There's a Shark in My Hockey Pool (23 page)

This was as it should be, thought Derek.
These gregarious emotions had escaped the confines of SkyDome. They
elicited others to escape from everyday tension ... and to enter
the fun-filled fray. Come on in and let off some steam. The boss's
blowout three hours previous would be erased by a 4-6-3 double
play. For those who spent all day crunching numbers, they could put
away their Exceed spread sheets, sit back and relax. It was someone
else's keyboard accessing and displaying every baseball statistic
known to Elias.

Win or lose, the masonry's maniacal
expressions didn't change. They were still as rabid as ever. In the
crucial pennant chase, the catch phrase was that there was no
tomorrow. The was for this bunch. Their worst fear was erosion and
pigeon droppings. Derek chuckled. This motley mortared crew was too
ribald for the staid Maple Leaf Gardens. Something like this would
bring Harold Ballard back from the dead.

The fan with the upright beer cup took a
sip.

Upright Beer Cup: Big things are expected of
Marcotte this year.

Gargoyle Groupie: If he ever decides who he's
going to play for.

Bedrock Shades: You don't think he's going to
Montreal?

There's been interest lately.

GG: No, Toronto should keep him. Hogtown's
been good to him.

UBC: He's not a team player, y'know.

GG: (sighing) Who is these days?

BS: I think he'd be a good fit for Montreal's
up-tempo style of play.

GG: But he's been a stay-at-home defensive
player for so long.

UBC: Or has he merely been in a rut?

GG: Okay, so he hasn't had many goals.

BS: Yeah. But he's been hurt.

GG: (sighing again) Who hasn't?

Mr. Upright Beer Cup turned and looked down
at Derek.

"Better to be lucky than good ... eh,
Marcotte? How is the knee these days?"

"You're nothing but a hopeless romantic,"
said the gargoyle groupie. "Me or her, Derek. Choose." Hands on
hips, she leaned forward precariously out of the box seat.

The three cornerstone fanatics fell silent
and, in unison, extended their right hands outward and gave him the
thumbs-down sign.

Derek swore he could feel the weight of the
three gigantic, granite digits. He exited the chiseled cheering
section with a shudder.

Back in his apartment, Derek dozed in his
lazy boy. The clock on the wall read 1:00 a.m. A Leafs baseball cap
was pulled over his eyes. Derek twitched in the middle of a
dream.

He was behind the player's bench. With a full
head of steam, his teammate playing center lugged the puck up the
middle. The right winger was flying down the right side,
stride-for-stride with the center. Derek was afraid his center
wouldn't see the wide open line-mate in time.

"You gotta winger! Hit him! Skate!
Skate!"

The winger anticipated a pass that wasn't
going to come. He started braking for the blue line, not wanting to
slow down and lose the speed that had put him in the clear. He
dragged his back leg, hoping to stay onside. Too far and too late.
The play was offside. The linesman blew the whistle.

The phone rang.

"Damn!" Derek slapped his palms together. The
center came off the ice with his tail between his legs. One of the
other players was toying with the puck during the stoppage in play.
The linesman tagged along behind the player, growing impatient for
the puck. He blew his whistle.

The phone rang again.

"Pass the puck next time, eh? You gotta
head-man it," Derek said to the embarrassed center who quickly
found a spot on the bench and sat down. The referee dropped the
puck and play continued. The other linesman had his back against
the boards in front of their bench. He looked over his shoulder at
Derek and the disgruntled player.

"What are you looking at?!" Derek shouted at
the linesman. "The puck's over there. Do ya wanna map or do I
havetuh draw you a fuckin' picture!?!"

The linesman, eyes wide, put the whistle in
his mouth, puffed his cheeks and blew it loud.

The phone rang again.

"If you blow that damn thing one more time
I'm gonna stick it up yer ass and make you play O Canada!"

Derek awoke with a start. He shook his head
and picked up the phone.

"Derek. It's me, Artie."

"What is it?" Marcotte felt irritable but
couldn't quite figure out why. Something about being his patriotic
duty. The feeling soon subsided.

"Can you meet me at the office?"

Derek entered the office. Artie paced the
floor nervously. He walked past Derek over to the door. Artie
leaned forward and, shading his eyes, peered through the glass.

