The Art of Fielding_ A Novel - Chad Harbach [68]
Meat was right. Starblind was popping his pitches like Schwartz had never seen. The only balls put into play were weak pop-ups or squibblers back to the pitcher. Schwartz heard a couple of Holy Poets cursing under their breath as they swung and missed. The curses were different from his own, but the currents that ran beneath their shucks and biscuit and featherhead were equally dark. Then their cheery looks returned, whether because a world of deeds and miracles surrounded them even when they lost, or because they were playing Westish and were therefore bound to win.
Between pitches Schwartz snuck glances at the crowd of scouts sitting three-deep behind the backstop, their wraparound shades disguising their thoughts. If there wasn’t one from every major-league team, it was damned close. He almost wished that Starblind wouldn’t pitch so well, so the Poets would put more balls in play, so the Skrimmer could show off his defense.
In the bottom of the fourth, finally, an Opentoe batter laced a low shot into the hole between short and third. Henry broke toward it with typical quickness, snapped it up cleanly on the backhand side. As he set his feet to throw, though, the ball seemed to get stuck in his glove. He had to rush the throw, which flew low and wide of the bag. Rick O’Shea stretched to his full length and scooped it out of the dirt, lifted his glove to show the ump he had the ball.
“Safe!”
“What?” Rick, enraged, jumped like he was hornet-stung. “I scooped it!” he yelled, waving the ball. “I scooped it clean!”
The ump shook his head. “Foot came off the bag.”
“No way!”
Schwartz couldn’t say for sure whether Rick’s foot had stayed on the bag or not. Normally he might not have argued, but Rick seemed adamant—and if the runner was safe, the play would be ruled an error. Henry’s streak would be over, Aparicio’s record unbroken. He turned to the plate umpire. “D’you see that, Stan?”
“Not my call.”
“You’re in charge out here.”
Stan shook his head.
“I’ll be right back.” As Schwartz walked toward him, the field ump resumed his crouch, hands on thighs, peering in toward home plate as if the next pitch were about to be thrown. This was his way of saying, Don’t approach me. Schwartz approached. “Close play.”
The ump kept his hands planted on his thighs, humorlessly ignoring Schwartz. “Stan said I could come out here,” Schwartz told him.
“Good for Stan.”
Schwartz glanced at Henry, who was earnestly smoothing the dirt with his cleat, head bowed. “The throw had him,” he said.
The ump stayed in his crouch and stared straight ahead.
“Stand up and talk to me like a man,” Schwartz said.
“Watch yourself.”
“You watch yourself. You blew the call and you know it.”
“I don’t know who you think you are, kid, but you’ve got till the count of one to get out of my face.”
“Kid?” Schwartz repeated. He lowered his chin to stare down into the watery eyes of this pathetic, ineffectual man.
Whether the umpire did it on purpose, or was fumbling his words because it unnerved him to have two hundred thirty pounds of Schwartz looming over him, or simply because such things were inevitable when you put two faces so close together, a fleck of spittle flew out of his mouth and struck Schwartz on the cheek. A red cloud descended over Schwartz. He never should have told Henry about law school. “You little pissant,” he hissed. “Your real job sucks, your wife doesn’t, so you come out here and boss around a bunch of college kids every weekend, to make you feel like a man, a big fucking man, a big fucking little man, and now you’re going to spit on me? Do you have any idea who