Bang The Drum Slowly (25 page)

“Hats off to Arthur,” said Bruce. “Come right in and join the celebration.”

“I guess I will,” I said. “I live here. What in hell is going on?”

“We are celebrating,” said Bruce.

“So I see,” said I.

“Bottoms up in honor of Author,” said Perry Simpson.

“My bottom is up,” said Wash Washburn, and he flipped over and done a handstand on a chair, and everybody watched, and then he climbed up the rungs of the back, hand over hand until he was standing on his hands on the top of the chair, and the chair swayed a little, backwards and forwards but never falling, and everybody clapped, and then he climbed down again and jumped on the floor and begun walking across the floor, and Jonah stuck a cigarette in his mouth, in Wash’s mouth I mean, and Wash started out the room, still on his hands, and down the hall, and the first door he come to he knocked with his feet and a chap answered, a fellow in a bathrobe. I don’t know who. He is always in the lobby reading racing magazines. “Pardon me, sir,” said Wash, “but I need a match,” and the fellow went and got a match, and Wash reached up and took it and brung it down ever so careful and lit it, standing there on one arm, and he blew a puff and said “Thank you, sir” and give the chap his matches back. “No trouble a-tall,” said the fellow, and Wash walked back in the room on his hands and kicked the door shut behind him, and we all clapped, or maybe all but me. I don’t remember. I was still pretty confused and all.

Holly telephoned and said “Congrats”. I could hardly hear her. I took the telephone in the bathroom. “What in the world is going on down there?” she said. “Who is singing that music?”

“Piney Woods,” said I. “We are celebrating.”

“He is quite a horrible singer,” she said. “Celebrating what? Number 20?”

“I do not know,” I said. “I believe they are in on the truth.”

“Since when?” she said.

“Since sometime in the last couple hours,” I said.

“Wait,” said she, “Michele is crying,” and she run and brung her to the phone, and I flung open the door and said, “Boys! Listen!” and they all quietened down and Michele cried for them awhile.

“Leave us sing her a lullaby,” said Jonah. “Piney old boy, sing her an old-fashion Georgia lullaby.”

“I do not know none,” said Piney, “and I do not think you can play a lullaby on a guitar, but I know a song. Listen to this, honey. You just shut up now and listen, for it is a tale told by a cowboy,” and he sung—

When he was done the boys all clapped, and Michele started crying again, and the boys all laughed, and Holly, too, though I could tell it was laughing and crying, both.

“I will sing her another,” said Piney.

“Not on my bill,” I said.

“It is night rates,” he said. “You just picked up another $1,000 anyhow.”

”Bottoms up to Author’s bonus clause,” said Coker.

“Author, dear Author,” called Keith Crane in this high, girly voice, “come here and make love to me and tell your wife go feed the child.”

“Who is that?” said she.

“Keith,” I said.

“He is right anyhow,” said she. “I better feed her. She ain’t gained an ounce since Tuesday and I am worried sick.”

“Holy Moses,” said I. “Mike, what if she ain’t gained an ounce since Tuesday?” Mike has 8 children, one of them signed by the Mammoths only just a couple weeks ago and libel to wind up playing for his old man at QC some fine day.

“Lace her milk with a slug of whiskey,” said Mike.

“The baby’s?” said I.

“No,” said he. “Holly’s. It will relax her mind.”

“Mike says forget it,” I said.

“That is what the doctor says,” she said.

“She is named for me,” said Mike. “What do you boys think about that?”

“And many another baby looks like you,” said Horse, “but does not bear your name.”

“That is a lie,” said Mike.

“35 years ago today I was born,” said Goose.

“Bottoms up to Goose,” said Canada.

“We are celebrating,” said Bruce. “Hats off!”

“He said hats off,” said Ugly, “so take off your hat, Piney,” and Piney took off his 10-gallon hat, saying “Whatever Bruce says I will do, for in my opinion there is no greater catcher in baseball today.”

“Lay it on easy, boys,” said I to myself, and they sung —

“Speech!” they cried. “Speech! Speech!” and Goose stood up with a beer and said, “I will now deliver you boys my farewell speech, for when a man turns 35 he must play out the string and be gone. I believe Red was wise to quit when he did, though he had a thing to go back to while I have nothing. I was never as smart as him and never the great catcher, though I believe on any other club I would of played regular.”

