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that he was younger than I thought at first; he probably wasn’t out of his forties. His brown hair was thick, without a hint of gray. From his dress and bearing, he wanted to appear older—to bolster his autocratic manner, I figured. He finally went on, “However, I’m not without influence. The team does have a certain status in the city of Boston, and we can probably protect you somewhat from any hasty accusations by the police.”
    “But why would I need protection? I didn’t do anything wrong.”
    “You’re a major-league baseball player. You’re in the public eye now. If he wants to, a cop or a reporter could get a lot of attention for himself just by accusing you. That kind of publicity tends to stick, though, and that’s bad for all of us. The point is that a ball club can do a lot to protect its players.” Tyler glanced up at the ceiling for a moment. Then he said in a confidential voice, “I’ll let you in on something: every couple of years, Ty Cobb gets in one of his rages and assaults somebody. Then Frank Navin has to calm down the cops and try to keep it out of the papers. You remember when the Tigers played the Pirates in the World Series?”
    I nodded. It had been just two or three years ago.
    “Cobb had to travel outside the Ohio border every time they went from Detroit to Pittsburgh. You know why?”
    I shook my head.
    “Because he knifed some hotel worker in Cleveland, and there was a warrant out for his arrest. Navin took care of it in the off-season. He’s a good owner. He takes care of his players’ problems. If the Tigers can keep it quiet when a famous player like Cobb really commits a crime, we should be able to protect a nobo—a, uh, lesser-known player who was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. You’re going to have to do your part, though.” I started to ask what that was, but he talked over my question, already answering, “You don’t say anything to anybody about anything that happened.”
    “But what about the police? What if they want to ask me more questions?”
    “Of course we want to cooperate with the police—just like we expect them to cooperate with us. If Captain O’Malley has any questions for you, you should answer them—just make sure I’m there, too.”
    “You mentioned the papers. I saw today’s paper and there wasn’t anything about it.”
    “Well ... Boston’s a big city. People turn up dead all the time.”
    “At Fenway Park? ”
    Tyler looked annoyed. “We wouldn’t want Fenway to be mentioned, would we? Look. Nobody even knows who the man was. I don’t know if this occurred to you, but he may not have been some innocent victim. What if he was killed in self-defense? What if he was a hoodlum who had it coming? Look. This is what it comes down to: you don’t need trouble, the team don’t need trouble. The cops will do their investigating, but they’ll have to do it quietly. If O’Malley wants to talk to you, that’s fine—I’ll just come along and make sure your interests are protected. Other than that, you don’t say a word to anybody. Understood?”
    I didn’t feel like I understood, but I nodded that I did.
    With a forced smile Tyler said, “Good. Let’s get this behind us, and concentrate on baseball. Jake’s probably going to start you in tomorrow’s game.” He clapped his cane on the floor to signal an end to the conversation. “Send Jimmy in on your way out.”
    I did as he asked and returned to my seat. I wasn’t able to get my thoughts on baseball, though, so I fruitlessly mulled over Tyler’s words. This business with the police and the papers and the ball club was beyond my experience. I could make no sense of the situation.
    But I could tell that this didn’t look like it was going to be my season.

Chapter Four
    M y new teammates milled about home plate, coordinating their moves so that each time I tried to step to the batter’s box I was blocked out. This came as no surprise; preventing rookies from