Carrying Albert Home

by Homer Hickam

  She was at the time wearing her nurse’s uniform. “Nurse Hickam,” Dr. Clowers said, “I am Dr. Clowers. You may recognize my name as the attending physician for your Mr. Feldman. It is good to meet an angel of mercy such as yourself.”

  Clowers was a man Elsie judged to be in his sixties, distinguished, with silver hair and a mustache and a bowler hat, the latter of which he held primly while addressing her.

  “Mr. Feldman told me about you,” she said. And he had, too. Damn quack, he’d said more than once. It was the first time Elsie had heard the phrase but it didn’t take long before she understood what it meant. It had taken her a bit longer to understand that Mr. Feldman was using it in an affectionate way. He and the doctor were old, old friends.

  “Feldman also told me about you,” Clowers went on. “He seems pleased with the care you are giving him. But, tell me, all these books about nursing . . . what school did you say you graduated from?”

  The doctor’s question placed Elsie in something of a corner, one from which she recognized there was no escape, and so she fell back on the truth. “I matriculated at the Orlando Secretary School,” she said.

  Dr. Clowers smiled. “So, young woman, it appears you are something of a fraud.”

  Elsie looked the doctor squarely in the eye. “I never said I was a nurse who’d gone to school for it. It just sort of happened that Mr. Feldman thought that was so.”

  With an amused expression, Dr. Clowers studied her. “If you had to do it, do you think you could give Feldman a shot?”

  Elsie reddened. “Well . . . I’ve never tried anything like that.”

  Clowers put his bowler hat on the floor and opened his black bag, producing from it an orange along with a wicked-looking needle. “Practice on this.” He demonstrated the proper technique and handed the orange and the needle to her. “Now, if you please.”

  Elsie gave it a try. “Like this?”

  “You’re a natural.” He dug farther into his bag and gave her two needles and several vials. “Should Feldman begin to shake uncontrollably, or his eyes roll back into his head, or if he begins to gasp while unable to speak, inject this medicine, preferably in the hip. I will depend on you to be my eyes and ears and sometimes hands.” He tapped the books. “And these will be our little secret.”

  Elsie took the syringes and medicines and tucked them into her purse, thanked the doctor, then got back to her studies. Mr. Feldman’s needs, she now understood, were far more serious and immediate than she had supposed.

  During one of her excursions to the library, Elsie read a book that included a description of fever, the very thing that had taken her little brother Victor, and what to do about it. Her eyes softened and then became damp when she read: It is imperative to lower the body temperature as soon as possible. A very effective means of accomplishing this is wrapping the patient in ice packs.

  Elsie took a short breath, then a longer one. “Ice packs. I could have saved Victor!”

  But Elsie had also read a biography of Florence Nightingale, the first nurse who’d set the standard for all nurses to come. She forced back her tears, since Nightingale believed they were unworthy of a nurse. Still, she couldn’t help that her tears fell inside her just the same. Again and again, the thought came to her: I could have saved Victor!

  Elsie often took Mr. Feldman to the field to watch his team practice or, if it was playing a home game, to watch the game itself. It was a disappointment to her that Homer sat on the bench during all the games. Why this was, she could not understand, seeing as how in practice Homer threw the ball as fast as Mercury’s lightning, and hit the ball with great regularity across the fence or into the stands. Once, when the manager came up to say hello to Feldman, Elsie got in a private word. “Mr. Thompson, why isn’t my husband playing?”

  Thompson clearly did not like explaining the management of his team to the wife of one of his players but he unbent enough to say, “He will play, ma’am. I will know when is the proper time. You are not to worry about that.”

  “But I am worried,” Elsie replied. “What if Homer hates sitting on the bench so much he decides he’d rather mine coal?”

  “All in good time,” Thompson advised. “Be patient.”

  Elsie considered the manager’s advice, then said, “I wonder what Mr. Feldman would think of this.”

  Thompson’s eyebrows went up. “You would complain to our boss about my managerial decisions?”

  “Not complain. Merely wonder out loud why Homer doesn’t play.”

