Keeping Score (13 page)

Which was less and less often these days. She was busier than ever with homework, as the teachers prepared the class for next year's move up to junior high. One nice surprise: the highest grade in her math class for the percentages unit, which was a breeze after all the hours she had spent calculating batting averages.

But still no word from Jim.

Nothing.

He wasn't getting better.

The letters weren't enough. And it didn't look as though her prayers were helping, either.

On a cold January afternoon, Maggie sat in the green armchair, counting the bills for what was probably the twentieth time.

"What are you gonna do with it?" Joey-Mick asked.

It was her confirmation money, seventeen dollars altogether. Five each from Uncle Pat and Uncle Leo, three from Treecie's parents, and four from the fire-house guys. Treecie had gotten even more, twenty-four dollars—she had more aunts and uncles than Maggie did.

Just as they planned, the girls had taken each other's names. On the day itself they had gone around calling each other by all four names, and "Margaret Olivia Theresa Fortini" was such a mouthful that every time Treecie said it, they both had giggle fits.

Maggie riffled the bills, then restacked them so the George Washingtons were all facing the same way.

Joey-Mick prodded her. "C'mon, you must have some idea."

"I don't know yet," Maggie said.

"I can't believe you don't got a plan," Joey-Mick said. "I had it planned out for
ages
before my confirmation" His voice cracked in midsentence, finishing much lower than it started, as if it wanted to be deep and manly but wasn't quite sure how. That happened often these days. Maggie giggled. Joey-Mick shrugged and couldn't help grinning a little himself.

Joey-Mick had been confirmed just before his thirteenth birthday a year and a half ago. The day after the service, he had taken down the magazine ad on his wall. It had been there for months: a full-page ad for the top-of-the-line Wilson fielder's glove, $19.95. The kind the big-leaguers used. He had folded the page carefully around his wad of bills, and Dad had taken him downtown.

Joey-Mick could have gotten a glove for a lot less. Eight dollars, or twelve—that was what most of the neighborhood boys paid for a glove, those who could afford one. But Joey-Mick knew what he wanted. "They don't let you get confirmed more than once," he had said. "I'm never gonna have this kind of dough again—I need to get me a glove that's gonna last forever."

He had done just that. The glove had seemed clownishly big at first, stiff with newness, but with use and several applications of neat's-foot oil, it mellowed, and Joey-Mick grew to fit it. Now it was like part of his body, on his hand that very moment as he
thunked
a ball into the pocket again and again.

Maggie knew that Treecie had a plan, too. She was saving her money to buy a camera. Treecie was not
happy with her handed-down Brownie; she had her heart set on a Rolleiflex, a fancy German camera. The kind used by the famous photographer Margaret Bourke-White, Treecie's hero.

According to Treecie, Miss Bourke-White had taken photos all over the world, even in combat during World War II. Treecie also told Maggie that a photo taken by Miss Bourke-White had been chosen for the cover of the very first issue of
Life
magazine.

Everyone knew
Life,
of course. Mr. Armstrong brought it in the mail once a week. Treecie's family got
Life,
too; the girls often phoned each other when the magazine arrived, to talk about the interesting pictures.

"All those men photographers out there, and they picked
her
photo," Treecie had gloated.

Maggie didn't know how much a Rolleiflex cost, but she was sure it was a terrifying amount. It would take Treecie a long time to save up enough.

Thunk—thunk—

Joey-Mick, plunking the ball into his glove. And here it was the middle of January, with baseball season too far away to even be thinking about.

Maggie stared at the ball as it went back and forth ceaselessly.
Baseball season ... the Dodgers playing again ... the Giants ... Willie Mays ... Jim ... Jim loves baseball...

"I have an idea," Maggie whispered, so quietly that Joey-Mick didn't hear.

It was a good idea. Maybe even a
great
idea.

Seeing a Giants game would surely make Jim feel
better! She could take him to a game! And why not a game against the Dodgers at Ebbets Field?

Maybe Dad would say yes, because it's for Jim. Especially if I paid for it.

In the top drawer of her bureau, in an old sock—a little-girl sock, with pink lace around the cuff—Maggie had three dollars more. With her confirmation money, that made twenty dollars total. A ticket to a Dodgers game cost around two dollars. Not for box seats closest to the field—those were more expensive—but for seats in the grandstand.

I've got enough to take ten people! Jim, and Mom and Dad and Joey-Mick. And Treecie, of course, and me. That's only six, so I'd have plenty of money left over....

Maggie folded down a corner of the bill on top of the stack, then unfolded it and began rolling the little point between her thumb and forefinger, thinking hard.

But maybe Jim would want his family with him. So his sister would come, too. And she has two kids, and her husband....

It was getting complicated. Maggie took the money up to her bedroom and put it carefully into the old sock. Then she got out her scoring notebook and turned to a blank page at the back.

