May the Road Rise Up to Meet You: A Novel

by Peter Troy

  So Mam’s got a steak? Ethan asks by way of easing the silence.

  But his Da only nods, not relieved at all, and still has that look of uneasiness when Feeny brings their pints. Ethan picks his up same as always, but stops when he sees his Da holding his glass up as if to make a toast, as if they’d just caught enough fish to turn Saint Peter green with envy. And it’s awkward for him to see his Da this way, struggling to find words of consolation, when it’s Ethan who feels he’s the one who should do the consoling since he’d been the one to let his family down and waste a good steak dinner and a cake from the baker’s.

  I wish we’da come over sooner, Da says. I wish I’d done more t’get you inta that place … maybe I shoulda took ya over to the Father to be an altar boy an’ learn th’Latin … maybe if Aislinn’d lived she coulda …

  No Da. It wouldn’ta mattered, Ethan said, shaking his head definitively.

  Well—here’s to you lad, Da says. Sure I’m as prouda ya as a father ever was of his son.

  They clink their glasses together and spill a little over the top, then take a gulp and put them back down.

  And won’t yer Mam cook the Devil outta dat t’ing ’til it’ll be just a mem’ry of a steak, Da said, offering relief to Ethan that the conversation would return to something more accustomed to them.

  Mmmm. Maybe we shoulda brought the filly knife wit’ us?

  Got it right here lad, Da says, patting his coat pocket, and Ethan laughs and turns his head to one side just a bit, as if in the presence of genius.

  It’s maybe ten minutes and the better part of a pint before an unmistakable voice bellows from the doorway and Ethan’s sorry it won’t be just him and his Da for a few moments more.

  How the hell am I supposed to know, Finny! Harry bellows. The man just said they wanted a few respectable lads who owned a suit an’ could actually play the bleedin’ game!

  And then Harry sees Ethan and his Da.

  Perfessor! he shouts down the length of the bar, and here come Harry and Finny, two of his friends from the first day he’d arrived in America and for every day since then.

  So is it a perfessor yer t’be fer real? Harry asks.

  And Ethan shakes his head, telling him about how Latin and Greek had done him in, since it’s a more tangible thing to focus their anger upon than the idea of having no actual proof of being an educated man. Harry’s been the leader of them from the start, bigger and louder than any of them back then and even more so now. It’d been Harry who first took to calling Ethan Perfessor when Ethan was just a few days off the boat and got caught reading Aislinn’s Shakespeare book one morning while there were ball games to be played. But Harry has a way about him, something drawn from profound loyalty, that’s always made his nickname a thing of honor for Ethan.

  Latin? Harry says. Christ, it ain’t like you wanna become a bleedin’ priest!

  And then Harry’s quick to apologize to Ethan’s Da for saying such words, but he stops when Da starts laughing even before the rest of them do.

  Lads, Da says, join us in a pint, woncha? And he nods to Feeny to set the boys up.

  There’s a little bit more by way of explanations, and Finny seems to be the one who’s most disappointed of all. Finny, short for Fintan Caldwell, had been there the first day Ethan arrived and played ball with the rest of them down in old Red Hook. He was the shortest of them, fast as lightning on the base paths, and the primary target of Harry’s jokes. But Finny’s the one to offer the best line of this conversation, and it comes after all the discussion of schools and Latin and other such matters foreign to most of the lads in Feeny’s is done with, serving as a conclusion to the matter altogether.

  Ahh, whatya wanna go an’ study with those fellas for anyways, Perfessor? Fook ’em! Those robes they wear make’m look like a buncha nancy boys!

  And as Finny begins to apologize to Ethan’s Da for the salty language, Ethan can only think about how glad he is that he’ll still be Perfessor to the lads, the way he’s been ever since he was twelve years old.

  Tell Perfessor about the fella who came t’see ya Harry, Finny says after the laughter’s calmed down.

  Harry takes a gulp from his newly arrived pint and puts his long arm around Ethan’s shoulders, smiling as if he’s bursting with news.

