strode to first. Jugger was not pleased. The game meant a lot to him because there were Major League scouts in the stands and Jugger, who couldn’t do much in life, but could burn a baseball, knew that was his ticket to a good life. He settled down and struck out the side.”
My father and his pals always added how “the Jugger’s” grin lit up the ballpark. “They could have played a night game by that grin,” my father said.
The game progressed and The Saxony Mills Team—Jugger’s team—took a seven to one lead going into the ninth inning. The scouts were standing behind the backstop now, scrutinizing every pitch and Jugger was not disappointing them. The catcher’s mitt was puffing smoke and every pitch brought “oh’s and ah’s” from the crowd.
The giant lumberman got up to bat again. Jugger had made him look bad all afternoon and the Frenchman’s bravado had greatly diminished.
Just as Jugger was about to throw, the Canadian stepped out of the box and began pointing with his bat to second base. His great bulk was bent over with laughter. All eyes turned to second base to see a dog squatting on the bag and then chased off by the second baseman’s flailing glove.
The Frenchman took center stage again and he turned to the crowd and announced, “Well, one thing is cer-tane—whoeverrr gets sec-ond gets turd.”
The crowd roared its approval, laughing, screaming, the echoes of laughter washing over the crowd, the players and the ball field. Everyone roared and applauded gleefully, everyone except the Jugger, who was one out away from a Major League contract. He could feel it, he could taste it. He was about to be somebody and this Frog out of some two-bit lumber town was turning his moment of glory into mockery. Even the rival scouts were thumping each other on the shoulders now in jovial camaraderie.
Jugger rubbed the ball until he almost rubbed the threads off it.
“C’mon, you Frog. Save your act for vaudeville. This is baseball.”
The giant stopped in his tracks, glued to the grass. The stands quieted down. “What did he say? What did the Jugger call him?” ‘Frog’ passed from aisle to aisle and on out to the standing spectators behind the ropes in left field and right.
“Hey, picture man. What you call me?” The brown eyes narrowed and the Frenchman’s grip tightened around the bat. Veins stuck out like cords in his neck. “Frog,” Jugger said. “Play ball, Frog.”
Now the afternoon was muffled as though someone had thrown a blanket over the entire field and spectators.
The Frenchman began a slow, deliberate walk in the direction of the pitcher’s mound. He held the bat like a toothpick in his powerful right hand.
The Jugger backed up, and the Frenchman kept coming. The plate umpire ran after him and tried to hold him back. The Frenchman swatted him with his left forearm, knocking him to the ground as he gained the rubber.
“Frog, eh?” and he threw a punch at Jugger, who tried to block it by putting his pitching hand in front of his face. The fist drove on through to the face. There was a sickening sound of bone snapping like a branch, and Jugger toppled to the ground. His face turned pale and he was too weak to get out of the way of the bat that smashed against his head and outstretched arms.
The Jugger never threw a baseball again. The arm never responded to surgery and it hung crooked all his life. The skull fracture dimmed his vision and caused his thinking to slip a few beats. Sometimes, he spoke slowly and slurred his words.
The Frenchman was to be tried for assault, but he made a run for the border and was never seen again.
“I’m sorry you’re sad, Sully. You shouldn’t have to be sad. Kids should never be sad. Things happen in life. That’s what my father says. It’s the way God wants things. We can’t always know why these things happen, my father says, but they just do. Like accidents. So don’t be sad, Sully. You’re just a kid. I don’t ever like to see kids sad. I was watching from my window one day and I saw Mr. Callahan come into the Park looking for his kids. When they saw him coming they started running away and he was stumbling and staggering and swearing at them. He yelled at them to stop and the little girl, the pretty little one with the curly, black hair, how old isshee, Sully?” he slurred.
“Oh, I dunno. Maybe nine?”
“Well, she stopped and came back even though her brothers kept yelling at her to get away. Mr. Callahan’s face was red as a beet, Sully, and he hauls off and whacks her right across the face three or four times. Oh, Sully, I was so sad when I saw that. I wanted to go down to the Park and kill him. But I didn’t do anything because my father sent me to my room for drinking too much wine.” He laughed a high-pitched, giddy laugh. “That’s why I drink down here and hide my bottles. Once I’m drunk there’s nothing he can do about it. Sometimes I sleep it off on the bench and sneak in the house before the sun comes up. Hey, you know a real funny thing? I took Miss Feeney’s key once and had a set made by Willie Shapiro up at the Lake. You know some nights when it’s real cold I sleep in this Box. I just prop up the cover to get a little air and I have my wine and I lie there thinking about the old days.
“You know, Sully, I can lie right here in this Box and look up at my house. I watch my father’s shadow in the parlor, walking up and down, up and down, until he gets tired of waiting for me and he goes to bed. That’s a nice feeling for me, Sully. I put one over on him. Do you know what I mean, Sully? Have some more wine.”
“Yeah, I know what you mean, Jugger. Thanks.” I swallowed off another mouthful and I was feeling a little heady.
“That will make you feel better, Sull. It kind of covers the pain. It always does for me. You’re not sad now are you, Sull?”
“No, I feel better, Jugger. I guess Miss Feeney’s dying is just one of those accidents like your father said.”
The word father was like pressing an alarm button as the cracked, cackle of a voice cut through the high grass and bushes of Jugger’s backyard and tripped on down the hill and over the fence to the Park where we sat huddled on the Green Box.
“Francis. Fran-Cis. Frannncis.” The paper-thin cackle roamed the night.
“Ssssssh, don’t say anything. Just stay still, Sully. That’s my father. He wants me home. But I’m not going home. I’ve got plenty of wine and I’m going to sleep in the Box for a while and look up at the stars. That’s when I have my best dreams.”
“Francis. Fran-Cis. Frannncis.” The eerie cadence continued hovering first over the Park and then drifting off in the night as the back door of Jugger’s house slammed shut.
“He’s gone.”
“Yeah. Well, thanks for the wine and the talk, Jug. I really appreciate it. I feel better.”
“Do ya, Sull?”
“Honest. I really do.”
“Good. Sull, you won’t tell anybody about the keys and the wine and the Green Box will ya?”
“Course not, Jug. That’s our secret. Between us. Shake.” And we shook hands on something that was ours and nobody else’s, and knowing that made me feel good.
CHAPTER THREE
The war was no longer being fought on the back lot of Warner Brothers
