John Grisham - Calico Joe

“The code says he’s getting hit, okay, so the next time he prances his cocky ass up to the plate, it’s your job to hit him. Same as if one of your guys got plunked, then you gotta protect your team. Are you listening to me?”

“Yes sir.”

“I do it with three pitches. Some guys go right at them and hit them with the first pitch. I don’t do that, because most batters are looking for it on the first pitch. I set them up. My first pitch is a fastball a foot outside.”

He took a windup and threw a fastball a foot outside. It wasn’t full speed, but then I wasn’t fully grown. The pitch looked awfully fast to me.

“Don’t step out!” he growled. “Second pitch, same as the first.” Another windup, another fastball a foot outside.

“Now, this is when you nail the son of a bitch. He’s leaning in a little, thinking I’m picking at the outside corner, so he’s not thinking about getting drilled. I’m not gonna hit you in the head, so don’t step out, okay? Dig in, Paul, like a real player.”

I was terrified and couldn’t move. He took his windup and threw the ball at me, not high and not as hard as he could, but when the ball hit my thigh, it hurt like hell and I think I screamed. He was yelling, “See. You’re gonna survive. That’s how you do it. Two fastballs away, then you hit the bastard, preferably in the head.” He scurried around and picked up the three baseballs while I rubbed my thigh and tried not to cry. “Give me the bat and get your glove,” he said.

I was now the pitcher, and he was at the plate. “Two fastballs outside. Let’s go.”

I delivered the first one in the grass and three feet off the plate. “You gotta hit the catcher’s mitt, Paul, come on, damn it,” he snarled as he waved the bat like a real hitter. His career batting average was .159.

I threw the second pitch outside and higher.

“Now,” he said, taking a step toward me. “Drill me right here.” He tapped the side of his head. “Stick it in my ear, Paul.” He was back at the plate in his stance. “Stick it in my ear. You can’t throw hard enough to hurt me.”

I was forty feet away, gripping the baseball, wanting desperately to throw a pitch that would knock out his teeth, spill blood, fracture his skull, and lay him out flat on the grass. I kicked high, delivered, and the ball went straight down the middle of the plate, a perfect strike. As it bounced off the backstop, he picked it up, threw it back to me, and said, “Come on, you little chicken-shit. Hit me with the damned baseball.”

I threw another fastball, one that was higher but still over the plate. This made him even angrier, and after retrieving the ball, he fired it back. It was getting dark. He threw the ball much too hard. It glanced off the webbing of my glove and hit me in the chest. I shrieked and started crying, and before I realized it, he was in my face, yelling, “If you don’t take this ball and hit me in the head, I’m gonna beat your ass, you understand?”

As he stomped to the plate, I glanced at the house. Upstairs, Jill was peeking out her bedroom window.

My third effort at beaning him was as unsuccessful as the first two. The pitch was high and inside, but not close enough to do the damage I wanted. To show his disgust, he reached out with his left hand and caught the pitch bare-handed. What an insult to a pitcher, but then I really didn’t care. I just wanted to get away from this madman. He flung the bat toward the house and came after me.

“You’re a coward, you know that, Paul? Nothing but a coward. It takes guts to throw at batters, but a pitcher has to do it.”

“Not in Little League,” I managed to say.

“In every league!”

I guess I was too small to punch, so he slapped me across the face with the back of his left hand, protecting, of course, his pitching hand. I screamed and fell down, and just as he grabbed me by the collar, I heard my mother yell, “Get away from him, Warren!”

She was standing ten feet away, holding the baseball bat, something she had probably never done before in her life, and aiming its barrel at my father. Jill was hiding behind her. For a few seconds no one moved, then, seeing the opportunity, I crawled away.

“Put the bat down,” he said.

“You hit him in the face,” she said. “What kind of animal are you?”

“He hit him with the baseball too,” Jill added.

“Shut up,” he snarled.

A few more seconds passed as everyone took a breath. We slowly made our way inside, each carefully watching the other. My parents went to the basement and fought for a long time, and when they got tired, he left.

Killing time in the Atlanta airport, I call Clarence Rook. It has been slightly more than twenty-four hours since I said good-bye to him, but it seems like a month. “You’ll never guess who called me last night,” he says.

“Charlie or Red?”

“Charlie. Said he got a call from Joe, who said I showed up at the field with a stranger, and he was just checking in to make sure everything’s okay. That’s what Charlie always says—‘Clarence, everything okay?’ I said, sure, Charlie, just a nephew from Texas who wanted to see the field.”

“Why didn’t you tell him the truth?” I ask.

“Well, I did, later. I got to thinking about it, chatted with Fay, and so I called Charlie back, said I had something important to discuss with him and Red, and could we meet for coffee? We did, this morning, at a quieter place north of town. I told them all about you, your visit, and so on.” He stops talking, and this is not a good sign.

“Let me guess. They did not weep with sorrow at the news that Warren Tracey has terminal cancer.”

“They did not.”

A pause, another bad sign. “And the idea of him coming to Calico Rock to meet with Joe? How was that received?”

“Not very well, at least not at first. In fact, they didn’t like the idea of you being here.”

“Will they shoot me if I return?”

“No. They warmed up considerably, even promised to talk to Joe and see if he likes the idea. I pushed a little, but it’s really none of my business. What about the meeting with your father?”

I decide to spin it. “I got the door open, I think. We had some frank discussions, a lot of old family stuff, nothing you want to hear. The problem is that he is in denial about his cancer, and until he faces the prospect of death, he will be hard to persuade.”

“Poor guy.”

“Maybe, but I could not reach the point where I actually felt sorry for him.”

I ask about Fay, and the conversation runs out of gas. An hour later, I board the flight to Dallas.

Sara and the girls are waiting with a late dinner when I finally get home. The girls have no idea where I have been or what I’ve been doing, so we talk about the weekend we are about to spend camping in the mountains. Sara, though, is curious. After we’re finished and the girls are gone, I replay the trip as we clear the table.

“What’s next?” she asks.

“I have no idea. I might wait a couple of weeks and call Warren, ask about his chemo, maybe bring up Joe again.”

“What’s your favorite saying, dear? Didn’t get halfway—”

“Didn’t get halfway to first base. Yep, that pretty well sums up my little visit with Warren. He’s still the tough guy, and he could take it to his grave. Probably will.”

“Are you glad you went?”

“Yes, very much so. I got a glimpse of Joe Castle, and he’s doing as well as possible, I guess. I got to see Warren, which doesn’t mean much now but it could seem important one day. And, most important, I had a glass of Ozark peach brandy.”