  How’d ya like to play ball fer th’Excelsiors? he asks, and Ethan jerks his head back slightly, a question on his face as to just who, or what, were the Excelsiors.

  So Harry proceeds to tell Ethan and his Da about the man named Lydell who came to the South Street Port inspector’s office that afternoon. Harry works for the City of New York technically, but he mostly works for Seanny and other Tammany lads who prefer not to pay the standard taxes or go through the rigors of the law when it comes to their “importing” business. He’s always good for a boatload of stories anytime they meet up at Feeny’s, but this one is quite different.

  So this fella Lydell is askin’ fer me especially, an’ even waits ’til I get done assessin’ the cargo on a steamer from Jamaica, Harry says. Oh, an’ if yer Mam’s lookin’ for sugar, tell ’er I know a few places she can get it at half th’usual.

  Jesus, Harry, Finny interjects, d’ya think he cares about the sugar? Would ya just get to the part about playin’ ball?

  And Harry doesn’t even look Finny’s way but flicks his hand back to hit him on the shoulder and continues on with his story, with the usual amount of exaggeration to be sure. It begins with a fellow named Lydell from Brooklyn, a banker from up in Greenpoint, who, along with a few of his gent friends, is getting up a ball club just like the Empires and the Eagles and the Gothams. But most especially, just like the grand old Knickerbockers from across the river. The nancy boy Knickerbockers from New York, who’d codified the damn game like they’d owned it, writing down the rules they decided on and forming an exclusive club just for themselves, with nothing but gentlemen allowed in like it was a goddamn fox hunt back in th’Old Country, as Harry always protested. Harry’d come over with his family when he was no more than six or seven. Still, he liked saying th’Old Country more than any of them.

  So Lydell wants to beat the goddamn Knickerbockers, Harry says. That is, if they’ll ever play us, and he figures he’s gonna need a few lads who can actually play the game, gents or not. He’s heard about us all the way up in Greenpoint, and he wants you an’ me an’ Smitty an’ Finny t’come up to a sorta tryout.

  Ethan spends some time talking with Harry and Finny about the idea of taking on the Knickerbockers, and it’s the chance to take his mind off the day’s events for a while. But when Da says he best be gettin’ back home to th’overcooked steak, Ethan can’t possibly stay at Feeny’s any longer, even though Da tells him to stay and have an evening with his lads. The walk back home is all too brief for Ethan as he tries to conjure the words that’ll make the disappointment easiest to bear for Mam and Aunt Em. That morning they’d stood atop the steps at the house and watched him head off for the ferry, and that after all the fuss of making sure his suit and hat were fixed just so, after the fuss over breakfast and the fuss of telling him how they were so proud of him and how Aislinn’d … and then their voices drifting off and a bittersweet smile taking the place of more words.

  Da’s the first one to walk inside, and both of them are greeted with the smells emanating from a kitchen where two women who’d never had much more than potatoes to boil back home have imposed their will upon a steak from the butcher’s. They’re soon into the hallway, one then the other, smiling in great anticipation of the news. But Da’s expression must do some of the dirty work for Ethan, since by the time they turn their gaze to him, some of the life has gone out of their faces.

  I’m sorry Mam … sorry Aunt Em, Ethan says.

  And there’s nothing more to be said for a few moments, just the two of them taking turns kissing him on the cheek and hugging him with the same sort of energy they’d had that morning, ’til they’re both telling Ethan what a loss it’ll be to the New York Univer
sity not to have such a fine lad as him. It doesn’t take long for normalcy to return to the McOwen household, as fanciful dreams are put back in their proper place. And they eat their steak from the butcher, sliced by Da and his filly knife amidst knowing smiles between Ethan and him, as if the excitement of the last two days was something altogether out of character.

