Keystone Kids (6 page)

“Right, Charlie.” Cassidy spoke up. “I’d agree to all that. Baseball isn’t just a game to this kid, it’s life. Why, he’s a new person since he got in there. He isn’t a pop-off guy like Razzle, but he has that same aggressiveness. He’s pepper; it stands out all over him, and he’s a mighty tough loser. Believe me, when he gets on base that lad is a spike-flying dervish. I watched him close yesterday.”

“Well, we’ve tried about every combination except pitching the bat-boy, so we might as well try this, too,” remarked the manager. “O.K., let’s see what he’ll do. Come on, boys, time to be moving.”

It was just before game time that afternoon when the manager took Bob aside. “Russell, I want you to do something out there from now on. This team needs a punch in the jaw. I want you to be the punch.”

Bob was puzzled. “What’s that mean? I guess I don’t get you.”

“From now on you’re going to be our holler guy—”

“Holler guy?”

“That’s it. Holler. Pep. Pepper. Lots of it. too. Don’t let the crowds that’ll come to see us play the Giants this weekend frighten you. I’ve got things sized up and, as I see ’em, you’re a holler guy. All right, you go out and holler. Give ’em all you got.”

He looked at the slender figure in uniform. Maybe, after all, Cassidy is right. Maybe it’s a good thing Ed Davis got injured; it’ll give me a chance this fall to see what these kids can do, and anyhow we aren’t getting any place fast the way it stands now. Since I’m not in there they need pepping up; maybe this boy’s youth and freshness will do the trick.

“O.K., sir, if you say so.”

“That’s it. Let me hear you holler plenty; let me hear you yelling at the infield and the pitcher, too.”

“Shucks, the crowd don’t scare me; but, gee whiz, do I have to holler at the other fellas on the team who are older and been longer on the club?”

“Yes, you do. Forget the others. Just you holler.”

“I will if you want me to. I’ll holler if you say the word. But, golly... that’s some job, that is.”

However, no one ever had to tease Bob Russell to “holler.” As he remarked that night in their room to his brother, “I can take a hint when a steam roller runs over me.” In Nashville despite his youth he had been the “holler guy” of the team, and once out there beside second for the Dodgers, all he needed was a go-ahead from the boss. For he was naturally full of salt, yes, and pepper, too, giving it as well as taking it. His voice echoed daily over the infield. “Go get ’em, gang, le’s go get ’em.” And his chatter toned up everyone’s play.

Moreover, he backed up his voice with deeds. It was Bob’s single in the ninth that sent them ahead in the first game of their important series with the Giants. At first some of the older men looked on him as a brash youngster and muttered under their breaths about the “old college try.” But his stops and throws around second, his sensational fielding and his work with the stick, forced them to respect this youngster. Gradually they saw that he was more than just a fresh youngster with a strident voice.

Bob made one bad error in the second game against the Giants, dropping a quick throw from the pitcher which would have picked a man off second. The man scored later and the Giants won the game, and for a few days the fans were muttering that the boy certainly booted that one. But in the next game and the game after, which they won, the pair were the Russell boys again.

Spike, tall, lean, was cutting down liners in deep short that a smaller man would never have touched; Bob was darting here and there, like an insect, stopping hot ones behind the bag and then racing out to steal hits between his position and first base. When the big behemoths came roaring down the basepaths, looking as they crashed in like human locomotives, Bob never gave an inch; in fact, he even went out to meet them.

The boys were playing good ball. Of course they were playing good ball; at last they were happy. For they were together as a pair, they understood each other and each other’s method of play. Best of all, no shadow of a possible separation hung over them because both felt that with the chance to prove what they could do, they’d never be split again. Chances came often, and they took advantage of them.

There was the series against the Cubs, in the first game of which Mallard, ever a dangerous pitcher, was facing the Dodgers. Going into the eighth, Brooklyn had worked into a three to nothing lead, but the eighth was almost always a dangerous inning for an old-timer like Rats Doyle, in the box for the Dodgers. Accordingly as the inning started Crane gave the warm-up signal, and two pitchers rose in the bullpen and began firing to their catchers. Just as well, for a base on balls was followed by a sacrifice and a two-bagger that sent Roy Tucker scurrying to the fence. One run over and a man on second. Big Elmer McCaffrey lumbered across the field and Rats, throwing his glove in disgust to the ground, walked off to the showers.

