Cincinnati’s public landing seethed in the midday heat. It was far less crowded than it would be later, when fleets of packets would depart after the Haymaker game. Now a dozen steamers along the dock moved with the river’s undulations. Heat shimmered on the vast paved loading area. Across the river in Newport I made out the United States barracks and esplanade. To my left, wagons stood partially loaded with barrels from the hold of a freighter, the job put off until cooler hours. To my right, a street vendor pushed his cart along Front Street. He’d find few customers in these unshaded areas.
My footsteps echoed on the concrete landing. I made my way toward the embankment. Along the levee stretched a line of massive posts, three feet thick and twenty feet high, to which the steamers were moored. At high water the swelling current brought the vessels to the very top of the posts, most of which were marked in footage to gauge the river’s rise and fall. One of the posts stood squarely at the foot of Broadway. I headed for it, forcing my eyes straight ahead. I put the valise down at the foot of the post, arm muscles cramped from the heavy burden. I turned and walked back the way I had come. Sweat glued my shirt to my skin.
Before I had gone thirty feet somebody yelled, “Mister, you left this here!”
The voice was Johnny’s. I kept walking.
“Mister!”
I was nearly to the corner of River Street before I heard another voice. Glancing back, I saw a man approaching Johnny.
“No, it’s his,” said Johnny loudly. “HEY MISTER!”
A hack pulled up nearby, and Charlie Gould stepped down, looming huge and blond. I nodded pleasantly and climbed into the hack as Gould ambled toward Johnny and the other.
“What’s the trouble?” I heard Gould say.
And that was all, for as the hack entered River Street I yelled, “Hit it!” and the driver whipped the horse into a gallop. We clattered wildly for a half block and careened onto Walnut, scattering a group of boys playing marbles. Another lurching turn onto Front, and we raced to the rear of the Spencer House. I jumped out and sprinted down the landing. A small animated group had formed around the valise. Gould and Johnny were arguing with two men, one of whom was trying to wrest the valise from Gould.
Johnny spotted me and, on cue, began screaming “POLICE!” His shouts carried along the riverfront. Somebody yelled in the distance. One of the men grabbed at Johnny, but he ducked easily behind Gould, who still gripped the valise. The yells were drawing a few onlookers from nearby streets. One was Sweasy, who walked rapidly toward the scene.
Then I saw what I feared I would see. A dark figure emerged from a warehouse behind Gould. He took in the scene—including me running—and moved quickly into the struggling knot. Something glinted in his hand. I didn’t need to see his face clearly to recognize him: Le Caron.
“Look out!” I yelled. “He’s the one!”
Johnny tumbled out of the way as Le Caron’s knife flashed at him. Gould dropped the valise and stepped back quickly. The man wrestling for it went over backward. Le Caron snatched the valise from him.
“Stop!” I yelled, fifteen feet away.
He ignored me. I fired the derringer over his head. Its small pop! froze everything for a moment. Le Caron’s black eyes drilled into mine. I sighted on him, holding the gun at arm’s length with both hands, like in police movies.
The shot had been in part a signal. In response, a wagon swung onto the landing from East Front. Le Caron looked at it nervously. I knew what he was seeing: Harry, George, Allison, and Mac—good-sized men, all brandishing baseball bats—coming straight for him. His eyes flickered at me; then, tucking the valise under his arm as if it weighed nothing, wheeled and broke into a crouching run along the embankment, moving with surprising speed. I fired another shot over him; he did not slow. As the coach pursued him and the others spread out to cut him off, I bent over the man on the ground and dug my gun into his neck. Its two chambers were empty, but he didn’t know it. His eyes widened and his Adam’s apple bobbed convulsively.
“Where’s Andy Leonard?” I demanded.
Wet sounds came from his throat. “Boat.”
“Which fucking boat?”
“The Mary Rae.”
I jabbed the barrel deeper. “Where do you have him?”
“Starboard cabin,” he gasped. “Stern.”
“Does it have a number?”
His eyes rolled. “Don’t remember, honest.”
“Where’s it docked?”
“Other end, by the gasworks.”
