Funny thing about real gloom, Bancroft reasoned; it had a giddy core. Made hard things soft, silly things true, grim things comic. Psyche, up against the wall, had its own defenses. Bancroft, the rationalist, disbelieved in reason. It was the beast's son, after all, not the father, and if it had a way of sometimes getting out of hand, there were always limits: it lacked the old man's cunning. And it had no hands. Re: back again, the primitive condition, the nonreflective operating thing: res. His son: if he couldn't scare the kid into submission, he could always tickle a rib and break all the connections. Rooney, sourest man in Association history, was staggering flop-limbed around the bar in an old man's fit of spittle-chinned cackling. Drunk as a skunk and he shouldn't even be drinking: "Hell, it split open hours ago, I gotta sterilize it!" And a wild rattle of hysterical laughter. The point was: Rooney was afraid to die. Pushing seventy. "Whole digestive tract nothing but one long raw sore. If he stopped to think about it, he couldn't keep going. So the old cerebrum got its switch flipped. But suicide…?
Was he intentionally feeding that inner volcano, hoping for the dark? Maybe, maybe not. Plastered, after all, he loosened up. Bile stopped pumping. Bourbon wasn't medicine exactly, but it might be a slower sweeter poison. Barney drank his own, listened to Sandy and the boys, waxed slowly soft and barmy: he received thanks, relayed through the skittish sconce, but sent him by the other fellow. .
I been gatherin' blisters in the bull pen,
Out here where the green grasses grow,
But you've kept me awaitin' so long, man,
The grass is all co-huh-vered with snow!
The grasses was all turnin' yeller
When our ace he got sent to the show'rs,
But ya went'n sent in some other feller,
And left me a-out here apickin' flow'rs!
I been gatherin' blisters in the bull pen,
Out here where the…
"It was a nice funeral, Barney," Tim Shadwell said, leaning close. Tim was the greatest pitcher in Association history until Brock Rutherford came along to wipe out all his records. How did he feel about that? That it was a nice funeral. "Fenn told me you had a lot to do with it."
"Not so much," Barney said, smiling faintly. Did rue sit so heavily on him? Tim was the fourth man to pass his bar-end perch, go glum, release a hushed lament. Guilt. The sons banded together. Old man psyche had his hands full, all right. Legalism. Was Tim a Legalist? We all were. McCaffree was in, wasn't he? Whoa, Barney! Slipping your stitches. "Slitching my stipples."
"Howzat?" Tim leaned closer, drunk, sincerely. Sincerely-drunk. Looked like his eyes might sincerely cross. Not more than a week ago, Barney's pile-driving Pioneers had shattered Shadwell's crumbling Keystones, socking them out of second with a three-game swamping sweep and they were still in a full-tilt tumble. Shattered Shadwell. Tuckered Tim. Didn't he hate? Well, talk instead about the funeral. Community of pain and beauty.
"I said, can I buy you a drink?"
"You owe me one," tumbling Tim said flatly, and leaned away.
I know thet I give a lotta passes,
I know thet I ain't no more a pup,
But yer love for me is like these grasses,
Yer love fo-hor me is all dried up!
I been gatherin' blisters in the bull pen…
Barney caught Jake Bradley's eye, and Jake filled them up. Grieved shake of the bald pate: they grievedly shook to ratify. Tough. It was. Poor Brock. "You'll pull out," Barney said.
"I hope so, Barney," Tim replied, sucking in deeply the dark bar air. "The sinking Stones: boy, those news guys really eat you up when you're down." Words of wisdom from the Manager of the Year. Tim reached for his drink, knocked it over. Full-tilt tumble. Clunk of the year. "God, I've had enough," he said sheepishly. As Shadwell righted his glass, Bancroft saw his hand was shaking. Too-tight Tim. Called for Jake again. "Another one, Jake. And a bar rag."
I wish that you would reconsider
And let po-hore me back in the game!
The grasses is brown and they're bitter,
And you have forgo-hotten my name!
I been gather in' blisters in the bull pen,
Out here where the green grasses grow,
But you've kept me awaitin' so long, man,
The grass is all co-huh-vered with snow!
Well, it was some gathering, this wake, bar packed to overflowing, and what was it for? it was hard to tell. It was like they'd all been squeezed into this big retort, Jake's athanor, seeking a transformation, a way of going on with it, some viable essence unaltered by the boy's death that they could start over with, and to be sure, the heat was on.
She came up to him. He hadn't noticed her there before. She winked cheaply and asked: "How's Damon's pitching arm tonight?"
"He's dead."
"Hunh?"
"Damon Rutherford is dead."
It was as though he'd struck her in the face. He asked Jake for another. When he looked again, she was gone. He turned to Tim Shadwell. "How's the boy coming along?"
"Who?"
"Your son. Thornton. Going to be ready next year?"
It was the wrong question. Shadwell began to break. Tears bubbled out. "When I saw that boy there today, Barney. . in that.. that box… so… so dead… I kept thinking… I kept feeling. . my own boy. . I'm afraid, Bamey. . he's so young. ."
And you're so old. Don't kid me, Shadwell. "He can take care of himself, Tim." As though to make matters worse,
Sandy struck up "The Happy Hours of Youth," and Tim and the other guys joined mournfully in. .
Oh, rookies, come along
And hear m' sad song!
Old age is the bane o' mankind!
So enjoy while ya may
The fair spring day,
Cause the blue season ain't far behind!
Oh, the happy sunny da-hays of old!
When our feet were fleet and our hearts were
bold!
There's nothin' so fine in the world to behold
As the happy hours of youth!
When the years're green
And the hits come clean,
You're honored among the athletes;
But they'll come a day
When they won't letcha play,
And like us, you must hang up yer cleats!
Oh, the happy sunny. .
Glorious days, bold hearts: Barney, you're just an old fool like the rest of them. Some of the boys were snuffling, most had a sparkle in their eye, as they harmonized on the chorus. Distantly, he heard Rooney vomiting. Too much drinking — or maybe it was the cheap sentiment. No letting up, that was Rooney's success. Shit maybe, but hard shit, hard as bricks. Rooney had a lot of fire all right, but there was no real life in it. It was fratricidal. Destructive. Divisive. But are you really Bure, Barney? Maybe the old sonuvabitch had the truth after all. Beside him, Tim Shadwell, all choked up, sang brokenly, soddenly, loudly. Nauseating, all right. Yet there was something human there. If Rooney did have the truth, Barney didn't want it. He entered in… into the soft shit…