Graves' Retreat (19 page)

    “So this is Cedar Rapids,” he said. “Never been here before. Never wanted to be, either.”

    The Sterling team roared.

    The mayor, who was not a demonstrative man, said, “Oh, it’s not such a bad place, Mad Mike.”

    “Hell, tell him where to get off!” somebody shouted from the Cedar Rapids crowd.

    The mayor, realizing he’d just let down the citizens who had voted him into office, cleared his throat, and said, “In fact, it’s not a bad place
at all,
” as if his words rang with courage.

    Several in the Cedar Rapids crowd shook their heads at the mayor.

    “Where’s this Graves I’ve heard so much about?” McGee said. “Rusty Fitzsimmons wants to meet him.”

    

    

    When Les heard his name mentioned, his stomach began doing terrible things.

    “Les? Is Les Graves here?” the mayor called, sounding like an usher paging somebody in the balcony of the Greene Opera House.

    May, obviously seeing that Les was nervous, squeezed his arm and said, “You’ll be fine, Les.”

    Les swallowed. “I hope.”

    “Les? Is Les Graves here?” the mayor continued to call.

    “Right here, Mayor,” Harding called back.

    To Les, Harding said, “Now don’t take no guff from that bastard.”

    Les wondered if Harding was referring to the mayor, Mad Mike McGee or Fitzsimmons.

    Les sort of waved his hand so that the mayor could see him and then he sort of put a smile on his face and then he sort of went up to the head of the crowd. His stomach was twice as bad as it had been and he knew anytime now it would be three times as bad.

    When he finally got a first look at Fitzsimmons, Les saw why all the sportswriters wrote about the man as if he was on loan from Olympus.

    Fitzsimmons stood at least six two and had shoulders you could comfortably rest a boxcar on. He had a shanty-Irish face, which meant he managed to look both innocent and mean at the same time, and he had a smile he must have practiced as often as he did his fast ball.

    “This is Graves?” Mad Mike McGee said.

    “This,” the mayor said, missing Mad Mike’s disparaging tone completely, “is Lester Graves.”

    “God, Mayor,” Les said, like a small boy who’d just been embarrassed by a parent, "you know how much I hate Lester.”

    “So it’s ‘Lester,’ is it?” said Rusty Fitzsimmons, laughing. “That’s an awfully nice name, ‘Lester’ is.”

    Even from ten feet away, you could hear Harding say, “Boy, that mayor’s a stupid bastard.”

    “Well, ‘Lester,’ I’m Rusty Fitzsimmons.”

    And with that he put out a right hand whose palm was so big you could hide a baseball in it.

    Les watched as his own, much smaller, hand traversed the empty space separating the two men and connected with Fitzsimmons’.

    The pain was instant.

    Never before in his life had Les felt a grip like this.

    The ache started in his fingers and ran the length of his arm and even began radiating into his shoulder.

    Fitzsimmons knew what he was doing, of course, and so his smile rivaled the sun’s for sheer brilliance.

    And he didn’t let go, either.

    Les wriggled his hand as much as he could without looking as if he was trying to wrench it free, but Fitzsimmons kept holding on.

    “Quite a grip he’s got there, don’t you think, ‘Lester?’ ” said Mad Mike McGee.

    By now Harding had pushed his way up to the front of the crowd. The burly fireman said, “That’s his pitching hand and you know it, Fitzsimmons.”

    Les felt hot blood start up his neck and fill his cheeks.

    He felt a total fool.

    “Well, so it is,” Fitzsimmons said. “Now I sure wouldn’t want to damage ‘Lester’s’ pitching hand now, would I?”

    “Let him go.”

    “Please, Harding, I can take care of myself,” Les said. He was beginning to feel a lot like somebody who should actually be named Lester.

    Later on, the newspaper account of what followed would accuse Harding, who had never been known for his even temper, of throwing the first punch. And so it was.

    Harding took two steps toward Fitzsimmons, got just enough leverage to let go a short cracking hook to the jaw and fired.

    If nothing else, Fitzsimmons let go of Les’s hand. Right away.