I turned and chased the others. Le Caron, already a hundred yards down the landing, dropped the valise as the four Stockings jumped out of the wagon behind him. Had he known it held scrap iron and newspaper, he might not have carried it so far. For a moment, as they closed in on him with bats poised, it looked as if he were trapped. But Le Caron turned and bounded goatlike up the steep embankment. He poised and dove. I heard a faint splash.
“In the wagon!” I yelled.
With Mac and Gould, I clung to the outside. Harry, handling the reins deftly, took us thundering along the docks. I scanned the names of boats as we passed. Melody Lady . . . Cheyenne . . . Silver Spray . . . Clifton . . . Moored at the foot of John Street sat the Mary Rae, a weather-beaten, medium-sized stern-wheeler. A rugged-looking deckhand stood in the shade of the pilothouse overhang.
“Where you headed?” he growled, blocking the gangway as we swarmed up.
Without a word Mac and Gould threw him in the river. It was a mistake not to muzzle him. He shouted a warning even as he plunged toward the surface. We scrambled up a runged ladder to the passenger deck and moved sternward like grim commandos, wrenching compartment doors open.
There were few signs of life on deck, but that was hardly true in the cabins. Curses and shrieks echoed in our wake. Glimpses of gaudy clothing and hastily covered bodies told us what sort of passengers these were. I wondered if McDermott was aboard.
Everything we’d counted on in our hurried strategy meeting at Harry’s had so far worked out: the kidnappers hadn’t expected a trap to be sprung from so many directions, particularly since I’d done nothing suspicious at the outset; Le Caron had been flushed, as I thought he or McDermott would be; and Andy was near the riverfront, where the kidnappers could escape far easier than by railway or road—which would be closely watched had I gone to the police.
Harry and I burst into the last compartment and saw Andy bound and gagged in the far corner. His eyes bugged at us and his head shook violently. In the instant I realized he was trying to warn us, Harry yelled, “Watch out!”
I twisted sideways as something exploded on my right shoulder. Staggering back against the bulkhead, I saw a man stalking me with something that looked like a rolling pin. Behind him, others crowded through the doorway. The rolling pin flashed at me. Sick with the certainty that I couldn’t move fast enough, I tried to duck. There was a splintering impact over my head. For an instant I thought I had been brained. I tumbled to the deck as fragments of wood showered on me. I looked up and saw Harry drop the handle of his shattered bat. Swearing, the deckhand lifted his club. Harry stepped inside the upraised arm and crashed a textbook right hook to his jaw. The deckhand’s knees buckled and he sagged to the deck beside me.
Then they were on us. A boot kicked at me. I grabbed it and pulled myself upward.
“Help!” Harry was yelling. “In here!”
They pressed us back against the bulkhead. It looked bad. Only the cramped space worked in our favor as the half dozen men trying to get at us were practically jumping over each other. I sent one down with a hard left but took several flailing hits in exchange. Harry, fighting desperately, suddenly crumpled as a plank thudded against his head. I grabbed him before he fell and tried to shelter him. I was rocked by a blow to my neck.
God, I thought, this is it.
THWAAAAACKKK!
A burly man in front of me screamed and nearly folded over backward. A cloud of dust rose from him. Behind him, George cocked his bat and looked for a new target. I saw Mac and Allison, too. As our attackers turned to meet the new threat, I jumped one from behind. The next minutes were a jumble of straining bodies and brutal sounds. I pried a deckhand off Sweasy and slammed him against the bulkhead. Harry, back on his feet, threw a timely rolling block to save Allison from being blindsided. Gould snatched away a knife that had stabbed him in the shoulder and snapped its owner’s arm over his knee like kindling. I was having trouble landing clean punches. Mostly it was a matter of wrestling and gouging in the too-narrow space.
Then, suddenly, straddling several inert bodies on the deck, only Stockings were upright in the cabin. Panting, we looked at each other. Sweasy bent over Andy and worked to free him, intoning, “I’m sorry, pal, I’m sorry, Andy, I’m sorry,” a litany which struck me as oddly uncharacteristic.
“We gotta move,” said Allison, peering through the doorway.
“Folks’re comin’ out everywhere. I think the roughs went to the Texas deck.”
“Where’s that?” I said.
“Above, by the pilothouse,” Harry said.
“Pleased to see you fellers,” said Andy, standing unsteadily. The gag had left raw marks by his mouth. “All I’ve been hearing is how these sharps on board’ll clean up today.”
