Steve Cash: Time Dancers

“I can’t until later, Z,” he said. “But I’d love to then.”

I was disappointed almost as much as a real kid. Still, later was better than not at all. “Deal,” I said.

“Deal,” Jack answered.

Carolina was well aware of baseball fever and understood why I needed to play catch. “Why don’t you have Jack show you his magazines and newspapers,” she said, “so you can catch up. Jack saves everything.”

And that’s what I did. After breakfast and for the next several hours I was oblivious to everyone else. I sat in the long living room and read about the state of the game, the new players, the new teams, trades, rumors, and anything to do with the Cardinals, who had finished dead last in 1918, I was to find out, with a won-loss record of 51–78. In the American League the Browns had not fared much better. I found out good old Ty Cobb was still playing and tearing it up on the base paths. Branch Rickey, a man who seemed to have a lot of new ideas about everything, had been named the new manager of the Cardinals in January, replacing Jack Hendricks. I read all the articles, every statistic, every team roster, every opinion and prediction from every sportswriter in St. Louis. Opening Day for the season was April 23 and I couldn’t wait. There is nothing like a real professional baseball game. Whether the outcome is a pitching duel, a slugfest, or something in between, you will disappear into the experience for however long the game lasts. It is physical chess. Carolina and Owen Bramley had box seats and season tickets, so I was looking forward to seeing as many games as possible.

Late in the afternoon with the sun low in the sky, and in a fresh breeze and freckled light, Jack and I finally played catch. Mama’s glove made a familiar pop when Jack threw a hard strike. We tossed the ball back and forth, mostly in silence, until we were having trouble seeing the ball. That’s when every kid wishes the sun would never set. Our arms were dog tired, and yet, only Jack and I knew how good it felt. We walked into the house talking nonstop about the art of pitching and the relevance of baseball to anything good. The itch had been scratched.

Opari, Geaxi, Nova, Star and the baby Caine, Willie, Carolina, everyone else in the house, even Ciela, spent the late afternoon in Forest Park helping Owen Bramley fly his Chinese kites. They each returned in high spirits, and along with Jack and me, we ate every morsel of food that Ciela had prepared earlier in the day. The whole meal was waiting for us, some in the oven and some in the icebox. It was delicious.

Then we all retired to our rooms to change into the tuxedos Mitch had sent over that afternoon. Each was tailored and made to fit all of us who were Meq, but since I was the only male among us, I couldn’t figure why he’d sent them.

I knew he was sending his two Packard touring cars to pick us up and he had closed his club to the general public. It was to be a private party and there was no reason not to trust his judgment. We had been posing as refugees and relatives of Nova and Eder, but still, to see a group of twelve-year-old children, dressed in tuxedos, possibly sipping champagne or drinking beer, late at night in the roughest part of town, well, I had to wonder if that was wise.

Geaxi said she wanted to experience the culture and music of Mitch’s world, so she thought it would be worth it. Also, she had no problem with the tuxedo. Nor did Opari, which surprised me until I remembered that they both had donned “boys’” clothing many times in many places for many reasons. Both were anxious to wear the tuxedos and Nova thought it was not only a good idea, but said she might start dressing that way in the future.

Once she was dressed, Opari added red lipstick to her lips, a red silk bow tie, and the white rose from Mitch in her lapel. The effect was stunning. She was a child-woman of uncommon beauty and presence. I understood in an instant why centuries of princes and kings, even the Empress Dowager of China, found her irresistible.

Star left Caine with Ciela and Willie helped her, along with the rest of us, into the touring cars. It was well after dark and once we’d gone a few blocks east, the trip downtown was busy and filled with the sound and lights of automobiles.

Mitch’s nightclub was just off Market, near all the neighborhoods of his youth, yet I also remember never knowing exactly where he lived in those days. The entrance was a simple glass door with “Mitch’s Café” painted in an arc across the glass. It was a narrow entrance, squeezed between two other businesses, a pawnshop and a barbershop, both of which Mitch also owned. The café was for real—a few tables in the front, then a counter with stools where you could order chili, barbecue sandwiches, and beer. But if you were led, as we were, around the counter and down a long, high-ceilinged hall, you would enter a room the size of a warehouse, which is exactly what it had been. The room was now transformed into a nightclub, complete with a large stage at one end, two full bars along opposite walls, tables with white linen tablecloths, and a spacious semicircular dance floor in front of the stage. Factory lights muted with green filters hung from a forty-foot gabled ceiling, and two dozen waiters in long aprons stood at the ready throughout. The music coming from the stage was the best I’d heard in years, going back to what Ray and I listened to in New Orleans. But this music had something else, a swing and syncopation I’d never heard before. People were dancing new steps and there was a raw and raucous joy everywhere in the room.

Mitch greeted us from behind the bar as soon as we emerged from the long hall. Even in his tuxedo, he leaped easily over the bar while waving to us, then motioned us toward a corner section of the big room where several tables had been pulled together to become one large table-in-the-round, covered with a banquet-sized white tablecloth. Champagne and bottles of beer sat in iced buckets placed around the table. At least six waiters stood in line, ready to act as our personal staff. Mitch made it to the table and escorted Carolina to her chair, making sure she was seated first.

“Why, thank you, Mitchell,” Carolina said, sitting down and pushing up on the long formal gloves she wore on her hands and forearms. The gloves were a dark green, the same color as her dress and shoes. She was beautiful, elegant, and graceful, still commanding stares from strangers. It was hard to imagine the skinny, stringy-haired kid she had been when I first saw her, standing with her sister outside Sportsman’s Park. She was now a woman completely comfortable in her own life and her own skin.

“It’s my pleasure, Miss C.,” Mitch said. “I want you at the head of the table. After all, you’re the reason I’m able to do this.”

“Nonsense,” Carolina said. “And don’t be modest, Mitchell. You have done what you’ve done on your own. I had nothing to do with it.”

“Oh, yes you did. You’re the one who talked to Mr. Joplin in the first place. You know what that meant to me? It meant just about everything, that’s what it meant. Everything in this world started for me right then, Miss C., and I want to say thank you, thank you for everything.” Mitch signaled one of the waiters, who brought a tray of glasses filled with champagne. Each glass was served and everyone but Carolina held a glass in the air. Mitch shouted, “To Miss C. and Mr. J.! May one live on and the other not be forgotten.”

“Here! Here!” Owen Bramley said.

“Second that!” Willie added.

Geaxi and Opari made high-pitched trilling noises and clicked their tongues.

I looked at Mitch. “Do you mean Scott Joplin is…dead?”

“Yeah, Z. Mr. Joplin passed away two years ago, on the first of April.” Mitch took a sip of champagne and looked around, waving his hand toward the stage. “That’s why we’re here tonight, Z, and I plan on doin’ this every year from now on. I owe so much to the man. He taught me more than how to appreciate good music—he taught me how to appreciate life. He was a great man, Z.”