City Beasts

by Mark Kurlansky

  “It all became true. The sugar is worth nothing now and those back fields are full of groans and screams. That’s why they stopped planting there. No one would work it with that terrible noise. Even the galsas and the cuervos that aren’t afraid of anything stay away. Now it’s a baseball field, but you can still hear it. You’ll see. It’s not a whisper. It’s a scream.”

  Baldito didn’t know what to think of this story, but it was at this time that Dante took him for a ride in his black Mitsubishi Montero with the smoked windows so no one could see who was inside. Everyone knew it was a Major League Baseball player because they were the only ones who had Mitsubishi Monteros. This large luxurious sport-utility vehicle with air-conditioning and stereo sound to play bachatas and comfortable leather seats was the first car Baldito had ever ridden in. He understood that someday he would have one, too. Dante drove him past the enormous houses of Sammy Sosa, Alfredo Griffin, George Bell. All the Major Leaguers. Most of them didn’t live in these houses anymore because they lost them in divorces, but they built other ones in other towns. This, too, was in his future. He, too, would have many wives and many houses. He had to succeed because the family was counting on him, but something else happened in the Mitsubishi Montero. He got bitten by the baseball bug. This was just the first bug bite.

  * * *

  At the time Baldito Gil reported for training Dante Galvinez had seventeen prospects and Baldito was clearly the most promising. “This kid is money,” said Dante to Elvio, who smiled greedily. He made Elvio say several times that he was a genius for spotting him. Elvio didn’t mind repeating it because he thought it was true.

  As a batter Baldito had what scouts called “pop.” When his bat made contact with a ball the ball leapt into flight. He seemed to be one of those rare people who could see the pitch as it left the pitcher’s hand and know where it would go. Dante brought in Romeo Santos, a pitcher he had played with in the majors. Santos drove up in his Montero, wearing blue jeans and a yellow cashmere sweater with a thin gold chain around his neck and looking lean and fit. The sweater impressed people because only a man who is constantly air-conditioned wears sweaters in San Pedro. Most people did not even have the electricity, even if they could buy an air conditioner.

  Romeo looked at Baldito as though he were a coat he was thinking of buying. “A nice-looking boy,” he said, and walked to the mound. Santos was known as a “tricky” pitcher. His pitches were full of movement—sliders, sinkers, curveballs. He had his own pitches with names he invented, like the “killer ball,” a kind of cutter that looked like an easy outside pitch to a right-handed hitter but then darted to the right at the last moment so that it looked like it was headed right for the batter. Given his reputation for hitting batters, most stepped aside, but the pitch did not hit the batter and was a strike. His “crazy ball” headed for the center of the zone but at the last minute dropped so quickly it bounced off the plate. Most umpires would have called it a ball except that hitters could not resist swinging at it, and they always missed.

  Crazy Ball had become his nickname. Everybody said that he was crazy. He still had his arm and could have still been in the majors but no one wanted him because he was too crazy. When he was with the Dodgers he announced before a game against the Giants in Candlestick Park that he was going to hit one of them with a pitch but it would be a surprise when he would do it. The umpire warned that he would be thrown out of the game if he hit any batters. On his first pitch of the game he fired a fastball into the Giants’ dugout and was suspended from baseball for fifty games. The Dodgers dropped him after that and no one else wanted him. He sometimes played in the Dominican League for the local Estrellas, but even they did not welcome him anymore.

  He could still pitch even without many warm-up throws, and he showed Baldito every pitch he had. Baldito hit every one of them. He knocked the “crazy ball” into a palm tree beyond the center-field wall. Everyone on the field applauded, and Santos, who had beads of sweat showing on his forehead and would have to either remove his sweater or return to air-conditioning, walked to home plate and said, “Son, go tell your father that you have beaten the greatest pitcher in baseball,” and he got into his Montero and drove off, sending up a cloud of yellow dust behind him.

  Baldito told his parents exactly that. He was going to save his family, buy the boat, and drive a Montero.

