The Fan

29

All the Sterns were poor sleepers, and Jewel was the worst. She left the ballpark at eleven-thirty, was home in bed by midnight, and then just lay there, eyes wide open. She thought about Bobby, and Sean, and Val, and Bobby again. She got up, had a glass of water and two Tylenol, in case the pressure behind her eyes blew up into a headache, and, while she was at it, swallowed a Vitamin E, in case some cell in one of her breasts was planning to mutate later that night. Then she went back to bed, rolled over, closed her eyes, and stayed awake.

Mr. Curly Onis. The name rang a bell, of course, but so distant. In her work she met a lot of people, heard a lot of names. Jewel had a good memory. She searched it now. The media rep in Chicago? The head groundskeeper in Oakland? That lawyer who worked with the umpires’ union? All had names with Cs and Os in them, but none was Curly Onis. Maybe the name didn’t ring a bell at all, maybe it was a case of deja vu. She found her eyes were open, closed them, rolled over.

Or maybe he was a ballplayer somewhere, a minor-leaguer. There were a lot of wonderful ballplayer names-hadn’t someone written a song composed of nothing but? Sure: “Van Lingle Mungo,” by Dave Frishberg. Sometimes, when she couldn’t sleep, she opened the Baseball Encyclopedia, which lay on the floor by her bed, and leafed through it, just reading the names.

Sometimes, when she couldn’t sleep.

Jewel snapped on the light, grabbed the encyclopedia, whipped through the pages. And there he was, on page 1226 right above Edward Joseph Onslow, lifetime B.A.. 232: Manuel Dominguez “Curly” Onis. One big-league at bat, a single, for the 1935 Brooklyn Dodgers. Batted 1.000. Jewel thought right away of John Paciorek, her favorite example of this kind of thing, and recalled the shtick she and Bernie had done about European movies. Curly Onis’s case was even purer.

But having thought that, she didn’t know what to think next. She switched off the light, lay down, monitored her systems. They were all humming away at midmorning speed. She got up, went back to the bathroom, drank another glass of water, swallowed another Vitamin E. Jewel had a phone in her bathroom, dating from a long-ago decision to live a little. She stared at it for a while. Then she picked it up and dialed Bobby Rayburn’s home number.

One ring and a microsecond of the next. Then Bobby said: “Hello?”

His voice was thick and sleepy, and very near. The sound did something to her.

“It’s me,” she said.

“Oh.” Pause. “It’s kind of late.” In the background, Jewel heard Val-she hoped it was Val-say, “Who is it?” She hoped it was Val? Good God.

“I know the time,” Jewel said, “so obviously it’s important. I just looked up Curly Onis in the Baseball Encyclopedia. ”

“He’s there?”

“On page twelve twenty-six.”

“Christ, he’s really deteriorated.”

“What?”

“He told me he was up for a cup of coffee, but I didn’t believe him. Lots of guys say that.”

In the background, Val said, “What’s going on?”

“I’m not following you, Bobby,” Jewel said.

“Having a cup of coffee. It means playing briefly in the show.”

“I know what having a cup of coffee means, Bobby. I’ve been covering this stupid game since before you put on your very first jock strap. And don’t forget to wear it.” That last part just popped out; she couldn’t help it. Think it, say it-like, see the ball, hit the ball-she was a natural, at running her mouth.

Bobby laughed. In the background, but louder now, and more insistent, Val said, “Who is it? Who’s calling at this hour?” And more, but muffled as he smothered the receiver in his hand.

Then he said, “What was his record? With the Padres, right?”

“The Padres?” said Jewel. “Curly Onis played for the Dodgers in 1935. The Brooklyn Dodgers, Bobby.”

“This is his son, then?” said Bobby. “I don’t get it.”

“I don’t think-” Jewel began, and then came the soft but stress-inducing pulse of her call-waiting. “Hold on.” She hit flash. “What is it?”

“Fred.”

“What?”

“I’m at work.”

“And?”

“You wouldn’t believe this Between Brewskis thing. Guess how many calls we’ve had so far.”

“I don’t give a shit. Was one of them Gil Renard?”

“Three hundred and seventeen,” said Fred, giving her the information anyway. “And one was Gil. He didn’t leave a last name.”

“What did he say?”

