John Casey: Compass Rose

Baseball was as familiar to her as a shadow play. She knew there were long periods of apparently unproductive pitching and catching and then suddenly a single player might hit the ball and confront another single player of the array of players spread out on the field in an abruptly terrifying instant. She thought this game gave a nervous edge to the otherwise tranquil and consoling line “They also serve who only stand and wait.”

She was glad that Charlie had a repetitively active part. For a while she enjoyed watching him throw the baseball again and again, starting with a single elaborately slow step and then a quick whirl. Her mind wandered. The bakery had delivered the cake for Charlie and Tom, but had she put it in the refrigerator? Ought she have done so? She adjusted her eyeglasses and found herself admiring the catcher bravely crouched close behind the bat. She remembered a poem by Marianne Moore that mentioned the attractive curve of a catcher’s haunches. Indeed. And somehow this was made more noticeable by the mask that covered his face, reminding her of a gladiator.

The batter swung and the catcher threw off his mask and ran directly toward her, his face tilted up. When he was almost at arm’s length from her he reached up with both hands. She heard a distinct thwock , but she couldn’t see anything but Elsie’s white dress. Then she saw Elsie and the catcher tipping sideways until they were on the ground at her feet. The catcher raised his glove with the ball in it, apparently to show the umpire, although the gesture also elicited applause from the audience and cheers from his teammates. The catcher got to his feet, asked Elsie if she was all right, then hauled her to her feet with one hand. Elsie smiled at the boy. Miss Perry was reminded of Elsie’s smile as a girl. Never what anyone would call a sweet child, she would sometimes be surprised into a brief energetic smile. A charming paradox — Elsie’s eyes would almost shut, but her face opened. As it did now. How very nice, how very much like pleasure.

May didn’t see the ball, but when the catcher got close to them the tilt of his body began to scare her. He shuffled nearer and nearer, then turned his back. May felt the bench jounce as Elsie got up. Elsie stood in front of Miss Perry with one hand in the air and the other on the catcher’s back. As he caught the ball he began to fall. May felt the bench move again as Elsie braced a foot on it and pushed against the boy. Elsie and he sank sideways and then lay together on the ground. For an instant May saw Elsie as shameless — clutching him, pressing her hips and breasts against him. Then May was ashamed.

She saw Charlie standing just beyond Elsie and the catcher. He closed his mouth and his face settled. Elsie was on her feet, smoothing her dress.

The catcher jogged toward the umpire, who was listening stolidly to the coach of the other team. Charlie took a step closer to Elsie. Elsie waved one hand and said, “Fine. We’re all fine.”

Charlie said, “Ma, maybe you and Miss Perry ought to move back a couple of rows.”

May thought there was no end to Elsie Buttrick.

The people in the row behind them made room. May and Elsie stood Miss Perry up, turned her around, and guided her up to the next level.

When Dick got home Charlie would tell him about the ball game, would tell him Elsie Buttrick had saved Miss Perry from being landed on by the catcher. May didn’t want to be there to see Dick’s careful face.

May was pleased when Miss Perry said, “Really, Elsie. All this fuss?”

Miss Perry thought the game had gone on quite long enough. She thought Charlie himself looked as if pitching was becoming tiresome. He took several deep breaths and threw the ball. There was a sound as sharp as when the catcher caught the ball in front of her, but more resonant. “Blow, bugle, blow — set the wild echoes flying.” Tennyson? She looked up and saw the ball suspended against the blue sky. She said “Ah!” as it began to move. She was surprised that she could see it so clearly, that she felt so light and connected to that single speck, as though she herself were flying.

She was startled to find that she was standing, Elsie’s arm around her waist. She lost sight of the ball against a cloud, then saw it fall out of the cloud. A faraway player leaned against a fence and watched the ball land. Two little boys beyond the fence began to run toward it. The first time it landed it skipped quite high, as though it might fly again. Then it bounced gently. Miss Perry was glad to see this — one of the boys caught it and the two of them ran off with it.

She sat down again with Elsie’s help. It had been as thrilling as when she’d surprised a stag in her garden and he’d bolted with a snort that froze her in place. Then he leapt over the high stone wall, as if lifted by a wave. How much invisible energy there was in this world — how amazing to feel it press through her still.

She applauded. Elsie touched her arm and asked her if she would like a glass of lemonade. She said, “Not now, Elsie.”

May said, “Poor Charlie,” and Miss Perry knew — had only temporarily not known — that this splendid moment was unfortunate for Charlie. In fact, after he watched two of the opposing players trot around the bases, there was a gathering around him and a new pitcher replaced him. There was a smattering of applause as he left the field.

May was upset for Charlie but pleased to see him shyly tip his hat to the bleachers of Matunuck fans who cheered him. It was a compensation, May thought — Dick had left a wake of wariness and bad feelings, but now that Charlie got out and around, people warmed to him. Of course, people were nice to her, but that was because she paid her bills now. They were a respectable family. Here she was with Miss Perry, her two sons on the ball team, all in the extra time and space that came of rising just one step in the world.

The midday breeze came up, swirling the dust on the base paths, cooling the crowd’s necks and cheeks. On the other side of Miss Perry, Elsie Buttrick sat up and fanned her knees with the hem of her white dress. May couldn’t think where to put her. Miss Perry loved her; she loved Miss Perry. She’d been a little heroine. May had managed to put her in a corner of her mind, almost had her sealed up as Dick’s last bad craziness. Let her tend to her baby in her house next to Miss Perry’s; let her go to the store for food in her Volvo station wagon. Let her know how small she should keep herself, not fanning her knees at Charlie’s ball game.

May wondered if she herself could become bigger. What if her mind could hold a larger map so that she saw all the houses and boats and people at a distance? Then she could see Elsie Buttrick’s little apologetic wave, her shielding Miss Perry with her body, as acts not poisoned by what she’d done with Dick. There would be a space that was far from the center of May’s mind in which Elsie could raise her daughter — May would see the daughter and think of enough different things in the clutter of those lives, different things that would cover the old nakedness.

How did someone get a bigger mind? That sort of a bigger mind? Right now, May’s narrow comfort was that Elsie had grown fat.

The game was over. May went to find Charlie and Tom. She saw another mother hug her son, and May was encouraged to put her hand on Charlie’s shoulder. She did the same for Tom, who needed some sympathy because he hadn’t played.

Tom said, “You know, it wasn’t that bad of a pitch. The guy got lucky.”

Charlie said, “No. He had it timed. He really clocked it. I’ve never seen such a long ball. I mean, not in person.”

Miss Perry arrived. She said, “I’m glad to hear you say that, Charlie. I confess I was thrilled. I’m afraid I applauded for the wrong team.”