  There was more good news for Dante. Baldito was a switch-hitter and could bat equally from either side of the plate. He was so ambidextrous he did not know whether he was right-handed or left-handed. Dante taught him to bat both but to throw right-handed “just like Mickey Mantle,” he would say to scouts. And like Mantle, he would play center field. Dante thought he might sell him to the New York Yankees. He was going to bring far more money than the Gil family imagined, and as long as Dante could keep it quiet, a lot of that extra money would be his. Baldito ran like a hundred-yard sprinter and he was a natural base stealer. Dante had been right about his arm. He could fire a ball from the deep outfield in seconds to any base. And they were accurate throws. “You know, Elvio,” Dante whispered to his assistant. “We may have our hands on a five-tool player.” Elvio laughed with glee.

  Everyone wanted a five-tool player—someone who mastered all the varied skills of baseball. His weakest skill was his hands. He was fairly good at catching flies and fast enough to get to them from anywhere, but he was surprisingly clumsy at fielding grounders. So that was what Dante worked on.

  In truth, Baldito was not comfortable in the outfield. Frants had been right. It was a spooky place and made strange loud hissing noises. Baldito could hear the screams of the cane workers. The field became particularly loud when they practiced ground balls.

  One afternoon when the boys stood in a circle around Dante and Elvio, which was how practice ended, Dante said, “Anything troubling any of you, come to us. Any problem on the field or off. Come talk to us. We want to take care of you.”

  Baldito chose Elvio, who was closer to his age. “There is some weird spooky noise in the outfield.”

  Elvio seemed concerned. “What kind of noise?”

  “A hissing or buzzing. But loud. More like a hoarse scream. Like someone trying to scream without being too loud.”

  “Like someone screaming a whisper.”

  “Exactly. What do you think it is?”

  “I don’t know, but we will take care of it.”

  Baldito felt relieved. It had been hard to perform in the outfield with that sound. He should have said something sooner.

  The next day after practice Dante and Elvio offered him a ride home. There was something purposeful about the invitation. He sat in the front next to Dante, and Elvio, in the backseat, was leaning forward. Baldito felt good riding through San Pedro, sealed off so that no one could see him, comfortable in the air-conditioning while he looked out and watched people sweat.

  “Baldito,” said Dante. “What do you think of Romeo Santos?”

  “He’s a great pitcher.”

  “He is that,” Dante agreed. “Who knows, maybe even as great as he says he is.” He and Elvio chuckled. Baldito was becoming uncomfortable.

  “You know,” said Dante, “they threw him out of the majors. Just threw him out because they thought he was crazy.”

  “That’s right,” Elvio confirmed. “He just said too many crazy things.”

  “Yes,” said Dante. “You say crazy things and it gets to the majors and you’re out.”

  Baldito understood. How would he face his father and his brothers and his grandfather if all their hopes were gone because he had listened to some crazy story from Frants Belsaint?

  * * *

  Baldito worked hard and he became a more and more polished ballplayer. By the time he was sixteen the scouts were talking about him all over the Dominican Republic. If he was as good as they said, they would bid high to get him. Some said it might go to a million dollars. But that w
as if he really was that good.

  He really was that good at everything but fielding grounders. In fact, he was making spectacular long-distance catches so that he would not have to pick the ball off the ground. Every time a grounder came into center field there was that noise and he couldn’t concentrate.

  On February 4, Dante brought the Yankees scout to watch him. He called Baldito over to meet this small black man with the sun at his back. As he got closer he could see that he was an aged and amiable moreno, as dark-skinned people were called.

  “I’ve heard great things about you, Baldito.”

  Dante had taught Baldito that a little confidence was good, so Baldito simply said, “I think I’m ready, sir.”

  The scout smiled. He had said the right thing. “Well, let’s see what you can do.”

