Billy Phelan's Greatest Game Read online

She sat in the Daugherty living room, reading in the evening paper the latest story on the kidnap gang. When Martin raised the issue of Billy Phelan by way of making polite conversation, she dropped the paper in her lap and looked at him through the top of her bifocals, her gaze defining him as a booster for the anti-Christ.

  “The boy is evil,” she said. “Only an evil person would refuse to help bring back young Charles from the clutches of demons.”

  “But Billy gave them the information that caught the demons,” Martin said.

  “He didn’t know what he was doing.”

  “Of course he knew. He knew he was informing, which was why he refused to inform any further.”

  “Let him go to hell with his evil friends.”

  “Your tone lacks charity.”

  “Charity begins at home,” said Mary, “and I feel first for young Charles, my own flesh and blood, and for his father and his uncles. Better men never drew breath.”

  Martin silently charted the difference between his wife and Melissa. Michelangelo and Hieronymus Bosch, Saint Theresa and Sally Rand. In the sweetness of her latter-day bovinity, Mary Daugherty swathed herself in immaculate conceptions and divine pleasure. And with recourse to such wonders, who has need of soiled visions? Life is clean if you keep it clean. Hire the priests to sweep up and there will be no disease. Joan of Arc and Joan Crawford. Hell hath no fury like a zealous virgin.

  “What are we having for dinner?” Martin inquired.

  Martin decided to send the column to Damon Runyon, for the recent edict from Hearst on Runyon was still fresh in his mind. Runyon was now the oriflamme of the Hearst newspapers, and yet editors across the country were cutting and shaving his column regularly. “Run Runyon uncut,” came the word from The Chief when he heard what was happening.

  “If you find a way to get this piece into print,” Martin wrote Runyon, “I will try to find it in my heart to forgive you for those four bum tips you gave me at Saratoga in August.”

  And so, on a morning a week after he wrote it, Martin’s defense of Billy Phelan appeared in Runyon’s column in full, with a preface reminding his readers who Martin was, and suggesting that if he only gambled as well as he wrote, he would very soon make Nick the Greek look like a second-class sausage salesman.

  The day it appeared in the Times-Union, the word went out to Broadway: Billy Phelan is all right. Don’t give him any more grief.

  Red Tom called Billy with the news and Billy called George Quinn at the Hendrick Hudson Hotel in Troy and told him to come home.

  And Martin Daugherty bought himself six new sets of underwear.

  Martin visited his father in the nursing home the afternoon the Runyon column appeared. His purpose was to read the old man a letter from Peter. Martin found his father sitting in a wheelchair with a retractable side table, having lunch. His hair had been combed but he needed a shave, his white whiskers sticking out of his chin like bleached grass waiting for the pure white lawnmower.

  “Papa,” he said, “how are you feeling?”

  “Glmbvvvvv,” said the old man, his mouth full of potatoes.

  By his eyes, by the movement of his hands over the bread, by the controlled hoisting of the fork to his mouth, Martin perceived that the old man was clear-headed, as clear-headed as he would ever again be.

  “Did I tell you I had lunch with Henry James?” the old man said, when he had swallowed the potatoes.

  “No, Papa, when was that?”

  “Nineteen-oh-three, I think. He and I had just published some of our work in the North American Review, and the editor dropped me a note saying James was coming to America and wanted to talk to me. He was interested in Elk Street. His aunt had lived there when she married Martin Van Buren’s son, and he wanted news of the Coopers and the Pruyns and others. I had written about life on Elk Street and he remembered the street fondly, even though he loathed Albany. We had lunch at Delmonico’s and he had turtle soup. He talked about nothing but his varicose veins. An eccentric man.”

  “Mary and I had a letter from Peter,” Martin said.

  “Peter?”

  “Your grandson.”

  “Oh yes.”

  “He’s gone off to become a priest.”

  “Has he?”

  “He likes the idea of being good.”

  “Quite a novel pursuit.”

  “It is. He thinks of Saint Francis as his hero.”

  “Saint Francis. A noble fellow but rather seedy.”

  “The boy is out of my hands, at any rate. Somebody else will shape him from now on.”

