“How about a writer?” I said.
“The guys know all the writers.”
“Not a sports reporter, a writer. A guy doing a book on baseball—you know, The Boys of Summer, The Summer Game, that stuff.”
Erskine thought about it. “Not bad,” he said. “Not bad.
You don’t look much like a writer, but hell, what’s a writer look like? Right? Why not? I’ll take you down, tell them you’re doing a book and you’re going to be hanging around the club and asking questions. It’s perfect. You know anything about writing?”
“I’ve read some,” I said.
“I mean, can you sound like a writer? You look like the bouncer at a health club.”
“I can keep from sounding as stupid as I look,” I said.
“Yeah, okay, it sounds good to me. I see no problem.
But you gotta be, for crissake, discreet. I mean dis-goddamncreet. Right?”
“I am, as we writers say, the very soul of discretion. I’ll need a press pass or whatever credentials you people issue.
And it is probably smart if you take me down and introduce me around.”
“Yeah, I’ll take care of that.” He looked at me and started working on his lip again. “This is between you and me,” he said. “No one else knows. Not the manager, not the owners, not the players, nobody.”
“How about your lawyer?” I asked.
“He is my own lawyer, not the club’s. He thinks I wanted you for personal business.”
“Okay, when do I meet the team?”
Erskine looked at his watch. “Too late today, half of them are showered and gone. How about tomorrow? We’ll go in before the game and I’ll introduce you around.”
“I’ll show up here about noon tomorrow then.”
“Yeah,” he said. “That’ll be good. You got a title for this book you’re supposed to be writing?”
“I’m looking for sales appeal,” I said. “How about The Sensuous Baseball?”
Erskine said he didn’t like that title. I went home to think of another one.
CHAPTER TWO
I GOT UP early the next morning and jogged along the river.
There were sparrows and grackles mixed in among the pigeons on the esplanade, and I saw two chickadees in the sandpit of one of the play areas. A couple of rowers were on the river, a girl in jeans tucked into high brown boots was walking two Welsh corgis, and there were some other joggers.
Near the lagoon, past the concert shell, a bum in an old blue sharkskin suit was sleeping on a newspaper, and along Storrow Drive the commuter traffic was just beginning.
I was still living at the bottom of Marlborough Street and the run up to the BU footbridge took about ten minutes. I crossed the footbridge over Storrow Drive and went in the side door of the BU gym. I knew a guy in the athletic department and they let me use the weight room. I spent forty-five minutes on the irons and another half hour on the heavy bag. By that time some coeds were passing by on their way to class and I finished up with a big flourish on the speed bag. They didn’t seem impressed.
I jogged back downriver with the sun much warmer now and the dew gone from the grass and the commuter traffic in full cry. I was back in my apartment at five of nine, glistening with sweat, and reeking of good circulation, and throbbing with appetite.
I squeezed some orange juice and drank it, plugged in the coffee, and went for a shower. At quarter past nine I was back in the kitchen again in my red and white terry-cloth robe that Susan Silverman had given me on my last birthday.
It had short sleeves and a golf umbrella on the breast pocket and the label said JACK NICKLAUS. Every time I put it on I wanted to yell “Fore.”
I drank my first cup of coffee while I made a mushroom omelet with sherry, and my second cup of coffee while I ate the omelet, along with a warm loaf of unleavened Arab bread, and read the morning Globe. When I finished, I put the dishes in the dishwasher, made the bed, and got dressed.
Gray socks, gray slacks, black loafers, and an eggshell-colored stretch knit shirt with small red hexagons all over it. I clipped my holster on over the belt on my right hip. The blue steel revolver was nicely color-coordinated with the black holster and the gray slacks. It clashed badly when I wore brown. To cover the gun I wore a gray denim jacket with red stitching along the pockets and lapels. I checked myself in the mirror.
Adorable. Lucky it wasn’t ladies’ day. I’d get molested at the park.
The temperature was in the mid-eighties and the sun was bright when I got out onto Marlborough Street. I walked a block over to Commonwealth and strolled up the mall toward Fenway Park. It was still too early for the crowd to start gathering, but the early signs of a game were there. The old guy that sells peanuts from a pushcart was pushing it along toward Kenmore Square, an old canvas over the peanuts. A middle-aged couple had parked a maroon Chevy by a hydrant near Kenmore Square and were setting up to sell balloons from the trunk. The trunk lid was up, an air tank leaned against the rear bumper, and the husband, wearing a blue and red tennis visor, was opening a large cardboard box in the trunk. Near the corner of Brookline Ave, outside the subway kiosk, a young man with shoulder-length blond hair was selling small pennants that said RED SOX in red script against a blue background. I looked at my watch: 11:40. You couldn’t see the park from Kenmore Square, but the light standards
