The Conman

by Mike Murphey

  “Guys, this is crazy,” Kenny said. “We need to find some girls.”

  “Okay, where?”

  They’d already stopped by a neighborhood-looking pub within walking distance. They found a bunch of old guys playing darts. The youngest woman there might have been somebody’s grandmother.

  “I know a great pickup bar,” said Gary Tebetts, who’d played in Quad Cities the previous year and knew the exotic backwaters of Iowa. “Only it’s in Cedar Falls.”

  “What good does that do us?”

  “We could pool our money, get a cab.”

  “If I spend money for a cab, I won’t have anything left for beer. We don’t get paid again until next week.”

  A general groan of agreement made its way around the motel room.

  Until Conor said, “I can drive a bus.”

  The Quad Cities Angels owned a 1950’s-era GMC Silversides, several incarnations removed from its proud service in the Greyhound fleet. Immediately prior to its acquisition by Quad Cities, it apparently lived south of the border, as instructional signs were in Spanish, and empty tequila bottles sometimes rattled from way under a random seat when the brakes were applied with too much enthusiasm.

  The Silversides featured its original diesel engine, unencumbered by emission control devices, eight forward gears, and a reverse the ballplayers considered only a rumor. Doc Hartman, who doubled as both team trainer and bus driver, hailed from the same era as the bus and they apparently understood each other.

  Conor enjoyed watching Doc drive during their endless journeys, cajoling and threatening as he ground through the gears, his cigarette smoke sucked outside by means of a tiny wing window.

  “Where did you learn to drive a bus?”

  “One of my summer jobs,” Conor said. “I drove an airport shuttle.”

  He did not mention that the Silversides dwarfed his airport shuttle, or that he’d been fired for kissing one too many bumpers in the departures lane. He figured a bus is a bus is a bus.

  “How do we get the keys?”

  Conor checked his watch.

  “It’s after nine,” he said. “Doc’s asleep. Someone has to sneak into his room.”

  “Are you crazy?”

  “No. He’s half deaf. He’s seventy-two, for Chrissake.”

  “Okay, how are you gonna get into his room?”

  Conor and Ken Shrom rang the night desk bell. A bleary-eyed teen-aged boy yawned as he opened the door behind the counter.

  “Yeah?”

  Conor turned up the collar of his jacket, pulled his baseball cap low over his forehead and puffed on a cigarette.

  “I’m Doc Hartman. I need a key to my room.”

  The desk boy squinted and rubbed one eye with the back of his wrist. He thumbed through a set of index cards representing the day’s registrations.

  “We got a problem,” he said, glancing from a card to Conor.

  Kenny edged toward the door.

  “And what’s that?” Conor asked without flinching.

  “You gotta pay five dollars for a duplicate key.”

  “Okay . . . can I just charge it to the room?”

  “I don’t see why not.”

  Kenny stood guard as Conor eased inside. Long, wheezing snores drifted into the night. The snoring stuttered as Conor lifted a set of keys from the dresser. He froze and held his breath. Doc rolled onto his side and resumed his snore. Conor emerged holding a ring of at least forty-seven keys.

  By then, eight ballplayers had signed up for the trip. They waited while Conor sorted through the ring, finding a key that unlocked the bus door on his thirty-fifth attempt.

  “We can’t start it here,” Conor advised his crew. “It’ll make too much noise. Let’s push it down the street.”

  He tried each key again, found one that brought the bus’s electrical system to life, fumbled with a heavy, floor-mounted gear shift and—according to the pattern printed on the knob—discovered neutral. The baseball players rocked the bus a couple of times and shoved it onto a slight decline that rolled it a block away.

  Conor saw gauges jump to life as he turned the key. He searched for a starter button, finding it mounted on the floor to left of the clutch. The diesel clattered to life.

  The shift knob showed him positions for eight gears. The transmission gave a shriek as he searched for the clutch’s correct friction point. And, eventually, they were off along a dark two-lane roadway headed toward Cedar Falls.