  “I hope it’s not the Christian Brothers. Your mother was very distrustful of the Christian Brothers.”

  “It’s the Franciscans.”

  “Well they’re grotesque but they have the advantage of not being bellicose.”

  “How is the food these days, Papa?”

  “It’s fine but I long for some duck. Your mother was always very fond of duck à l’orange. She could never cook it. She could never cook anything very well.”

  “Melissa was in town this week.”

  “Melissa was in town?”

  “She appeared in your play.”

  “Which play?”

  “The Flaming Corsage.”

  “Melissa appeared in The Flaming Corsage?”

  “At Harmanus Bleecker Hall. It was quite a success. Well attended, good reviews, and quite a handsome production. I saw it, of course.”

  “What was Melissa’s last name?”

  “Spencer.”

  “Ah yes. Melissa Spencer. Quite a nice girl. Well rounded. She could command the attention of an entire dinner table.”

  “She asked for you.”

  “Did she?”

  “She’s writing her memoirs. I presume you’ll figure in them somewhere.”

  “Will I? How so?”

  “I couldn’t say. I’ll get a copy as soon as they’re published.”

  “I remember her profile. She had a nose like Madame Albani. Exactly like Madame Albani. I remarked on that frequently. I was there the night Albani came to Albany and sang at the Music Hall on South Pearl Street. In ’eighty-three it was. She drew the largest crowd they ever had there. Did you know she lived in Arbor Hill for a time? She played the organ at St. Joseph’s Church. She always denied she was named for Albany, but she wouldn’t have used the name if she hadn’t had a fondness for the city.”

  “Papa, you’re full of stories today.”

  “Am I? I didn’t realize.”

  “Would you like to hear Peter’s letter?”

  “Peter who?”

  “Your grandson.”

  “Oh, by all means.”

  “I won’t read it all, it’s full of trivial detail about his trip, but at the end he says this: ‘Please tell Grandpa that I already miss him and that I am going to pray every day for his good health. I look forward to the day when I will be able to lay my anointed hands on his head in priestly blessing so that he may have the benefit, in the next, of my vocation. I know that you, Papa, and Grandpa, too, have been worldly men. But for me, I am committed to the way of the Cross. “Live in the world but be no part of it,” is what I have been instructed and I will try with all my heart and soul to follow that guidance. I love you and Mother and bless you all and long for the time when next we meet. Your loving son, Peter.’ ”

  “Who wrote that?” the old man asked.

  “Peter.”

  “Peter who?”

  “Peter Daugherty.”

  “He’s full of medieval bullshit.”

  “Yes, I’m afraid he is.”

  “It’s a nice letter, however.”

  “The sentiment is real.”

  “What was his name?”

  “Peter Daugherty.”

  “Daugherty. That’s the same name as mine.”

  “Yes, it is. Quite a coincidence.”

  “The Irish always wrote good letters. If they could write.”

  Martin’s view of his meeting with his fa
ther was this: that all sons are Isaac, all fathers are Abraham, and that all Isaacs become Abrahams if they work at it long enough.

  He decided: We are only as possible as what happened to us yesterday. We all change as we move.

  Billy Phelan came into Becker’s at early evening wearing a new hat and a double-breasted gray topcoat. The fall winds howled outside as the door swung closed behind him. He walked to the middle of the bar and stood between Footers O’Brien and Martin Daugherty.

  “The magician is among us,” Footers said.

  “I could’ve done without that line, Martin,” Billy said.

  “Magic is magic,” said Martin. “Let’s call things by their rightful names.”

  “What’re you drinking, Billy?” Red Tom asked.

  “You still sellin’ scotch?”

  “Most days.”

  “A small one, with water.”

  “On the house,” Red Tom said, setting the drink down in front of Billy.

  “Times certainly do change,” Billy said.

  “Hey, Billy,” Footers said, “there’s a hustler upstairs looking for fish. Why don’t you go give him a game?”

  “I’m resting,” Billy said. “Too much action all at once gives you the hives. Who’s running the pool room now?”