“Let’s get to the grounds,” Harry said. “Before anything else happens.”
We were almost to the gangplank when George sniffed noisily and said, “Where’s that coming from?”
We stopped as the acrid smell of burning wood and paint reached us.
“FIRE!” somebody bellowed above.
A crush of people began to swarm around us. The narrow passageways jammed within seconds. Half-dressed men shoved furiously. Near us a woman cried out in pain and fear. I saw some of the deckhands we’d just fought forcing their way through, no longer concerned about us. A contagion of terror was about to erupt.
“WAIT!” boomed Harry, brandishing his bat. “FIRST THE LADIES!”
It was a generous use of the term, considering the women in question. To my amazement, it worked. He jangled their Victorian conditioning enough to halt the rush—and our cocked bats doubtless helped. Harry guided the disheveled woman to the gangplank himself and made sure others were allowed to pass to the front. “There’s time for all!” he cried repeatedly.
He was nearly wrong. By the time we stepped on the gangway ourselves, tongues of flame licked high in the black clouds billowing from below. “Hurry, get off before the boilers go!” Sweasy yelled, voicing what we all feared.
My feet no sooner touched the dock than there came an enormous CRUMP! The boat lurched violently, then a booming explosion hurled me forward. A fiery column erupted between the tall stacks, bending them outward; they toppled into the pall of smoke. The decks were buckling, the entire bow section a roaring inferno. Through the smoke I saw dim shapes plunging overboard.
Along the landing a chorus of bells and whistles sounded. One horse-drawn fire pump arrived, then another. A neighboring steamer was hosed down to protect it from the searing heat. That was about all that could be done. The Mary Rae was doomed.
“Say,” exclaimed an onlooker, “ain’t you the Red Stockings?”
“We’re the Haymakers,” George told him.
“Come on,” Harry said, pulling us away. “We face them in less than an hour.”
We moved toward our wagon.
“Singular how that fire broke out just when it did,” Andy said grimly.
“Sure is,” I said. I had no idea how Le Caron had reached the Mary Rae so quickly or how he had managed to ignite the fire. But I hadn’t the slightest doubt he was responsible.
“How’d you find me?” Andy asked as we rumbled away from the landing.
I explained how we’d gotten the threatening note, lured Le Caron into the open but failed to capture him, and forced Andy’s whereabouts from the accomplice. I started to get the shakes as I thought about how close we’d come to catastrophe.
“Thought I’d be stuck in there forever,” he said. “They seemed to figure that with me out of the match, we didn’t stand a sucker’s chance.”
“Probably true.”
“Naw, Harry’d’ve let you lick ’em again.”
“I’ll be content letting you do it.”
He grinned. “How’re the odds running?”
“They dropped this morning,” I said. “Now it’s us to win by ten runs.”
He whistled. “The ones I heard on that boat were plungin’ heavy on the Haymakers. Talkin’ tens of thousands. No wonder the odds fell some—but they’re still good for them.” He leaned close. “Sam, I think they’re playin’ other angles. I heard ’em say, ‘It’s in the bag, they took the money.’”
“‘They’? Meaning Stockings?”
He nodded slowly. Possibly it was my imagination, but it seemed that Sweasy, sitting nearby, was being studiously casual. I had a feeling he was straining to hear. “Any names?” I said.
Andy shook his head and whispered, “But I heard one say, it cost a pretty penny, but he’ll deliver the game to us like on a tray.’”
“Who’d they mean?”
He hesitated, then, “They said the signal’d be for the first two tosses to go wild.”
That left little doubt. Now I knew where Brainard had gotten his money.
“We can’t tell Harry,” he whispered. “Acey’d be finished.”
Sweasy shifted position, glanced our way. My mind raced. I tried to put aside shock and just deal with the logistics of the situation.
“I may have an idea,” I whispered. “Don’t say anything yet, okay?” He looked relieved. “You bet.”