  With much clanking and grinding, Conor found the first five gears. The bus, though, refused him access to the other three. Still, they managed a reasonable forty miles an hour as the tachometer needle hovered near the red line.

  The eight-ball sat at the lip of a corner pocket, the six blocking Conor’s shot. He picked his spot on a far rail. He needed to kiss the eight ball slightly off center, so the cue ball wouldn’t follow it into the pocket. He hit it exactly right.

  “You want to go again,” he grinned as he pocketed a stack of bills resting on the rail. The morose farm boy leaning on his cue grunted and shook his head no.

  “Hey, you might make a living with that stick,” Ken said. “You never told me you were a pool shark.”

  “I’m not. My brother Sam taught me some things, but he’s the real shark. I’m good enough to make some money in a place like this. My brother and his friends would eat me alive, though.”

  “They aren’t here, are they?”

  “Nope,” Conor said, “and tonight I made two hundred and thirty-five bucks shooting against the locals. I’ll buy dinner.”

  Brady’s Pub & Grub featured beer, pool, and rural Midwest cuisine. Brady’s main room consisted of a bar and a bunch of high tops scattered around three pool tables. A pair of French doors opened onto a second room lighted by dim wall sconces where customers wanting some separation from the more raucous bar crowd occupied shadowed booths lining the walls.

  As the official bus driver, Conor nursed a single beer all evening. His teammates seemed determined to compensate for Conor’s sobriety. And Gary hadn’t exaggerated his promise of girls. A noisy gaggle of young women, in various stages of impairment, clustered around the ball players. The juke box roared. The party rocked.

  “This is the Conman,” Dave slurred as he introduced a young woman displaying spectacular cleavage.

  “We want to ride your bus,” she said.

  “Okay.” Conor grinned. “Where to?”

  “Back to the motel,” Dave said in a theatrical whisper.

  “Yeah. There.”

  Being seventy-two years old, Doc Hartman rarely slept through the night. He usually had to pee at least twice, and as long as he had to get up, he used the occasion to enjoy a smoke. He stepped onto the sidewalk, embracing the cool of the evening. He inhaled deeply and studied his view of the parking lot when some little something picked at the corners of his brain. He frowned. He inhaled. He squinted.

  Where did I park the bus?

  He leaned over the second story railing to see a dirt strip way down alongside the building. No. He parked the bus in the parking lot. He was almost sure. Maybe I put it around back . . . Doc liked a nip of bourbon each evening. This wouldn’t be the first time he’d misplaced his bus.

  He’d get the keys and go check around . . . His keys were gone! His bus was gone!

  “Somebody stole my goddam bus!”

  Conor peeked at the raucous celebration as he drove. His rearview mirror reflected that not everyone remained entirely clothed. He felt proud. He’d performed a humanitarian service for his teammates. He’d told them he’d drive the bus, and he did. All they needed to do now was get it to the parking lot and return Doc’s keys.

  Conor signaled for a left turn into the lot. He slowed, found second gear, and began muscling the Silversides though the turn. He misjudged the bus’s length only a little. Big rear wheels bounced over a curb. Which would have been okay, except for the fire hydrant.

  The bus lurched, and the engine died. Conor heard a ban
g and a sort of rushing noise he didn’t immediately identify. Behind him, his passengers observed a moment of silence. Rain began to fall. Conor flipped on the windshield wipers.

  At the back, though, where some windows were open, a fat torrent of water spewed skyward in a majestic arc.

  “Abandon ship!” someone yelled, and a stampede of humanity left Conor alone as he tried to restart the engine. He didn’t notice the blue and red lights. The roaring sound of the flood initially masked a wet policeman’s voice shouting, “Hands on your head, and get out of the bus!”

  “I’m sorry about the puddle.”

  The policeman gave Conor a puzzled look. With his hands cuffed behind him, Conor could only nod at his head toward the police car.

  “I dripped on your seat.”

