From the kitchen I proceeded to the dining room, where I surveyed the china and silver, as previously reported; I stopped in the living room to recork the whiskey and switch off the phonograph, then headed upstairs.
Skipping over the room where Woolly and I had spent the night, I poked my head into another guest room, then what looked like a sewing room, before coming upon a bedroom that was being painted.
In the middle of the room, someone had pulled the protective tarp off the boxes that were stacked on the bed, exposing them to the hazards of the light blue paint. This didn’t seem the sort of thing that Woolly’s sister would do, so I took the initiative of putting the tarp back in place. And what did I discover leaning against the bedframe but a Louisville Slugger.
That must have been what was resting on those J hooks in Dennis’s office, I thought to myself. He had probably hit a home run fifteen years ago, and he had hung the bat on the wall so he could be reminded of the fact whenever he wasn’t looking at his fish. But for some strange reason, someone had brought it here.
Picking it up and weighing it in my hands, I shook my head in disbelief. Why hadn’t I thought of it before?
In shape and principle, a Louisville Slugger couldn’t be that different from the clubs our ancestors used to subdue wildcats and wolves. And yet, somehow it seems as sleek and modern as a Maserati. The gentle tapering of the shaft that ensures a perfect distribution of weight. . . . The lip at the base that catches the heel of the hand to maximize the strength of the swing without allowing the bat to slip from your grasp. . . . Carved, sanded, and polished with the same devotion that’s brought to the crafting of violins and ships, a Louisville Slugger is simultaneously a thing of beauty and a thing of purpose.
In fact, I challenge you to name a more perfect example of form following function than when Joltin’ Joe, having rested the barrel of a bat on his shoulder, suddenly sets his body in motion in order to greet the projectile that’s headed toward him at ninety miles an hour and send it hurtling back in the opposite direction with a satisfying crack.
Yep, I thought to myself. You can forget your two-by-fours, your frying pans, and your whiskey bottles. When it comes to dispensing justice, all you need is a good old American baseball bat.
Walking down the hall with a whistle on my lips, I used the tip of the bat to push open the door of the master suite.
It was a lovely, light-filled room in which there was not only a bed, but a chaise longue, a high-back chair with a footstool, and a matching pair of his and her bureaus. There was also a matching pair of his and her closets. In the one on the left was a long line of dresses. Most of them were as bright and elegant as their owner, although tucked in the corner were a few skimpy numbers that I was almost too shy to look at, and she was certainly too shy to wear.
In the second closet were shelves with neatly folded oxford shirts and a hanging pole with a collection of three-piece suits progressing from tan to gray to blue to black. On a shelf above the suits was a row of fedoras arranged in a similar progression.
The clothes make the man, or so the saying goes. But all you have to do is look at a row of fedoras to know what a bunch of baloney that is. Gather together a group of men of every gradation—from the powerhouse to the putz—have them toss their fedoras in a pile, and you’ll spend a lifetime trying to figure out whose was whose. Because it’s the man who makes the fedora, not versa vice. I mean, wouldn’t you rather wear the hat worn by Frank Sinatra than the one worn by Sergeant Joe Friday? I should hope so.
In all, I figured that Dennis had about ten fedoras, twenty-five suits, and forty shirts, for mixing and matching. I didn’t bother calculating all the potential combinations of outfits. It was plain enough to the naked eye that were one to go missing, no one would even notice.
Emmett
On Friday at half past one, Emmett was approaching a brownstone on 126th Street.
—Here we go again, said the fair-skinned black youth who was leaning on the railing at the top of the stoop.
When the fair-skinned one spoke, the big one who was sitting on the bottom step looked up at Emmett with an expression of welcome surprise.
—You here for a beating too? he asked.
As he began to shake with a noiseless laughter, the door to the building opened and out came Townhouse.
—Well, well, he said with a smile. If it isn’t Mr. Emmett Watson.
—Hey, Townhouse.
Townhouse paused for a moment to stare at the fair-skinned one, who was partially blocking his way. When he begrudgingly stepped aside, Townhouse came down the stoop and took Emmett’s hand.