It took us half an hour to crawl the last quarter mile west on Seventh. If we hadn’t been so banged up we’d have gotten out and walked—except that it wouldn’t have been any faster. Crowds swarmed every thoroughfare, jammed all sidewalks. The city seemed to have shut down completely, everybody surging to the Union Grounds. We tried to shield ourselves in the wagon but were soon recognized. Hiding our scrapes, we waved back to throngs clapping and cheering, yelling encouragement, reaching up to touch us, tugging at our clothes. We were their team, their champions, projections of themselves. I wondered if medieval knights had felt like this on their way to the tilting grounds.
In the clubhouse a near-apoplectic Champion could barely speak when he saw us. Harry told him we’d gotten banged around a bit in traffic. Which was true enough.
Brainard and Waterman had not accompanied us, for the simple reason that we couldn’t find them. I tried to read their faces as they listened to what had happened. I wondered if Waterman was in on the deal too. As usual, neither of them showed much. Deciding to tackle the toughest first, I approached Brainard, who worked his toothpick in irritation when I said I wanted to talk privately.
“Ain’t the time, so close to the match.”
“That’s exactly what we need to discuss. The match. And your future.”
He eyed me warily and stood. We moved down the long room to a bench near the equipment closet.
“Word has it you’ll sell us out today,” I said with brutal directness. “To show the deal is on, you’ll start with two wild pitches.
The toothpick stopped moving. “Where’d you hear that?
“Does it matter? Harry doesn’t know. Yet.”
“Throwing off a match is a serious charge.”
Very serious.”
He stared at me, trying to determine, I imagined, what I wanted.
“Asa, I’m not gonna make you tell me whether it’s true—”
“Goddamn right you’re not!”
“—but if you’ve got a deal with McDermott, it had better be good for life. You’ll be through with baseball.”
“Horseshit.”
“You think Harry will just forgive and forget? You think Champion won’t crucify you?”
He worked at a piece of tape on the floor with his spikes.
“Whatever the arrangement is,” I said, “we’re not losing today.”
He glanced up, his eyes ironic, world-weary. “No?”
“That’s right. I know the stakes are high. And I know better than you that McDermott plays rough and wouldn’t look kindly on a double cross. So here’s what you’re going to do.”
“Look, Fowler, I’ve listened to—”
“Quiet, we don’t have much time. You’re going to make those two wild pitches to open the game. Meanwhile I’ll tell Millar you were approached by gamblers and offered a bribe.”
His eyes widened. “You what?”
“We’ll start it circulating as a rumor. Maybe I can get him to print something. You’ll be vague, shrug it off as one of those things. I’ll line up police protection during the game and after. Look, Asa, if you did take money from them, for God’s sake give it back. You can forget what you owe me—I’ll even give the five hundred back if you need it.”
The toothpick began waggling as Harry called us. Brainard rose and said, “Who else you talked to?”
“Nobody. Just throw your two pitches and I’ll take care of the rest. After we kick the Haymakers’ butts, I’m going to be scarce the next few days. You might do the same.”
He gestured casually, brushing me away. But I sensed that he was calculating like mad.
“Who’s the other?” I asked.
He looked at me. “What?”
“The other Stocking. Is it Waterman?”
“Don’t you say that,” he snapped. “Fred’s on the square.”
“Sweasy, then?”
“I ain’t saying nothing to you about any of this,” he said flatly. “And I won’t.”
Looking us over, his own face bandaged, Harry shook his head. We didn’t inspire confidence. Sweasy was hobbling, Gould was practically one-armed, and the rest of us bore marks from the fight. My shoulder felt leaden. I might be able to bat, but throwing was out of the question. Andy, ironically, had come out in the best shape among us.
But we must have made a brave picture as we emerged in the sunlight. An earsplitting sound swelled from the crowd. Spectators clustered on the roof of the Grand Duchess, overflowed the new stand, clung to the fences, covered carriages and drays circling the outfield, and were packed outside the foul lines so densely it would have been impossible to sit had they wanted. Police worked to clear the diamond, a slow process.
We warmed up methodically, no sleight-of-hand exhibitions today.
I stood next to Sweasy while we waited for the Haymakers to appear.
“Remember the guy on the landing?” I said. “The one who told me where Andy was?”
“What about him?” Sweasy said.“He told me a few other things.”
Sweasy fumbled an easy throw from George and looked at me with stricken eyes. “What’d he say?”
I knew I had him then; how much easier he was than Brainard to crack. “He mentioned Acey,” I said casually. “And you.”