    But almost simultaneously, Fitzsimmons also decked Harding. With a single punch.

    And that’s when the general melee broke out.

    The Cedar Rapids depot was transformed from a somewhat sleepy wooden platform filled with respectable men in celluloid collars and women in flowery summer hats to the scene of an all-out brawl.

    The men of both teams managed to push the ladies aside and go at each other with a fervor the heat of the day only increased.

    If you were not tall enough to crack a man on the jaw, then it was eminently permissible to kick him sharply on the shins (if not other bodily parts), and if you saw a friend of yours in trouble, then you were to forget all about Queensberry and come up from behind the man assaulting your friend and let him have a good and sinking punch to the spine.

    Les was aware of throwing six (or maybe seven) punches at men in white uniforms and even more aware of taking twenty or so in return.

    Given the fact that his nose was bleeding and that one of his front teeth was loose, he was not unhappy when a policeman stood up on a nearby baggage wagon and exploded a Smith and Wesson for attention and order.

    The gunshot got everybody’s attention immediately.

    The few men who continued to swing were yanked to order by their friends.

    The policeman, a well-respected Czech named Severe, said, “Say something, Mayor.”

    The mayor, standing on the ground, looked miserably up at Severe and said, “Why don’t you handle it? You’re doing a good job.”

    Severe frowned and shook his head and then barked to the men before him, “You’re supposed to save your spunk for the playing field.”

    There was, of course, grumbling and cursing and various accusations as to who had started it. Severe raised his weapon as if to fire again. It was enough to bring back order.

    “Now, I want one of you businessmen to help the Sterling team find their hotel,” Severe said, “and I want the Cedar Rapids team to go back to their jobs or their homes.” He paused. “Now does everybody understand me?”

    Like chastened children-Severe was a thickset, impressive man- they all paid him at least the lip service of dutiful nods.

    “Now,” Severe said, “go!”

    And so they went.

    

    

    “Hurt?”

    “Sort of.”

    “I’m being as easy as I can.”

    "I know and I appreciate it.”

    “How’s your hand?”

    “All right, I guess.”

    They were in Greene Square Park, Les and May, and she was seeing to his cut lip with cotton and iodine.

    Les stretched his fingers out before him. Between getting them squeezed by Rusty Fitzsimmons and bruised by pounding them on people’s faces, they were pained but seemed otherwise all right. “Now let’s look at that tooth,” May said.

    She put a tender finger to his loose tooth. “Boy,” she said. “Boy, it’s really loose.”

    He touched his tongue to it. “It’s like when you were six and you had a tooth that was about to fall out and you kept on worrying it with your tongue.”

    She smiled at him. “I guess you’re going to live.”

    “I guess I am.”

    She laughed. “And I guess that’s pretty good news.”

    “Well, I’m happy to hear it, anyway.”

    So they sat back against the tree. The grass was very green and there were butterflies, some orange, some white, one even bluish, and there was a breeze that blew the tops of fluffy dandelions into a million pieces that floated on the soft currents of summer air.

    She said, “I’m scared.”

    “What?” He was genuinely surprised by her remark. They had been sitting here so peacefully-he had even managed to quit thinking about T.Z. for a time-and now she was talking about being scared.

    “I’m scared.”

    “Of what?”

    “You. Me. Us.”

    “May, I-”

    “I’m just going to ask you one thing.”

    “What?”

    “This time don’t make me any promises.”

    “But, May, I-”

    “That’s all I want you to promise me. That you won’t promise me anything.”

    He was silent for a time, feeling how her thin body was tense against his. He sighed. “All right, May. I promise not to make any promises.”

    She stared straight ahead. “Thank you. We’ll just let whatever happens, happen.”

    “Is it all right if I tell you how nice it is to be with you again?” She turned and stared at him and then she smiled. “Yes, I guess that's all right.”

    And then a voice said, “Lovely day, isn’t it?”

    Les followed May’s gaze to the right of the elm against which they sat.

    Neely stood there. He was dean-shaved and wore new clothes. Even so, you could smell the beer on his breath and see the crackling anger in his eyes.

