The Last of the Lumbermen (24 page)

I glance at Wendel, hoping
he'll reassure me that we won't need a
half-dozen more new players by the end of F
reddy's first practice, but he just grins.

James Bathgate shows up a few minutes before we're ready to hit the ice, and damned if the little bugger isn't
in gear, right down to a Montreal Canadiens sweate
r. I consider whether to have a little chat with
him about arriving earlier, and maybe stuff a
gag in his smart mouth as a precautionary measure. I don't.

With barely more
than a nod in my direction, and without putting
on his skates, he goes directly to the team's
equipment locker, flips off the lock I opened
when I came in, and gets to work as if
he's been doing it for months. He's out of the
dressing room before anyone else, and is back
for the water bottles and first aid kits by
the time the first players are filing into the
corridor to the ice. And as far as I can see, he hasn't called anyone an asshole while he's been doing it.

TWENTY-SIX

T
HE PRACTICE GOES SMOOTHLY
, given that I have
three new players and one of them is
dressed as Frosty the Snowman.
Gord di
rects the drills from the ice while I stand
behind the bench, puff up my chest a
little — too much hurts — and think what I
hope are general manager-type things.

Like evaluating the new and old talent.
Sorting out the old isn't a big job, because once
I get past Wendel and maybe Bobby Bell there
isn't much. But Artie Newman is everything I hoped
for, and then some. He's got all the instincts,
and, outside of Wendel, the best speed on the team.
He's a little rusty, but the eye-hand stuf
f will come back soon enough. Wendel sees what
he's got, and at one point skates past the bench,
gives me an appreciative nod, and says, “You
did good, Weaver. I can
play
with this guy.”

Freddy Quaw can play, too. He's fast for
a big man, and he knows what he's doing at both
ends of the ice. What surprises me most is how
good he is around the net. In the middle
of a shooting drill, he skates in front of the
net and spends five min- utes deflecting pucks past poor bewildered Stan.

More important,
he doesn't kill anyone during the scrimmage — not that anyone
tries to push him around. Only Gord has the balls to lay a bodycheck on him, and when he
does it's a good, clean hit. Freddy gets to his
feet laughing, and tips his stick to him.

Gus T
olenti is a pleasant surprise, too. Despite the goofy getup,
he's for real. Not on conventional terms, but those
haven't been working for us anyway. From the bench
he appears to be doing everything backassward, banking pucks
off the board when there's no apparent
reason for it, flipping the puck high in the
air on passes so they arrive on the forwards'
sticks over their shoulders. He has a number of dipsy-doodle
moves I've never seen before, and he's fond, apropos
of nothing, of letting fly with them. His antics will
probably drive Jack crazy, but they're no
skin off my nose so long as they're working.

I try to watch the action with
a managerial eye, but I can't keep my eyes o
ff James. He's doing fine, retrieving pucks for the players
during the shooting drills and looping soft shots at Stan
whenever he sees no one else is ready to go.
But generally he keeps out of the way, which
is what he's supposed to do. When the scrimmage starts, he retreats to the bench and stays there.

About halfway through practice, Junior shows up. His shiners a
re looking pretty glorious, and the bandana he's tied
around his head to hide the bandage makes him
look like a deranged pirate. No matter. His grin as
he clambers across the stands to lean against the
glass behind the bench convinces me he's not here
to assassinate Stan Lagace.

“I hope you don't have any dumb
ideas about practising,” I say to him.

“Not a one,” he replies.
“Until Friday, anyway. Gord said I can
backup on the weekend.”

“If you can get the mask over that puffed-out
puss of yours, maybe. I'd like some practice time with
you and that mask before I'll let you into a game.”

“Yeah, that's what
my old man says, too,” he answers, hook- ing his
thumb over his shoulder. I look up in the stands and spot Don Sr. standing along the rails,
watching the scrimmage. “Okay by me.”

“How come he didn't say something
to you about this five years ago?”

Junior looks a little sheepish.
“I never asked,” he says. “And you know what the old man is like.”

“I thought I did. Now I'm not so sure.”

“Me neither,”
he answers. “How's Stan doing? And where'd you get the tyrannosaurus?”

I
explain how we came by Freddy Quaw and the
two others. By this time Don Sr. has joined us and is listening in.

“Looks like you got the makings
of a decent hockey team here, son,” the
old man says. “Been a long time since we had
one of those in Mantua.”

As far as I can recall Mantua's never had
a decent hockey team, but I'm not about to
slander myself and a lot of people I'm fond of by saying so.

HE'S RIGHT
, THOUGH. SOMETHING
has happened, and the old players — the
kids who've played all year, I mean — sense
there is both good news and a slight thr
eat in it, and respond by upping their effort.

After the
practice Junior shows the autopsy mask around, and that
gets some laughs. I watch from the doorway to
the office until the office phone rings. It's Esther.

“Practice go okay?” she wants to know.

“Pretty good,” I sa
y. “Your pal Tolenti is a player.
So are the other two.”

“That's not what I mean,” she
says, impatiently. “Did the little guy show up?”

“Yeah, he did.
And he was terrific. Did his work and was more or less invisible, otherwise.”

“Hadn't you better see he gets home okay?”