"Something the matter?" Derek asked. "I
haven't seen you this jumpy since you got that valentine from the
redhead on the second floor."

"I think we have a security problem. Remember
when I told you about calling LaBonneglace to check out a few
details?"

"And he told you he was playing for
Erskine?"

"Right. Well, LaBonneglace gave me some
excuse about not wanting to play on our team because some of our
players from out west weren't ... uh ... politically correct."

"Yeah?"

They both knew this to be an excuse
orchestrated by Erskine. It had that certain unsavory aspect to it,
like chasing cranberry juice with a glass of milk.

"I asked him which players he was talking
about," Artie said. "He mumbled something about a Short Hand from
Raven Lake. LaBonneglace told me that Erskine had told him that
Short Hand had an uncle who ran a construction business near
Pembroke. Evidently whenever work was contracted out, it only went
to Ontario companies. The French contractors were effectively shut
out."

"But Short Hand's from Portage Beaucoup,"
Derek said.

"Exactly," said Artie. "I went back and
checked the database on our computer. I must have entered the
information in a hurry. I made a mistake and accidentally switched
addresses for Short Hand and Tuckapuk."

Derek's mind raced. He picked up the
LaBonneglace folder and tapped it against the desktop, trying to
put it all together. This mess may have Erskine's fingerprints all
over it -- but Sylvie was involved too. The questions was ... how
deep?

Nonsense. They'd shared too many intimate
secrets together. He didn't complain when she only mixed in half
the pack of cheddar cheese with the Orel Pinkenpacker's microwave
popcorn. She knew the torment he went through when the linesman in
the face-off circle didn't drop the puck fast enough. For the past
two weeks he'd made a concerted effort to remember that she didn't
take sugar with her tea. At the drop of a hat, she could recite --
in order -- his ten favorite hockey buildings. They were a
team.

One day while they were out for a stroll,
he'd confided to her that he was a man of the 90s ... and was
taking it upon himself to right some of the sexual discrimination
practises of certain European cultures. On that note, he told her
it was her turn to walk a few steps ahead of him and he would
follow her, head down. She did so ... knowing he just wanted to
watch her wiggle as she walked.

Had she walked out of his life? Was it now
him and Helen? Had Sylvie made the choice for him? Derek was
looking at major multiple choice questions that didn't have any dud
answers he could quickly toss out.

"Did Sylvie have access to the computer?" he
finally asked.

"All the hockey software is kept under a
password. It would take twenty of Bill Gate's best hackers working
day and night to crack it."

"Erskine," they said together.

"Alright. It's obvious that bastard has
tapped into our computers," said Derek.

Marcotte continued tapping the folder against
the desktop. They weren't any closer to figuring how Sylvie was
mixed up in this.

"You're not going to tell Muldowney?" asked
Artie.

"We can't. We're in too deep. Erskine has
nothing to lose."

Derek looked Artie square in the eyes and
said, "Besides ... I've been making excuses long enough."

The look in Derek's eyes hooked Artie. It was
a tackle-box full of trust, honesty and genuine friendship. If
Artie at the age of four had paused long enough -- while making his
latest L'il Stinker-Toy creation -- to look up at the TV, he would
have seen the same determination during Sunday Night Showcase on
CBC (Cameral Broadcasting Corporation). The identical expression
was on John Wayne's rugged mug as Rooster Cogburn, the cagey U.S.
Marshall, when he stared across a field at a few foul-mouthed fools
packing six-guns in True Gristle.

The Duke threw the reins between his teeth
and caution to the wind. He kicked his heels hard into the flanks
of his sturdy steed and charged into action. He filled the screen.
With a gun in each hand and firing from the hip, Cogburn maintained
such a high level of concentration while at full gallop ... that
the viewing audience had to wonder if the top half of the screen
was connected to the bottom half. Even with the hailstorm of
bullets, the bad guys still missed this fast-approaching,
side-of-a-barn target.

Artie's generation would instead compare
Derek's stiff upper lip to Clint Eastwood's from The Outcast Josey
Wales. Derek's right cheek was minus the beef jerky juice and the
nearest cockroach to be spat at was in the next room. But
Marcotte's squinting, steely eyes seemed to ask, "Is there
something wrong with my poncho?"