Elmer was ordered to pass the next man, a good hitter, and there were runners on first and second with only one out. The next batter hit a grounder past McCaffrey in the box, a slow roller which had to be picked up on the run with precious little time in which to do it. Spike was forced to “grab it by the handle” and let it go, for it was one of those plays in which half a step either way meant the decision.

Advancing for the ball, he knew it was impossible to make the long throw to first and, scooping it up, he tossed it underhand toward his brother who was racing in to second from his position on the grass. Bob came in a few steps ahead of the runner, caught the ball on the dead run just as he reached the bag and, without pausing, shot it to Harry Street on third. The whole thing was one movement done in an instant. The Cub runner from second had turned the corner at third and was several paces off the base before he saw what was coming. He dove for safety. Too late. A doubleplay and the side was out.

Now that Bob was on the team he felt completely sure of himself. He was the first man out for practice in the morning, the last man dressed in the afternoon, so tired he could hardly put his clothes on, so tired that after dinner he wanted only to lie down and sleep. For he was giving all the time, giving with strength and nervous energy, and his pep and chatter around second base were a tonic both the infield and the whole team badly needed.

The fans observed at once how the team snapped back. From fourth place they moved to third as the season drew to a close. The whole squad began making plays they hadn’t been making for weeks. That combination around second was a shot in the arm to every man on the club. The team noticed it; so did the bleachers; so did the sportswriters who followed them from day to day.

“These Russell boys,” wrote Jim Foster in the
Times
, “are as different as chalk and cheese. They’re both baseball rookies making their first appearance in the big leagues; they’re both good, and there the resemblance ends. Spike, the elder, is quiet and conscientious; Bob, the younger, is rowdy and raucous. Besides being Ginger Crane’s solution to the infield problem that has been bothering the little manager all season, both boys have the ability to make the tough ones look easy. They’re the cuffs on the trousers to the rooters, and this kid Bob is poison to left-handed lowball hitters. These Dodger freshmen may turn out to be one of the finest keystone combinations in baseball.”

W
INTER. SNOW WAS FALLING
that evening in mid-February when Spike got back after work to their room in Mrs. Hampton’s boarding-house on McGavock Street to find Bob triumphantly waving a telegram.

“It’s from him, from Jack MacManus! Says he’s passing through town next week and wants to see us about the contract. Gee, Spike, I sure hope we can fix things up. It looks like you were right after all.”

As the business manager of the pair, Spike had confidence in his dealings with the Dodger management that was not entirely shared by his brother. Before leaving Brooklyn last fall he had consulted Fat Stuff at some length as to what kind of a contract they should ask for the next season. The veteran’s opinion was that the Dodgers’ Keystone Kids deserved a substantial raise.

“What’d you boys knock down this year?”

“I was paid on a basis of three thousand five, and Bobby three straight,” answered Spike, talking baseball figures to the old pitcher.

He thought a while. “Well, let’s see. The team finished up in third place, and you boys both had more than a little to do with our standing. Judging by your play out there, I’d say you were worth considerable more next year. Guess you oughta double it, say fifteen. Split it anyway you like—or they do.”

But the contracts that arrived unsigned in Nashville shortly after Christmas called for a five thousand dollar salary to Spike and four to Bob. Somewhat to Bob’s distress, Spike insisted on returning them immediately, unsigned, with a polite letter. “There’s some guys think it’s fine to holler and curse the management, but I think we’d be smart to leave Ginger an out.”

“Yeah, an’ suppose they don’t take the out. Suppose they don’t come back at us.”

“They will,” Spike assured him. “They got to. They don’t expect you to sign the first contract; they just send it out in hopes, that’s all.”

He was correct. The contract was returned with a raise of a thousand dollars apiece, making eleven thousand in all. Once again Bob was worried. Not Spike.

“No, sir, we’re in a strong position. They need us bad out there round second base, and they know it. Besides, we got a leverage on ’em; we can make a living outside of baseball and they realize it. You got a good electrical job, haven’t you? O.K., and I can always work in the L. and N. freight house. We got something to bargain with, boy.”

