King of the Mound: My Summer With Satchel Paige (13 page)

“You didn’t seem very happy that time I walked up to you and your friends at the ballpark.”

Nick shrugged. “It’s just . . . hard. Tom and Nate wouldn’t understand about a girl liking baseball and stuff.”

“Is that why you like me? Because I like baseball?”

There was a note in her voice that Nick couldn’t quite identify—hurt, maybe—and some instinct told him that his
answer was really important. “I don’t know,” he said after a long pause. “I guess I like you because you’re you.”

“Okay,” she said. And then she stood and skipped away across the wet grass of the lawn, the words trailing behind her in the darkness. “Sleep well, Nick.”

Late the next morning Nick idly swept the home bench while watching Satch take batting practice. He was a surprisingly good hitter given his lanky frame, and when he made solid contact, the ball would leap off his bat. He tended to hit line drives, which meant that he ended up with lots of singles and doubles rather than home runs, but when he really caught a pitch, he would send it a long way. He had just rapped a sharp grounder up the middle, hard enough that the pitcher had to hop to the side, when Mr. Churchill walked onto the field. He whistled at Nick, and Nick hustled over as quickly as he could.

“We got a meeting,” he said when Nick reached his side. “You and me.”

Nick stared at him, puzzled. “A meeting?”

“Downtown. With Wild Bill Langer.”

Nick’s jaw dropped. William “Wild Bill” Langer was a notorious figure. He had been elected governor four years earlier,
but he had been convicted by a federal court for some complex scheme involving taking money from highway department employees. As a result the state supreme court had ordered him removed from office, and Wild Bill had responded by barricading himself with ten friends in the governor’s mansion and declaring that North Dakota was now an independent country. The drama had ultimately ended when Wild Bill decided to step down as governor and fight the case in the courts, and while Nick was in the hospital his conviction had been overturned. Now he was running for governor again and claiming that the entire thing had been a scam to get him out of office.

“Why do you want me to go to the meeting?” Nick finally asked.

Mr. Churchill smiled thinly. “Because he’s less likely to eat me for lunch if there’s a kid in the room.”

Nick didn’t find that very comforting—especially since he’d never seen Mr. Churchill intimidated by anything—but he got in the car because he couldn’t think of any good excuses. They drove downtown and parked in front of the Patterson Hotel. Nick had never been inside, but he knew the building well—it was ten stories high and had been the tallest structure in North Dakota until they’d completed the new statehouse, two years earlier. As they walked into the ornate lobby, Nick stayed as close to Mr. Churchill’s side as possible. Mr. Churchill nodded at several men in severe blue uniforms and then stopped in front of the giant oak reception desk.

“I’m here to see Bill,” he said to the clerk.

The clerk glanced up from writing in a giant book. “Name?”

“Churchill.”

“Of course,” the clerk said, snapping the book closed. “Sorry, Mr. Churchill. I’ll tell him you’re here.”

As the clerk scurried away, Mr. Churchill glanced down at Nick. “Have you ever been in here before?” he asked.

“No, sir.”

“Well, what do you think?”

“It’s nice,” Nick said.

Mr. Churchill smiled. “It ought to be nice. They worked on this monstrosity for twenty years. Do you know why?”

“Because it was hard to build?”

“Because according to state law any property under construction is exempt from taxes. So as long as they kept working on it, they didn’t owe the tax man a red cent.”

“I heard they built a secret tunnel connecting the basement with the train station,” Nick said. “So they could smuggle stuff inside during Prohibition.”

Mr. Churchill gave him a sharp look. “And where did you hear that?”

“At school. One of the kids said his father helped build it.”

Mr. Churchill was silent for a long moment and then shrugged. “Well, I wouldn’t put it past them. Most of the folks who come into this building have a rather loose interpretation of the law.”

The clerk suddenly reappeared at Mr. Churchill’s side. “Follow me,” he said. “Mr. Langer is ready to see you.”

The clerk led them to a dark wood door in the back of the lobby. He knocked five times in an unusual pattern and then a lock clicked. As the door swung open, a thick burst of smoke escaped, and when Nick followed Mr. Churchill into the room, it took his eyes a moment to adjust to both the
dark and the burning haze of tobacco. He recognized Wild Bill immediately from the newspaper photographs. His hair was slicked straight back from his forehead, and he had a round face with a pronounced dimple in his chin. He stared at Mr. Churchill through intense eyes for a few seconds and then glanced at Nick.

“Hey, kid,” he said. “Are you supposed to be his bodyguard or something?” There was no smile on his face or anything else to indicate he was joking.

“No, sir,” Nick said. “I’m just here to make sure you don’t eat him.”

A smile flickered across Wild Bill’s face—quick as a bolt of lightning—and the men sitting around the table with him laughed.

“I generally don’t eat people until suppertime,” Wild Bill said when the laughter subsided. “But I’m sure Churchill appreciates your concern.” His gaze turned to Mr. Churchill. “I’ve been hearing a lot about your team.”

“Best players money can buy,” Mr. Churchill said. “At least outside of the majors.”

Mr. Churchill reached for a chair, but Wild Bill shook his head. “Don’t sit,” he said. “I’ve just got a quick proposition for you.”

Mr. Churchill gave the chair a glance and then shrugged. “You know me, Bill. I’m always ready to hear a deal.”

“I was talking with one of my compatriots the other day,” Wild Bill said, his voice rising, “and we realized that Bismarck has never won a championship in any sport. Which, we agreed, is an outrage. This city is the capital of the great state of North Dakota, and as such it should achieve
glory commensurate with its stature. Do you not agree?”

