The all-stars came on as though they meant business, warming up with dispatch, winning the coin toss, sending us to bat, and sprinting to their positions. Unfortunately for them, George’s lead-off double was the first of a string of solid hits, and the California Nine trailed 10-0 before even coming to bat—a deficit they could not overcome, although they played well. The final was 46-14. George slammed three homers and Andy, clubbing the ball angrily, added two more. Despite the offensive barrage, the contest moved quickly. For once we were out of the ballpark before sundown.
I carried the derringer. I scanned faces at the ballpark and around the Cosmopolitan. I didn’t anticipate an attack as open as Le Caron’s and McDermott’s, assuming, that O’Donovan wanted the money more than he wanted me. But I couldn’t be sure. He had definitely arrived—the papers carried accounts of his speeches—and he could find me easily. What was he waiting for?
I busied myself working up a piece that compared George’s individual stats for the six San Francisco games against all opposing players’. George came out ahead in every offensive category: 48 hits to their 45 (his in only 62 at bats, for a gaudy .774 average); 45 runs to 36; 106 total bases to 55; 13 homers to 0. His slugging percentage for the series was an incredible 1.710. Several Stockings, including Andy with six homers himself, were not far behind. I concluded that the message was as clear here as it had been around the country all summer: to contend with pros, teams would have to find outstanding players, skilled managers—and money enough to hold them.
Millar read it and scowled. He said it rubbed our courteous hosts’ noses in their defeats. And what on earth was a slugging percentage?
Johnny’s face was a mess. He’d been worked over, he mumbled, several nights earlier by a sailor.
“You gotta get out of that dive,” I said.
“Pay’s too good.”
“What do you do for it?”
“Clean up, different things.”
I parted the curtains. Sunlight poured in. Sunday morning. I’d come to see if he wanted to catch the velocipede races that afternoon. But he’d made it clear he didn’t intend to get out of bed.
“You’ll get yourself killed in the Barbary Coast.”
He shrugged fatalistically.
“I’m coming down there tonight.”
“You won’t fancy it, Sam.”
No smoking. No spitting. No standing. Strict limit of sixteen passengers. Well worth a dime—double the usual fare—to travel like that. The streetcar was normally reserved for ladies, gents riding only as escorts. And it existed strictly to carry patrons to Samuel Woodward’s amusement park. Twentieth-century Americans take for granted padded seats, dirt- and spit-free surroundings—not to mention body soaps and deodorants. Back here I’d learned that anything reserved for women meant superior conditions. Even in horsecars.
Woodward’s Gardens was a Victorian Disneyland; more aptly, a Xanadu. Picnickers thronged the sunlit lawns, flowered terraces, palm-shaded nooks. Children rode ponies and camels, were pulled in carriages by goats, petted tiger cubs, and threw peanuts to caged bears. The Second Artillery Band played on a platform decorated with streamers and baskets of roses.
In a different mood I would have enjoyed the picture-book world. Andy and I walked in silence past stuffed reindeer and grizzlies and watched giggling children leap to touch the end of the Chinese Giant’s braided cue. With the other Stockings we sat in a pavilion and watched Major Burke’s rifle drill, Japanese acrobats, and Jaguarine the Swordswoman.
“Let’s get out,” Andy said as Herman the Great was about to explode from a cannon.
At the edge of the lake, where men readied a balloon ascension, we watched a couple drift by in a boat. The boy plucked water lilies from the surface. He handed them to the girl, who smiled. I remembered first kissing Cait in such a boat. God, I wanted to be with her. Andy sighed. I knew Elise was on his mind. What a couple of lovesick wimps, I thought.
“Hey,” I said abruptly, “I’ve made up my mind to stay out here a little while.”
He looked at me. “Why?”
“Some business to settle.”
“Does Cait know?”
“Not yet.”
He stopped walking and faced me. “Are you coming back to Cincinnati, Sam?”
“Yes, of course.”
“Season ends in only six weeks. I’ll be heading for Newark. You’ll be back before?”
“I imagine so,” I said. “I’m sending Cait a telegram tonight.”
“What is it you need to take care of here?”
“I’m not sure. I mean, it’s still developing.”
“There’s a hell of a lot you’re not sayin’, Sam.”
“If I understood it and could tell anybody, it’d be you and Cait.”
He looked worried. “Are you wanted for not being on the straight?”
I was about to make a wisecrack, but he was in no mood. “No, nothing like that. I just need to sort out a few things, tie up some loose ends.”
“Is it connected, your life out here . . . before?”
For a second I was stunned, thinking he meant my twentieth-century life. Then I realized he meant my amnesia.
“I’m not sure, but I think O’Donovan’s involved.”
He pondered that. “Over Cait?”
“Partly,” I said. “Maybe mostly.”
He waited for more, then sighed noisily. “O’Donovan’s mean, Sam. More than mean . . .” He hunted for a word. “He’s twisted inside. Cait’s been wise not to fancy him.”
I said nothing.
“Okay, I’ll let it drop,” he said; then, a few seconds later, “Sam, you know how you have a way of disappearing? Don’t ever forget to pop up again, you hear?”
“I won’t, Andy,” I said, moved by his earnestness. “I promise.”
Even then I wondered if it was a promise I could keep.
Chapter 30
The Barbary Coast, a maze of dingy alleys, lay between Broadway, Stockton, Kearney, and Dupont. As the area went into full swing around eleven, I set out down Kearney past noisy Mexican fandango joints where guitars twanged and boots stomped. More than once hands brushed my pockets as I was jostled on the crowded sidewalks. I gripped the derringer, glad I’d tucked my money inside my belt.
Stenches rose from pools and rivulets of