  “Nobody yet,” Footers said. “Just the helpers Daddy had. Did you hear? They had to take up a collection to pay the undertaker. Bindy bought the coffin, but that still left a hundred and ten due. All they got was seventy-five.”

  “Who passed the hat?” Billy asked.

  “Gus. Lemon. I scraped up a few bucks for the old bastard. Let this be a lesson to us all. He who lives by the tit shall die by the tit.”

  Gus Becker came out of the kitchen and saw Billy.

  “So the renegade hero returns.”

  “The door was open.”

  “Give the man a drink on me, Tom,” Gus said.

  “I already did.”

  “Then give him another one.”

  “I don’t need free booze, Gus. I got money.”

  “Don’t hold it against us, Bill,” Gus said. “When the word comes down, the word comes down. You understand.”

  “Sure, Gus. You got your business to think of. Your wife and kids. Your insurance policies.”

  “Don’t be difficult, Bill. There was no other way.”

  “I understand that, Gus. I really understand that now.”

  “That a new hat, Billy?” Red Tom asked. “It looks like a new hat.”

  “It’s a new hat. The river spirits got my old one.”

  “The river spirits?” Martin said.

  “He’s over the edge,” said Footers. “You started this, Martin.”

  “You wouldn’t want to explain that, Billy?” said Martin.

  “No,” Billy said.

  “In that case,” Martin said, “did you hear that Jake Berman raised two thousand dollars to have Marcus Gorman defend Morrie? It’ll be in the paper tonight, without mentioning the fee, of course.”

  “I thought old Jake didn’t like Morrie.”

  “He doesn’t.”

  “Yeah. What star is that up there?” Billy said. “The one in the back row. That’s new.”

  “That’s Curry,” Red Tom said.

  “Curry? I didn’t know he was in that picture. I must’ve looked at it five thousand times, I never saw him.”

  “It’s him. He hung in here a lot in those days.”

  “Curry was a gen-u-ine crazy,” Footers said. “I saw him and another guy steal a billy club away from a sleeping cop one night over in the station. But the billy club wasn’t enough so they took the cop’s pants and left the poor sucker in the middle of the station in his long underwear.”

  “And Daddy’s got his star, too,” Billy said. “That’s three in a couple of weeks.”

  “They go,” Red Tom said.

  Billy looked at the picture and thought about the three dead. They all died doing what they had to do. Billy could have died, could have jumped into the river to earn his star. But he didn’t have to do that. There were other things Billy had to do. Going through the shit was one of them. If Billy had died that night, he’d have died a sucker. But the sucker got wised up and he ain’t anywheres near heaven yet. They are buying you drinks now, Billy, because the word is new, but they’ll remember you’re not to be trusted. You’re a renegade, Billy. Gus said so. You got the mark on you now.

  Lemon Lewis came in the front door with red cheeks. Never looked healthier.

  “Cold as a witch’s tit out there,” Lemon said.

  “Don’t talk about witches,” Footers said. “The magician is here.”

  “What magician?”

  “Don’t you ever read the papers, Lemon?”

  “Oh, you mean Phelan. Aaaaah. So they let you back in, eh, hotshot?”

  “They just did it to make you feel good, Lemon,” Billy said.

  “Hey, Phelan,” said Lemon, “that card game at Nick’s that night of the holdup. Did you really have that ace in the hole?”

  All Billy could do was chuckle.

  “You’ll never know, will you, Lemon?”

  “You ready for another?” Red Tom asked Billy. “You got a free one coming from Gus.”

  “Tell him to give it to the starving Armenians. Footers, what about that guy looking for fish. You ready to back me till I figure him out? Fifty, say?”

  “How does twenty-five grab you?” Footers said.

  “In a pinch I’ll take twenty-five,” Billy said.

  Billy drank his scotch and said, “Come on, Martin, maybe we’ll get even yet.”

  And with Footers beside him, and Martin trailing with an amused smile, Billy went out into the early freeze that was just settling on Broadway and made a right turn into the warmth of the stairs to Louie’s pool room, a place where even serious men sometimes go to seek the meaning of magical webs, mystical coin, golden birds, and other artifacts of the only cosmos in town.