“I can play it. Hang on.” Jewel hung on. She heard a high-pitched whir, then: “This is Gil. Tell them thanks, but I stopped caring.” Click.

“That’s it?”

“Yup.”

“When did he call?”

“About three-quarters of an hour ago. But I just got the slip. Things are backed up here tonight. Like I said, three hundred and-”

“Shut up. Did they trace it?”

“That’s why I’m calling at this hour,” Fred replied, offended, “if you’ll give me half a chance.”

“And?”

“This is the strange part. It might be a hoax or something.”

“Why?”

“Because it came from a phone at Bobby Rayburn’s house.”

Jewel hit flash. “Bobby?”

“Still here. Listen, can we continue this another-”

“Lock your door.”

“What?”

“Call the cops. Don’t go near a window.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Gil Renard is in your house.”

“Who’s he?”

“Curly Onis. He killed Primo.”

“Why would he do that?”

“That fight you had with Primo. Gil Renard was there.”

“Fight?”

“Stop it, Bobby. You’ve got to be smart now. Don’t go near him. I’m on my way.”

“But what about Sean?”

“What about him?”

“He’s in his bedroom.”

Jewel had no immediate solution to that, and it had to be immediate, because the next instant she heard the phone drop to the floor of Bobby’s bedroom.

“Bobby?” she said. “Bobby?”

She heard Val: “What’s going on?”

And Bobby: “Get in the bathroom and lock the door.”

“Why? What’s happening?”

“Just do it.”

Then there was silence, except for Val’s whimpers. Call-waiting flashed again. Jewel switched lines.

“I got tired of holding,” Fred said.

“Did you call the cops?”

“Sure. What do you take me for?”

She switched him off again. Now, at Bobby’s house, there was nothing to hear at all, not even whimpering.

Bobby went into his walk-in closet, ripped out the long wooden clothes rail. Then he moved down the hall, crouched, on the balls of his feet, almost running. He entered the playroom, lit by the glow from the space-station console, and stopped at Sean’s closed door. Not a sound came from the other side. That had to be because Sean was tired from the long day, and deep in sleep. Bobby threw open the door, snapped on the lights.

The bed was empty.

And neatly made.

Bobby’s heartbeat rose in two stages, as he absorbed those facts. Something lay on the pillow. An empty bottle. He picked it up. Jose Cuervo Gold, but not quite empty. There was a rolled-up note inside. Bobby upended the bottle, tried to shake it out. It wouldn’t come. He smashed the bottle on the floor, fumbled for the note in the broken glass.

Dear #11:

You’ve got a lot to learn about gratitude. Gone fishin’.

The Fan

P.S. Val and Chaz, sittin’ in a tree.

Bobby ran outside, down to the beach. The moon had risen and he could see quite well. No one was fishing. “Sean,” he called. “Sean.” There was no answer.

Bobby ran around the house to the garage. The landscaping truck was gone. He went up to the apartment. The door was open. There was nothing inside but the fishing pole.

He went back into the house, back to Sean’s room. It was all real: empty bed, neatly made, and shards of glass all over the floor. On the way back to the master suite, he saw the message on the space-console screen: “Nice job, Vice Admiral Sean! Save game (Y/N)?”

He rapped on the bathroom door.

“Bobby?”

“Open up.”

Val opened the door, then stood trembling, arms crossed over her breasts. He handed her the note. She read it, looked up, and said: “What did you expect, after all those years you’ve been screwing around?”

A moment passed before he understood what she was talking about. “I couldn’t care less,” he said.

“Clearly.”

“About you and Wald, I mean. Do what you like. The point is he’s taken Sean.”

“Curly has?” She looked down at the note. “But we couldn’t have been more grateful,” she said. “We gave him a job.”

“It has nothing to do with that.”

“Then what?”

“I knew this was going to happen,” Bobby said. “I just knew it.”

“What have you done?” she said.

He reached out to touch her shoulder. She flinched away.

Bobby went into the bedroom and saw the phone, lying on the floor. He picked it up. “Jewel?”

“Let’s have it.”

“He’s taken Sean.”

“Goddamn it.”

“I knew something bad was going to happen to him,” Bobby said. “I’ve known since day one.”

