The Robins of Iverhill: Chapter 29 – Dairy

NOTE: the following story, which will be serialized on this blog, was originally written in 1985 as my senior project in creative writing at Hamilton College. 25 years later, it has been updated. New chapters will appear Monday, Wednesday and Saturday.

NOTE: To read Chuck Miller’s book “The Robins of Iverhill: A Minor League Fairy Tale,” as well as the short stories in the “Christmas in Iverhill” series, visit this link.

My name is Clete Olson.  I’m the best relief pitcher in the Intrastate Baseball Association, and right now I’m watching Smokey Dulieau throw a complete game, a 4-hit shutout of New Providence on the road.

New Providence’s visitor bullpen is along the third base line.  The other parks have bullpens in the outfield corners, or in the case of Bark Creek, the bullpen is just outside their small bandbox stadium.  In New Providence, I can watch the game while I’m warming up.  I can also watch the fans in the stands – most of them wearing New Providence Grays souvenir T-shirts and hats, waving New Providence pennants and having a good time.

And then I saw him.  It was the old guy, Samuel Taylor Norton, sitting in the bleachers just above the visitors’ dugout.  He kept staring at Monty Mauntmaurency, watching as Monty made his defensive stops at third base.  He watched as Monty went 1-for-5 at the plate with a line-drive double.

And then I saw Monty staring over to the dugout – and he looked up – and I know he saw Norton in the stands.  “I’m not done yet!” Monty shouted to the bleachers.  “Go away!! I’m not done yet!!!”

Of course he’s not done, I thought.  The game still has at least two innings to go, and Smokey’s pitching so strongly, New Providence couldn’t get a hit off Smokey if they used telephone poles for bats.

I looked back at the stands.  Norton was gone.  Almost as if he never was there.

I looked back to the diamond.  Tierney struck out at the plate, and the top of the eighth inning was over.  Monty ran into the dugout, and straight into the visitors’ locker room.  I could tell it was serious – especially when Coach McCarling motioned to Willie Frees to get his glove and get to third base.

I followed Monty into the locker room.  I found him there; he was drinking water from the stand-up glass cooler.  “He can’t be here,” Monty mumbled.  “I’m not done yet.”

“Not done yet with what?” I asked.

“Clete.”  Monty looked up and saw me.  “Go back outside.  This doesn’t concern you.”

I looked at Monty.  “Sounds like it concerns me a great deal.  My teammate sees someone in the stands and then runs into the locker room like it’s a matter of life or death.”

Monty swigged another paper cupful of water.  “It’s more than you think, Clete.”

I looked outside.  The game was still going forward, and I’m sure Smokey can finish this matchup if he wanted to.

“Monty,” I said, as the words poured out of my mouth like water from the cooler, “you were there for me when I was at my lowest.  You helped me.  You were the person who came and visited me in the hospital, and – believe it or not – you were the person who made me believe in myself.  No one else did that.  You were there for me.  You made my being here worth all the aggravation and struggle.  Without you, I would have given up and gone home and spent the rest of my life pumping gas at the local filling station.”

He continued to drink the water, but I noticed his attention was now fixed on me – as if the words I was saying were water he needed to taste.

“What I’m trying to say is – I wish you were there when I was struggling back in Pennsylvania.  Not just for baseball.  When I was struggling with what I thought my parents wanted for me.  I’m a pitcher because my father wanted me to be a pitcher.  He worked for years at a dairy outside of Lancaster, doing whatever it took to make an honest dollar.  And he thought baseball would be the way for me to get away from a life of farmwork.”

“Go on, Clete,” Monty said.  I noticed he stopped drinking the water.

“Last year, I was in an independent league, we traveled throughout the state.  Scranton, Allentown, Pottsville, through all these coal mining towns.  There was a game in Centralia, I remember pitching and not getting anybody out.  I threw gopher balls that everybody knocked over the wall for home runs.  And the manager wouldn’t take me out of the game.  We lost 9-1 – I still remember the score, nine earned runs hung on me in one inning of work.  He wouldn’t take me out of the game.”

“Keep talking, Clete.”

“I went back to the hotel in Centralia after the game and I told my father what happened, and I told him that baseball was too hard for me.  And that I needed his help.”

Monty poured another cup of water and started to drink it.

“He showed up and started yelling at me.  Cursing at me and telling me I was a failure.  Telling me that all he did for me was try to make me a better person, so I wouldn’t be working with him in a dairy all his life.  He brought a suitcase with him.  He threw all my clothes in the suitcase, and told me to get in the car and we were going home.”