“It is in the past,” said Red.

“Some people are born luckier than others,” said Goose. “I wish I was being born again and dropped in at a movie and seen my whole life ahead. I would of done it over better.”

“We will all be born again,” said Mike. “We are only passing through to a better deal than this.”

“Maybe so,” said Red, “though I am leery of magic.”

“There is no maybe nor magic to it,” said Mike. “There is time to do over again what you done wrong, even at 35.”

“You have probably got to hustle,” said Goose. “I have got too many goddam black marks against me. Nobody knows what a son of a bitch I am except her, and I do not think I can hustle that fast, plus which if she gets there first she will put the finger on me.”

“She will forgive you,” said Mike.

“Put an ad in the paper,” said Jonah.

“Do what?” said Goose.

“Put an ad in the paper. Down home you put an ad in the “Picayune.” You tell the saints you done wrong and will do better and he shoots the word up.” Red laughed and put it in Spanish for George, but George did not laugh. “Black and white all the same,” said Jonah. “I put an ad in the “Picayune” saying to my saint please do not leave me sign on with any organization but the New York Mammoths.”

“What did Washington do?” I said.

“They won,” said Horse. “The son of a bitches.”

Piney put his hat back on and begun thumbing his guitar.

“Hats off,” said Ugly.

Piney whipped it off. “What to?”

“Hats off to you,” said Ugly. “You rounded up them corrals down there under the lonesome star and lassooed your horse and headed them off at the pass.”

“I got no horse,” said Piney. “I am going to buy one in the winter and name her Good Hope 2.” His motorcycle is Good Hope One.

“Hats off to motorcycles,” said Coker, and Piney reached for his hat, except it was already off.

“Breed your motorcycle to your horse and come up with a horse on wheels,” said Herb.

“Or a 4-legged motorcycle,” said Gil.

Then they kicked that around awhile and come up with some rather unusual combinations.

“Hats off to hats off,” said Coker. “Bottoms up to hats off,” and they all drunk, all but me, and they kicked
that
around awhile, bottoms up to bottoms up and hats off to hats off, swigging a little swig with every toast, beer only until they sent down for some whiskey to wash out the dirty old beer cans with. I begun getting undressed, for I was tired, and every once in awhile somebody said, “Leave us go elsewhere, for Author is turning in,” and they talked about it but never went, and I scrubbed my teeth and sal in the bath awhile, soaking out a little Charley horse I had and reading a book Arcturus sent me name of “Widening Your Circle of Acquaintances.” The boys kept floating in and out the bathroom, some of them getting rather tanked up by now. I got out and dried off and crawled in bed, and the boys all said, “Leave us go elsewhere, for Author is turning in.”

“You do not bother me,” I said, and I pulled the cover up over my head and laid there listening, dozing off and on a little, hearing little snatches of things that now come back to me more and more while I write. I remember they talked about Sid’s slump, and I remember Mike told some stories of the old days, stories I heard in QC but forgot, and somebody read out loud from the book, “Widening Your Circle of Acquaintances,” and Bruce said he would be marrying Katie any day, and Goose shouted over to me, saying, “Author, where do you keep your bullets?”

“In my top drawer with my gold nuggets and extra socks,” I said, and he went and put a bullet in Piney’s gun, or said he did. Piney said he didn’t. “Very well,” said Goose, “I will dare you to point this gun at your head and pull the trigger,” but Piney wouldn’t do it, knowing there was no bullet in it, yet not so sure.

Goose said, “I will go and get a
real
bullet,” and I heard him leave. That was the last I heard for a while.

*   *   *

Yet I could hear them even while sleeping, and I kept saying to myself in my sleep, “It is all a dream. I am only dreaming. I will wake up in the morning and they will be slinging horseshit at each other again on schedule,” and I kept waking myself up every hour or so and looking around, and it was not a dream. It was real. They were sitting there, and Bruce amongst them, and it was a club, and I sat up and said, “How about turning off the light and turning on some lamps?”

“I will shoot out the light,” said Goose, “like they do in the west,” and he aimed at the light with Piney’s gun.

“Why do you think a cowboy is a hero?” said Red to Piney. “Cowboys no doubt think ballplayers are heroes.”

