, he was close, he felt the wall behind him when the ball descended. Raising his hands high above his head and leaning against the boards, he managed to haul down the drive for the second out. His whole arm hurt as he rifled the ball to the infield while the runner galloped into third. Now there were two out, the tieing run on third base, and the winning run at the plate.

Bob Russell took the throw and relayed it to his brother. Spike walked in, rubbing the ball up in his hands, to the perspiring pitcher on the mound. One tremendous whack to left, another to right. Should he stick with this rookie or call for help from the bullpen?

“Here, Chris, lemme hold this for you; it’s plenty hot. I’ll just cool it off for you a while.” He stood for a minute, talking quietly to the youngster. “Look, Chris, come down overhand. Stride toward the spot you’re throwing at, and the ball will go in there for you.” Then he handed over the pill.

The youngster grinned and stepped back on the slab, checking the runner on third. He wound up quickly and whipped a fast ball under the batter’s club. Then another strike, an inside curve which the man swung at and missed. And a third in succession. The game was over.

Loose, free, and happy, the gang poured from the dugout and tramped across the field to the clubhouse in deep center. They were laughing and joking as they piled up the stairs, hot, panting, and relaxed for the first time that afternoon. They passed from the hot sunshine outside to the dim coolness within, feeling a sensation of relief. Now they were able to breathe again. When a team is a team, you feel it most of all in the clubhouse. It was a different atmosphere and a different crowd of ballplayers from the struggling fourth-place Dodgers of July and August.

After a session with the Doc, who shook his head as he looked at the swelling elbow and insisted on treating it with cold compresses, Highpockets finally got away. Shedding his clothes, he ambled over to the showers. Most of the boys were finished, and they greeted him with shouts.

“Hey, there, Cecil, how many is that for you? Thirty-eight homers or thirty-nine? Jocko says it’s thirty-eight. Is that your thirty-eighth or thirty-ninth?”

“Boy, you sure took a-holt of that one. I knew it was gone; the moment you connected I knew it was in there.”

“Why, you old son-of-a-gun, look at that elbow! Doncha know better than to stop one of Jack Fuller’s fast ones with yer elbow? Look at it, guys!”

“Hey, fellas, look at Highpockets’ elbow. It’s as big as a baseball!”

Then suddenly someone slapped him with the wet end of a towel. In six long months with the Dodgers it had never happened to him before.

He turned quickly, but the player had escaped to the other end of the room. Just then someone else slapped him with another wet towel. The blow stung his thigh. It also warmed his heart.

Slowly he went into the shower and returned to his locker, sitting there happy and content despite that angry throbbing in his elbow, which was getting worse. As he yanked on his trousers, an attendant came past.

“Mr. McDade, they’s a boy by the name of Kennedy outside. Says he’s waiting for you. The kid just won’t leave. Shall we send him home or what?”

“No, no, bring him in. Bring him in here, Steve.”

A few minutes later Dean Kennedy entered, dressed in his best clothes, wide-eyed, silent and rather subdued by the strangeness of the scene. He stood watching the unfamiliar ballplayers while Highpockets finished dressing. In the boy’s hand was a brand new league baseball.

“Like to have the gang sign that-there ball for you, Dean?” Highpockets extended his hand. A stab of pain went through his elbow as he took the ball.

“Gee, thanks. Thanks lots, Mr. McDade.” Highpockets uncoiled himself from the bench and, taking Dean’s fountain pen, went from one player to another with the ball. Finally it was covered with autographs. He returned to the bench where the boy was standing solemnly, watching. Under the youngster’s arm was a folded newspaper which dropped to the floor as he reached out eagerly for the autographed baseball. It was a copy of the
Sporting News.