In the team picture for the yearbook, Brian's left arm is in a heavy bandage. He had just done the trick with Wotan's food dish, pretending to give it to Loki, and was reaching it back into Wotan's cage when the dog clamped ahold of his wrist. No snarl, no display, just a quick, silent pounce that brought Brian to his knees. Brian tried to command him to stop, but the voice wouldn't come, he couldn't work a sound past his throat. He banged on the cage with his free hand till Mr. Pettit came out. Wotan held on like a bulldog, blood running down his clamped jaws, looking Brian in the eye. He didn't listen to Mr. Pettit, not even when he shouted, and he chomped even harder when Pettit kicked him in the ribs. It took a double dose of Nembutal to put him out.
"You'd been inside the cage," said Mr. Pettit as he poured antiseptic on Brian's puncture wounds, "it would of been your throat."
Sometime later in the year, when Brian hadn't had a girl for months, Russ Palumbo approached him in metal shop.
"Wanna buy a balloon, kid?" he said, and flashed his wallet rubber. Brian ignored him.
"Listen, McNeil," said Russ Palumbo, "I hear that Ditty Stack is strictly a cockteaser."
Brian ignored him.
"That so? McNeil?"
"No, Russ," said Brian in the dry, disinterested style he had almost perfected, "she's not a cockteaser at all."
Palumbo's face brightened. "Yeah?"
"She's a cliff-hanger."
Thoroughly confused, Russ Palumbo walked away with a knowing laugh.
Hoop
ULE NUMBER ONE," Jockey would only have to bend a little to line up his shots, "Never Show Your Speed." Five-seven-two, corner pocket. Jockey liked to punctuate his lectures with combination shots. Anybody at the Hibernian could tell you Jockey Conn would pass up a half-dozen straight chippies for a three-ball combination.
"You show your speed and they got you pegged. They know just what you can do and what you can't do. They know where to hurt you, Sport. Am I right?"
Brian liked the way jockey would always call him Sport. The old man always called him "boy," or, if he was really gassed, "sonny."
"You pay attention to the jockey now, boy," the old man would call from the bar. "There's many a thing worth learning they don't teach at that school." And Slim Teeter would say A-men. The old man and Slim would be trying to get in as many cold ones as possible before five o'clock when the prices went up. The bartender would usually be Sweeny, sitting over a racing form circling his picks. Sweeny never played, he just picked and followed the results.
"I've saved a fortune in my time," he'd say when the regulars prodded him. "If I was a gamblin man I'd been a pauper years ago." Sometimes Sweeny would help Brian remind the old man that supper was ready. "The boy's been here a halfhour, McNeil," he would say, "and Hell hath no fury like a woman with a cold pot roast on her hands."
On game days, days when there wasn't practice. Brian's mother would send him over. She started sending him after the time the old man got pinched for taking a leak in public. She never started dinner till five. When the old man got up to leave Slim would wink and toast him with a beer glass.
"Until tomorrow, Hugh."
"Until tomorrow."
The men who sat at tables still told stories about the old man. Stories about the fights he'd won, the tricks he'd played, the witty things he'd said at just the right time. About the devil he was as a young man. They still told stories about the old man and dragged him over to verify that the truth had been told and bought him a drink and then tucked him back into his slot at the bar.
"You see that shot I just made, Sport? What would you say the odds against were? Hundred to one? Am I right? But when she fell in the pocket, did you see me whoop an holler? When I missed that gimme, that five in the side, did you see me piss an moan? Nosir, you did not." The felt was always covered with smudges from the jockey's cigar droppings. The light was off center so that when your back was to the bar you threw shadows on the table. The cue sticks on the wall rack were all crooked. Jockey said you'd be better off using a baseball bat. Jockey packed his own stick, three sections that screwed together.
"Nosir, I didn't bat an eyelash either time. The less you let them know about you, the better off you are. Keep em guessing and you're one step ahead of the game." Seven-five combination, opposite corner. Jockey would have the stogie in his mouth and he never blinked. Brian had never seen jockey blink.
The old man's eyes ran, he blinked all the time. Slim Teeter played hide-and-seek, avoiding his own eyes in the mirror behind the bar.
"The best face, Sport, is no face at all."
"A-men."
"He burned your ass, man. Burned your ass! And you had the turkey, had him nailed to the floor."
Brian sat in front of his locker and almost smiled at the sound of Lucius Foster ragging Preston in the next row.
"Where's yours?" said Preston. Too tired to yell.
"My what?"
"Your money. We went halfs, remember? Win or lose. That's two-fifty."
"Shit, man."
"You're the one upped it to five dollars. Don't you go tellin me `shit.' " Preston and Lucius both came out of the Children's Home and went for brothers. Scratch one and the other would bleed.
"Here."
"All you got is change?"
Brian considered yelling over the locker that they could pay him tomorrow but he decided not to. One of jockey's rules, Never Rub It In.
"Man think I'm made of money."
"Forget it. Pay me when we get back."
Brian waited till he saw Preston's feet before he looked up. Preston had red-and-white checkered laces which Coach let him wear for practice. For games he had to use plain white like everybody else. Coach said appearance was important for the proper mental attitude. Coach wouldn't let you wear a kneepad unless you could show him the bruise.
Preston laid five dollars next to Brian on the wooden bench. "There you go."
"Right. Nice game."
"Yuh."
Preston was a light-colored one, the kind the others called Chinaman. The kind the old man said made the best pimps. Preston wore a religious medal that sometimes hopped up and stung you when you played him.
"You almost took me," said Brian, but Preston was already gone around the corner. Five bucks was no little thing at the Children's Home.
"Not only do they ask for it, they beg for it." Three-seveneleven, off the cushion and in. "And who are you to disappoint them?"
The word had gotten out about Brian and Condredge Holloway, the one from 13th Street Park that everybody called Boots. The word of how he had bet Boots on a one-onone game and Boots had swallowed it. Everybody knew Boots was crazy, the white boy was on the varsity at school and, blood or not, Boots didn't even start for the Boys' Club. But Boots only lost it by three, he was close all the way and the white boy only came back to take it at the end. The word got out that maybe McNeil was only good as a team player, a passan-pick dude. One of Coach's boys.
"Hey! McNeil! Brianl" Practice had just broken up and he was heading down to the showers. Lucius pulled at his jersey from behind. "I hear you a gamblin man."
"Huh?"
"You an ole Boots. One-on-one game."
"Oh. Yuh. I almost blew it." He'd really have to work hard to make it look good with Lucius. Lucius gave away four or five inches and had almost missed the last cut.
"You want to try your luck again?"
"Against you?"
"Naw! Think I'm crazy like Boots?" Lucius had a chipped tooth up front that made him look like he was smiling more than he was. "You an my man Preston."