Sudden Death

not far from the Silverdome. Koesler would have preferred the main restaurant area. But he knew they were lucky to be seated anywhere. The restaurant was packed, mostly with fans fresh from the game.

Of course Koesler had noticed the large painting of a voluptuous nude hanging in the lounge. It dominated the room. Being oblivious to the painting would require an ability to overlook the Grand Canyon.

But he had to smile at his friend, Pat McNiff, a typical Irish-American priest obsessed with all the evils that could be laid at the door of sex-read Women. As long as Koesler had known McNiff-and that had been forty-two of their fifty-five years of life-Pat had always been at least slightly more conservative than any of their confreres. McNiff usually caught up with the rest of the world, eventually; but he always arrived late, kicking and screaming.

“I give up.” Koesler had not tried counting. “How many nudes are there in this room?”

“Twenty!”

“Twenty?”

“Twenty!”

Until now, Koesler had been unaware of the exact nature of any of the other paintings hanging in the lounge. Alerted by McNiff s curiosity, Koesler began gazing more intently at the other paintings.

“Don’t look,” McNiff cautioned in a stage whisper. “People will notice you’re looking at naked women.” He always pronounced it “nekkid.”

“What do you mean, don’t look? You looked.”

“That’s different. I counted. You’re looking. There’s a difference.”

A waitress came to take their drink orders. She smiled at Koesler. She had seen him looking at the paintings. Koesler blushed.

McNiff ordered a martini; Koesler a bourbon manhattan. Neither priest smoked. Koesler had quit several years before. McNiff had surrendered the habit more recently, in deference to triple-bypass heart surgery.

“Don’t you recall the sage advice of our old speech professor. Father Sklarski?” Koesler reminded. “‘Look, but don’t touch.’”

“Sure. I just prefer the advice of our old rector, Henry Donnelly, ‘The look is father to the touch.’”

“You would.” Koesler began studying the menu. McNiff did the same.

“God, what a game!” McNiff commented from behind his menu.

“Huh? Oh, yeah … a real barnburner.”

They returned to their menus for several minutes until, simultaneously, they decided what they would order.

“If only the Cougars could have held onto the ball,” McNiff said, shaking his head. “We had that game in the bag.”

“It happens. Frankly, I thought we were playing too conservatively.”

“Well, for Pete’s sake, what did you want them to do-pass?”

“Even though I know in advance that you are not going to like this very much. .yes.”

McNiff flung his napkin the short distance from the table to his lap. “Isn’t that just like you! Taking chances, not going with the percentages.”

“Sometimes the dramatic pays off. Don’t you remember how bunched up the Chicago team was the last time we had the ball, everybody crowding around the scrimmage line? They not only wanted to hit the ball carrier, they were up there to strip the ball away.”

“We’re pros. We’re paid to hold onto the ball.”

“But,” Koesler continued, “just think what might have happened if Cobb had faked a running play, then dropped back and passed.”

“It probably would have been intercepted.”

“Maybe, maybe not. It could have been a touchdown. Then the game would have been iced.”

“Or it would have been intercepted,” McNiff repeated.

“We lost the ball anyway.”

“That’s hindsight.”

“The Monday morning quarterback is always right.”

The waitress brought their drinks and took their dinner orders. Koesler ordered ground round, medium. The Machus Sly Fox would join the considerable list of restaurants about whose hamburgers Koesler could testify. McNiff would have scrod. Having so said, he glanced at Koesler. Silently, they shared the old joke that scrod was the pluperfect of screw. One of the consequences of their long and close friendship was the ability to communicate wordlessly.

Koesler cupped his manhattan in both hands, trying to help the ice melt. With his index finger, McNiff began stirring the ice in his martini. Just as he always did. Just as he always had, beginning with his very first taste of hard liquor. That epic event had taken place in Koesler’s suite at Sacred Heart. At the time, each had been a priest for ten years. And thereby hung the tale.

When Koesler and McNiff were ordained as priests, they and their entire class had taken-been forced to take-a pledge that for a period of ten years each would drink no alcoholic beverage more powerful than beer or wine. Such a pledge had been required of everyone ordained by Cardinal Edward Mooney.

Long before the ten years had passed, most of their classmates had rationalized their way around that pledge.

After eight years as a priest, Koesler had been appointed editor-in-chief of the archdiocesan newspaper, the Detroit Catholic. In his new role, Koesler found it necessary-or thought he did-to join his new colleagues in newsgathering, reporting, commenting, and drinking. If that was the bad news, the good news was that Koesler soon learned, through the school of honest mistakes, the necessity for moderation.

In any case, after the allotted ten-year period, McNiff presented himself to Koesler for his baptism in hard liquor. As was the case in all McNiff s more important endeavors, he imbued the occasion of his first serious drink with a melodramatic ambiance. One could, in one’s imagination, hear the roll of kettledrums.

McNiff, solemnly announcing that he was placing his immediate alcoholic future in Koesler’s trusted hands, warned, “You ain’t gonna play fool-around with me!”

Koesler assured him that no horseplay would mar this sacred moment. He repaired to his inner sanctum, where he prepared McNiff’s first drink. He dropped several ice cubes in the glass, poured in a few drops of Scotch, and filled the considerable remaining space with water. Technically, it was an alcoholic drink-the lightest McNiff would ever taste.

The presentation was suitably solemn. McNiff sat pondering his initiation into the realm of serious drinkers. He once again extracted Koesler’s assurance that there had been no hanky-panky in the drink’s preparation.

McNiff stirred the ice with his index finger; for years, he’d been watching confirmed drinkers do that. Finally, he took a sip, rolled it around his palate, swallowed it, looked up brightly, and commented, “That wasn’t so bad.”

Now, as Koesler watched McNiff stir his martini, a drink considerably stronger than his first, the long-ago scene flooded his memory.

“Besides,” McNiff picked up the thread of their conversation, “any offensive chance we had in that game was shot when Hunsinger got thrown out.”

“Oh, c’mon, Pat; the Cougars’ entire offense isn’t tied up in one player.”

McNiff nodded gravely. “Who does Bobby Cobb go to when we need the big play? Nine out of ten times,” he answered his own question, “it’s the Hun. If he’d been in the game at the end, I’d almost go along with your crazy pass play.”

Koesler smiled. “For you, that’s a real act of faith.”

“The Hun can get the job done. He’s been doing it for years. I don’t know what we’re going to do when the Hun hangs it up, as, inevitably, he must.”

“There’ll be someone else, Pat. There always is.”

“Who’s the Hun’s backup now?”

“Hoffer. Kit Hoffer.”

“Yeah, that’s the guy. What’d he do today? One incompleted pass!”

“The ball was thrown behind him! Good grief, what do you expect!”

“The Hun would have caught it.”