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Jackie smiled down at her and held her close. “Hold on.”

“I am holding on,” she promised.

He smiled and kissed her again. “Long as we hold on, it'll be okay.”

Rachel hoped he was right. But just in case, she planned to hold on as tight as she could.

Y
ou look lovely, Mrs. Robinson,” Rickey told Rachel a few days later. They sat in the stands together watching Jackie at batting practice.

She smiled. “Thank you.” She hadn't met the general manager often, but when she had she'd thought he seemed like a good, decent man. And she knew Jackie respected him a great deal.

“I don't know how you do it,” Rickey continued. “Every day, from the first to the ninth. Myself? I could pay a hundred bucks for a suit and in twenty minutes I'd look like I fell out of bed. Even my shoes look rumpled.”

They watched Jackie crack one high off the beer sign that loomed over the outfield.

“I used to think Jack was conceited,” Rachel offered out of nowhere, as her thoughts and memories spun around her.

Rickey glanced at her, his bushy eyebrows rising. “Is that so?”

She nodded. “It was the very first thing I noticed about him.”

“How did you two meet?” Rickey asked, leaning back in his seat. He sounded genuinely interested.

Rachel smiled. “I saw him at a UCLA football game. Even in uniform with a helmet on, his vanity was awful. It was the way he held his hands on his hips. I hated him!” Rickey laughed at that. “And on campus he always wore crisp white shirts and I'd think,
His skin is so dark, why would he do that?
Then I got to know him, his pride and confidence, and I realized he was showing off his color. I was wrong. He wasn't conceited; he was proud. Always, of who and what he is. I'd never met another man like that.” She turned to study her companion. “What about you? How did you meet your wife?”

The smile he offered in return was sweeter than any she'd seen on him. Business and baseball were momentarily forgotten as Rickey told her the story. “I was trying to catch her in a race. She was the fastest girl in town. Beautiful legs. I finally caught up; we've been together ever since.”

Neither of them spoke for a moment. Below, Jackie nailed another fastball.

“I wanted to apologize to you,” Rickey said finally, his voice serious again.

That surprised her. “For what?”

“Everything.” Rickey gestured down toward Jackie. “I can't apologize to him. He and I both knew what we were getting into. But you, a newlywed, trying to begin a marriage under all this pressure?”

“Don't worry about me,” Rachel assured him. “Or us. We know who we are.” She hadn't been so sure of that at first, on that first trip down to Daytona Beach, but she was now.

“Your husband has humbled me,” Rickey told her over the crack of Jackie hitting another ball. “When this all began I thought I was changing the world and that Jackie was my instrument. Can you imagine?” He shook his head. “I wish I could help him, but I'm just a spectator.”

Rachel wanted to pat his hand, but she restrained herself and settled for telling him, “You help him plenty. Believe me.”

“Is he able to get things off his chest?” Rickey asked then. “So he doesn't burn up?”

She smiled. “I have to let him have that silence at first, let him come to me. But he opens up eventually.”

He nodded. “Good. It's too much to carry inside. Does he have any friends on the team?” He didn't miss the look she gave him. “They're spectators, too. They do admire him, though.”

She looked out to where Reese and Stanky played catch. “Do you think so?”

“Even the worst of us recognizes courage,” he promised her solemnly. “Moral courage especially. I have to think they see it. Jackie's a man on trial. He's responding with glory and grace. No one can take their eyes off him.”

Rachel sighed. “He's had himself on trial since the day I met him. No man is harder on himself or gets to himself worse than Jack. But I hope his teammates know they're on trial, too.” She thought about some of the things Jackie had told her, some of the things she'd seen. Some of his teammates treated him well enough, but others — they still couldn't get used to the way the world was changing. She wasn't sure they ever would.

Rickey was digesting her last statement, and now he nodded. “I suppose we all are. You're an astute woman, Mrs. Robinson.”

That made her laugh. “I have to be, Mr. Rickey,” she said with a smile. “I'm married to a man of destiny. I can't let him down.”

He patted her hand in a friendly fashion, and there was a twinkle in his eye when he responded, “If I'd met you first, I wouldn't have looked so long for Jackie.”

Rachel frowned. “How do you mean?”

“If he was good enough for you, he's certainly good enough for the rest of us.”

Rachel ducked her head to acknowledge the compliment, and they sat there companionably watching her Jackie pound ball after ball out across the field.

The next day, Rickey had a far less pleasant conversation.

“Branch, it's Herb,” Phillies general manager Herb Pennock said after Rickey had answered the phone.

“What can I do for you, Herb?” Rickey replied. He could tell from Pennock's tone that he hadn't called just to chat.

“How long have we known each other?” Pennock asked.