  They had arranged a game with another program from Consuelo. Baldito thought that it would be played in Consuelo, but it turned out to be a game in the haunted home field. Consuelo had some prospects they were showing, too, including the starting pitcher. He had a 92-mile-per-hour fastball, but it did not have much motion and the only other pitch he had was a changeup. He threw nothing but fastballs until he had a two-strike count. Then came the changeup—the same pitch at 75 miles per hour. Baldito deliberately worked the count until he got the changeup. His first at-bat he hit it for a triple. Then, to everyone’s amazement, he stole home. Dante did not encourage dangerous plays like stealing home, but it was a right-handed pitcher with a slow motion and a slight turn so that his back was to the third-base line and Baldito knew he could make it. Elvio ran up to him and said, “Dante says to just play your game. No showing off.” Baldito swallowed the rebuke.

  For the first four innings the outfield was quiet. Every hit that came to center field was high in the air, and Baldito, with his great speed, was able to make the catch. Then he could show off his throwing arm and fire the ball into the infield for a double play.

  But then Dante put in a new pitcher, Feliz George, a tough fifteen-year-old who came from the sugar fields and would not go back. Feliz threw everything low so the batter could not get underneath the ball to lift it into the air. There were always a lot of hits off of Feliz, but they were always grounders and most of them were easy outs.

  Fortunately they had a good shortstop, so the grounders were not getting out to center field. But in the sixth inning a grounder took an odd hop, which was not unusual in this irregular field, and got by the shortstop and bounced to the left of Baldito. He ran in with his glove at the ready, as he was trained. The scream was so loud that it occurred to him that maybe he really was crazy. And then he saw something too horrible to be real. Next to the ball was a huge black-and-orange spider almost eight inches wide, and its thick body and legs were completely covered with hair.

  This monster was screaming at him. So were a lot of people. “Baldito, the ball! Throw the ball!” With a sick feeling in his belly, he reached his glove down to grab the ball and the monster—this couldn’t be real—reared back like an attacking bear or a frightened horse and spit at him. It was a cloud of mist or spit and it stung his left forearm but he reached in his glove, grabbed the ball, and fired it with his accustomed speed and strength to first base.

  Unfortunately by then the runner had made it to second base, and after Baldito threw to first the runner sprinted on to third. So what should have been a routine out at first turned into a triple.

  Baldito raised his feet with his spiked shoes high and stomped the ground over and over, but the spider had retreated to the safety of his silken nest under the grass. When the game was over Dante said to him, “You blew the play. Happens all the time. Not such a big thing. But that temper tantrum—stamping your feet out there. Don’t ever let anybody see that again. I think that ruined it for the Yankees.” Then he slapped Baldito’s back. “It’s all right. There’s others interested.”

  * * *

  A red itchy rash started to heat up his left forearm. He could not talk to the people in baseball about it so he showed his rash to Frants, who shook his head sadly.

  “It was a huge hairy spider,” Baldito told him, and Frants nodded with comprehension.

  “A tarantula.”

  “Is it serious?” Baldito asked.

  “Depends.”

  “But it can’t kill you, right?”

  “Not directly.”

  Everything was a riddle with Frants, and Baldito was losing patience. “What does that mean? ‘Not directly.’ So it kills you indirectly?”

  “Some say it makes you crazy. And that can kill you.”

  “Crazy how?”

  Frants made a gesture like washing his hands. “Who can say? There is all kinds of crazy. Some say all the crazy people in the world are people who got bitten.”

  Baldito thought it was possible that Frants had been bitten. Is that what was going to happen to him? Would he end up like Frants, dispensing wisdom that made no sense? Baldito decided his last hope was to talk to Conky Rojas, who ran a clinic from his little green-and-red-trimmed wooden house near the Porvenir Sugar Mill. Conky was not crazy. When a baseball player in San Pedro, or anywhere in the Dominican Republic, had an injury they went to Conky. Conky could cure most anything. There was always a line along the banana bushes outside, but Baldito didn’t mind because, standing in that line, he felt like a real ballplayer. Three of the men in the line that afternoon were Major Leaguers nursing their injuries back home during the off-season.

