The Palace Thief (5 page)

By daybreak the sprinklers had stopped and from my room the fields appeared strewn with diamonds. I sat on the sill and contemplated the state of the world, as one often does in such situations. How could I have known that our economy would enter a prolonged and deep recession and that profits at our own firm, which had been robust, would undergo a correction? It stood to reason that Mr. Emond, as the eldest of the principals, would again be weakened in this new footing and that my own advancement might once again be delayed. Profits at Mr. Peters’s firm, on the other hand, had remained stable, as his products were low-cost items such as the magnetic oil plug, which in fact reduced the necessity of future high-cost procedures such as oil changes. The fact was, I realized as I gazed over the glistening fields, that he was well positioned and we were not.

I went to my briefcase and removed the documents I had brought, detailed explanations of our services and fees in regard to high-inventory, multiple-point-of-sale businesses such as Mr. Peters’s, including several innovations that I am proud of but cannot discuss. Of course these had been reviewed and approved by Mr. Farmer and Mr. Priebe, whose signatures stood below mine on the penultimate page of the proposal. The entire document had been bound in the imprinted leather portfolio
cover that the firm reserved for its more important clients, and I will admit that I felt a certain pride to be carrying it. To wit, I had never made such a large proposal without one of our principals alongside.

Presently the groundskeepers appeared, two Mexican men in white trousers, and my thoughts returned to baseball. They raked the infield briskly, set the bases on their spikes, and then turned their attentions to a section of the right-field fence, which apparently had come loose at an earlier time. As they unscrewed this section and lifted it from its housing, I was pleasantly reminded of the old days of major league play, when groundskeepers moved the fences in or out depending on the batting strength of the visiting team. It appeared to me that, despite advances in the state of our society, something had been lost in the ensuing years. With a start I realized I was late for breakfast.

Returning to the task at hand, I decided after brief thought to wear my uniform to the dining area because it seemed to me that most of the other men would do so as well. Thus I donned it, shaved quickly, and went downstairs, where I found breakfast under way. Indeed I had chosen correctly concerning the uniform, as I now gazed out on the two long tables filled with men similarly dressed. One table wore the home colors and the other the traveling.

My own uniform was home colors, and I was relieved to scan the table and see that Mr. Peters’s was as well. One of the men gestured to me, and I took the place next to him. The man introduced himself as Randall Forbes, shook my hand forcefully, and mentioned that he too was a friend of Mr. Peters, who now sat across from us. An older man, who I would later discover had been the batting coach for the Cleveland Indians two decades ago, came out from the kitchen and set down in
front of me a plate heaping with waffles. I noticed that most of the men were not speaking, so I gestured in a friendly way to Mr. Peters and Mr. Forbes, then rubbed my hands together in pantomime of hunger and began eating my breakfast.

However, it was not long before I realized the cause for the near silence in the dining area. In fact, only one conversation was taking place, a low affair at our end of the table two seats away from me, and it was not until I had eaten one of the waffles and cut up the second that I glanced over and saw that one of those conversing was none other than Willie Mays.

How can I describe what it was like to eat a Belgian waffle with such a man sitting nearby? Of course I had expected players like a Dick Dietz or a Tito Fuentes, but now two chairs away from me sat the greatest player of his era and one of the great players of all time. Immediately my throat constricted and my mouth became dry. I believe I finished the waffles in front of me, although I have no memory of doing so. I soon understood that they were talking about the elbow difficulties of the current 49ers quarterback, and I will say that Willie Mays talking about football was enough to make me chuckle. Of course, why should he not talk about it? Indeed, although it seemed ironic to me, none of the other men returned the small smile I made looking up from my plate.