“I didn’t go back on us!”
“How much did you get?”
“God Almighty.” His voice quavered. “I told ’em I wouldn’t throw off. They said they’d pay me just to listen to their proposition. No fault in hearing them out, was there? I turned ’em down!”
The last piece clicked in place in my mind. “You stupid asshole, where’d you meet them?”
“I can’t tell,” he protested. “I promised.”
“What happened while you were gone?”
He stood as if frozen. George yelled at him.
“Throw the damn ball,” I said. “They set you up, didn’t they? They knew Andy’d be alone, and that’s when they took him. You couldn’t go to the cops because you’d compromised yourself. So you tried to put it all on me, sweet guy that you are.”
“I didn’t know.” It was almost a whisper.
“That’s right,” I said. “You didn’t know shit, so you ended up selling Andy out.”
His eyes stabbed into mine, imploring. “You ain’t gonna tell him.”
A gathering murmur came from the crowd, punctuated by loud cheers from the visitors’ area behind third, as a pennant-festooned omnibus rumbled through the carriage gate in right field and moved around the track.
“It depends,” I said. “If we lose I’m gonna beat you to a pulp and go public with the whole shoddy story. How does that sound?”
“We won’t lose,” he said nervously. “Not on account of me.”
“Well, that’s all you have to worry about. Just yourself. I’ll be watching. Everything. Understand?”
He nodded.
The omnibus halted near the visitors’ bench. The Haymakers emerged in jaunty new uniforms, no longer their old-fashioned brown cords but now a splash of patriotic colors: red caps with white peaks, white pants and shirts, red belts, blue stockings, tan canvas shoes. They looked confident. And mean as ever.
I studied them: Clipper Flynn tossing his blond locks and posturing before the Troy rooters; the King brothers already swaggering and shooting us hard looks; agile Bellan moving with lithe grace; Cherokee Fisher smiling sardonically at jibes from the crowd, many of whom had cheered him last season when he pitched for the Bucks; and Bull Craver, whose eyes sought mine before he turned away to take Fisher’s warm-ups. I had the same feeling I remembered in Troy: we’d need everything we had to beat them.
As cops finished clearing the field, I informed Millar that Brainard had been offered a bribe.
“Jupiter!” he said. “How’d you know? He tell you?”
“Not exactly, but it’s no secret by now. Ask him yourself. Others may have been approached too. Haven’t you heard the rumors?”
“There’ve been nothing but rumors for days now. Morrissey’s supposed to have twenty thousand dollars on the Haymakers.”
“He’s here?” I asked quickly.“No, but our friend McDermott is.”
I followed his gesture and saw the red-haired gambler standing behind the Haymaker bench staring darkly at Andy. That was good. It meant he hadn’t been in touch with Le Caron—although I wasn’t optimistic enough to think that the latter had been trapped in the fire. Andy’s your first surprise, Red Jim, you bastard, I thought. Not getting the ransom is your second. And with any luck your third will come when we win big and you lose even bigger.
“Who’s next to him?” I asked, eyeing a short dapper man in a white summer suit.
“McKeon, Haymaker president.”
Christ, another Irishman. It seemed they ran everything.
“Given the situation, a cop or two near the benches might be good,” I said. “But I’d rather not bother Champion with it.”
Millar gave me his owlish look. “Chief Mercil’s here. You think there’ll be trouble?”
“The odds still with us?”
He nodded. “Latest I heard from Vine was that eastern money was pouring in on the Haymakers to finish no more than nine runs behind.”
Almost a cinch bet, even with Andy on hand and Brainard—I hoped—playing to win. We’d barely taken them in Troy—and we hadn’t started out with a pregame brawl. With all the angles he thought he had going, McDermott must have bet every dime he could find.
“There’ll be some real anxious bettors, then,” I said. “And a lot of sore losers.”
“Understood,” Millar said, and went off to find the police chief.
Ten minutes later uniformed cops stood conspicuously behind the players’ benches and scorer’s table. I felt about as secure as I was likely to that afternoon.
“What were you doing at that big steamboat fire?” Millar asked. “People swear they saw the nine there—carrying bats, even—just about the time the boilers blew.”
“Just passing by,” I said. “On our way here.”
