The Given Day Read Online Free PDF

the old Negro's face. He knew it as soon as it left his hand: it was fat.
    Babe thought about whiffing, sliding over it, doing the fair thing.
    The train whistle blew then, blew loud and shrill and up through the sky, and Ruth thought, That's a sign, and he planted his foot and swung his bat and heard the catcher say, "Shit," and then--that sound, that gorgeous sound of wood against cowhide and that ball disappeared into the sky.
    Ruth trotted a few yards down the line and stopped because he knew he'd gotten under it.
    He looked out and saw Luther Laurence looking at him, just for a split second, and he felt what Luther knew: that he'd tried to hit a home run, a grand slam. That he'd tried to take this game, unfairly played, away from those who'd played it clean.
    Luther's eyes left Ruth's face, slid off it in such a way that Ruth knew he'd never feel them again. And Luther looked up as he faded into position under the ball. He set his feet. He raised his glove over his head. And that was it, that was the ball game, because Luther was right under it.
    But Luther walked away.
    Luther lowered his glove and started walking toward the infi eld and so did the right fielder and so did the left fielder and that ball plopped to the grass behind them all and they didn't even turn to look at it, just kept walking, and Hollocher crossed home, but there was no catcher there waiting. The catcher was walking toward the bench along third base and so was the third baseman.
    Scott reached home, but McInnis stopped running at third, just stood there, looking at the coloreds ambling toward their bench like it was the bottom of the second instead of the bottom of the ninth. They congregated there and stuffed their bats and gloves into two separate canvas bags, acting like the white men weren't even there. Ruth wanted to cross the field to Luther, to say something, but Luther never turned around. Then they were all walking toward the dirt road behind the field, and he lost Luther in the sea of coloreds, couldn't tell if he was the guy up front or on the left and Luther never looked back.
    The whistle blew again, and none of the white men had so much as moved, and even though the coloreds had seemed to walk slow, they were almost all off the field.
    Except Sticky Joe Beam. He came over and picked up the bat Babe had used. He rested it on his shoulder and looked into Babe's face. Babe held out his hand. "Great game, Mr. Beam."
    Sticky Joe Beam gave no indication he saw Babe's hand.
    He said, "Believe that's your train, suh," and walked off the field.
    Babe went back onto the train. He had a drink at the bar. The train left Ohio and hurtled through Pennsylvania. Ruth sat by himself and drank and looked out at Pennsylvania in all its scrabbled hills and dust. He thought of his father who'd died two weeks ago in Baltimore during a fight with his second wife's brother, Benjie Sipes. Babe's father got in two punches and Sipes only got in one, but it was that one that counted because his father's head hit the curb and he died at University Hospital a few hours later.
    The papers made a big deal of it for a couple of days. They asked for his opinion, for his feelings. Babe said he was sorry the man was dead. It was a sad thing.
    His father had dumped him in reform school when he was eight. Said he needed to learn some manners. Said he was tired of trying to teach him how to mind his mother and him. Said some time at Saint Mary's would do him good. Said he had a saloon to run. He'd be back to pick him up when he learned to mind.
    His mother died while he was in there.
    It was a sad thing, he'd told the papers. A sad thing.
    He kept waiting to feel something. He'd been waiting for two weeks.
    In general, the only time he felt anything, outside of the self-pity he felt when very drunk, was when he hit a ball. Not when he pitched it. Not when he caught it. Only when he hit it. When the wood connected with the cowhide and he swiveled his hips and pivoted his