I shall take a moment to describe Mr. Mays. His hair had begun to gray, and although his face had broadened—there seemed to be a sort of general thickening to his features that spoke perhaps of his recent misfortunes concerning major league baseball—he nonetheless moved and spoke with a yawning, feline expansiveness that suggested great strength in reserve. Although he was merely eating a waffle, I can say that his limbs moved like clockwork. That is to say, as though they were attached within him to gears that moved independently. He
possessed the unmistakable aura of greatness. I believe that all of us in one way or another were watching his small movements—the way he braced his knife against the inside of his wrist before cutting his waffle or the manner in which he gripped his glass of orange juice at the rim—and every one of these gestures possessed the clarity of motion one might expect in a juggler, an acrobat, or a magician. Among the men, only Eugene Peters was at ease.

Immediately after breakfast we took to the fields for warm-ups, which began with the group of us running two laps around the entire complex of four baseball diamonds facing one another. Each had dugouts, an overhanging backstop, several rows of bleachers, and the low, curved, asymmetric fence around the outfield. One of the diamonds was surrounded by a larger fan area, fifty or sixty rows of bleachers stretching in a semicircle up to the white Arizona sky, and as we jogged past these seats it seemed to me that we could have been professional players jogging to our positions. I will admit, however, that by the time Mr. Peters and I crossed the last flag in left field and jogged toward home, our breath pounding and our feet lumbering on the grass, I was seized with the idea that I had wasted my money on a foolish dream.

The whole week’s endeavor had cost thirty-four hundred dollars in advance, not inclusive of bats, which we brought along ourselves. I personally had purchased three, because although each one was “indestructible,” I remembered that depending on the humidity and temperature and the limberness of my arms, I sometimes preferred a heavier bat or one with a more narrow taper. In the style of our current era they were anodized aluminum instead of wood, and of course they were rubberized at the handle rather than taped. Although the money was not important to me, I will note that they cost forty-five dollars each.

Other men were gathering at the dugout. These men were financial officers, physicians, and attorneys. One stood peering out from the steps with his foot on top of the low wall, the way I remembered my own heroes used to stand—the Alou brothers, Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays himself—although this man probably worked in an office and would be sleeping with a heating pad tonight like the rest of us.

We threw that first day, fielded ground balls, and hit against the old man who ran the camp, a fellow named Corsetti who had pitched two seasons thirty years ago. He was older than we were. I guessed he was almost sixty, and he pitched with the old man’s limited, eccentric motion on the mound. He had no leg kick. The arms came together in the glove at chest height, and then the ball was on its way. My first at-bat it came faster than I thought, and I swung like a man trying to catch a bird in his bare hands. “Don’t hurt yourself,” the catcher said through his mask. The old man on the mound threw a curveball next, and I fell back out of the box. I heard the catcher snort. But the next pitch I hit on a line into center field. I shall never forget the pop of the bat in my hands. However, I am not too vain to say that after my previous swing I had seen the catcher make a sign with his glove, and I believe the pitch I hit might have been lobbed.

In summary, our first day was uneventful, although it is of human interest to note how quickly one can become used to the presence of Willie Mays. The first time I tossed a ball to him in the warm-up throws, my arm quaked in nervousness, but my throw was a good one and I had no reason to be embarrassed by it. Willie Mays caught it without comment and sent it on to the next player. I suppose the camp needed to be concerned with injuries, and therefore on the first day we ran infield and outfield drills and each man took a turn in the box, but we did not begin actual play.

That night we heard a lecture on the current tax laws. In case
anything of value was said I brought my briefcase with me, although I believe some of the other men might have been laughing at this fact. The lecture turned out to be of a basic nature, although the information was reasonably handled and for the most part correct. Afterward we all moved out to the clubhouse lounge, where soda pop and cookies were served and the weekend’s teams were posted. Mr. Peters and I were on the same team, as I have noted. He was written in at shortstop and I at third base. This of course was an insult to me but I was not bothered by it. Various members of the team were introducing themselves to one another, and I did not want to appear slighted at this early juncture. It was bad enough that I was carrying a briefcase. Mr. Peters took off his baseball cap, slapped me on the back with it, and made a comment about it being like old times; of course I had to agree, although I was not sure whether he was referring to our positions in the infield or what we each held in our hands. His mood was expansive, however, and after the cookies we walked back together across the fields to the hotel.

