An Unfinished Season Read Online Free PDF Page A

rain was paid for, and which crops flourished and which didn’t and why. Chicago was a lawyer’s paradise.
    Not a wife’s paradise, my mother said.
    The city was dirty. Not a tree. We lived a mile from the lake. I had time on my hands. God, I was lonely. Your father told me to be patient, that when we had a stake we would move to Quarterday, renovate his family’s house, begin a family of our own. My father offered to help but Teddy didn’t want his help. So we remained in Chicago for five years, saving what we could, your father dreaming of Quarterday. And then Andy came riding to our rescue.
    Early in his practice, my father was retained by the owner of a suburban printing business, routine corporate work that included union negotiations. Andres Carillo had a knack for infuriating labor unions, and there were three of them at his plant in the western lakes region. My father excelled at labor law and eventually Andy Carillo asked him to join his board of directors, and then to give up private practice altogether and work full-time as general manager and counsel to the corporation. These discussions took place on Friday afternoons at the Arlington Park racetrack, where Andy had a box. My father was also a dedicated horseplayer, so he was happy to meet his client each Friday at noon, a fine lunch at the Post and Paddock and then the races, all the while talking business and horses. He always had a tip on a horse from Judge Greenslat; and later in his life my father loved to reminisce about his afternoons at the track, the smell of the turf, the excitement when the horses broke from the gate, everyone rising, fists in the air, an animal roar from the grandstand. Andy Carillo was a widower and childless and gave my father to understand that he would inherit the business “in due course,” meaning upon Andy’s death or retirement.
    You’re like a son to me, Andy told my father.
    You’re the reason this business is as successful as it is. You’ve kept the taxes low and the unions down.
    And I like the way you bet, Andy went on. Study the field, study the odds, study the track, and go with your findings. Screw the hunches.
    My father knew he was not a natural lawyer. He was ton impatient, often tactless, and perhaps not clever enough. A sly business, he called the law, a business without
product.
The lawyer gave the client advice and the client made money on the advice while the lawyer received a retainer. He hated the expression “on retainer,” as if he were someone’s manservant. Of course the Greenslats always seemed to be part of whatever legal hocus-pocus they were engaged in, part of the deal, part of the profits—“the whole shoeshine,” as Judge Greenslat said. But the judge’s sort of law was not my father’s sort of law, so he would always be “on retainer” and driving Chevrolets while the judge and his nephew drove Cadillacs.
    I’ve been expecting this, can’t say I haven’t, the judge said when my father told him of Andy Carillo’s offer. I suppose it wouldn’t do any good if I offered you a piece of our action. Small piece, but still a piece.
    My father shook his head, smiling because he liked the judge, whom everyone called Butch. They were sitting in a tavern around the corner from the office.
    I want to run my own show, my father said.
    I’ll help you with the contract, if you like.
    We have a handshake, my father said.
    Teddy, Teddy, Teddy—a handshake isn’t worth batshit.
    I know more about his business than he does, my father said.
    You want money, don’t you, Teddy?
    I didn’t think I did but it turns out that I do.
    I like money, too. But I’ve always known that. How come you just figured it out?
    My father remembered Butch Greenslat’s eyes sliding away to watch the waitress bend at the waist to say something to one of the customers, her skirt riding above her knees, and her