Virtually everyone on the trolley wore some sort of Pittsburgh Pirates identification: baseball caps, ribbons, shirts and shifts hand-embroidered with a red “P” for the home team. Arthur clutched his Honus Wagner trading card. Little did he know that only 291 of these cards had been issued; the few that survived would become some of the most valuable baseball trading cards ever printed, eventually worth $250,000 at auction. However, neither Arthur nor his family would ever see a penny from his card, since it was lost along with various parts of his body during a prolonged artillery barrage during the Battle of the Argonne Forest.
It took close to 90 minutes to reach the corner of Fifth Avenue and Bouquet Street in the center of Oakland, just a few blocks from the new stadium. The weather was sunny and glorious, the air remarkably smoke free, as if the steel mills had taken the day off, too. Brass bands played, street vendors hawked popcorn and peanuts, hot dogs and bratwurst, cotton candy and snow cones with thick syrup. Abe panted when he saw trays of cold Bohemian, but Irene convinced him not to indulge for one day, for the boys’ sake. Rebuffed, he took Arthur and Benjamin by the wrists and joined the thousands milling around the entrances, gawking at the new edifice. Irene followed along with the baby as best she could, working her way through the throng, her steps heavy with a premonition of impending disaster.
All the gates were shuttered and padlocked. Clusters of fans, who’d begun to gather as early as eight that morning, tromped across the new grass, crushing the neat rows of daffodils and crocuses planted along the walkways, eager to touch the great structure, the new wonder of the world, to let some of its grandeur would rub off on them. Proud Pittsburghers they were, residents of the city whose muscle pumped out steel for the world and now had spawned this unmatched stadium.
Irene fed Alex some mashed carrots. He burped. He waved his tiny hands at her, as if to say all done. She sat on a wooden bench, out of the sun, and put him over her shoulder, waiting for a burp. Gradually, a small crowd of women and girls began to form around her. The questions began: How old is he, or is it a she? Is it a dwarf? Does it talk? Can I hold it? At first, Irene was proud to answer that Alex had just had his one-year, four-month birthday. No one believed her—no way could he be one year old, why, he was as little as a breadbox, small even for a premature baby. As the crush of bodies pressed up against them, Irene feared that Alex would be terrified by all the attention, but if he were, he didn’t show it. His blue eyes were as clear and calm as the sky above. A woman with large yellow teeth and a broad-brimmed red hat kept touching Irene’s hip, reaching her chubby arms toward Alex, and Irene worried that at any moment this woman would snatch Alex from her grasp and pass him around the crowed like a talisman of good fortune for the new stadium and the baseball team. This might well have happened except that, as the horde pressed tighter, Alex shouted, “Honus Wagner!”
Heads turned this way and that, hoping to catch a glimpse of the great Pirates shortstop. “Where, where?” they cried.
Alex pointed toward Gate B.
Immediately, the mob turned as one organism, much as a flight of starlings dips and veers and changes direction in mid-flight, and stormed toward the gate.
Irene allowed herself to breathe, now that the crowd in its hero-worshipping frenzy had forgotten about Alex. Had he really seen Honus Wagner? And how in the world would he know it was him?
“Irene?”
It was Abe, sweat rolling down the sides of his sunburned neck. “My God, Abe, where were you? The baby and I were about to be attacked by a mob.”
“We were looking around, taking it all in, right boys?” Abe looked around. “I don’t see no crowd.”
“But then Alex…never mind. Are we ready to leave?”
“Leave? Now?”
“But I thought we were going to see the place and go home.”
“Go home now? Look.” Abe held up his hand to show off his great and wonderful prize—three bleachers tickets. “Do you see this, Irene? Do you know what this means? The boys and I, we’re going to be part of history. Didn’t I tell you this morning, boys? History! Didn’t I tell you?” In response, Arthur and Benjamin jumped and pulled at his sides like nervous boxer dogs.
“How in God’s name did you get them?”
Yes, Abe explained, as sure as the day is long every seat has been sold, all 20,000, maybe 30,000, can you believe it, 30,000 people in one place to watch a baseball game, and every blessed seat has been sold, but, he ranted, no sold-out game was going to stop Abe Miller, not this remarkable day, so when this fellow approaches me, and says buddy, could you use three tickets, well, you’re damn right I could, I said., “Ain’t that what I said, boys?”, and with that he patted Benjamin and Arthur on their heads.
