Las Vegas Gold (12 page)

“You mean Harry Mendoza? He did go to Japan, didn't he? I'd forgotten that.”

“That's the guy. Mendoza. Well, he used to have a heavy beard, and the guy I saw this morning was clean-shaven, but I'm sure it was him. He was sitting in the second deck by himself, just watching us this morning.” Molly turned to look where T.Y. was pointing, but there was nobody there. “He left about ten minutes ago.”

“What was he wearing?”

“He was too far away for me to be sure, but I think he was wearing a black bomber jacket and jeans, and a ball cap of some kind.”

Molly pulled her cell phone from her warm-up jacket and dialed security, and asked them for a search of the stadium for a man of the description T.Y. had given. Then she went back to her office and called the office of Jeff Turnbull. He was out, but she left a message for him to call her. She made the same kind of call to the Las Vegas Police department asking for Sgt. Michaluk. He was in, and said he would be right there. Turnbull arrived a few minutes after Michaluk. Molly told them about T.Y.'s sighting and made a suggestion.

“Do you remember sometimes the calls Larry got were in very rudimentary Japanese? I wonder if this guy Mendoza was actually in Japan all summer. Could he have come back long enough to kill Tabby? Is he back now? If so, did he come back in time to kill Larry? Larry was shot by a left-handed person, and Mendoza is a left-handed pitcher.”

16

The team was at the Rogers Center in Toronto for a three-game set with the Blue Jays, the two teams' last meeting of the regular season, when the unthinkable happened. The game was in the third inning, scoreless. The roof was closed because the evening was stormy—lightning and thunder with the rain pouring down. Nevertheless, the crowd was more than thirty-five thousand. Everywhere they went, baseball fans wanted to see the red hot Gold who were in the process of setting all kinds of records, not only for an expansion team, but for any team in either Major League.

Just as Las Vegas had taken the field for the bottom of the third, a man in a FedEx jacket and cap appeared in the dugout from the runway leading to the dressing room. He was holding a brown paper package, about a foot square and six inches deep. “Package for Ms. Malone,” he said, looking for somebody to give it to. Jiggs Kelly was sitting on the bench closest to the man and he took it. “I'll give it to her.”

“Okay,” replied the deliveryman, who immediately disappeared down the runway again.

“Hey!” yelled Jiggs. He threw the package onto the playing field as far as he could. “Everyone hit the deck. Bomb! Bomb!”

Without waiting, everyone on the bench dropped to the floor, and almost immediately the package exploded. A nail bomb! Nails flew in all directions. Nobody on the bench was struck because they had immediately followed Jiggs' warning, but those on the field, including the batboy and the policeman who had been standing in front of the dugout and had just returned to his stool beside the dugout, were not so lucky. The first base coach for the Jays, the first base umpire and Jerry Lyons were all hit; the plate umpire, the batter and Grazi Harango, who was catching, were also hit. Nails flew as far as the stands behind and beside the Gold dugout and several fans were hit, so great was the power of the blast.

Fortunately, only two people were hit by nails going straight at them. The rest were struck by nails that had turned sideways: large nails, small one-inch sharp nails, nails of all sizes had been blasted 360 degrees. First baseman Jerry Lyons, the Jays' first base coach and the first base umpire were bruised in many places, but not severely. Because they had been standing facing away from the blast, they had not been hit directly in the face, or they could have lost eyes.

Two nails had pierced Grazi in the right hip, one of the few unprotected places on the catcher's body, and the policeman had been pierced by a dozen of the little missiles, one right below the left eye. The batboy was also hit several times in various parts of his body. The head trainer was out pulling the nails from Grazi, and his assistant was looking after the policeman and the batboy. The Jays trainers also were on the field helping out. They even went into the stands, where the fans were gathered around those who had been injured. While none had been pierced, the explosion had hurled the nails at great force, and the fans in the first couple of rows were well bruised on exposed parts of their bodies.

Ambulances were called and Grazi, the police constable, the batboy and one or two fans were sent to hospital for tetanus shots and general check-ups. The groundskeepers appeared and began to clear up the nails from the field and from the Las Vegas dugout, where hundreds of nails had landed. Had Molly, the players and coaches not hit the floor, they could have been badly hurt, maybe killed if a nail had penetrated the right part of the body.

When the police arrived, which was within minutes, their first question to Jiggs was, “What made you think it was a bomb?”

