Robert Coover - The Universal Baseball Association, Inc., J. Henry Waugh, Prop

Sandy Shaw brought his guitar and Long Lew Lydell his reputation. Jason (Jaybird) Wall was on the scene, dropping rubber bugs in drinks, passing out explosive cigars, and slipping whoopee cushions under couching hunkers, the only consolation being that, fairly soon, Jaybird would pass out, bringing a sodden peace to the place, the more appreciated for its contrast to the persecutions preceding. And two great player-coaches from the Golden Age of the XX's turned up: the Knicks' Whipper Will Andersen and the Bridegrooms' Puritan Ballou, both Hall of Famers. And Yip Yick Ping, the Chinese lefty, and Prince Hal Scarlet and Chin-Chin Chicker-ing and Cueball McAuliffe and Agapito Bacigamupo. And there came Bruiser Brusatti and No-Hit Nealy and Birdie Deaton and Jumpin' Joe Gallagher and a bunch of their old teammates with them.

Intense, brilliant, but isolate Patrick Monday looked in, but Pat didn't stay long: Monday, it was remarked by all, had aspirations above and beyond the temporal kingdom of elbow-benders. No love for old Maloney either, and matters might have got touchy had Monday stuck around. Gus had squandered a lifetime building up his Bogglers Party, and knocking off McCaffree's Legalist gang was almost a sure bet, if not this year, then in LX, and now, just when the old man had a chance at last, along came Monday to chew him up. Monday was starting his new party from scratch, after all, he had to get his followers from somewhere, and where he was getting them from mostly, it seemed, was from the ranks of Boggier soreheads. Especially the young ones. Patience, young fellas, we all die, you'll get your chance. At a corner table, Gus puffed, laughed loud at jokes, and bought rounds, while Monday, with that maddening self-assurance of his, stood coolly at the bar and dropped the now-familiar phrases: the imperative of excellence, freedom through constancy, the contagion of confusion, pilgrimage back to majesty — Maloney's laughter boomed, the coins rang, but his ears quivered with attention. He slipped Jaybird Wall a buck. "The intransigent will of history!" Monday declaimed, and sat back: blaa-aat! moistly. He smiled faintly at the bar-wide rhubarb and pulled out.

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,