  He’d tried explaining he hadn’t stolen the bus. This bus, after all, belonged to the baseball team. He worked for the team. He’d only borrowed it.

  “They reported a stolen bus,” the cop told him, “so you’re under arrest.”

  Conor wasn’t particularly worried. He’d been arrested before, back home, for siphoning gas. A.J. and Basil had dared him to do it. And, like this time, his buddies had escaped, leaving Conor holding the evidence. Then, he’d been scared. Then, he’d had to face his father.

  Now, though, he figured he’d be okay. The cop fingerprinting him became angry because Conor kept dripping on the print card, but Conor knew he’d pass a breathalyzer and he didn’t think the team would press charges against their closer.

  He decided to savor the experience.

  “Quit smiling!” the next cop yelled as Conor stood for his booking photo. “This isn’t your senior prom.”

  “Yeah, well, I still want to look nice.” Conor configured his face into the expected convict scowl. Carefully, he timed his grin for the moment the camera flashed.

  “Shit,” said the cop.

  For his profile shot, he timed it right again, this time striking a Walk Like an Egyptian pose. He decided asking for a couple of eight-by-tens would be pushing his luck.

  Conor spent the night in a holding cell with a couple of drunken baseball fans. His manager retrieved him the next morning.

  “No charges filed,” said the officer, who opened Conor’s cell door. “Don’t show up here again.”

  Cottier dropped Conor at the motel. “Come see me as soon as I get to the ballyard.”

  “You stole a damn bus,” Cottier said.

  Wearing his uniform pants and an undershirt, Conor did his best to appear contrite. “I—”

  “Hey, I don’t want to hear it. You can’t do shit like that. I’m gonna fine you.”

  Conor gulped. He’d completely overlooked this aspect of professional baseball.

  Cottier stared at him for a long moment. “You shoot a pretty good game of pool,” he said finally.

  “I . . . what?”

  “I said you shoot a pretty good game of pool.” He paused, letting his observation register, and added, “A bit of advice. If you go out to drink and chase a little tail, just be sure you don’t choose the same bar your manager does. It’s an unwritten rule.”

  “You were—”

  “Yeah. Darkest corner, behind the pool table. At the time, though, I didn’t know you’d stolen the goddam bus.”

  Conor waited through another awkward silence.

  “Normally, I’d fine you a hundred bucks,” Cottier finally said. “In this case, the fine’s two hundred and thirty-five dollars. I happen to know you can afford it.”

  fourteen

  “If we do this,” Kate told him, “I will not be one of those baseball wives who smiles and looks the other way. I will not accept that boys-will-be-boys. I don’t want to marry a boy. I want to marry a man. I want to marry your father’s son.”

  Kate Dunnigan had been on Conor’s radar since his freshman year at Cañada. They met at the San Carlos High School Nude Relays—although both were fully clothed. A sort of formalized version of the streaking craze, this event was, surprisingly, embraced by the community.

  “You guys running in the nude relays?” Hugh asked Conor and Basil.

  “Um . . . yes?”

  “Good,” Hugh said. “I don’t want any son of mine wimping out when it comes to tradition.”

  Technically, the competition was limited to San Carlos High School seniors. But Conor snuck A.J. and Brad into the mix. They wore Lone Ranger masks.

  “This mask won’t do any good,” A.J. said. “It’s not covering the part of me girls will recognize.”

  “Yeah, you wish,” said Basil.

  The team of Nash, Cohen, Leary and Doan finished first, thus drawing the responsibility to organize the following year’s Nude Relays. A.J. worked hard at recruiting the first-ever female entrants. He’d obtained a solid commitment, but they bailed at the last minute.

  Kate, a year younger than Conor, attended a different high school. The Nude Relays, though, enjoyed a wide following. She met Conor when she sought him out to inquire about the semi-secret location of this year’s course. Soon, she took her place among a pantheon of Conor’s female friends. They dated occasionally. They had fun.

