while I pour.“
I opened the wine and handed it to her. ”Now,“ I said, ”where was I?“
”Oh, giant intellect,“ she said, and poured some wine into my glass. ”You were saying that Marty Rabb had met his wife when she was—as we sociologists would put it—screwing him professionally.“
”Words,“ I said, ”what a magic web you weave with them. Yeah, that’s what I think.“
”How do you know?“ She poured herself a half glass of wine.
”Well, he’s covering up her past. He lied about how he met her and where they were married. I don’t know what he knows, but he knows something.“
Brenda brought out an unsliced loaf of bread and took off the transparent wrapping.
”Sourdough?“ I said.
She nodded and put the loaf on one of the paper plates.
”Is there more?“ she said.
”Yeah. A print of the film she made was sold to Lester Floyd.“ She looked puzzled. ”Lester Floyd,“ I said, ”is Bucky Maynard’s gofer, and Bucky Maynard is, in case you forgot, the play by play man for the Sox.“
”What’s a gofer?“
”A lackey. Someone to go-for coffee and go-for cigarettes and go-for whatever he’s told.“
”And you think Maynard told him to go-for the film?“
”Yeah, maybe, anyway, say Bucky got a look at the film and recognized Mrs. Rabb. Is that smoked turkey?“
Brenda nodded and put a cranshaw melon out beside it, and four nectarines.
”Oh, I hope she doesn’t know,“ she said.
”Yeah, but I think she does know. And I think Marty knows.“
”Some kind of blackmail?“
”Yeah. First I thought it was maybe Maynard or Lester of the costumes getting Rabb to shave a game here and there and cleaning up from the bookies. But they don’t seem to bet any these days, and I found out that Maynard owes money to a shylock.“
”Is that like a loan shark?“
”Just like a loan shark,“ I said.
A large wedge of Monterey Jack cheese came out of the hamper, and a small crystal vase with a single red rose in it, which Brenda placed in the middle of the tablecloth.
”That hamper is like the clown car at the circus. I’m waiting for the sommelier to jump out with his gold key and ask if Monsieur is pleased with the wine.“
”Eat,“ she said.
While I was breaking a chunk off the sourdough bread, Brenda said, ”So what does the loan shark mean?“
I said, ”Phnumph.“
She said, ”Don’t talk with your mouth full. I’ll wait till you’ve eaten a little and gotten control of yourself.“
I drank some wine and said, ”My compliments to the chef.“
She said, ”The chef is Bert Heidemann at Bert’s Deli on Newbury Street. I’ll tell him you were pleased.“
”The shylock means that maybe Maynard can’t pay up and they’ve put the squeeze on him and he gave them Rabb.“
”What do you mean, gave them Rabb?“
”Well, say Maynard owes a lot of bread to the shylock and he can’t pay, and he can’t pay the vig, and—“
“The what?”
“The vig, vigorish, interest. A good shylock can keep you paying interest the rest of your life and never dent the principal… like a revolving charge… Anyway, say Maynard can’t make the payments. Shylocks like Wally Hogg are quite scary. They threaten broken bones, or propane torches on the bottoms of feet, or maybe cut off a finger each time you miss a payment.”
Brenda shivered and made a face.
“Yeah, I know, okay, say that’s the case and along comes this piece of luck. Mrs. Rabb in the skin flick. He tells the shylock he can control the games that Marty Rabb pitches, and Rabb, being probably the best pitcher now active, if he’s under control can make the shylock and his employers a good many tax-free muffins.”
“But would he go for it?” Brenda asked. “I mean it would be embarrassing, but the sexual revolution has been won. No one, surely, would stone her to death.”
“Maybe so if she were married to someone in a different line of work, but baseball is more conservative than the entire city of Buffalo. And Rabb is part of a whole ethic: Man protects the family, no matter what.”
“Even if he has to throw games? What about the jock ethic? You know winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing.
Wouldn’t that be a problem?”