  The final difficult moment comes just after dinner is finished, when Seanny arrives unexpectedly. There’s no flourish to his entrance the way he often makes it, no anticipatory stare at Ethan waiting to hear the verdict and be proven right or wrong in his assessment of the matter. And Ethan thinks it must be because Seanny’d known all along that it wasn’t meant to be. It’s only after Mam and Aunt Em go for the cake from the baker’s that Seanny tells Ethan he’s already heard the news.

  Ran into Harry at Feeny’s, he says, and there seems to be a combination of anger and disappointment in his words.

  There are plenty of things Seanny has to say to his brother, but they have to wait until the cake from the baker’s is done and ’til it’s just the two of them standing on the steps out front of the house.

  So are you ready to finally get off the boat for real? he asks Ethan after lighting his cigar.

  Ethan looks at him as if the question is a strange one but he knows the general meaning behind it.

  You an’ Da an’ Mam an’ Aunt Em’re all livin’ here as if all you done was move into a nicer place along the Lane back home, Seanny says. I can see that for them, but fer chrissakes Ethan, you’ve been here for almost as many years as you were back there. Are ya gonna spend the rest of yer life fishin’ off a little skiff in the Gowanus Bay and playin’ ball games with yer lads?

  And Ethan knows that Harry must’ve said something to Seanny about the Excelsiors. Just that very morning his position was a more tenable one, what with the hope that an appointment with a Dean from the New York University represented. But now Ethan knows there’s little in his arsenal to contest Seanny’s assessment of things. He’d never imagined he’d be just a fisherman this long either.

  Whenever yer ready, there’s a real job waitin’ for ya, Seanny adds. Not in th’Points or with lads like Cormac or Harry even. Something where you’ll get to use that brain o’ yours for more than readin’.

  Okay Seanny, is as much of an answer as Ethan is willing to give.

  ELYSIAN FIELDS, NEW JERSEY

  AUGUST 2, 1857

  It’s the most highly anticipated match of the Excelsiors’ brief existence, a clash with the self-proclaimed guardians and kings of the game, the New York Knickerbockers. The Knickerbockers have called the Excelsiors common, semiliterate ruffians, and the Excelsiors have called the Knickerbockers untalented dandies afraid of a little competition. Of course most of it isn’t really true, since the Excelsiors have bankers and clerks and even one lawyer on their squad, while the Knickerbockers no longer exclusively play games within their own elite club. Still, it’s taken most of the summer for the two teams to finally play each other, and according to the newspapers, the event promises to draw as many as a thousand spectators to the Elysian Fields across the river in New Jersey, where the Knickerbockers have been playing for some ten years now.

  The crowd is still gathering around the field when the game begins at a few minutes after two in the afternoon. It’s a democratic crowd to be sure, all of them dressed in their Sunday best, but their individual bests varying greatly from the humblest of the Excelsior backers to the grandest of the Knickerbocker supporters, no segregation here, but all of them mixed together in one long line that encircles the entire infield and creates its own sort of barrier across the outfield maybe three hundred feet from home base. Early on Ethan spots his Mam and Da beside Aunt Em and her new beau, a ferryboat operator named Paddy, the four of them standing along the first-base line where the Excelsiors reside. But it’s not until the Knickerbockers take the field that he spots Seanny, doing a little business most likely, in the company of a few Wall Street types right behind the Knickerbocker bench, as ever infiltrating enemy territory.

  The visiting Excelsiors hit first and are retired without a run scored, three batters up, three batters retired, two on ground balls in the infield, and one on a one-hopper to the right fielder—still an out, according to the Knickerbocker rules, which have become the standard of the New York game. It was the Knickerbockers who made things like foul balls and called strikes and umpires and nine innings official parts of the game, ever since they’d bothered to write all these rules down a decade earlier. They’re certainly New York’s most famous ball club, which makes the Excelsiors hate them all the more, but Harry, their pitcher, has a little something up his sleeve for them, something perfectly legal within the rules that the Knickerbockers themselves have created.

