“Well, let’s see,” Vernice said, “Andy Williams is at Harrah’s, George Jones at Bally’s. One of the Righteous Brothers is opening at Isle of Capri, taking over from that Elvis impersonator.” She said, “If all ten casinos can get any big-name entertainers they want . . . ? You see my point?”
She must’ve seen it as a stopper, a question she could ask without even a smarty tone to her voice. Charlie said, “I got an idea I haven’t told you about.” Her or anyone at all while he watched the new hotel going up, from bare iron to stone, with a big goddamn tepee made of concrete rising a good three stories above the entrance. He said, “You know there’s a new one opening next week. They got the sign up now, Tishomingo Lodge and Casino, Tunica, Mississippi.”
It gave Vernice pause. “You been over there?”
“I’m seeing the fella runs it, Billy Darwin from Atlantic City, young guy. He was running Spade’s and the people here waved enough money at him he moved to Tunica. I’ve seen him around—little guy, has hair like Robert Redford.”
Vernice said, “Tishomingo, that’s Indian.”
“Chickasaw. Tishomingo was the big chief the time they got shipped off to Oklahoma. Follow me now,” Charlie said. “Where was I raised? In Corinth. And where’s Corinth? Clear across the state but only fifteen miles from the Tishomingo County line, where the Chickasaws came from originally. Some never went to Oklahoma and’re still around here. See, but Indians don’t have nothing to do with the hotel. I think the owners just like the name.”
He watched Vernice thinking about it sipping her toddy, then begin to nod. “You’re gonna tell this hotshot from Atlantic City you’re a Chickasaw Indian—”
“I am, honey, part. I’ve told you that.”
“And you expect having a few drops of Indian blood’ll get you a job—I mean, a position?”
“I find out this fella has run a sports book, loves the game of baseball and has a head fulla stats. What I’m saying, I expect he could also know me.”
“You’re kidding,” Vernice said, “aren’t you?”
Being hurtful now as well as ignorant. It gave Charlie that urge to bear down and he said off the top of his head, “I’ll bet you anything you want I get the job. How much?”
Vernice smiled, but it was like she felt sorry for him. She said, “Charlie, you ever get hired as a celebrity host I’ll lose twenty pounds and go to work as a keno runner.”
Sitting there like a strawberry sundae in her La-Z-Boy, knees apart—the woman’s know-it-all tone of voice moved his irritation up a couple of notches and he said, “I was you, honey, I’d make it forty pounds.”
She was having fun now and ignored the remark. “You’re gonna tell this man you’re a full-blooded Chickasaw.”
“And played ball.”
“Gonna paint your face and put on a war bonnet?”
“No,” Charlie said, “I’m gonna tell this fella runs the place I’m a direct descendant of the man they named it for, Tishomingo himself.”
Vernice said, “And you know what he’ll say?”
He said, “Well, Chief, if I thought it mattered, can you prove it?”
This was in front of the Tishomingo Hotel & Casino as Billy Darwin came out of his Jaguar in leisure attire and Charlie introduced himself.
“During my playing days,” Charlie said, “the Tishomingo Times in Oklahoma’d run stories about me and mention my lineage. I never left Tishomingo County till I was signed by the Baltimore organization.”
“You played ball, uh?”
“Eighteen years. I phoned for an appointment, your girl put me down for two P.M. So while I been waiting an hour and a half,” Charlie said, trying not to sound too irritated, “I been studying your tepee”—the three stories of concrete coming to a point above the entrance—”trying to think if Chickasaws ever lived in tepees, with or without all different-colored neon running up it, and it come to me that we never did.”
Billy Darwin said, “That’s what you want to see me about?”
“I thought I’d mention it. No, I’m here seeking employment as a celebrity host.”
“As a relative of Tishomingo or a former ballplayer?”
“I can handle either, talk the talk.”
When Billy Darwin shrugged and walked away, going into the hotel, Charlie was right behind him, passing through a room the size of a ballpark where they were laying carpet. On the escalator going up to the mezzanine Charlie said to the back of the man’s silky sportshirt, “I was with five majorleague organizations and pitched in a World Series.”
