Billy Phelan's Greatest Game by William Kennedy

him.
    “Forty there,” Tod said, jaunty in his counterman’s white military cap of gauze and cardboard. “All I can come up with.”
    Billy didn’t touch the envelope.
    “That phone call,” Billy said.
    “Forget it. Peg called me.”
    “She tell you what happened?”
    “All but the numbers.”
    “Seven eighty-eight eighty-five. How do you like that, doctor?”
    “You got a reason to be edgy.”
    “I’m through till I pay it off and get another bankroll.”
    “You got no reserve at all?”
    “A wipeout.”
    “Then what’s next?”
    “I thought I’d look up Harvey. You want to make the call?”
    “For when?”
    “When, hell. Now. I’m there if he wants me.”
    Tod looked at his watch. “Five to six. He’s home by now. Shit. I got to work. I’ll miss it.”
    “I’ll tell you about it. But I wanna make the game at Nick’s.”
    “How you gonna play with no money?”
    “I got almost two bills.”
    “And you got this forty,” and Tod shoved the envelope closer.
    “Two-thirty then. I play with half that. I can’t afford to lose more than that. I got to save something for Martin, unless I can swing him.”
    “I’ll call Harvey, good old Harv.”
    “Hey, you hear I rolled two-ninety-nine last night? I beat Scotty Streck and the son of a bitch dropped dead from shock.”
    “I saw the obituary in the afternoon paper. It didn’t mention you. Two-ninety-nine? What stood up?”
    “The four pin. Gimme a western.” Billy pocketed the envelope and carried the coffee to Chick’s table, thinking: I could grunt and Toddy’d get the message. Talk to Chick
all week and he’ll ask you is this Thursday. Chick wasn’t dumb, he was ignorant. Anybody’d be ignorant living in that goddamn house. Like living in a ditch with a herd of goats.
Years back, Chick got baseball passes regular from Jack Daley, the Times-Union’s sports editor. The Albany Senators were fighting Newark for first place and Red Rolfe was with Newark,
and George McQuinn and others who later went up with the Yankees. Chick gave the passes for the whole Newark series to young Mahan, a tub-o’guts kid whose mother was a widow. Billy always
figured Chick was after her ass. Chick gave Billy a pass two weeks later to see Albany play the cellar club. Who gave a damn about the cellar club? Billy can’t even remember now which club it
was. Shove your pass, Nasty Billy told his uncle.
    “You’re all dressed up,” Chick said, chuckling. “Are you going to work?”
    “Not to give you a short answer to a snotty question, but what the hell is it to you? What am I supposed to do, dress like a bum? Look like you?”
    “All right, Billy, I was only kidding.”
    “The hell you were.”
    “Dress any way you want. Who cares?”
    “I do what I want, all right.”
    “Calm down, Billy, and answer me a question. You seen Charlie McCall lately?”
    “I saw him last night. He bet against me in a bowling match.”
    “You hear anything about him?”
    “Since last night? Like how he slept?”
    “No, no.”
    “What the hell you asking then?”
    “Can you keep a secret?”
    “I’d be dead if I couldn’t.”
    “I hear Charlie’s in bad trouble. I hear maybe he was kidnapped last night.”
    Billy stared Chick down, not speaking, not moving except to follow Chick’s eyes when they moved. Chick blinked. Kidnapped . With Warner Baxter.
    “You heard what I said?”
    “I heard.”
    “Don’t that mean anything to you?”
    “Yeah, it means something. It means I don’t know what the hell it means. You got this straight or you making it up?”
    “I’m telling you, it’s a secret. I shouldn’t have said anything, but I know you know Charlie and thought maybe you heard something.”
    “Like who kidnapped him?”
    “Hey, come on, Billy. Not so loud. Listen, forget it, forget I said anything.” Chick bit his doughnut. “You heard any news about your father?”
    “Wait a minute. Why is it a secret about Charlie?”
    “It’s just not out