came the sound again, this time picking up ten or more other old voices. Then the pause, an entire school community searching into its mythic past, everyone—even those not born then—recalling memories of the great Dilly Burden, the school’s one true and enduring hero. One voice rose this time, one voice from the throats of every St. Greg’s boy past, present, and future. “Burden, rah,” it boomed. “Burden, rah. Burden, rah, rah.”
The seventh and last inning went quickly. There was no need to add anything to the ball. It was exactly the way Wheeler liked it. The prongball dipped and hopped and danced. Two Dover batsmen came up, took their swings, and went down. One, two—The third batter fared no better on the first two pitches, chasing two low outsiders. Strike two.
The last pitch. Wheeler thought of his Feather River bottomland walks with his mother. He saw the sparrow hawk, he felt the stone in his hand, he looked in at Thornton’s target, and heard the “How to chuck-fire wheeler-dealer kid!” from his one true friend in the world. He thought of Buddy Holly, lost in the chords and the rhythm and the skip of the Tex-Mex voice he had first heard mimicked in the old Feather River Union High gym. For the first time since coming east, he was beginning to feel the “flow,” as his mother called it, the connectedness of all things.
The crowd took a corporate breath, and Wheeler gripped the ball between the two fingers of his right hand, kicked up his left leg, brought it down, and fired. The ball did not dip or sink. It flew straight and true and snapped into Thornton’s glove, past the last violent and hapless swing of the last Dover batter. It was a pure straight fastball, maybe the fastest, straightest, purest pitch anyone there that day had ever seen. “Steee-rike!” yelled the umpire. Strike three. The day was St. Gregory’s.
The crowd exploded from the sidelines out to the raised pitcher’s mound, where Wheeler’s grandfather, Frank Burden, and his father, Dilly, had stood, and Wheeler slapped his fist one last time into his thirty-year -old glove. They hoisted Wheeler onto their shoulders.
From his perch atop the swarm Wheeler looked back at the emptied bench. Only Prentice Olcott, the disabled captain, stared out at him with a mixture of joy and outrage. Wheeler blinked at him, his best lizard look, then he looked into the emptied stands. There stood the solitary remaining spectator, the Venerable Haze. Wheeler realized something in that moment, and he carried it with him for the next twenty-five years, for the rest of his life. It was love the old man held for his father, Dilly Burden, a love based on something more than his athletic heroics or his near-mythic turn as the Resistance hero Rouge Gorge. The Haze was now seeing two Burdens out on the St. Greg’s mound, hoisted on the shoulders of the Dover game crowd, son and father, 1958 and 1932. Wheeler understood that in the tumultuous moment. Steadying himself on his rough ride, he looked the old man square in the eye and touched the bill of his cap, as if to doff it. It was then Wheeler noticed the tears soaking the old man’s cheeks.
10
City of Music
Wheeler found himself wandering out on the Ringstrasse. Still shocked by the discovery earlier in the day that the Viennese in the park was his mentor, Arnauld Esterhazy, he needed time to sort things all out. He kept his appointment at the cabinetmaker’s shop and viewed the near-finished version of the wooden Frisbee, making a few last corrections, then found his way back onto the boulevard. When he came to the Imperial Art History Museum he walked up the steps, paid his fifty kreuzer admission fee and began wandering through the high-ceilinged rooms, all the time preoccupied by the strangeness of his predicament. He was standing in front of a collection of sixteenth-century paintings, lost in a flood of thoughts, when a voice came from behind him.
“You have an interest in the
The seventh and last inning went quickly. There was no need to add anything to the ball. It was exactly the way Wheeler liked it. The prongball dipped and hopped and danced. Two Dover batsmen came up, took their swings, and went down. One, two—The third batter fared no better on the first two pitches, chasing two low outsiders. Strike two.
The last pitch. Wheeler thought of his Feather River bottomland walks with his mother. He saw the sparrow hawk, he felt the stone in his hand, he looked in at Thornton’s target, and heard the “How to chuck-fire wheeler-dealer kid!” from his one true friend in the world. He thought of Buddy Holly, lost in the chords and the rhythm and the skip of the Tex-Mex voice he had first heard mimicked in the old Feather River Union High gym. For the first time since coming east, he was beginning to feel the “flow,” as his mother called it, the connectedness of all things.
The crowd took a corporate breath, and Wheeler gripped the ball between the two fingers of his right hand, kicked up his left leg, brought it down, and fired. The ball did not dip or sink. It flew straight and true and snapped into Thornton’s glove, past the last violent and hapless swing of the last Dover batter. It was a pure straight fastball, maybe the fastest, straightest, purest pitch anyone there that day had ever seen. “Steee-rike!” yelled the umpire. Strike three. The day was St. Gregory’s.
The crowd exploded from the sidelines out to the raised pitcher’s mound, where Wheeler’s grandfather, Frank Burden, and his father, Dilly, had stood, and Wheeler slapped his fist one last time into his thirty-year -old glove. They hoisted Wheeler onto their shoulders.
From his perch atop the swarm Wheeler looked back at the emptied bench. Only Prentice Olcott, the disabled captain, stared out at him with a mixture of joy and outrage. Wheeler blinked at him, his best lizard look, then he looked into the emptied stands. There stood the solitary remaining spectator, the Venerable Haze. Wheeler realized something in that moment, and he carried it with him for the next twenty-five years, for the rest of his life. It was love the old man held for his father, Dilly Burden, a love based on something more than his athletic heroics or his near-mythic turn as the Resistance hero Rouge Gorge. The Haze was now seeing two Burdens out on the St. Greg’s mound, hoisted on the shoulders of the Dover game crowd, son and father, 1958 and 1932. Wheeler understood that in the tumultuous moment. Steadying himself on his rough ride, he looked the old man square in the eye and touched the bill of his cap, as if to doff it. It was then Wheeler noticed the tears soaking the old man’s cheeks.
10
City of Music
Wheeler found himself wandering out on the Ringstrasse. Still shocked by the discovery earlier in the day that the Viennese in the park was his mentor, Arnauld Esterhazy, he needed time to sort things all out. He kept his appointment at the cabinetmaker’s shop and viewed the near-finished version of the wooden Frisbee, making a few last corrections, then found his way back onto the boulevard. When he came to the Imperial Art History Museum he walked up the steps, paid his fifty kreuzer admission fee and began wandering through the high-ceilinged rooms, all the time preoccupied by the strangeness of his predicament. He was standing in front of a collection of sixteenth-century paintings, lost in a flood of thoughts, when a voice came from behind him.
“You have an interest in the
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