“Well, it took a second, but I realized he had not asked for a signature, then I realized FedEx doesn't deliver parcels to the dugout in the middle of a ball game, and the guy wasn't wearing a complete FedEx uniform. By the time I got that all together, I knew what I was holding and just acted impulsively. But by then he was gone.”

The police gathered up the fragments of the package to use to look for fingerprints, and picked up some of the nails for lab examination. The Inspector in charge asked for the names of the FBI and other police agencies involved with the previous incidents. Molly also gave him the name of Harry Mendoza and as good a description as possible. The detective went directly to a phone to ask his Sergeant to call Canada Customs and Immigration to alert all border-crossings, as well as security at Pearson International Airport.

“If he's driving, our best chance to catch him is at Niagara Falls or Fort Erie-Buffalo crossings, but there's no guarantee. He could be halfway to the border already, or he could be heading for border crossings at Windsor-Detroit or Sarnia-Port Huron.”

Finally, after an hour and a half delay, with the injured players and officials, other than Grazi, patched up and ready to go, the game continued, with Johnny Lighthorn doing the Gold's catching. When sometime after midnight the game had ended, Mac Driscoll had picked up his 29th save and the Gold had won 4-3 thanks to some little ball in the sixth inning. After Tubby Littleton had walked and stolen second, Molly called for a hit and run. Porter Kipping slapped a single into right center field over the second baseman's head and Tubby scampered all the way home, sliding in under the catcher's attempted tag after a great throw by the Jays outfielder. Connie Armstrong went seven interrupted innings to pick up his 15th win.

* * *

The attempt on Molly's life was really an attempt on the life of a number of team members, and the players were angry. Jiggs Kelly's quick thinking had saved lives, and the players were more than grateful, but they were also mad. They took out their anger first on the Blue Jays in the next two games, and then against the Red Sox at Fenway Park and the Orioles at Camden Yards. They hit for extra bases, slid hard into second and third, pitched like Cy Young winners and generally tore up the league like they had done at the first of the year. Of the twelve games played before they got home to their own stadium, they won all twelve, nine of them by double figures. T.Y. and Connie were both within reach of 20 games, and Owen and Lynn were both in double figures in the win column. Mac Driscoll didn't get credit for a single save after the first game in Toronto. He had no opportunity!

* * *

Once again, Curly Joe walked into Ricci's office in Las Vegas, and told him, “My guy was responsible for that one in Toronto, and the cops and FBI are all looking for this player Mendoza. We tried, it didn't work and we got away clean. They're not even looking for somebody else. You were right, though, it's tough to get through to the Malone dame. She's got security all around her wherever she is. But we'll get her.”

Achille Ricci made a noise, but it was more a grunt than words. Finally, he said, “Okay, Joe. You tried. Keep trying. But remember what I told you. I don't want it getting back to us.”

* * *

Another outcome of the Toronto incident was the fact that the hunt for Harry Mendoza had become an even wider international hunt. The police in both the U.S.A. and Canada were looking for him, as well as Customs and Immigration on both sides of the border, from Atlantic to Pacific. He was not picked up at any border crossing, of course, because he had not been in Canada. Police in Japan were still involved, but no longer as actively. At least there was a named suspect for the two murders and the attempted murder, but they were stumped as to how to find him.

The Gold finished out the regular season with three games at home against the Yankees. They swept the once proud New York team, which had fallen to third place in the Eastern Division. The three teams in the AL playoffs, besides the Gold from the Western Division, were the Blue Jays from the East, the White Sox, who won the Central, and the Wild Card winner, the Detroit Tigers, a team that surprised everyone by sneaking into second past the Indians in the AL Central.

* * *

The semi-finals are best of five affairs, the team with the best record having home field for the first two games. The Gold drew the Tigers as opponents, and so the first two games were at home. With the roof open on a pleasant fall afternoon, and amid tight security, the two teams were ready to play the opening game before a full house. It wasn't much of a game. Damaso Gonzalez shut out the Tigers 4-0 on a four hitter as the Las Vegas batters went to work on Tiger pitching. The second game was not much different. The score was also 4-0, with Connie Armstrong on the mound giving up three hits in eight innings. He also walked five, so Molly called Mac Driscoll to finish it off, which he did, facing only three batters, two of them strike outs.

The series moved to Comerica Park in Detroit, where the security was just as tight. T.Y. Hollinger finished off the Tigers with a 4-2 victory, going six innings before being helped out by Kenny Sykes and Mac Driscoll. Jerry Lyons and Diego Martinez each hit two-run dingers, which accounted for the Gold's scoring.