There would be no changing Derek's mind on
this one. Artie wasn't about to. He'd hitch his wagon to Derek's
new found attitude and sing Oklahoma if he had to. Artie knew it
was something Derek had to get out of his system.

Marcotte nodded toward the computer.

"Alright then. Let's get this database
bouncin'."

"But ..."

"No buts, Artie. Fire it up."

Artie sat at his desk. Derek leaned over his
shoulder. They were pouring over minor pro, junior and college
hockey guides from the past five years. The names blurred into each
other. Name after name ... so many players thinking a pair of
skates, a hockey stick and a wrist shot with Raymond Bourque-like
accuracy would be their ticket to the show. Hundreds of players who
were household names -- but only in their own homes. They couldn't
buy a cup of coffee in the big league ... so they had to settle for
Peppy-Cola in Kelowna.

"Who've we got?" Derek asked.

"There's Gerry Sandman from Campbelltown, New
Brunswick. He scored three goals on his own team last year before
he was diagnosed as being color blind."

"No," said Marcotte. "Too dangerous."

"How about Biff Porkowsky from Moose Jaw?
Six-one, 275 pounds ... defenseman. Played a couple of games in
junior B two years ago but quit after he was traded."

"Let me guess. For a bag of pucks?"

"CAHA stamped and approved, said Artie. "It
says here it was a big bag too."

"Hey. No one wants to get traded for a small
bag of pucks. Before you know it, there's the emotional duress, the
league has to look into it, the pucks are analyzed, etc., etc. It's
just better to cough up the extra pucks and save yourself the
hassle."

"So we're gonna take him?" asked Artie.

"Sure. Just be sure that when you enter him
in the computer, you put him down for the full year. Give him a few
goals and 300-plus penalty minutes. We'll beat Erskine at his own
game."

"What if he decides to check it out?"

"Why should he?" said Derek. "We're doing his
homework for him. All right. Who's next?"

"Let's see here. We've got Binky Feinstein
... a kid from Downsview. Five-seven, 148 pounds."

Derek leaned closer to the screen.

"He scored 68 goals?"

"No, that's his typing speed. The kid is the
sports editor for the Downsview Update."

"Yes, but can he play hockey?" asked
Derek.

"It says here he's seen more ice time at the
Gardens than most young players coming up through the ranks."

"No shit?"

"That's right. He hasn't missed a Fan
Appreciation Day skate in 12 years."

"Wait a minute," said Derek. "How the hell
did he wind up in these stats?"

"Well, you know those media types. They play
pick-up hockey against each other. One of them takes a post-game
verbal poke at another and it becomes a never ending game of
one-upmanship. Except they don't leave it on the ice. No, they take
it to print. I guess the Downsview Update doesn't have the
circulation or enough copy space for both parties involved. So
Binky snuck his name into the ..."

Derek closed the hockey guide so they could
see the cover. It was the 1992-93 NHL Entry Draft.

"Let's give him a call," Derek said. "The
little shyster might give Erskine a run for his money."

At Herculean, Erskine and Bittman crowded
behind MacIlroy at his computer. Feinstein's nerdy, pock-marked
face and his bogus statistics appeared on the screen. MacIlroy
pressed a button and the chubby face of Porkowsky and his likewise
inflated stats popped up. MacIlroy frowned.

"Who are these guys?" he asked.

"Never heard of'em," said Bittman.

"Of course not," said Erskine. "Marcotte is
filling his final roster spots with ringers. He's looking under the
rocks for us. Get them on the horn, boys."

Artie entered Derek's office. It was the day
after they'd picked up Porkowsky and Feinstein. Derek was playing a
computer hockey game. His team, the Leafs, scored on the Red
Wings.

"Hah! Take that, octopussies ..."

"I just got off the phone with Porkowsky and
Feinstein," said Artie. "Erskine went for it. They're flying out
here later today."

"Yes!" Derek and Artie snapped off a
high-five. "Time for phase two of Operation Dummy Drop," Marcotte
said. He turned to his desk, grabbed the handset and put it on
speaker phone. He punched in numbers and waited.