  When Baldito finally got inside, Conky, a small, bony African-looking man with fingers that were unnaturally long for his small frame, looked at the rash. “Have you been near spiders?”

  Baldito would have to tell him. He whispered, “Yes, huge, hairy spiders.”

  “Tarantulas. Lucky he didn’t bite you.”

  “He didn’t?”

  “No. That would be much more serious. He just sprayed you. Rub these leaves.” He looked in a cabinet and took out a roll of green leaves and handed them to him. “Just keep rubbing it with these leaves and try not to scratch and it will go away.”

  “And what happens if it does bite me?”

  “Oh, if it bites you . . . just stay away from them.”

  “But suppose it does.”

  “Well, it won’t kill you.”

  “What will it do?”

  “Well . . . Well, they say a bite from a tarantula makes you crazy.”

  “Crazy?”

  “Just stay away from them.”

  “And there is nothing you can do?”

  “Oh, I think there is. If you ever get bitten, the one you want to talk to is Romeo Santos.”

  “Rome—?”

  “Yes.”

  “But he’s already crazy.”

  Conky Rojas closed his eyes and nodded knowingly.

  * * *

  Baldito knew that day would come, and it did with Red Sox, Houston, and Tampa Bay scouts present. The ball rolled into the outfield and Baldito ran in for it and when he got there the tarantula was sitting on it as though he’d claimed it. Baldito reached down with his glove and scooped up the tarantula and the baseball. When he reached for the ball he could feel the tarantula bite his hand. As soon as he had the ball in his right hand he threw the spider down as hard as he could and quickly snapped a throw to first base, aimed perfectly at the first baseman’s glove, and he made the out.

  “Hey,” said the Tampa Bay scout to Houston. “Who said this kid can’t field.”

  Baldito looked in the grass where he had slammed the tarantula down and he found two hairy twigs, broken-off joints of the creature’s legs. But it could move well without them and it was gone. It would be back, though, more angry than ever. He looked at his hand and there was a red welt just above his thumb. Was he going to become crazy? Didn’t crazy people think they were normal? How did you know if you were crazy?

  These q
uestions raced through his mind as he walked into town. He had to see Romeo, but it was well known that Romeo spent all night in the clubs along the Malecón and did not get up until about four in the afternoon. Baldito wandered through town, testing his craziness. Every minute until he did something about it the spider venom was making its way to his mind. Would he get crazier with time? So now was he only a little crazy? He stopped at the stand near Porvenir where a friend sold cane. He bought a stick and peeled off the end and started chewing and sucking in the sweetness. This was normal, right? He talked to his friend for a while about baseball. The friend wanted to know how his training was going and how much money he thought he could get for signing. And that seemed to go well. He didn’t have an impulse to say anything strange. He didn’t say, “I think they will offer fifty million dollars.”

  Baldito had a friend, Paquito, who sold oranges by the Tetelo Vargas Stadium. “Hey, Paquito, do me a favor. Ask me a question.”

  “Any question?”

  “Yes, any question, and see if my answer makes sense.”

  “Are you crazy?”

  “Why do you say that?” answered Baldito with an urgency that frightened Paquito.

  “I was joking, man. Just joking.”

  Paquito was smiling, Baldito thought. He was trying to calm him down. Talking to him the way you talk to a crazy man.

  “Okay,” said Paquito. “Who is the all-time greatest baseball player?”

  “Tetelo Vargas!”

  Paquito smiled when he heard the local hero’s name and they bumped knuckles of their right fists together. “You’re not crazy, man.”

  Baldito wandered on past the little shopping mall Sammy Sosa had built with the statue of Sammy that looked nothing like him. When he got to Romeo’s apartment building it was exactly four, though Baldito was not certain because he had no watch. Several Major Leaguers lived in the building and their black Monteros were lined up inside the gate. Romeo answered his door in a plush velvety wine-colored bathrobe and dark sunglasses that hid his eyes. Baldito could feel the cold air rushing out of the apartment like he was standing in the doorway of the walk-in on the dock where they froze the fish.