“And then what happened?”

“We went home.  I never pitched another game for the amateur team.  They released me the next day, called me a quitter and a poor teammate.  I felt that I had let everybody down.  I needed one more chance.  I needed one more chance to prove that I wasn’t a quitter.  That I could finish what I set out to do.  And I don’t know if it’s because I’m hundreds of miles away from my parents, in a town where nobody knows who I am or what I’ve done in the past, and that I’ve got teammates who can help me out – I don’t know how to say this – “

Monty walked over to me and put his hand on my shoulder.  “You’ve done well, Clete,” he said to me.

Then he said something else.

“Now I’m done.”

---

My name is Eugene Raveler.  We have one series left in the regular season, with a chance to win a playoff berth.  And I need some help – someone to make sure that we win this game without any distractions.

See, I used to date this girl a couple of years ago who was into numerology.  She would add up all the letters in your name and tell you whether that meant anything in your future.  She would tell you that the song that was playing on the radio when you were born will dictate what your adult life will be.  I remember we broke up after she found I had used her tarot cards to play solitaire.  I think that offended her.

But a few days ago, on the bus ride back from New Providence to Iverhill, I thought about that business card Norton gave me.  Samuel Taylor Norton.  Six letters in the first, middle and last name.  And he never addressed himself as Sam Norton – he made sure to list the full name.  And his card – when he circled the handwritten phone number for the Iverhill Motor Lodge on the back of the card, the impressions of his pen caused a raised circle on the front of the card – and the letters “SA” for Samuel, “TA” for Taylor and “N” for Norton were circled.

And I don’t have to tell you what those letters spell.

Before we left for the return trip to Iverhill, I gave my girlfriend Treasure a phone call, and told her to go check out this guy Norton.  Try to find out more about him.

The road trip from New Providence to Iverhill was long and dreary.  But it was great to see Treasure when I got back to my apartment.

“Gene, I’ve got to talk to you,” she said as I opened the door.

“I hope so,” I replied.  “A little talk, and maybe some other – “

“Gene, I’m serious.  That man Norton, the one you asked me to see at the Iverhill Motor Lodge, he wasn’t there.”

“He might have gone out for dinner.”

“No, I went back there a few times.  Even the manager at the Iverhill Motor Lodge was wondering what I was doing going to the place so many times.”

Nosy manager.  Got to learn to keep to himself.

“Anyway, he finally did show up.  And when I saw him, Gene, I can’t describe it, but my whole body just started feeling weak.  He asked me who I was, and I tried to tell him my name, but all that came out of my mouth was Louise Osterman.”

“Who’s Louise Osterman?” I asked.

“That’s my real name,” she said glumly.  “I was born Louise Osterman, but when I moved to Florida, I took the name ‘Treasure’ as my stage name.  You didn’t know my real name?”

“You never told me,” I said.  Then again, I never asked her.  Treasure seemed like a reasonable name for a person who dances in a go-go bar.

“Gene, he said something to me.  Something scary.”

“Go on.”

“He asked how well I knew you.  I told him we’ve been together for a while.  And then he said to give you a message.”

I looked in her hands for a piece of paper.  Maybe Norton wrote it down.

“He said, ‘If you don’t personally bring Monty Mauntmaurency to me at the Iverhill Motor Lodge before the final game of your season … I will personally make sure that your only eternal memory will be of that day at the pond.  Gene, what pond is he talking about?”

---

My name is Genvieve McCarling.  I’m the manager of the Iverhill Robins, and I’ve got an issue to deal with – regarding my team.

Any time a player needs to be traded to another team, both teams involved in the trade need to fill out a Form O-15.  It’s known around the IBA as the “O” form, a simple trade agreement.  Both teams need to call the IBA after the transaction has  been consummated, and then both teams must submit the paperwork to the league office.

One of the things the Wilson family allows me to do is to negotiate trades and releases.  They trust me enough to get a trade taken care of.  And some might question why I’m making this trade right now – there’s only one week left in the regular season, even if I completed this trade, the affected parties could not play in the postseason.  Essentially all I’m doing with the manager at Corbett Falls is swapping one of his players for one of mine – they’ll each play one more series, and then their year is done.

Well, essentially in Corbett Falls they’re done.  But we’ve still got a chance for the playoffs.

I knew I had to fill out this form.  After what Gene Raveler told me earlier today, there’s only one thing to do to keep this franchise from completely imploding upon itself.

I looked at the transaction form one more time.  On the line where one lists the player to be traded, I started to write.  M… A… U… N… T…