Rickey frowned. “Twenty years. Maybe more.”

He heard the other man take a breath. “Then trust me when I say, Brooklyn's due here tomorrow, but you cannot bring that nigger down here with the rest of your team.”

Rickey gritted his teeth at the insult but managed to stay civil. “And why's that, Herb?” he asked. “His name's Jackie Robinson, by the way.”

“We're just not ready for this sort of thing in Philadelphia,” Pennock told him bluntly. “I'm not sure we'll be able to take the field against your team if that boy is in uniform.”

“Herbert,” Rickey replied, “what your team does is your decision. But my team is coming to Philadelphia. With Robinson. If we have to claim the game as a forfeit, we will. That's nine nothing, in case you forgot.” A number like that would do a world of good for the Dodgers, actually, but Rickey didn't want to win that way, and he knew his team would feel the same.

Pennock was clearly getting worked up now. “Branch,” he declared, “you've got a real bee in your bonnet about this thing and I, for one, would like to know what you're trying to prove.”

Rickey didn't answer him directly. Instead, he asked, “Do you think God likes baseball? I do.”

“What does that mean?” Pennock snapped.

Rickey leaned back in his chair and smiled, letting a little iron creep into his voice. “It means you're going to meet God one day, Herb, and when he inquires why Robinson wasn't on the field in Philadelphia and you answer because he was a Negro, it may not be a sufficient reply.”

Then he hung up the phone. But he couldn't shake the feeling that things in Philadelphia were about to get mighty interesting. He hoped the team could handle it.

The trouble started when the team bus pulled up to the Benjamin Franklin Hotel. Parrott hopped off first. “Come on, fellas!” he called over his shoulder. “We have twenty minutes to check in and then get to Shibe! Chop-chop.”

But just as the driver was opening the lower compartment so the players could grab their bags, the hotel manager came bustling out, followed by a pair of security guards.

“Out!” he shouted. “Get that bus out of here!”

“We're the Dodgers,” Parrott told him quickly. “We have a reservation.” He started to pull the confirmation letter from his folder, but the manager waved it off.

“Your team's not welcome,” the man declared. “Not while you have ball club Negroes with you.”

Everyone stopped and stared. “You mean Robinson can't stay here?” Parrott asked.

The manager glared at him. “I mean the entire team is refused!”

Now Parrott looked floored. “We've been staying here ten years.”

“And you can stay away that long!” the manager snapped. Jackie hung his head, hating that his teammates now had to bear the brunt of harassment for him. At least he was used to this.

“Hold on, now,” Shotton said as he climbed down off the bus. “Let's talk about this.”

But the hotel manager jerked his thumb like an umpire. “Get out! Now, Grandpa!”

For the first time, Jackie saw Shotton lose his temper. “Grandpa? Hey, hold on, you!” He made for the manager, but the security guards got between them.

Several of the other players turned, clearly intending to back their coach up — but they stopped short when Walker muttered, “Maybe Forty-Two's got enough friends in town, we can bunk up.”

Jackie turned on the veteran player. “What's that supposed to mean?”

Walker shrugged, though a scowl covered his face. “Nothing. It's just, I know when you can't get into a hotel you got people's houses you can stay at.” Somehow he made it sound like an accusation, like either Jackie felt he was too good to stay in hotels with the rest of them, or else he figured Jackie would take care of himself and leave the rest of the team to rot.

Jackie was tired of this. He closed the distance between them. “What do you want from me, Walker?” he asked.

If anything, the other man's scowl got fiercer. “An apology.”

Jackie shook his head. “For what? Places like this?”

“For turning this season into a sideshow,” Walker snapped. “I'm a ballplayer — I want to play ball!”

“So am I!” Jackie reminded him. “I'm here to win!”

Now Walker was in his face. “How are we gonna win sleeping on the bus?”

“Fellas —” Parrott tried to step in, but Jackie was too angry to listen to him.

“It might do you some good, the way you're swinging the bat lately.”

“Watch your mouth!” Walker jabbed Jackie in the chest with a thick, blunt finger. Jackie batted his hand away.

“Watch your hand!” he shot back.

Walker lunged at him, and Jackie didn't back down an inch. But Reese, Stanky, and the others got between them, pulling them apart. Other players were dragging Shotton away from the hotel manager. Shotton was still shouting, “Grandpa? I'll show you Grandpa!”

Then Parrott loosed a shrill whistle, finally winning everyone's attention. “Fellas! Burt! Please!” he appealed. “Take the bus to the field! Worry about the game. I'll find another hotel.”

They crowded back onto the bus, Branca and the others carefully keeping Jackie and Walker separated. Jackie wondered if his position with the team was getting better — or worse.