Irene transferred Alex to her left hip. “How much?”
“Never let it be said,” said Abraham the Munificent, “that I would deny my sons this opportunity to witness history in the making.”
“How much, Abe?”
He paused to wipe his mustachioed lip with the back of his cuff, “These boys are worth the six dollars I paid.”
“Six dollars? Six, you say? That’s a butcher’s bill for two weeks! But wait a minute. How long does a baseball game take?”
“Well, it depends.”
“And what about the baby and me? What are we supposed to do, wait here for you in the heat?”
Before Abe could come up with a plausible or even an implausible answer as to how his wife and Alex were going to spend the rest of the hot afternoon and early evening, while he and the bigger boys and Pirates president Barney Dreyfuss and two musical bands and United States congressmen from three states and Pittsburgh mayor William A. “Willie” Magee enjoyed the game, a familiar, annoying voice intervened. “Aha, is it not the Miller family from Mellon Street that I am seeing?” Dr. Malkin bowed. “At your service.”
Irene pulled Alex tightly to her chest, as if she were afraid Malkin might snatch him away. “What are you doing here?”
“Yes, it is the logical question, no? Of course it is true that I am not understanding of it this American baseball, of men running around in pajamas in the hot sun, they could get heat stroke. However, with so many of the people gathered around here, it is a good opportunity I am thinking to pass it out to them my business address, is it not?” He held up one of his handbills:
Dr. Sergei Malkin, General Doctor and Dentist also
. “Is it not the good idea, no? I have passed it out to many of the people this vital information, for you see, America, the land of opportunity, it is for all of us, no?” He wiped his forehead with a checkered handkerchief.
Arthur said, “Dad, he talks like a greenhorn.”
“Arthur!”
“It is of no matter, I have heard it this phrase more than once.” Malkin pointed to the tickets in Abe’s fist. “You are taking it the family to the game of baseball, I see.”
Irene said, “Not all of us. Just the three of them.” She folded her arms across her chest.
The sun glinted on Malkin’s glasses as he stared at Alex. Such an opportunity, he thought, and he sidled his way between husband and wife. “A moment, if I may. Perhaps I can be it of the assistance to you and yours, Mr. Miller. I could see the lady to home, her and the little one, of which I must say I am quite curious as to the little fellow, for his welfare of course, as well as from it the medical point of view, naturally, as any doctor would be, you can understand it.”
Benjamin said, “Alex can talk now. I think he can read, too.”
“Yes? Talking and reading? But this is a remarkable sign of the developmental process, so we shall see it perhaps soon the physical development, it won’t be to lagging behind, God willing.”
Abe handed Malkin a dollar. “Do me a favor, Malkin. Get them home for me.”
“But, Abe—”
“It would be it my pleasure to escort Mrs. Miller and the little one for nothing, but since you have offered.” Malkin plucked the coin from Abe and slid it into his vest pocket. “You and your boys, enjoy it the playing of baseball.”
Irene wanted to explode, to dress Abe down in front of Malkin and her sons, but this wasn’t the time or place, and so she said, “Abraham, this ain’t the last of this.”
With his boys in tow, Abe slunk off, wondering if he had done the right thing. However, his pangs of guilt diminished as the distance grew between Irene and him and the stadium grew closer, and then he and the boys were one with the crowd, stoked by beer and the band music and the sun.
Malkin, Irene and Alex drifted against the flow. Malkin offered to buy Irene a cold drink with Abe’s money, and they settled into a booth at the Home Town Inn & Tavern, not three blocks from the stadium. Malkin order a fried fish sandwich with all the trimmings and one for Irene as well, along with a plate of pickles, brown bread and beans, and two bottles of ginger beer. He urged Irene to drink. “It will be good for the baby, as it is you are nursing yet, I take it,” to which Irene replied that of course she was, and what did that have to do with anything.
They ate in relative silence, broken only by Malkin’s slurping and occasional belch. Irene watched him shovel in the food with his stubby, long-nailed fingers and it dawned on her that he’d put those fingers inside her to deliver Alex. She wondered if he’d washed them first. The fish rose halfway up her throat.
Malkin wiped his mouth with a flourish, but several bits of brown bread remained embedded in his goatee. He reached into his medical bag and held up a tongue depressor. “Perhaps now that I am seeing the boy here, it is the good time I shall give it to him the quick medical check.”