“By way of the landing?” When I didn’t elaborate he sighed. “Well, that’s more than I got from Harry and the rest.”
“How so?”
“They all said, ‘What fire?’”
The umpire Harry proposed was Joe Brockway of the Great Westerns. I’d seen him play and ump; he was accurate, fair, and respected locally. Surprisingly, the Haymakers accepted him with no quarrel. Brockway, a tall man with thinning sandy hair and sunburned skin, flipped a coin, which landed in Troy’s favor. Craver waved us to the plate first with a peremptory gesture. Harry came away looking sour.
“Those fellows require another lesson,” he told us.
The Haymakers surprised us by starting Fisher at second and pitching Charlie Bearman, a player we hadn’t seen in Troy. His slow warm-ups looked easy to hit. As if to confirm it, George pounded his first pitch through the infield for a single and promptly stole second. But Gould and Waterman popped up, and Allison’s liner was snared by Bellan at third. We’d been whitewashed in the first. Not a good beginning.
As the Haymakers came in, McDermott stood clapping beside McKeon, his eyes on Brainard.
Now was the pitcher’s moment. I’d seen him note the cops and glance at me. Now I studied him in the box. His motion looked jerkier than usual. His warm-ups came high and low. Allison went out to talk to him.
The leadoff Haymaker stepped in—and took a pitch ten feet over his head. The crowd groaned. Twelve thousand pairs of eyes fastened on Brainard. His next pitch went completely behind the hitter. McDermott, grinning broadly, leaned close to McKeon. Was the whole Troy club in on the fix?
Brainard worked the hitter to a full count, then gave up a sharp single to center. Mart King, up next, did not lift the bat from his shoulder. He walked on four pitches. Enough, Acey, I thought. The runners advanced on a ground out. Another grounder scored a run. Then the roof caved in. Flynn swatted a curving drive down the line that Andy misjudged. Craver smashed one in almost exactly the same place. Andy, breaking late, couldn’t reach it in time. Steve King’s blow to the right-center gap scored the runners. Bellan lofted an easy fly to left. Andy, completely rattled by then, dropped it. The disease spread as Mac muffed a routine fly and Waterman, usually the most reliable of infielders, let a pop-up slip off his hands. By the time we got the third out, I felt sick. For the first time I regretted my new scoreboard as a white 6 appeared beneath our 0.
“You okay?” I asked Andy. The Haymakers would have scored only once had his errors not opened the gates.
He shook his head, his cheeks burning. “I feel queer and I’m not seeing right. I didn’t eat and I—”
“You didn’t what?”
“They didn’t feed me on the boat. I haven’t had anything since yesterday. I think it’s making me dizzy.”
“Jesus, why didn’t you say something?”
“Forgot. Besides, there’s been no time.”
“I’ll be back,” I said, and dashed off to the booth. There, things were a mess. Helga and the other women had lagged far behind, with Johnny off on the steamboat rescue. Now the four were frantically trying to catch up and serve hundreds of customers standing in line.
“How’re we doing out there?” Johnny asked. He was drenched with sweat. A lump swelled his forehead where he’d taken a hit during the fight.
I wrapped up some fries (square-bottomed paper bags hadn’t been invented, so we, like everybody, twisted paper to form cone-shaped containers, much the way flowers are wrapped) and a hamburger and poured an ice-cream soda into a glass (disposable cups didn’t exist either) and said, “So far it couldn’t be much worse.”
I got back in time to see Andy thrown out by a step on an infield bouncer. Harry, breaking from first on Bearman’s floater, sprinted all the way to third. To my surprise he didn’t stop there. A roar erupted from the crowd. Too late the Haymaker first baseman realized what was happening and threw to the plate. Harry slid past Craver’s lunging tag. Only one run—but it was a start.
Andy wolfed the food down. I settled back at the scorer’s table. Brainard was due up next, then Sweasy. To me they’d looked as energized as the rest when Harry scored. If either intended to sell us out, he was putting on a good show. It got better: Brainard worked Bearman for a walk and Sweasy singled up the middle. Mac then drilled the ball past a diving Bellan to score Brainard, and George’s low shot over third base scored two more. Then Gould topped a roller down the line that Bellan, playing deep, couldn’t get to in time. Snakebit, he slammed the ball to the turf in frustration. Waterman walked to load the bases, then Allison stroked a single that, coupled with a wild throw, scored all three runners. We yelled with the exultant crowd. And it wasn’t ended yet. Harry, playing with the brilliant intensity he’d shown in the Forest City squeaker, singled Allison home and dove into second on the throw.