    Neely doffed his hat. “I’m a friend of Les’s,” he said to May. May looked at Les. Obviously she sensed his tension.

    Neely said, “We need to talk, Les.”

    Finally, Les found his voice. “Maybe you’d better go, May.”

    “Are you sure?”

    His throat felt constricted. “Yes,” he said in barely a whisper.

    He helped her up. They paused a moment, their eyes meeting. He gave her arm a tiny squeeze. “Why don’t you come over to practice after work?”

    “All right,” she said.

    She watched Neely for a long moment, as if he were of a species she had never seen before, and then she went on her quiet way. “Pretty,” Neely said. “Very pretty.”

    Les said nothing.

    Neely pointed at Les's mouth. “Heard about the fight. That’s going to be some game tomorrow. Too bad I won’t be around to see it.” Les said, “I didn't get the combination.”

    Neely had a way of narrowing his eyes. You felt them like sharp little knives, cutting you.

    “I take it,” Neely said, “a man named Black Jake Early has contacted you.”

    Les stiffened, betraying the truth.

    “I also take it,” Neely went on, "that you know who he works for.”

    Les’s mouth stiffened.

    “I’ve heard that Judge Parker has a quota system he uses.” Neely’s voice was prickly with irony. “He can’t sleep unless he hangs at least one man a month.”

    “I can’t get it, Neely,” Les said.

    Some shopgirls went by and waved to Les. He waved back. They went on across the railroad tracks, seeming to float in their frilly summer dresses.

    “He’s going to get him, Les. Black Jake Early, I mean. He never misses.”

    Les put his head down, sighed.

    “He’s your brother.”

    Les, in a voice hoarse with grief, said, “I can’t help him any more.” Neely let the silence grow between them. Then he said, “You’re afraid of losing your life here, aren’t you?”

    Les looked up suddenly. “Yes-yes, I am, Neely, and I’m damn well not ashamed of it.”

    “Nobody would have to know.”

    “Of course they would know. I work in the bank.”

    “I’ve got that figured out.”

    Les shook his head. “I can’t help you, Neely.”

    “It isn’t me you’re not helping, Les. It’s your brother.”

    “You sonofabitch.”

    Neely laughed. “You never did like me, did you, Les, even when we were little kids?”

    “All you did was manipulate people, Neely, pretend you wanted to help them. But the only person you’ve ever helped is yourself.” For the first time today, Neely lost his considerable temper. “Do you think it’s been goddamn easy carrying your brother around all these years-he’s drunk half the time and the other half he’s running around with somebody else’s wife and nearly getting himself killed. I’m the one who has to get him out of his scrapes. Not you. I’m the one who’s taken care of him all these years.”

    Halfway through Neely’s harsh words, Les began watching the other man carefully. He had never realized until this moment Neely’s feelings for T.Z. Neely spoke with hard contempt. Neely hated T.Z. Then Les felt a strange guilt.

    Maybe Neely had earned the right to hate T.Z. Could Les have put up with his brother all these years? Could Les have endured his drunkenness and his nightmares and his dangerous womanizing?

    T.Z., Les realized, was probably alive today only because hard, sober Neely had taken care of him.

    Les sighed.

    Neely, obviously sensing some shift in the other man, said, “Mexico will be good for T.Z. There’s a clinic down there. This priest who’s supposed to be good at sobering people up. That’s where I’m going to take him.”

    “They’ll find out,” Les said.

    “I’ll make sure they never connect you with it, Les, I promise.” Les’s eyes raised to fix on downtown Cedar Rapids. In the past two years this place had become his home. He liked standing on the comer of Third Street, right in front of the Guaranty Bank Building, and watching people stroll from the sunlight into the shade beneath the bright-striped awnings on the shops, then stroll out into the light again. There was the clang of the trolley and the sweet smell of heat on the oiled, sandy roadway.

    Neely said, “Les, they’ll hang him otherwise. They really will.” And all Les could do was shift his gaze to Neely and nod sadly in agreement.