“There is no bullet in it,” said Piney.

“There is no such a thing as a hero,” said Red. “The only hero is a man without heroes.”

“Will you bet $100?” said Goose.

“Done,” said Piney, and Goose aimed and fired, POOM!, and people started running up and down the halls and knocking on doors and screaming “Bloody murder,” and the boys all laughed in the dark.

“You will have to go west in the winter and brand up a great many stampedes to make that 100 back,” said Ugly to Piney.

“Open up in there,” shouted the house detective, and somebody opened up and he walked in and flipped the light on, but it did not light. “Who is in the bed?” he said. “Turn on the light,” and I reached up and turned on the bed-light. “So it is you, Author. Did you hear that shot?”

“How could I of possibly heard it,” I said. “It come from clear over the other side of the room.”

“Give me that gun,” said the detective.

Piney took it out of his belt. “I do not know how it got there,” he said.

“It must of jumped in,” said Perry. “And then the belt just jumped around his waist and the hat just jumped on his head.”

“Frame-up,” said Piney. “I been frame-upped.”

“Is not the switch on the wall a satisfactory way enough of turning out the light?” said the detective. “You will pay for the light and the hole in the ceiling and give me that gun besides,” and Piney give him the gun. “Come with me,” said the detective, and off they went, and I dropped back to sleep again.

They were still there when I woke up. It was just coming light, and they were drinking coffee and talking, quiet, and I laid looking up at the busted light. 100 times between August 26 and the end I flipped the switch but got nothing, for the hotel never fixed it, though it was paid for, and every time I done so I remembered the night. “This night cost you a rodeo or 2,” said I to Piney, “the $100 to Goose plus damages.”

“That ain’t what a rodeo is,” he said.

“We all kittied in on the damages,” said Bruce. He brung me a cup of coffee. “And Goose give him back the $100.”

“It is a great bunch of boys,” said Piney.

“They always was,” said Bruce.

But it was a sad lot of Mammoths faced Cleveland Saturday, and we lost, and no wonder, and the lead was chipped back down to 2 again, Washington beating Chicago. You can not play baseball hung over. It is not like most businesses I ever seen, insurance business, TV business, the writers, where everybody you meet is hung over or boiled, one day one and the next day the next, boiled, hung, boiled, hung. The only one not hung over was Sid, for he lives up home on Riverside Drive when we are in New York.

After the ball game Dutch said, “Very well, boys, you had your little celebration, and we will now not have another until the day we clinch it,” and the boys all said “Yes siree, boss” and “You said it, Dutch,” and such as that.

“What celebration?” said Sid. “What was being celebrated?” and he sat drying off and looking up and down the line. “Is my memory gone, too,” he said, “as well as my eye? I heard of nothing worth celebrating,” and he stood up and grabbed his shaver, getting ready to shave. He always shaves after a bad day. If he has a good day he leaves it grow. “Somebody name me something worth celebrating,” he said, but nobody answered, and he took and flung his shaver against the wall and it fell apart in 100 pieces, screws and bolts all over the place, probably a $25 shaver or more, and he looked at it but said nothing, saying only, “Celebrating,” and walking down the line then and looking in everybody’s locker, which nobody ever does, and taking a razor off Gil’s shelf and walking on, and taking a tube of cream off Vincent Carucci’s shelf and walking on some more, and taking a pack of blades off Horse’s shelf. “Celebrating,” he said. He lathered up his face with Vincent’s tube and threw the tube on the floor and looked at Vince, same as saying, “I dare you to say something,” but Vincent said nothing, only picked up the tube and put it back, and he took a blade out of the pack and threw the pack at Horse’s feet, and Horse picked it up and said nothing, and he stood looking in the mirror and shaving. “Celebrating,” he said. “I have picked up 5 hits in 43 times at bat and we are about to be dumped on our ass. Yet we are celebrating,” and his hand shook and he cut himself in about 4 or 5 places, and when he was done he never even washed the razor off but only shouted “Gill” and flung it more or less towards Gil, and Herb caught it and washed it off and handed it to Gil. He was bleeding around the chin, and it dripped on his shirt when he dressed, and Harry Glee said, “You are dripping blood on your shirt, Sid.”