  Kate felt a certain amount of apprehension. People didn’t live around San Carlos without knowing of the Nash family. “The boys were either famous or notorious, depending on whether or not Sam had beaten up someone you knew,” she explained.

  She only had to know Hugh, though, to understand that, in Conor’s company, she was safe.

  When Conor and Kate walked into Conor’s living room together the first time, Hugh turned to his wife and said, “Uh, oh.”

  Nadine told Conor, “Pay more attention to her. She’s good for you.”

  They dated more seriously during his second year at Cañada, although their relationship proved occasionally contentious. While Kate accepted Conor’s garrulous nature, even where other girls were concerned, Conor did not extend her the same courtesy. He declared their relationship over after seeing her chatting with a former boyfriend. Kate’s persistence won out, though, and the more time they spent together, the more he appreciated his father’s assessment. Both pretty and funny, he found an inner strength about her he hadn’t seen in others.

  Uh, oh, indeed.

  One aspect of being my father’s son, though, was practicality. Having already experienced the reality of minor league baseball, I headed off for Quad Cities with no desire to make a long-distance commitment I doubted I would be able to keep.

  “You wanted to see me, Skip?”

  “Yeah,” Cottier said. “Shut the door.”

  Conor warily stepped into his manager’s office. He’d thought the whole bus thing had blown over. No one had said anything about it the past week. In the meantime, he’d closed two games without allowing a base runner. This thing about shutting the door, though, gave him pause. A closed door translated into bad news for a couple of guys who’d recently been sent home.

  Conor suffered an awkward silence as Cottier scribbled something on some kind of form.

  “Pack your bags . . .” he said.

  Conor felt the floor almost collapse beneath his feet. Until Cottier completed the sentence.

  “You’ve been called up. They want you in Salinas tomorrow. Here’s your plane ticket.”

  Salinas Angels

  High A Baseball

  1977

  I was practically home.

  Salinas, California, located eighty-four miles south of San Carlos along Highway 101, hosted the Angels’ High A affiliate. Mark Brouhard started his season there, so I had a friend to introduce me around and help me adjust to the challenges of a higher level of play.

  Gary Tebetts moved up, too, and he broadcast news of our bus adventure throughout the clubhouse. I became the go-to guy for comic relief. My teammates learned that, on a dare, I’d do practically anything—perform a sliding act across an infield tarp during a rainstorm, break a sprinkler to flood an opposing ballpark when we needed a day off, hide the mascot’s cos
tume.

  Moose Stubing—nobody called him Lawrence—whose size and relative grace reflected his nickname, managed Salinas. He watched me throw a bullpen. “Lefty, you’re my closer. Try and gain some weight.”

  The best thing about Salinas? My family and friends could drive a little more than an hour to see me play. And more and more often, Kate accompanied my mom.

  The worst thing about Salinas? My family and friends could drive a little more than an hour and see me play. A month after I arrived, owners of the Blue Boar Bar banned me.

  “You can’t come in,” the bouncer said.

  “Why not? What did I do?”

  “You didn’t do anything, but last week your brothers were here. We’re afraid if we let you in, they might come back.”

  Proximity complicated the Kate issue. Particularly when A.J. or Baze were around.

  “I’ve got us a sure thing,” A.J. told Conor. He pointed at two women seated about a dozen rows behind the home dugout. He waved. They waved back.

  A.J. stood at the first row of seats.

  “What do you mean a sure thing?”

  “They’ll meet us after the game.”

  Conor made eye contact with these women. They wore low-cut tank tops and short shorts. And they were hot—in a dangerous sort of way. Conor had not seen tattooed women before. They waved again. Conor tentatively lifted his hand. They smiled.

  “So, what’s the catch?” he asked.

  “Come on, Connie, I talked to them and they like me. They like that you’re one of the players.”

  Conor stared at A.J. “And what else? Why are they a sure thing?”

  “They’re here to visit their boyfriends.”

  “To visit . . . what?”

  “Their boyfriends are in prison. They’ll be horny as hell.”