“Of course,” Mr. Churchill said. “But what did you have in mind?”

Wild Bill glanced at one of the men sitting with him, who pulled out a leaflet and tossed it on the table. “An old friend of mine has decided to put together a competition in Wichita, Kansas. A national semiprofessional baseball tournament. It will be played at the new stadium on the Arkansas River, and teams will travel from all over the country to compete for glory.”

“And you want us to go?” Mr. Churchill asked as he picked up the pamphlet.

“I want you to win,” Wild Bill said. “I want you to remind America that Bismarck and North Dakota are still on the map.” His voice dropped. “And I also want you to make history. No team with both white boys and colored boys has ever taken home a trophy in a tournament like this. You and Bismarck will be in the history books. Forever.”

Mr. Churchill gave Wild Bill a long look. “And what do you get out of it?”

“Just civic pride,” Wild Bill said with an odd smile that Nick recognized—it was the code that adults sometimes used to signal when they weren’t telling the truth. “Although it sure would be nice if your champions decided to march in one of my parades before the election.”

“Oh,” Mr. Churchill said. He paused. “I’ll think about it.”

Nick stared at the pamphlet as Mr. Churchill drove him home. It was just a grainy photograph of a man sliding into second base and a few lines of type:

National Baseball Congress Tournament

Semipro champion of the world to be crowned at the brand-new Lawrence Stadium. $1,000 cash prize to winning team!

Nick’s jaw dropped when he saw the prize. You could buy almost two Studebaker trucks for that kind of money—it seemed like an awful lot just for playing baseball.

“So what do you think?” Mr. Churchill eventually asked. “Do you think we should go?”

“That’s a big prize,” Nick said. “I mean, if the team wins.”

“It’s a lot of money even if we don’t win,” Mr. Churchill said. “The guy who’s putting it together contacted me and offered us an appearance fee.”

Nick looked at Mr. Churchill, surprised. “You already knew about the tournament?”

Mr. Churchill laughed. “Knew about it? That guy has been calling me every day since the moment I landed Satch. He knows that if we show up, his stadium will be full for every game.”

“Then why did you act surprised with Wild Bill?”

“Because now if we go, Wild Bill will think that he owes me a favor. And he’ll also think that I take his advice, which is even more valuable.”

A minute later they pulled up in front of the house, and as Nick got out of the car and walked toward the backyard, he realized that the adult world was really complicated. How were you supposed to know what was real when people were always telling half-truths or pretending they didn’t know things or sometimes just plain lying? Nick wondered
if he would ever figure it out—did you just turn eighteen and suddenly all of this stuff made sense? Or would he spend the rest of his life confused because he believed that there should be some relationship between what a person said and what they meant?

Nick was still lost in that thought as he walked up the stairs to his cabin, but as his hand touched the doorknob he heard a bright burst of laughter behind him. His head whipped around—Emma was standing next to a giant pile of dirt in the middle of the yard, a shovel in one hand.

“You walked right past me,” she said. “Like your head was lost in the clouds.”

“Oh.” Nick stared at the pile of dirt. “What are you doing?”

“I built you a pitcher’s mound.”

“What?”

“Look. . . .” Her foot nudged a block of wood. “You can use this as a rubber.”

Nick stared at the torn-up grass. “Your mother’s going to kill you.”

“Probably.” She paused. “You want to give it a try?”

Nick took a long moment before he answered. He knew what Emma was doing—and it was really, really nice of her. But he was also scared. Ever since he first got sick, Nick had clung to the fantasy that someday he would be able to pitch again, and he knew it would be harder to believe in that dream if he got on a mound and couldn’t even toss the ball to home plate without falling on his face. Yet Nick also knew he couldn’t put off this moment forever. At some point he needed to try.

“Yeah,” Nick finally said. “Let me get my glove.”

By the time Nick returned to the yard, Emma had finished sinking
the rubber into the mound, and Nick patted down the dirt with his foot. When he finally got into his set and fingered the ball in his mitt, his hands were sweaty. Emma was crouched at the far end of the yard, maybe a few steps too close, but Nick wasn’t going to complain. His mind was racing as he started his motion, but as his hands rose his instincts took over and his head cleared. The only thing in the world that mattered was Emma’s glove. His body drove forward, his hips coming through the way his father had taught him, and the ball spun out of his hand. For a moment everything felt the way he remembered, but then his bad leg couldn’t quite hold his weight and he stumbled a little. He managed to catch himself, and as he straightened back up he glanced at Emma. She was holding up the ball, a huge grin on her face.

“That was a strike,” she said.

She tossed the ball back, and Nick tried it again. And again. And again. With each toss his confidence grew a little bit. Yeah, his left leg wasn’t perfect and he couldn’t drive to the plate quite as confidently as he wanted, but he was
pitching
. His father had been wrong, the doctors were wrong . . . even Nick himself was wrong. It was possible.
He
could
do
it.

Around the fifteenth or twentieth pitch, just as Nick’s confidence reached its peak, he got the feeling that someone was watching him. He glanced over his shoulder and saw his father standing on the steps of the cabin. Nick tried to contain his excitement, but the words slipped out before he could stop them.

“Look, Dad,” he said. “I’m pitching!”

His father just stared at him, and Nick suddenly felt his confidence
slipping away like air leaking from a punctured balloon.

“Yeah,” his father said after what felt like an hour.

“Do I look . . . okay?”

“You’re wasting your time,” his father said. “Power comes from the legs. No legs, no power.”

He turned and went into the cabin. Nick waited until the door was closed and then he dropped his glove and walked toward the street. He heard Emma call his name behind him, but Nick couldn’t turn to look at her. Not right now.