“Grow up,” Jewel said, and then came a click and a dial tone. Bobby saw blue lights flashing through the trees. He hurried outside.

Hanging up on people left and right, thought Jewel as she threw on some clothes: wielding the phone like a goddamn club, in midseason form. She took the elevator down to the underground garage, got into her car, and started driving north. She came to the exit that would lead her to Bobby’s, and kept going.

The needle quivered at ninety, crept higher. Jewel sat on the edge of her seat and clutched the wheel, hanging on more than controlling the car, but she didn’t slow down. There was little traffic; she examined every car she passed. What model was she looking for? She didn’t know. She eased off the pedal to call Bobby for the information, and got a busy signal.

After that she tried Claymore. It took her some time to bully his home number out of the night man at his station. Claymore answered, not as quickly as Bobby had, but just as throatily. This time it did nothing for her.

“Jewel Stern,” she said. “Gil Renard’s on the loose. You’d better get out to that cemetery.”

“How do you know he’s going there?”

“That’s where he does his burying, isn’t it?”

He gave her directions.

It was still night when Jewel drove into the little town, found the cemetery, stopped the car. She stepped out, into what she thought at first was complete silence. Then she heard a breeze in the treetops, an animal scurring on dried leaves, a mosquito’s tiny whine. It bit her on the neck.

Jewel walked into the cemetery. Moonlight illuminated the names on the tombstones, all nonethnic, unless French counted as ethnic. She hadn’t been in a cemetery since her father’s funeral, a horrible convocation of nosy parkers, almost all of them answering to ethnic names at one time or other in their lives, almost all of them calling her Janie.

Tombstones: Pease, Laporte, Spofford, Cleary, Bouchard. Renard, R. G. A sudden light dazzled her eyes.

“That you?” said a voice. Claymore.

They sat behind the tombstone of Renard, R. G. Claymore shut off his torch. Jewel’s night vision, what was left of it, returned. A mosquito whined in her ear. She slapped at it.

“They’re not bad this year,” Claymore said. “Pollution’s maybe getting to them at last, thank God.”

Jewel glanced at her watch. “He should have been here by now.”

“Maybe he’s not coming,” Claymore said. “He could be anywhere. People get around these days. Two years ago we busted a guy from Djibouti. I’d never heard of it.”

“They don’t play ball in Djibouti.”

“Pardon?”

“Nothing.” She turned to him. He pushed his glasses higher on his nose. In his other hand, she noticed, he held a gun. “You played ball with him.”

“That’s right.”

She checked her watch again. “What kind of a player was he?”

“The star. I told you. Him and Boucicaut. They were the biggest kids in town back then, and they could both hit a ton. And Gil had a cannon for an arm.”

“And what position did you play, Sergeant Claymore?”

“Shortstop.”

“Batting first, right?” She could picture him, a speedy little red-haired kid with freckles.

“Ninth, actually,” said Claymore. “I could never hit much. Astigmatism in both eyes. And I was too slow to lead off anyway.”

“This was Little League?”

Claymore nodded.

“How far did he go?”

“Go?”

“In baseball.”

“That was it, to my knowledge. The high school had already dropped it a year or two before. This was after they closed the mill. We had baseball again for a while during the Reagan years, but now it’s gone.”

“But you still have Little League?”

“Haven’t had new uniforms in five years, but, yeah, we’ve still got Little League.”

They went silent. Jewel slapped at a few more mosquitos, checked her watch. “Something’s wrong.”

“It’s a big world,” Claymore said.

She was starting not to like him. If he mentioned Djibouti again, there was a danger she would let it show.

He cleared his throat. “Tell me,” he began, “how is it that you, you know, a woman, got so interested in base-”

Jewel held up her hand. “Where’s the field?”

“Field?”

“The Little League field.”

“Amvets.”

“Is that where they’ve always played?”

“Always?”

“You. Gil. Boucicaut. Is that where you played?”

“Yes,” he said. “No need to shout at me.”

She was already on her feet. “Let’s go.”

“I don’t-”

She grabbed him by the collar and pulled him up.

“What are you doing?” Sean said.

“Digging for worms,” Gil replied, standing knee-deep in the hole he’d dug under home plate. “Need worms for fishing.”

“Found any yet?” asked the boy, kneeling by the hole and peering in.