“I’m not paying you for an examination. Besides, he doesn’t need one. Especially not here in the middle of a restaurant.”
“Oh, you have it the misunderstanding of me. This medical check, it is purely for the scientific interest I have in such an unusual boy. There would be no charge. He is in it the good health, no, since the last time I have seen him?”
“He’s fine.”
“Yes, well, such a boy as this one we cannot be it too careful, what with his tiny size which as I say it is most unusual. How are his movements? Might I examine it a used diaper, just for the precaution against parasites, to rule it out any infestation which may be sapping his growth?”
Loud enough for the man seated two tables away to hear, Irene said, “You’re telling me you want to look at a dirty diaper here in the restaurant?”
The man stood and moved away.
Malkin said, “I meant no, of course, not at this time, I could take it with me, or I some time you could bring him to my surgery.” He buried his embarrassment in his beans.
The waitress laid the bill on the table and lingered a bit, explaining that there was no hurry, it would be slow until the game let out, she was sure, but then all hell would break loose, especially if they won. She stooped over to admire Alex, who grabbed her finger. She asked if she could hold the little thing, he was so precious, but Irene, whose mood hadn’t brightened even after a second ginger beer, told her no offense, but I just can’t have every Tom, Dick and Mary grabbing at the boy, you can see how tiny he is even for a one-year-old. The waitress nodded.
Malkin watched her as she walked away, a faint look of recognition on his face, as if he’d seen her somewhere before. Perhaps at The Squeaky Wheel, when delivering his tonic to Davy O’Brien.
The waitress’s nametag read
Delia
.
Chapter 4
In the fall of 1909, in one of his more popular edicts, America’s heaviest president, William Howard Taft issued a proclamation that appointed November 25 as a day of general thanksgiving, perhaps in part because of his love for a big spread. In any event, the Thanksgiving holiday was born, as was the four-day weekend.
It was on a cold Saturday after the first Thanksgiving that Abe, as was his Sabbath custom, went to The Squeaky Wheel with Alex. Before he could get out the door, however, Irene made him hand over his wallet, from which she extracted all the bills, leaving Abe with just ninety cents in pocket change.
Abe was wondering how to make it last, and so he started out with beer when he really had his eyes on a shot of Old Overholt. Davy O’Brien waved Abe and Alex over to his table. As he tickled the boy under the chin, he said, “I know something you don’t know.”
Abe looked at the three empty shot glasses on the table in front of him. “What?”
“Buy me a drink and I’ll tell you.”
Abe fingered his last seventy-five cents. The way Davy has enticed him, he had to know more. He motioned to the barmaid. “So?”
Davy threw back the shot. “She’s back.” He winked confidentially. He didn’t have to say whom.
Abe flushed. “How do you know?”
“Malkin.” Dr. Malkin had been treating Davy’s injured hip with a combination of hot salts and a homemade tonic consisting of chicory, celery seeds, white vinegar, honey, cider and grain alcohol. He charged Davy a dollar for a 12-ounce bottle, half the price of Davy’s beloved Irish whiskey and just as potent. “He told me yesterday.”
“So Delia’s back, is she? Well it’s nothing to me, Davy,” Abe professed, declaring that it was long over between them, he was a family man, everyone could see that. Why, didn’t he take little Alex everywhere? And as if to prove his point, he sat Alex up on his shoulders. Bouncing in the smoky Wheel air, Alex laughed and waved his stubby, chubby arms, and when he said “Davy,” his voice was as clear as the plink of an ice cube in a dry tumbler.
“So you’re not interested?”
Abe said, “Not in the least, but just out of curiosity, what did Malkin say about her—you know, what does she look like, does she have her old job back, is she married now or seeing someone, not that I care, you understand.”
The front door rattled as Horshushky the butcher entered, sat on a stool, wiped his nose with the back of his bloody work glove and told the bartender it was colder than a dead whore’s twat out there. Davy rocked Alex lightly on his bad hip, as if physical contact with the child would act as an elixir to ease his pain. He fed him bits of beer pretzel, which Alex sucked greedily in his baby-toothed mouth, and sang him a song about a happy whale with a tiny, briny eye. Alex stretched his hands toward Davy’s mouth, trying to touch his lips as the words came out.