“I see good now,” Andy told me, heading for the plate. He quickly proved it by slamming an inside pitch to left that scored Harry for our ninth run of the inning. McDermott’s grin had long since vanished.
The Haymakers moved Fisher to the box. Andy went to work on old Cherokee with dancing leads off first. To the crowd’s delight he stole second and third on consecutive pitches—and when Craver threw wildly over Bellan, he trotted home.
Something about the way Craver stood with hands on hips triggered in my mind his spiking of Andy. Not again! I thought. I jumped up and ran toward the plate, yelling, “Watch out! Watch their catcher!”
Brockway glanced curiously at me, then at Craver as Andy tagged the plate. Craver’s face turned purple. He pointed at me and snarled, “Get that nancy boy away!”
I pointed back. “Next time you want to step on somebody, try me!”Andy grabbed me, and suddenly I was hemmed in by Stockings.
“Calm down,” Harry said. “He hasn’t done anything.”
“He intended to,” I said, and looked at Brockway. “Watch that ape—he likes to hurt people.”
“I’ll run this, not you,” Brockway snapped.
“Enough, Sam!” Harry pushed me back. “Haven’t you had your fill today?”
“Meet me after!” Craver yelled. “I got a score to settle, nancy boy!”
“Anywhere!” I yelled.
Harry and the rest practically dragged me back to the table. Only later, after the Haymakers had argued in vain that my interference invalidated Andy’s run—Brockway ruled there was no possible play at the plate, and in any case I hadn’t actually stepped within the diamond—did I consider how monumentally stupid it would be for me to stick around to fight Craver instead of leaving the ballpark as soon as we’d won.
Assuming we did, that is, by enough runs. The Haymakers came at us again in the bottom of the second. After diving spectacularly to snag a sinking liner, Andy, playing more erratically than I’d ever seen, turned an easier drive into a two-base muff. A sequence of scratch hits preceded Mart King’s towering triple, on which Haymakers circled the bases like windup toys. Only Waterman’s ballsy knockdown of a blistering smash saved more Haymaker runs. As it was, they tallied seven and moved back in front, 13-10.
We got two back in the third on errors, then blanked them in their half when Andy snared a foul bound in the corner and Harry leaped high to rob Craver.
The next half inning belonged to Andy. Taking first on a fielder’s choice, he stole second and third again, outrunning Craver’s bullet throws with flashing speed that amazed even me. The burly catcher looked homicidal.
Then Brainard lofted a fly to short right. Andy tagged and set himself to sprint home. Flynn caught the ball on the dead run and launched a low whizzing peg. Andy’s legs drove him toward the plate. Craver straddled the base path several feet up the line. The ball arrived on a perfect bounce.
“Watch him,” I yelled at Brockway, jumping up again. “WATCH CRAVER!”
The throw had Andy by six feet. Craver wheeled for the tag, a murderous obstacle. I wanted to look away as Andy bunched his shoulders and ducked his head. No, I thought, not headfirst! Craver dropped to one knee and held the ball with both hands, ready to rip upward with it. But Andy had decoyed. Instead of diving he straightened abruptly and vaulted into the air. The suddenness of it was startling, as if he had exploded upward from the sod. For an instant—an indelible instant in the minds of the thousands watching—Andy seemed to air-walk over Craver. Realizing he’d been fooled, the catcher bellowed and reared, thrusting the ball upward with maiming force.
And Andy kicked it from his hand.
He landed on the plate with the tying run. In itself the vertical leap was astounding. In these circumstances it was the stuff of legend. The crowd shrieked and roared for minutes afterward. We pounded Andy nearly to the ground. The Haymakers, led by McKeon, formed a shouting, gesticulating circle around Brockway, arguing vehemently that Andy should be out.When he finally ordered them to resume playing, they managed only one ball out of the infield in the bottom of the fourth. The game’s momentum was all with us now. McDermott, I saw with mixed feelings, had disappeared.