  Thompson considered her response, then said, “Let me explain something to you, Nurse Hickam. The Coastal League has a peculiarity in that it has two championship series, one halfway through the season and one at the last. The owners believe they get more people to attend if their teams are in contention for a championship more often. It is a headache for managers but a boon to the owners and so it is done. Next week will begin a round-robin to determine the final two teams for the initial portion of our season. I am saving your husband for that series as something of a surprise.”

  “You mean Homer is a ringer?”

  Thompson cleared his throat and nodded.

  “Do you bet on these games?” Elsie asked.

  Thompson cleared his throat again, tipped his hat, said, “Good day to you, madam,” and left. Elsie squinted after him, her mind alive with nefarious plans to force him to let Homer play. One by one, she dismissed them until she reached the most probable, the same one she’d threatened, to convince Mr. Feldman to make the manager bend to her will.

  Next to visit Elsie was the lumpy bat boy, Humphrey, who also looked after Albert. “Ma’am,” Humphrey said, “I forgot how often you said I should feed Albert. He seems hungry all the time.”

  Humphrey was small enough that most spectators thought he was a boy rather than his factual age of thirty-two. Elsie liked Humphrey, mostly because he was eager to please her. “Once a day is plenty. Is he happy?”

  “He seems happy although he has bitten me twice,” Humphrey replied, rolling up his sleeve to present tooth marks.

  Elsie made a nursely inspection of Humphrey’s wounds and was unimpressed. “Did he bring the blood? No. These are clearly warnings that perhaps you were doing something wrong. Do you recall what you were doing at the time?”

  “I don’t recollect doing anything wrong, ma’am, although I’m not entirely sure what is right around an alligator. You might find it of interest that both times Albert bit me, those two men over there were nearby. Their presence seemed to make him nervous.”

  Elsie peered toward the two men Humphrey referred to. One of them was a big, tall, black fellow, the other shorter than even Humphrey. They appeared to be the same fellows she’d met at the union camp, the ones Homer claimed were bank robbers but this, of course, was impossible. Still, Elsie studied the lopsided pair with an intention of calling Homer’s attention to them for further identification. But then they spotted her, the little one tipping his cap as they slinked back into the shadows, a location in which they seemed to correctly inhabit.

  Elsie dismissed the two as inconsequential. “I am depending on you to look after Albert,” she told Humphrey. “Does he still have his rooster?”

  “Yes, ma’am. I’ve been feeding him crumbs from the leftover hot dog buns.”

  “That’s fine. Is there anything else? No? Toddle off then. I have nurse duties.”

  Humphrey saluted Elsie, then toddled off. Watching him go, Elsie allowed a short sigh. It wasn’t easy for her to keep everything going at the ball field and at Mr. Feldman’s house, although she was doing her best. She was also burdened with an awful knowledge. She saw Homer walking by with the other ballplayers on their way to the field. “I could have saved Victor,” she called out.

  Homer stopped in his cleated tracks. “What?”

  “I could have saved Victor.”

  He came near. “How?”

  “Ice packs. It said so in a book.”

  Homer looked doubtful. “Whe
re would you have gotten ice in Gary hollow?”

  It was just then that Young Mrs. Feldman presented herself to Elsie. “You brought my husband here without letting me know,” she said accusingly, and accurately. “I’m his wife. I should know where he is at all times.”

  “I told the chauffeur,” Elsie said. “I thought he’d tell you.” She could have added, During the times during the day while you are in the chauffeur’s room, but she didn’t.

  “Well, he didn’t tell me,” Mrs. Feldman said with her nose in the air. “From this moment on, Mr. Feldman is not to go anywhere without you letting me know, nor are you to give him his meals without my confirming the menu, nor shall you give him any medicines without my express permission, nor may you do anything having to do with his care without my granting you leave. Do you understand?”

  “Does that include when I take him to the bathroom?” Elsie asked in her sweetest voice. “I could use your help then. He’s a little unsteady on his feet.”

  Mrs. Feldman’s face clouded over. “You had best remember who signs your checks. It isn’t Mr. Feldman.”

  This observation from Mrs. Feldman struck home. Elsie said, all fake sweetness aside, “Yes, ma’am.”