Billy Darwin tossed his Robert Redford hair and looked over his shoulder as he reached the mezzanine.
“What year?”
“Eighty-four.”
“Tigers over the Padres in five,” Darwin said.
He kept walking and Charlie followed him through a reception area walled with murals, Plains Indians and buffalo, where some guys in suits were waiting, looking up to be noticed as Darwin went past, now into an office where a good-looking dark-haired woman sat behind a desk. Darwin stopped to ask her, “Carla, who was my two o’clock?”
She looked down at her pad and said, “Mr. Charlie Hoke. He wanted me to note, ‘Former big leaguer.’”
Darwin turned enough to look at Charlie. “How do you spell your name?”
Charlie told him.
Darwin said, “You sure it’s not H-o-a-x?”
Charlie said, “Billy”—hanging on to his irritation— “while you were playing stickball in the alley I was with the Orioles, the Texas Rangers, the Pittsburgh Pirates, the De-troit Tigers, Baltimore again, got traded back to De-troit in ’83 and finished my eighteen years of organized ball with the Tigers in the ’84 World Series. I went in what became the final game in the fifth and struck out the side. I got Brown and Salazar on called third strikes. I hit Wiggins by mistake, put him on, and I got the mighty Tony Gwynn to go down swinging at sixty-mile-an-hour knucklers. I went two and a third innings, threw twenty-six pitches and only five of ’em were balls. I hit Wiggins on a nothin’-and-two count, my only mistake, went to shave him with a fastball and come a little too close. I’ve struck out Al Oliver, Gorman Thomas and Jim Rice. Also Darrel Evans, Mike Schmidt, Bill Madlock, Willie McGee, Don Mattingly, and I fanned Wade Boggs twice in the same game—if those names mean anything to you.”
Billy Darwin said, “Come on in,” and led Charlie into an office big enough to hold a dance in and not even remove the desk, which by itself was a size. Darwin took his place behind it and began fooling with his computer, working the mouse, the PC and a phone the only things on the desk. Charlie got tired of standing and took one of the ranch-house leather chairs without being asked. Looking at Darwin close he saw the man was about forty, had that young-looking hair and appeared to be in shape. Charlie heard the computer making different noises like static on a radio, then was quiet and pretty soon Darwin went to work on the keyboard, typing and looking at the screen, which Charlie couldn’t see.
He finally asked Darwin what he was doing and was told, “Looking you up on CNNSI dot com.”
“I’m in there?”
“It says you’re six-five and weigh two-twenty.”
“I’ve shrunk,” Charlie said. “I’m only six-four now.”
“But you’ve put on some weight.”
“Couple pounds.”
Darwin was looking at the screen again. “The year you were with Detroit . . .” He stopped. “You only pitched those two and a third innings, allowed one hit, struck out five and walked two.” The man sounding surprised as he read it off the screen.
“I only walked one. I told you I hit Wiggins? Come inside on him too close. See, I was never afraid to throw inside. You’d see these batters sticking their butts out ready to bail.”
“But the only time you went up to the majors,” Darwin said, “was in ’84.”
“I was up with other clubs but never used.”
“And the only game you pitched in,” Darwin said, “was in the
World Series,” the man still sounding surprised. “When did you strike out Mattingly, Madlock, all those guys you mentioned, Gorman Thomas?”
“You want,” Charlie said, “I can go down the list. I got Mattingly when I was with Toledo in Triple-A and Don was with Columbus then. I recall I was playing A ball with Tulsa, a game against Shreveport I got Darrel Evans swinging. Madlock, let’s see, I was with Oneonta, that’s also A ball, and I believe he was with Pittsfield. I know Mike Schmidt was with Reading when I fanned him and I was playing Double-A with Altoona, back then throwing ninety-nine-mile-an-hour fastballs. I also held the record in the Eastern League for hitting the most batters.”
Billy Darwin didn’t look surprised anymore, sitting there deadpan, like he was looking at all these baseball facts sliding around in his head.
“Eighty-one I was back with De-troit, sent down to the Mud Hens and struck out Willie McGee. As I recall he was with the Louisville Riverbats. Who else you want to know? Oh, and I was in that longest game ever played that went thirty-two innings. You ever hear of it?”