We went into the lounge for a drink. Several of the men had preceded our arrival, joking as we entered about “milk and cookies” and the fact that we were “in training,” yet at the same time sipping cocktails from the hotel’s expensive tumblers. The one thing I have admired about Mr. Peters since we were children is his ease with all sorts of people, and now again I was impressed with how he moved among this group. He shook hands, told a joke here, laughed at one there. It has not eluded me that this has been a key element to his success in business, and perhaps such ease is as important in the final analysis as my own hard work has been.

Shortly, I found myself without conversation, and not knowing what else to do I moved to the window with my drink,
where I pretended to stare out at the fields. The room was reflected in the glass, and I used the opportunity to study Mr. Peters’s movements among the other players. I do not know whether the men turned to him because of his success in the marketplace or whether his success in the marketplace in fact resulted from the fact that men turned to him, but it was clear that he commanded attention. I myself have never done so. Many of those present in this lounge were successful in their own right, some hugely so, yet Mr. Peters could have spoken to any of them he wished.

However, within a short space of time, he left a group he was speaking with, came directly to the window, and stood next to me. “A nice view,” he said.

“You see some interesting things from here,” I answered.

He commented on the line drive I had hit earlier, and I answered by complimenting him on a double play he had turned, although in truth I thought he had been early on the pivot. We stood looking over the lighted fields, clinking the ice in our tumblers. I had been expecting a business proposal, and this was when it was made.

“Look, Roth,” he said, putting his arm around my shoulder, “we’re not happy with our bean counters anymore.”

I will admit I had been anticipating more of a cat-and-mouse game than this, and I must say that I was caught unawares. “Yes?” I said.

“Well, I want you to make me a proposal. I want Priebe, Emond & Farmer to handle our books. Can you do it?”

I looked out the window, trying to appear pensive, although one can imagine the satisfaction I felt at being proved correct in my hypothesis. At this point, of course, I was grateful for the kind of preparatory habits that had resulted in my having access to my briefcase at this moment. I smiled broadly at Mr. Peters,
tapped the leather case, and told him I had already prepared exactly such a proposal.

He smiled at me, first humorously, then skeptically, then appreciatively. “Of course, Roth,” he said, chuckling and shaking his head. “You’ve always thought of everything.”

The fact was that indeed I always had thought of everything, because this is what an accountant is paid for, and when Mr. Peters suggested that we meet on the evening of the last day of camp to discuss my proposal, I happily agreed. Indeed I was quite pleased that he wanted to discuss business before we had even returned home.

Although the last day of camp was when the substance of our dealings took place, it is important to relay what occurred in our baseball games before then.

I do not claim to be any more than an average player, but something happened to me in the ensuing days that no doubt will not happen again, and that, I admit, had not ever happened to me before. I suppose it began with my sleep in bed that second night. It was deep and slumberous, the type of sleep I had not enjoyed in many years, and when I woke for our first day of play I felt I was a young man again. Our team was nicknamed the Sluggers, and that first morning we played against the Bashers. The Bashers were comprised primarily of a group of radiologists from a practice in Boulder, Colorado. I do not know how a group of radiologists became so proficient at baseball, yet within two innings they had scattered base hits to every field and gathered a tally of four runs, to none for the Sluggers. Their representative from major league baseball was Alan Gallagher, a utility infielder I only vaguely remembered from a number of years back, and our own was one Kent
Powell, whom I did not recall at all. Willie Mays, it seemed, would not be playing with us. Naturally this was a disappointment, but I will not dwell on it. Of some interest was the fact the Mr. Gallagher at his age could contribute very little to the Bashers’ effort, and that Mr. Powell could contribute almost nothing to our own. He played first base passably and did not hit at all. The Bashers were led instead by a Dr. Argusian, who some years ago had played baseball for the University of Texas and was now in left field. He scored runs in both the first and second innings and in the outfield caught a ball hit well over his head.