  “You know, Elsie, I used to be poor,” the wife said.

  Yes, I bet you didn’t know where your next husband was coming from.

  “I’m a working girl, too,” she added.

  I bet you are, and as long as there are sidewalks and corners to stand on, I guess you’ll have a job that suits you.

  Elsie said none of those things, of course, but she thought them. “As soon as he’s finished looking at his silly ballplayers, bring him home,” Mrs. Feldman commanded, then walked away with her high heels clicking on the concrete. Despite her annoyance, Elsie had to admire how Young Mrs. Feldman could go anywhere she liked in those stiletto heels.

  She also thought about what Homer had said about Victor. Where would you have gotten ice in Gary hollow? It was true there was no ice to be had there, not even in the company store, nor did her parents own a car, nor did anyone else except maybe the owner of the mine, but there were horses on which a determined girl could ride to the county seat of Welch and there find ice and figure a way to get enough of it back before it melted.

  In fact, the more she thought about it, the more Homer’s question about getting ice rankled her. Did he think she was not resourceful? She was certain she knew what Buddy Ebsen would have said to her. She could almost hear his voice. “Well, Elsie, if anybody could have done it, you could have. But you should not blame yourself. Blame the coal company that did not have an ice house on its property.”

  Yes, she thought to herself, that is what her erstwhile husband should have said to her, not the all-too-Homerish and therefore overtly logical, Where would you have gotten ice in Gary hollow?

  “I would of got it, bub,” she muttered to herself. “If I’d have known Victor needed it, I would of got it.”

  Back at the house, Feldman, who had apparently overheard the exchange between Elsie and Young Mrs. Feldman, said to her, Sarmywifesezmeentingsoo, which Elsie correctly interpreted as “I am sorry about the mean things my wife says to you.”

  “It’s okay, Mr. Feldman. Have you ever heard of Florence Nightingale?”

  Firsnurrs.

  “That’s right. First nurse. She’s tougher on me than your wife.”

  He smiled. Likoonurzickem.

  Elsie provided him with a fetching smile. “And I like you, too, Mr. Feldman. Would you like your bath now? By the way, Homer still hasn’t played in a single game.”

  24

  HOMER WAS IN A STRANGE PLACE. THE QUICK JOURNEY he’d planned to carry his wife’s alligator to Florida had come completely undone. The Captain would have probably called it kismet, but if that’s what it was, it didn’t much matter. It seemed the whole world outside the coalfields was crazy. Homer was embarrassed that he hadn’t been up to its challenges and now found himself stranded. He’d considered wiring the Captain with a plea for enough money to get home but his pride wouldn’t allow it. After the two-week deadline had passed for when he was supposed to return to Coalwood, he thought about wiring the Captain about that, too, but he couldn’t bring himself to do that, either. The Captain had a calendar and would surely notice the number of days Homer had been gone and would take appropriate action. He required no sniveling telegram from his former assistant foreman to do what had to be done. He’d probably even consider it an insult. No, when Homer returned to Coalwood, he’d come with the one hundred dollars he owed and be prepared to take his medicine. In the meantime, all he could do was try his best to get back on track. Considering that the baseball team had promised to fix his Buick, and that the team had also given him and Elsie jobs, he saw nothing else to do but to stay until the car was ready and they had enough money to leave. With that philosophy fixed in his mind, Homer relaxed into the strange place he found himself, making the best of it and even occasionally allowing a little of an emotion he usually thought of as frivolous. It was that odd, peculiar, and somewhat un–West Virginian sensation called fun.

  One of the things Homer thought was fun was leaning on a post in the dugout and looking across the baseball field. He loved the bright green grass of the outfield and the garish colors of the advertisements on the surrounding fence and the brownish-red baselines and the bright white bags spaced just so and the yellowish home plate backed by a gray net to catch errant fouls. He loved the pitcher’s mound, a place of business where a man might find greatness, and he loved the surrounding bleachers that always seemed to stir with excitement even when they were empty.