This third game was a frustrating affair for the Tigers players. They had worked very hard to get the Wild Card spot, and to be swept was a huge embarrassment. By the eighth inning, when it was obvious how things were going, one of the Tiger batters became so angry at a called third strike he slung his bat straight out at Kenny Sykes. The flying bat just missed hitting Sykes in the head as he was straightening up from his follow-up pitching motion. The batter walked off the field and disappeared into the dressing room without waiting to be told he had been thrown out of the game. It was at that point Willie replaced the shaken Sykes with Mac Driscoll. The Tigers Manager apologized to Molly and Sykes after the game.

The other series required a full five games, as the Blue Jays and the White Sox fought each other down to extra innings in the fifth game. Toronto pushed across the winning run in the 12th and set up the final against the Las Vegas Gold.

Police and FBI were still searching for Harry Mendoza, with no luck. His agent had no contact with him except a phone number, but calling that number proved fruitless. The FBI persuaded the phone company to divulge the location of the phone, an apartment in a modern Los Angeles building. But even with a warrant to break in, the searchers came up empty. There was no sign of Mendoza, no indications of his comings or goings.

They had discovered he had made a trip from Japan to the US the day before Tabby's murder in New York, and New York police found the cab driver who had picked him up and driven him to Kennedy International Airport. They also confirmed his flight out on JAL both from and back to Tokyo, and the manager of the team he played for in Japan confirmed he had been given Mendoza permission to return to the US for the funeral of his grandmother. The fact his grandmother had been dead for many years proved his trip had another purpose.

He had left Japan permanently three days before Larry Henderson was shot, but other than the coinciding dates, nothing. The old car had hundreds of fingerprints, none of them Mendoza's, so the agents decided he had worn latex gloves, because there were traces of latex on the steering wheel. They were unable to trace the handgun used to fire the fatal shots at Larry. As for the bogus FedEx deliveryman in Toronto, the police there discovered nothing, not even a stolen uniform jacket or cap, or where he might have disposed of them.

The Gold now found themselves one step closer to their original goal: winning the AL pennant. The players were still anger-driven and determined not to let Molly down. But the Toronto Blue Jays were a different kettle of herring from the Detroit Tigers.

Again, Damaso Gonzalez opened the series, but he only lasted three and a third innings, and was in tears when Willie went to the mound to take him out. He had given up eight hits and three walks, and the Blue Jays were leading at that point 3-0. Molly didn't want her star pitcher to get into any more trouble. Jimmy Brandon pitched the rest of the third and added two more innings, giving up just one solitary two-out single. Diego Martinez hit a solo home run in the fifth and Corry Van Dyk hammered a two run double into the gap in right center to tie the score in the sixth. Lefty Kenny Sykes pitched two scoreless innings and Mac Driscoll came on in the top of the ninth, holding the Jays scoreless. It was Tubby Littleton, the rotund little second baseman who became the hero of the day. He batted leadoff in the bottom of the ninth and took just one pitch to end the game. He blasted a four hundred-foot plus home run into the upper deck in left field, and the Gold walked off with a one-game series lead.

Molly called Gonzalez into her office after the initial clubhouse celebration to let him know he was not to blame for a poor job. “These things happen,” she told him. “Forget it. Don't let your pride get in the way.”

That was the moment the phone on her desk rang. She excused herself to answer. Damaso could see her face go pale. The voice on the other end of the phone asked, “You miss hearing from me, bitch? Well, it won't be long now. Enjoy your wins while you can.” And Mendoza, for there was no doubt who the caller was, hung up. Gonzalez walked around the desk and put his arm around Molly's shoulder.

“That SOB again?”

She nodded.

All she could do was sit there with her head in her arms on the desk. She leaned against Damaso, and about five minutes later Kenny Boyce walked in and found them, neither one having moved. He took in the problem without asking a question, turned around and went to his own desk, where he called Jeff Turnbull's cell phone number. Turnbull had been at the game and was still in the stadium, and he arrived within five minutes. All he could do was trace the phone, and found it was a pay phone within the stadium itself. No luck with a search. Mendoza had slipped out again—long gone.

The word got around to the players pretty fast. The helpless rage each team member felt was frustrating. They boiled with anger.

“A baseball pro doing stuff like this?” commented Johnny Lighthorn. “I find the SOB and I might forget I'm a civilized Navaho and scalp the bugger!” That broke the tension of the moment, but the anger simmered along. As a result, the next game was a blowout 15-1 win for the Gold, and the series got ready to move to Toronto and Rogers Stadium.