“Pawtucket and Rochester,” Darwin said, “yeah, ’81.”
“You know your baseball. Baltimore was giving me another shot, this time with Rochester, Triple-A, and I struck out Wade Boggs both times I faced him. The game lasted eight hours and seven minutes before they called it at four-oh-seven the next morning, Easter Sunday. Guys came home and caught hell, their wives thinking they were out all night fooling around.”
“They finished the game sometime in June,” Darwin said, “but I don’t recall who won.”
“I don’t either,” Charlie said. “I was gone by then.” He grinned at Darwin. “I remember Wade Boggs saying, ‘A game like this, you can have a bad week in one night.’ “
Darwin was staring at him again and Charlie put on a serious look as Darwin said, “You spent your entire fucking career in the minors except for one game.”
“I was up by the end of August that time. With other clubs too, but was mostly used for batting practice. I had all the pitches, even a split-finger that worked sometimes. I’d throw knucklers, give the boys a chance to see if they could hit junk. Or I’d come inside hard, get ’em to develop the nerve to hang in there.”
“You were up several times—why didn’t you ever stay?”
“I was wild my first, say, five years, I have to admit that. But being a southpaw with a blazing fastball, shit, there was always a club wanted to have a look at me. Then there was a period I might’ve been cuttin’ up too much. I was having fun. Wherever I was I got my picture in the paper for one thing or another, like brawls they’d say I started. I’d hit a batter and he’d stand there giving me the evil eye. What I’d do, I’d hold my glove down by my leg and give him a motion with it like I’m saying, ‘Come on. You think I hit you on purpose?’ He’d come tearing at me and the benches’d empty. Seventy-three, or it might’ve been ’74, I won the big-league bubble-gum-blowing contest.” Charlie raised his hands like he was holding a basketball. “Goddamn bubble was this big, I swear.”
He knew he had Darwin’s attention, the way the man was staring at him, but couldn’t tell what he was thinking.
“On the road for something to do, I’d catch balls dropped from the roof of hotels—put on one of those big mitts catchers use for knuckleballers? It always drew a crowd, only management never cared for what they called showing off. That’s the kind of thing I’d get sent down for—don’t come back till you grow up.”
“I got a guy,” Darwin said, “wants to dive off the roof of the hotel. What you said reminded me. He calls up, says he’s a professional high diver and wants to know how many floors we have. I told him seven. He goes, ‘I’ll dive off the roof into eight feet of water.’ And he’ll bring his own tank.”
“I’d like to see that,” Charlie said. “How much’s he want?”
“Five bills to go off twice a day.”
“Sounds cheap enough for a death-defying stunt.”
“Said he worked in Acapulco.”
“Shit, I’d hire him. He likes high risk, he’s no doubt a gambler. Pay him and win it all back at your tables.”
Charlie noticed Billy Darwin’s keen, appraising look and pulled out another idea that might impress him. “Set up one of those radar guns they use to see how hard the ball’s thrown? Put in a pitching rubber and a bull’s-eye sixty feet six inches away, a buck a throw. Anybody can throw a hardball a hunnert miles an hour wins . . . how much would you say?”
“Ten grand,” Darwin said without even thinking about it.
“You have that on a sign by the radar cage,” Charlie said. “Another one, it says ‘Beat the big leaguer and win a hunnert bucks.’ These strong young boys come along and look me over. ‘Hell, I can take that old man.’ Five bucks a throw—you could make some money off me.”
Darwin kept staring at him. “You can still throw?”
“I can get it up to around eighty.”
“Come on—an old guy like you?”
“Hell, I’m only fifty.”
Darwin looked at his screen again. “Born in August of ’48, you’re pushing fifty-four.”
“I can still throw harder’n most anybody wants to try me.”
“You think,” Darwin said, “you could strike me out?”
“You play much?”
“High school and sandlot, couple years of industrial ball.”
“You bat right or left?”
“Left.”
“Yeah, I can strike you out.”
Darwin paused, thoughtful, and then asked him, “What’ve you been doing the past sixteen years?”
