Doctor Who_ Illegal Alien - Mike Tucker [33]
There was a photo of a younger McBride with a pretty, darkhaired woman.
Nothing to indicate where he might have taken Ace.
What was it that McBride had said to him the previous night? He was going to see his mother. It didn't make sense.
McBride's mother had died in a Chicago nursing home some five years before. The Doctor had seen the newspaper cutting, buried with the rest. He should have gone with Mullen. Under arrest or not, he had to get to see McBride.
As he prepared to leave, the Doctor's eyes scanned the office a final time. They stopped on the noticeboard. There had seemed to be nothing of importance pinned there. A bus timetable, a menu from a local pieandmash shop, a beer mat.
A beer mat. Stained, faded; the writing barely legible. The Doctor leaned forward, squinting. Mama's American Bar.
Glasshill Street. Your Home From Home.
That was it. It had to be. The Doctor looked at the clock on the wall. It was nearly six o'clock in the evening. In a few hours the bombing would start and the daring and decadent rich, convinced of their invincibility, would be sipping champagne under chandeliers in Claridge's, listening to the mellifluous tones of a jazz quartet. And, he hoped, the dishonest poor would be propping up Mama's Bar, perhaps listening to Glen Miller on the jukebox.
Having snatched his duffel coat from the hat stand near the door, the Doctor descended the stairs and went out into the dark evening.
A low, friendly murmur of voices greeted the Doctor as he approached the ramshackle building beneath the arches on Glasshill Street which was Mama's Bar. Scarcely a chink of light showed itself through the door or windows. Probably more to do with flouting licensing regulations than adhering to blackout regulations the Doctor couldn't imagine this place chucking out at eleven twenty.
He eased open the door and slipped inside. Instantly the buzz of conversation, the chink of glasses, even the music from the jukebox died as the Dorsey Orchestra hit the last big note of 'The Peanut Vendor'. All eyes were fixed on the little stranger. He walked over to the bar. The enormous black barman in the stained and sweaty vest made no move to serve him.
The Doctor looked at the array of caps, pennants, and photographs of baseball players that covered the wall behind the bar. 'Tyrus Cobb...' he said, to no one in particular. 'Hack Wilson... And of course the Babe...'
If anything, the silence thickened. Slowly, the barman walked over to the stranger. 'What you know 'bout baseball, mister?' he challenged.
This guy sure didn't look like no baseball fan. He had to be taking the rise.
Mama towered a good foot over the little stranger. If it came to it he wouldn't need the baseball bat he kept under the bar to deal with this one. He must have had a hundred pounds on him.
'Oh,' said the little man casually, I was there in 1926
when Babe Ruth hit three home runs in a single game.'
'You was there?' said Mama, his voice high with incredulity. 'I was there.'
'I think, though, that the best I ever saw was Joshua Gibson. Pure poetry in motion.'
Mama felt his face crease in puzzlement.
'How you seen him?' he demanded. 'He plays Negro League.'
'Oh, I've seen the Pittsburgh Crawfords many times,' said the stranger, a nostalgic smile playing across his lips.
'Though not for many years... I suppose you could say I'm a bit of a fan.'
At last Mama's face relaxed into a rueful smile. 'Well, I'll be. The Pittsburgh Crawfords, eh? OK, friend, what you drinkin'? On me.' The Doctor allowed himself tobe poured a cold beer. It was rare that he drank the potent brew sent a shudder up his spine.
'Are you... Mama?' the Doctor asked. 'I might be,' the big man replied, still smiling. 'Perhaps you can help me,' said the Doctor. 'I'm a friend of Cody McBride's. I'm looking for him.
'Cody ain't been in all night. He came in here maybe three o'clock this afternoon, with a girl. A kid.' 'And