  He also loved the way the field smelled. Its grass smelled green and alive and the dirt had a rich, wormy perfume. The wooden stands smelled of paint and tar in the midday heat and the fragrance of hot popcorn seemed never far away. He loved the crisp smell of his freshly laundered cotton uniform and the tart aroma of the shoe polish on his cleated shoes. He even liked the smell of his ball cap, that of well-earned sweat and Wildroot Creme Oil, and he especially liked the fresh, rawhide smell of the baseballs.

  Most of all, he liked that he was learning something new every day at the field. He did not mind at all that he had yet to play in a game. He knew he needed more instruction before he was fully prepared. No matter how talented his teammates might have been back in Coalwood, Homer recognized that they were still coal miners. In the Coalfield League, it was all about strength and intimidation and pitchers threw as hard as they could without many tricks past a spitball now and again. Nine times out of ten, the ball was going to come fast and hard, either high, low, somewhere in the strike zone, or at your head. Coal miner batters had been killed by coal miner pitchers. The game they played was almost entirely physical. Base runners were contested by blocking or hooking their arms and spinning them to the ground. Sometimes they were even punched in the nose. Umpires were lax about all the rough play. The more bloody noses and broken bones in the coalfields, the better the miner crowd liked it and the umps knew it.

  Such play was not tolerated in the Coastal League. Finesse was required. This became evident during a practice game when Homer had three men on base and Mr. Thompson had walked out to the pitcher’s mound. “Don’t know what I’m doing wrong, Mr. Thompson,” Homer had said while scratching up under his cap.

  “What you’re doing wrong, Homer, is throwing as hard as you can every time. They’ve got your number. All they have to do is to get some wood on it and it’s going to get knocked out of the park. Let me ask you something: what kind of pitcher do you want to be?”

  “Well, I guess a good one.”

  Thompson spat tobacco juice. He wasn’t a good spitter, usually hitting his own shoes or pants, but he knew something about pitching. “I’ve seen lots of good pitchers who couldn’t win a game to save themselves. You want to be a pitcher who wins games, forget about being good. Just beat each batter that stands before you. Do you understand?”

  Homer understo
od very well. In fact, it made eminent sense. That was why he’d replied, “That makes eminent sense, sir.”

  “Fine. I’ve been watching you and I think you’re a natural forkball pitcher.”

  “Forkball, sir?”

  “You’ve got big hands, perfect for a forkball, which some folks call splitters. Look at the way I’m gripping the ball. What you do is choke the ball deep, grip it moderately tight, put your index and middle finger on the upper side of the horseshoe seam, and throw it just like a fastball but with your palm aiming straight at where you want the ball to go. Keep your wrist stiff.” Thompson nodded toward home plate. “Now, look at Burnoski there, see him staring at you, swinging his bat? He knows what you’re gonna do, and he’s ready for your fastball. Only you’re gonna throw something completely different that looks exactly the same until it’s too late for him to do anything about it. You got it?”

  Homer got it. He worked his fingers over the seam, feeling the threads like they were roads on a map.

  “Pitching’s like building a house,” the manager went on. “You’ve got to first lay in a good foundation. You’ve got the talent and the skill, Homer, but not the mechanical technique. But I think you’re going to learn and you know why I think you’re going to learn where a thousand others as good or better haven’t?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Because you’re not only strong, you’re smart. You intellectualize this game. You see all the moving parts, the sequences, how it all fits together.”

  Thompson embarrassed Homer. He blushed and muttered, “I’m not so sure about that.”

  “Sure you do! You’ve got muscles like steel.” Thompson gripped Homer’s right arm. “But your real strength is here!” He pointed at Homer’s head. “After a couple of pitches with change-ups, a batter’s gonna look at you and give up. He can’t help it. He’ll give up and not even know he’s giving up. You’re smarter than he is and deep down at some kind of molecular level, he’ll know that. And something else,” Thompson went on. “You’ve got heart. Pluck. Grit. Whatever you want to call it. Saw that first thing about you in that parking lot. You and me, Homer, we’re going to go all the way. You ever think about the majors? Well, I have. A manager, he gets the right player, he can go along with him to the top. You’re my ticket out of here, boy!”