“I was a rep for the Jack Daniel’s people, went on the road with promotions. Then did the same thing for Miller Brewing.”
“You married?”
“Divorced, a long time. I have a couple of daughters, both in Florida, five grandchildren.” Charlie said, “Is this the job interview?”
Darwin had that thoughtful look again. “You really think you can strike me out?”
Charlie shrugged this time. “Step up to the plate, we’ll find out. You want to put money on it?”
The man kept staring. Finally he said, “How about this? I whiff, you’re my celebrity host.”
Charlie jumped on it. He said, “Hell, I’ll strike you out on three pitches,” and wanted to snatch the words back as he heard them. He saw Darwin smiling for the first time.
“I’ll bet it was your mouth,” Billy Darwin said, “kept you in the minors more’n your control.” Not a half hour with Charlie Hoke and starting to sound like him a little. Darwin said, “You’re a gamer, Charlie. I’ll give you four pitches.”
Charlie set it up. He called Vernice at the Isle of Capri coffee shop, told her please not to ask any questions and let him talk to Lamont, one of the busboys. Lamont Harris was the catcher on the Rosa Fort high school baseball team. Charlie knew him from going over there this past spring to help the pitchers with their mechanics, hit fungoes and throw batting practice now and then. He told Lamont to meet them at the field after work, bring a couple of bats, a glove, his equipment and, hey, the oversized catcher’s mitt Charlie had sold him for ten bucks.
By five-thirty they were out on the school’s hardpack diamond playing catch. Charlie took his warm-up pitches, throwing mostly sliders and knucklers, while Billy Darwin in his sunglasses, shorts, his silky shirt and sneakers stood off to the side watching and swinging a bat. Lamont strapped on his protection and Charlie motioned him out to the mound. He told Lamont, a big seventeen-year-old he’d played catch with all spring, “Use the knuckleball mitt.”
“That’s all you gonna throw?”
“He’ll think it and want to look the first one over. While he’s looking,” Charlie said, “I’m gonna throw it down the middle of downtown.”
And that’s what he did, grooved it. With that popping sound of the ball hitting the catcher’s mitt, Lamont called, “That’s a strike,” and Darwin turned his head to look at him. When he was facing
this way again, swinging the bat out to point it at him, Charlie said, “You satisfied with the call?”
“It was a strike,” Billy Darwin said, swung the bat out again, brought it back and dug in, Charlie observing the way he crowded the plate.
This time Charlie threw a slider, a two-bit curveball that came inside and hooked down and over the plate and Darwin swung late and missed. But he hung in, didn’t he?
Okay, with the count nothing and two Charlie was thinking about offering a big, sweeping curve, lefty against lefty, throw it behind him and watch him hunch and duck as the ball broke over home plate. Or, hell, give him a knuckler, a pitch he’d likely never see. Get it anywhere near the plate he’ll swing early and miss it a mile. Charlie gripped the ball with the tips of his gnarled fingers, his nails pressed into the hide, went into his motion, threw the floater and watched Darwin check his swing as the goddamn ball bounced a foot and a half in front of the plate.
“He came around on it,” Charlie said.
Lamont was shaking his head saying no, he held up.
“We don’t have a third base ump to call it,” Charlie said, “but I’m pretty sure he came around.”
Billy Darwin said, “Hey, Charlie, you threw it in the dirt, man. Come on, throw me a strike.”
Shit.
What he needed was a resin bag.
Darwin was swinging the bat now and pointing it way out past Charlie toward the Mississippi River, then took his stance, digging in, and Charlie wasn’t sure what to throw him. Maybe another slider, put it on the inside corner. Or show him a major-league fastball—or what passed for one sixteen years later. Shit. He felt his irritation heating up and told himself to throw the goddamn ball, fire it in there, this guy won’t hit it, look at him holding the bat straight up behind him, waving the fat end in a circle. Jesus, a red bat, one of those metal ones they used in high school. You can’t strike out a guy waving a tin bat at you, for Christ sake? Charlie went into his motion and bore down, threw it as hard as he could and saw the red bat fly up in the air as Billy Darwin hit the dirt to save his life.