“No.” Gil could have done it right then, lifted the spade and just done it, but the hole wasn’t deep enough, and he didn’t want to linger after it was over. Just because it was logical and right didn’t mean it would be easy. He went over the logic: how he’d sacrificed so much-his career, Richie, Primo-that the world was tilting crazily and the balance had to be restored. Plus, Bobby had to be taught a lesson about team play. And what had become of the hop on his fastball? All very clear. But that didn’t make it easy.

“The mosquitos are biting me,” Sean said.

Gil hit a soft layer, began tossing up rapid spadefuls. “Smack ’em,” he said.

Sean smacked his cheek. “Look at the blood, Curly.” He held out his hand. Gil, now up to his waist, looked. There was a streak of blood on the boy’s cheek too. Gil almost puked.

“Can’t you stop interrupting?” he said.

The boy backed away a little. Five more spadefuls, Gil decided. One, two, three, fo-

“When’s my daddy meeting us?”

Gil paused, looked at his watch. Dirt covered the face. “Soon,” he said.

“And my mommy?”

“She’s not coming. Your mother’s a whore.”

The boy started crying.

“What are you crying about? You don’t even know what it means.”

“I do. Like on MTV.” He cried harder. The sound was unbearable. It was hard to think of him as a potential big-league star when he was carrying on like that. “I want to go home.”

“Soon, soon.” Four, five. Gil stopped digging. “Here’s a big fat one,” he said. “Have a look.”

The boy didn’t move. “I don’t want to go fishing. I want to go home.” He glanced around. “It’s night,” he said.

“Best time for fishing, I told you,” Gil said, and grabbed his arm.

“What are you doing to me, Curly?”

“Showing you the big fat worm.” With his free hand, Gil got a good grip on the spade handle, started to raise it.

A light flashed on near the first-base dugout, blinding him. He had to drop the spade to shield his eyes.

A man said: “Let the boy go, Gil.”

Gil tightened his grip. “Claymore? Is that you?”

“Let him go, Gil. I’m aimed right at you.”

Gil tried to see beyond the glare. He picked out one shadow, maybe two. “Did I ever thank you for that play you made at short?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Gil. Let him go.”

“A lucky play, but still.” He raised his right foot, found a toehold halfway up the inside of the hole, in easy reach.

“We can reminisce later, Gil. Let him go.”

“Why would I want to reminisce with you?” Gil said. “We both know you couldn’t carry my jock.”

“Never said I could, Gil. I was a big fan of yours. Just let him go.”

Gil let go. Had Claymore really been a fan? He hadn’t known. Perhaps there’d been others. Too late.

Sean stood still, by the edge of the hole.

“Come here, son. I’m a policeman. I won’t hurt you.”

Sean didn’t move.

Somewhere behind the light a woman said, “Sean.”

“Mommy?” He took a step toward the light, then another. The beam wavered off Gil and onto the boy. Gil whipped out the thrower and hurled it at the glaring disc.

The beam changed directions wildly, trying different points of the compass, finally coming to rest pointing straight up at the stars. Pupils dilated, Gil couldn’t see a thing. He felt for the surface of the ground, started clawing out of the hole.

Jewel crouched over Sergeant Claymore, saw a knife stuck deep in his throat, and no life in his eyes. She ran onto the field, grabbed Sean, swung him around, and took off the other way, carrying him in her arms.

She ran, out through the gate Claymore had unlocked in the chain-link fence, onto a path, silvered in the moonlight. As she passed under the arched Amvets sign that led to the road, she heard him coming.

Jewel went right past her parked car. She didn’t trust herself to get them both in and start it in time. She fled down a street lined with dark houses, the boy in her arms. Footsteps pounded closer.

“Put me down,” Sean said. “I’m fast.”

But Jewel wouldn’t put him down. She came to a crossroads, saw the main drag, and a blue light shining a block and a half away. Now she heard nothing but her own panting breath, did nothing but try to go faster. The blue light: POLICE. Jewel banged open the door.

The night man, dozing at his desk, jerked his head up in surprise.

Jewel slammed the door and rammed the bolt home. Rising, the night man wiped drool off his chin.

“Even Mommy runs better than that,” Sean said. But he was in no hurry to be put down.