Haymakers 13, Stockings 13.
“I checked with Western Union,” Millar said. “When the first inning’s score went out, every sharp in the East tried to get money down on the Haymakers.”
“And now?”
“Now the wire’s jammed with messages for McKeon.”
“What sort of messages?”
“They can’t tell me, but I’ll bet we see the Haymakers pull some curious stunts, now that we’re settling to our business.”
Millar’s words proved to be prophetic.
In the top of the fifth, Brainard’s double scored two and sent Andy to third. Andy then scared the daylights out of me—and rubbed salt in Craver’s wounds—by stealing home, belly-sliding to touch the plate before Craver drove the ball hard into his thigh. Andy bounced up as if he’d felt nothing. We led by four runs.
“Don’t try him again,” I warned. “He’ll kill you.”
“I’ve gone over and under him,” Andy said, laughing. “Next time maybe I’ll go through him. Wouldn’t that be a dinger?”
“No, it’d be suicide.”
Fighting back, the Haymakers kept the game what Millar called, “Dick pull, Devil pull.” Brainard’s late start for first on a grounder to Gould allowed a runner. I scrutinized Brainard, wondering if the miscue had been deliberate. So far he’d been nearly as up-and-down as Andy. Then he walked Flynn—Brockway’s calls had favored hitters all afternoon—and Craver stalked to the plate. Uh-oh, I thought. Sure enough, Craver smashed a belt-high fastball into the left-field corner for a triple. Brainard grooved another to Mart King, who went for it like a shark after blood, ramming the ball clear out of the Union Grounds. So much for our lead. It was now 17—17.
“What the hell’re you doing?” I demanded of Brainard when he came off.
“Not showing the white, if that’s what you’re saying.” He massaged his pitching shoulder. “My wing’s nearly used up, and they’re heavy strikers.”
“We gotta win,” I said. “By at least ten runs.”
He shrugged, as if it were out of his domain. The crowd’s noise rose around us. We turned toward the plate, where Craver was talking animatedly with Brockway. Mac looked on in the striker’s box. Harry strode past us.
“What now?” I asked.“Can’t tell,” Harry said. “A wide called on Fisher, I think.”
But it was more than that. Mac had fouled a pitch straight back that Craver bob bled. Brockway ruled that it touched the ground before he’d secured a hold on it. The catcher now turned away and looked questioningly at McKeon. He did so again after the next pitch, a called ball. Brainard and I exchanged looks. Something strange was going on.
Fisher delivered again. Mac swung late, barely making contact. The ball flew back on a low trajectory, striking the gravelly dirt between Craver’s feet. He bent quickly, rose, and held it up. “How’s that?” he demanded.
We couldn’t tell from the Stockings’ bench whether Craver had taken the ball cleanly on the first bound. Brockway, however, stood only several feet from the action.
“Two bounces!” he announced promptly. “No out! That’s two against the striker!”
Craver didn’t say a word, but looked at McKeon, now walking toward him. They exchanged a nod. McKeon said something to Brockway. Then, before our disbelieving eyes and those of the buzzing crowd, Craver waved the Haymakers off the field. They began packing up their bats.
“What the hell?” I said.
“They figured there’s too much chance of losing,” Brainard said. “Or their backers did.”
We watched the carriage gates swing open and their omnibus come on the track. A rising murmur of discontent issued from the stands.
“Gonna get stirred up here,” Brainard said.“But what happens to all the bets?” I said.
“Don’t you see? We’ve finished five innings, so they’ll claim a tie. They were hoping for this or better.”
“McDermott will collect, then?”
“He’ll try, depending on what else happens. But he sure can’t lose now.”
As I tried to digest what that might mean for me, the Haymakers boarded their bus. A band of boys broke through the ropes, dodging cops and flinging rocks at the departing vehicle. Behind them the crowd flooded over the police line. Around us suddenly scrambled men yelling and running and hurling things.
“Let’s go,” I said, and was simultaneously aware of a subtle, almost subliminal whizzing sound. I heard it again, then a thud in the sod exploded dirt upward in a tiny eruption before me. I stared at it stupidly, then felt a tug at my pants. I saw a neat hole in the baggy white material just above my knee. Only then did I realize that somebody was shooting at me.