I hadn't thought about it. “I guess so. I'll of
fer to drive him. I want to know how the hell he gets from place to place anyway.”

“Well, this
is your chance to find out,” she says, then adds, “Don't
be pushy about it. I don't have to remind
you he doesn't like authority very much.”

She does remind me to give uniforms
to the three new players for the Friday game,
pointing out that a uniform for Freddy Quaw p
robably isn't going to be a simple matter of pulling
a spare out of the closet.

We hang up, and just as
I'm putting the receiver back on the hook Gord
comes into the office with Freddy Quaw in tow
. “Crack the closet,” Gord says. “Uniforms.”

I toss him the key to the
closet, where Jack has at least a dozen numbe
red jerseys stored, along with a box of leggings,
a half-dozen pairs of pants — and about a hundr
ed of the Chief Wahoo crests. Artie and Gus
Tolentini crowd into the office behind them.

“Let's see, he
re,” Gord says, looking and sounding a little like
Santa Claus at a children's Christmas party. “What do we have?”

“Is there a forty-four?” Gus asks, sounding
like a kid at the same Christmas party.

“Size forty-four?” Gord
echoes, tossing a pair of sweaters, home and away,
over his shoulder to Gus, who scoops them up and
disappears back to the dressing room.

“I'm not picky about numbers,” Artie says,
and is answered by an over-the-shoulder pair of
sweaters from Gord with the number
26
on
them. Like Gus, Artie retreats to the dressing
room with his booty. Inside the closet, Gord is cursing.

“Jesus H. Christ,” I hear him
grumble. “These blasted things wouldn't fit a midget.”

“Look for a number 35
,” I suggest. “It should be a goalie's jersey.”

“It
isn't,” Gord says, after a pause. “Freddy won't be able to get it over his forearms let alone his shoulders.”

Freddy, who's been standing behind Gord with
an impassive expression on his kisser, pipes up. “Give
me two of each. I'll make do. This has happened before.”

“Any special number
you want?” Gord asks from inside the closet.

“Makes
no difference,” Freddy answers. “A number
is a number.”

Gord sends a flurry of jerseys
over his shoulder and Freddy scoops them from the
air. “Big pair of pants here, anyway,”
Gord says as he emerges from the closet and tosses them at Freddy.

Freddy doesn't catch
these. He's examining the Chief Wahoo crest on the
front of one of the sweaters. “Who's responsible
for this stupid-looking thing?” he asks.

“The Chinese Government in Exile,” I say, sensing
that we may have a problem on our hands.
“The real general manager doesn't like them either. W
endel can tell you the story behind it. I've got to check on something.”

I skip
out of the office, but I'm not just escaping Fr
eddy's questions. James is standing on one of the benches
and peering into the office, obviously eager to get on his way.

“Good practice,” I say. “You did fine.”

He looks at me
distrustfully, decides I'm not going to do anything
to him, and a grin breaks across his
face. “I had fun,” he answers. “This is really fun.”

“If you need a
ride,” I begin to say. He cuts me o
ff and for a fleeting second I spot a wildness
in his face that looks pretty close to fear. Then he composes himself.

“It's
no problem,” he says. “I've got a ride. And
Mom says I can go with you to Okenoke on Friday.”

“We won't get back
here until about 2
AM
. Does she know that?”

He answers “Sure” so messily that it leaves me
without the slightest idea whether she knows anything about it. I
make a mental note to call her, and another to check to see how he
really
gets home. “Did you get everything put away?” I ask him.

This time the “Sure” is snappy and clean. I
glance over to see what Wendel is up to,
thinking maybe I'll have him follow James when he leaves to
see if anyone picks him up. Instantly, I understand
what at least part of the dressing-room buzz
is about: he's sitting on the training table, surrounded by
players, and he's talking tournament.

I start over, and am lucky
enough to catch Stan's eye. I jerk my head to
one side, and he steps away from the gr
oup. “Do me a favour,” I say. “Follow the
kid out and see if anyone picks him up.”

Stan lifts his eyebrows. “Didn't
realize you were his father.”

“I'm not,” I reply. “He lives
away out of town, and he's a little goofy. I just want to make sur
e he gets home okay.”

Stan gives me a silly salute. “Can do,
Mein Commandante!
”

Back in the office Gord
and Freddy are still conferring, now about the politics
of naming hockey teams after aboriginal tribes a continent away
and then representing them with moronic car
toons figures. It isn't an argument they're
having. More like they're agreeing on the
general level of idiocy in the world. I listen
in for a minute behind Freddy's gigantic shoulders, won
dering if Chief Wahoo is going to cost us
Freddy's services. But Freddy doesn't go that route.
He scoops up two sweaters and says, “Leave this to
me.” I scuttle out of his path and he's gone
before I have time to consider what it is
we're leaving to him. Since he may already be
part owner of the Coliseum and the rest of Mantua, maybe it doesn't matter.

I close the door behind Freddy and watch Gor
d refold a couple of the sweaters, give up, and
load them helter-skelter. “What do you think?” I ask him.

“Nothing much to
think,” he answers. “We dress all three,
and if they show up, we play them. We
can dress seventeen players if we want to, and
we haven't had more than fourteen all season. I don't
think any of them is going to hurt us out there.” A sly grin crosses his face. “Look who they're replacing.”