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around the town and drank a couple of MGDs and went back to get my car out of the garage and drove uptown to the GW Bridge jest before rush hour. It was a cool day and the lights were all lit on the Palisades on the New Jersey side.
    When I got back to my little apartment, I saw the message machine was lit. I rolled the tape and the only one on it was George.
    â€œWhere the hell are you, Ryan? You suddenly pulling a doublecross on me? I thought we had a contract worked out, you son of a bitch, what am I doing here with paper in my hand, what am I, chopped liver?”
    With that, the recording recorded a slam as in a phone being abused. Here I’ve been hanging around for three days and he decides to call me when I’m hanging out in Manhattan. Fuck him.
    Baltimore won the third game and advanced to the next round of the playoffs that night. I saw it on my 25-inch Mitsubishi. I turned in at eleven and George called me at one.
    â€œSo what’s going on, you trying to cut another deal for yourself?”
    I mumbled. It’s what I do at one in the morning.
    â€œYou drunk, Ryan?”
    â€œAre you, George? It’s one o’clock.”
    â€œWhy didn’t you call me?”
    â€œMiss Foster’ll tell you I called you twice, looking for my contract. I decided to take the afternoon off. Drove over to Manhattan and wandered around for a while.”
    â€œYou were here? In the city? When I was here trying to reach you?”
    His questions had a rising tone as though I lived in Venezuela and he was my best buddy and I had passed through New York without giving Mm a call. George gets away with his crazy act, of course, because he’s rich.
    I decided not to say anything. After a moment of silence, George continued in a less-aggrieved tone of voice.
    â€œI want to see you tomorrow morning in my office at ten.”
    â€œYou got my contract, George?”
    â€œWe can talk,” George said.
    â€œWhat does that mean, George?”
    â€œWe can talk. You’re awfully anxious about that contract, Ryan.”
    â€œGeorge, you offer me a contract for one year and I take it. So I’m hanging around now because you wanted me to hang around and I now get the feeling maybe we’re not talking about a contract.”
    â€œWhat makes you think that?”
    â€œGeorge, I’ve got a mind to get in my car around dawn and just aim it for Texas,” I said.
    â€œWhy? What have I said to make you do a thing like that? It’s your fucking agent, Sid, that son of a bitch is trying to torpedo —”
    â€œGeorge, I haven’t talked to Sid.”
    â€œThen what is it?”
    â€œIt’s you, George. It’s one in the morning, George.”
    â€œLook, put Texas on hold until tomorrow at ten. In my office.”
    â€œIn the ballpark.”
    â€œNo, no, no. My office on Park.”
    â€œYou gonna have the contract?”
    â€œTrust me,” George said. “And nighty-night.”
    He hung up and left me sitting there, wide awake. 1:21 A.M . I got up and went to the icebox and took out a can of Miller Genuine Draft beer and opened it. I took the beer to the window. It was only a studio, bet there was a sort of half-ass view of Manhattan and the bridge and the river. I do some of my best thinking there, looking at the city.
    Sixteen years in the Bigs was a good career. The only way I’d see Cooperstown was to buy a bus ticket, bet, what the hell, I was a major leaguer and there were a lot of boys who’d played baseball and never got as far as Single A in the minors. I had a major league pension coming and wasn’t a spendthrift, so a lot of money was in mutual funds and such. I wouldn’t starve even if it turned out I couldn’t sell Buicks. Charlene was talking about us opening up a healthy food fast-food restaurant, although I didn’t know that most of Texas was ready for that just yet. We might jest have to go to Santa Fe on that one