  They only recently added an Umpire who can call strikes once he’s issued a warning to the batter for letting a good pitch go by. And slowly the pitchers have stopped simply lobbing the ball underhanded to let the batters put it in play. In fact, some have even begun throwing in more of a side-armed motion, and with greater velocity than before—like they mean for the batter to miss the ball altogether. Catchers have begun moving farther and farther away from the batter in the interest of self-preservation, but Smitty, the last of Ethan’s friends from childhood and the Excelsiors’ catcher, is every bit of fifteen feet behind the first Knickerbockers’ batter when he comes up to hit in the bottom half of the first inning. The batter looks back at him and shakes his head, as if scorning the blatant cowardice on display, but the fellows in the field are mostly holding a bare hand or their hats over their mouths, to conceal the laughter they know is about to follow.

  Harry stands in the pitcher’s box as the formalities are taken care of, the batter tipping his cap to him and then Harry having to do it back, and then the Umpire getting in on the show, and the replies, as if, Harry always said, they were about to dance a goddamn reel instead of playing ball! But then it’s done and he kicks his left leg straight in the air so his foot is nearly as high as his shoulder, driving all his weight forward as he lands that left foot, and his right arm follows—overhanded!—releasing the ball as his torso bends at the waist toward the unsuspecting batter. The resulting bullet of a pitch flies past the Knickerbocker batter so fast that it crosses home base a foot above his waist and still is caught on a fly by Smitty just below his knees. There are some oohs and aahs from the assembled crowd, and at least as many hisses of disapproval at the ungentlemanly manner in which the pitch was delivered. The Knickerbocker batter stares at Harry with a look of bewildered disgust, and then looks over at the Umpire to issue a silent protest.

  Sir, the Umpire says to Harry, let’s remember that we are gentlemen here—and that there are ladies present.

  And as Smitty throws the ball back to Harry, the pitcher lifts his cap and bows slightly toward the batter, who nods back at the apparent apology. Harry then places his cap under one arm and turns toward Finny at shortstop, as he rubs some dirt into the ball.

  Steady there, Harry, Finny says with a knowing smile.

  Right-oh, Fin, Harry replies in a mock English accent. Jolly good.

  Then he returns to the pitcher’s box and fires another pitch every bit as fast as the first one, only this time a little closer to the batter’s chin. The batter takes three steps backward to get out of the way, then slams his bat down on the ground. And the crowd is mixed once again between the oohhs and aahhs and hisses, as if some of them are holding on to the gentler past while others cheer the approach of the future. Of course, Smitty does what he does best by adding a little fuel to the matter, walking up to the batter and picking up his discarded bat, flipping it once in his hand end to end, and handing it to him.

  Let’s remember there are ladies present, laddy, he says, and winks one eye at him.

  Smitty stands nearly six feet with shoulders almost as broad as Harry’s, and the batter, a full six inches shorter and forty pounds lighter, accepts his bat back without much more of a protest
. The Umpire can just mutter the same nonsense about being gentlemen, but there’s nothing in the rules to tell Harry to do otherwise. The next pitch follows the pattern, only this time splitting home base and crossing at the batter’s waist, and the Umpire, reluctantly, issues the warning to the batter that the next good pitch will be “called” a strike. And the Excelsiors, by way of Terrance Harrison, Harry to be precise, have just done a little bit of their own innovating of the game. The next pitch is thrown with the same authority, and the batter swings late at it, hitting it feebly to the first-base side of the infield, where he is easily retired. And so on it goes, through the rest of that inning, the Knickerbockers retired in order and with similar ease, the last one even striking out!

  The full measure of the moment isn’t truly seen until the top half of the second, as the Knickerbocker pitcher delivers his first pitch under the intent gaze of everyone in attendance. He kicks his front leg almost as high as Harry did, driving his weight forward and bending at the waist as his arm propels the ball forward, overhanded, toward Smitty, the Excelsiors’ batter. It sails high, even over the catcher’s head, and the next one bounces five feet before home base. But eventually he settles into this new delivery, and the game has now become anything but a pleasant Sunday afternoon’s activity where gentlemen may recreate and exercise all at once. This is something much more than that, with neither side willing to yield.