“But we don’t want to do that; we don’t want to work here in Nashville. We wanna play baseball.”

“Sure we do. But we can if we hafta, see? Point is, they need us bad. Now just sit tight and wait and see.”

The contract went back unsigned.

Three days later a telephone call came for Spike in the Louisville and Nashville freight house where he was working. It caught him when the boss and three helpers were able to listen with interest. They only heard Spike’s answers but they got enough to understand the meaning of the conversation.

“Spike?” It was the taut, aggressive voice of Ginger Crane. “Spike, let’s get down to brass tacks. How much do you boys want anyhow?”

“We want fifteen, Ginger, split any way you folks like up there.”

“Wow! Boy, have you got a nerve! For a couple of rookies in the big leagues, you got your gall. When I broke in with the Senators in ’35...”

Spike knew that record. “Yeah? This boy Wakefield, the kid who signed with the Tigers, got forty-two five,” he answered in baseball terminology, hoping the railway men around wouldn’t get it.

“What say? I don’t believe it. Those are newspaper figures. At any rate, you boys haven’t proved a thing so far, not a thing...”

“Nothing except we made eighteen double-plays that last month.”

“What’s that mean? Now that Ed Davis’s arm is mended, I probably shan’t use your brother except as a utility infielder next season.”

“Well, Ginger, that’s what we feel we’re worth—fifteen.”

“O.K., Spike, you know your own business best. I’d be mighty sorry to see you go, but that’s how things are. So long, and good luck to you both.”

He hung up. The click of the telephone had an impressively decisive tone that was unpleasant to hear, and Spike turned back to the open-mouthed freight-hands feeling unusually foolish.

Three or four days later a telegram arrived informing them that the raises were revoked. This really bothered both boys. What did that mean? They decided that it meant that if they signed now they’d have to do so at the figures of their original contracts—five and four thousand respectively. With difficulty Spike withstood his brother’s pleas to write for a contract and sign immediately. A week later he was glad he hadn’t weakened. A letter came from the manager saying he had no authority to treat further with them, and that from now on negotiations were in the hands of Jack MacManus, the fiery-tempered owner of the Dodgers. The letter didn’t describe him that way, however.

No word came from that worthy, either, for almost ten days, and then late in January, when they were both worried and having trouble getting to sleep at night, a telephone call caught them one evening at the boarding-house. Spike took the call, wondering just which MacManus he would find at the other end. There was MacManus genial and charming; MacManus aroused and crazy mad; MacManus eager and attentive; MacManus keen and sober; MacManus keen and not so sober. He was truly a man of moods. He could be agreeable and friendly, as he had been when they’d first come up, and in two minutes he could be as cold as ice.

To Spike’s relief, MacManus was in his genial mood. “I really oughtn’t to do this, but I’m fond of you boys and, confidentially, I’m going to break one of our club rules. Those raises are back in your contracts.”

Spike was pleased by this generosity but somehow managed to keep his self-control.

“Yessir. Thank you very much indeed, sir.”

“Then it’s settled?”

“Nosir.”

“What d’you mean, no?”

“Insufficient moolah, Mr. MacManus. We got good jobs down here; we can live on what we earn. And I feel we’re worth fifteen to the club, sir.”

Would he get mad? Would he rant and roar?

Would he bellow and call names over the phone? Not at all.

“O.K., Spike,” he replied in his suavest tone. “I’m terribly sorry. I always liked you two boys, fine type of fellows, kind of lads we like to have on the club. But this is your last chance. Come now, don’t you want to take a few days to think things over?”

“We have, sir.”

“All right, all right. That’s everything I’ve got to say then.” Once again the telephone clicked decisively.

More unpleasant was the arrival of a letter which followed immediately. It was a nice letter, too nice in fact. The genial and charming MacManus wrote that they would both be missed next summer on the team. But after all business was business, so he wished them good luck in their new venture.

“What new venture?” snorted Bob. “Now then, see what you’ve done! You sure pulled a boner this time. He’s through with us; he’s washed us up. Because why? Just on account you’re so doggoned stubborn. You held out for a few thousand and where are we? We’re out, that’s where we are!”