Seated on her bed, she wrote the word "People" at the top of the page. Then a list:

JIM
Dad, Mom, Joey-Mick
me
Carol (Jim's sister)
Carol's two kids and husband?
Treecie
George?

That was eleven altogether. Maggie doodled a tiny baseball diamond on one corner of the page while she thought.

Tickets alone wouldn't be enough. She would need bus fare for everyone, and it would be nice if she could buy snacks at the game—hot dogs, maybe, or at least peanuts.
Thirty dollars ought to do it. I'd need ten dollars more.

Her allowance was now twenty-five cents a week, which meant twenty cents was left after she put a nickel in the church plate. If she saved every cent—if she didn't spend a single penny on anything—it would take her fifty weeks to save ten dollars.

Fifty weeks was too long.

Okay, so no snacks. If I say just tickets and bus fare, then I wouldn't need thirty—twenty-five dollars would be enough.

Five dollars more. Twenty-five weeks instead of fifty.

She jumped up from the bed and went downstairs to look at the kitchen calendar. It was the third week of January. Maggie counted, flipping the pages. She lost track once and had to start over again. This time she counted out loud.

"Twenty-two, twenty-three, twenty-four..."

In twenty-five weeks it would be the middle of July. She could do it: There would still be plenty of games left in the season.

The calendar hung a little crookedly now. Maggie straightened it, and straightened her shoulders, too. July seemed awfully far away—a long time to have to save every bit of her allowance.

And saving the money would be the easy part.

That Saturday Dad gave Maggie two dimes and a nickel, as usual. The nickel would go into the church offering plate on Sunday. The dimes were for saving. Maggie was glad it was dimes. Of all the coins, they jingled the best.

Maggie took the dollar bills out of the sock and stacked them with her confirmation money. She held the sock's top ribbing wide open. With her other hand she dropped in a dime. She did the same with the second dime, which landed with a sweet clink on its cousin. Then she gave the sock a shake to hear the jingle.

Two thin little dimes. It felt like it would be forever before she had enough.

In the afternoon she passed by Mr. Aldo's shop. Through the window she could see the jars of candy on the counter. Licorice sticks, her favorite.
I could go home and get a dime. Just one, not both of them.

But an instant later she scolded herself:
Margaret Olivia Theresa Fortini, you will not spend that dime.

Maggie was shaken and a little ashamed at how easily she had been tempted to cheat. She decided not to tell anyone about the plan—not Treecie, not Joey-Mick, not Mom. What if she couldn't do it? What if she
told people and then didn't manage to save the money? Then she would have everyone else's disappointment to face on top of her own. No, better to keep it a secret, and that way it would be a surprise, too. As she hurried home, she resolved to try not to walk past Mr. Aldo's or the drugstore if she could help it.

But she did share her plan, just once. With Charky. She told him all about it on one of their walks.

"I can do this, Charks," she said. He barked in complete agreement, and she gave him a big hug.

The baseball season began in mid-April with a two-game series against the Giants in the Polo Grounds. The Dodgers lost the first game and won the second. And the next several weeks were sheer craziness—not just for the Dodgers and Giants. The Phillies and the Cardinals and the Braves were right in there too, all battling for the top spot and so close together that a team could go from first place to fourth in just a few games.

Vin Scully was now Brooklyn's regular radio announcer, which Maggie felt was a personal insult to both her and Red Barber. She missed Red's gentlemanly southern drawl and the familiar expressions she had heard so often: "can of corn" for an easy fly ball, "sittin' in the catbird seat" when the team was playing well. After about a month, Maggie finally gave up hope that Red would ever return, and she even had to admit that while Mr. Scully's broadcasts could never be the same as Red's, he was doing a fine job.

The Dodgers spent two weeks of June in first place,
but in the middle of the month they were overtaken by the Giants. The Bums seemed to play well only in streaks—winning five in a row, then losing the next four, winning four, then losing three. Maggie had begun making a single diagonal line from corner to corner across the entire spread of her scorebook whenever Brooklyn lost. That way, when she wanted to refer to an earlier game, she could see at a glance whether they had won or not. And slashing that line across the pages seemed like a perfect fit for her mood after a loss.

Willie Mays was back with the Giants, and having an unbelievable year—batting well over .300, hitting homers and driving in runs as if he was trying to catch up on the hundreds of games he had missed while in the army. Maggie started a special page in her scoring notebook to keep track of his statistics.

It was great to have Willie playing again ... but it also reminded her that Jim hadn't yet returned to his old job.

Maggie could hardly believe it. She had to say it aloud to herself: "The end of July." And then, "I did it."

All those weeks and weeks turning into months and months, and now, at last, the sock in her drawer held enough dimes. After supper one evening she sat on her bed, held the sock out at arm's length, and gave it a shake. The weight of the dimes stretched the sock out in a very satisfying way, and the jingle sounded nice and crowded.

But Maggie was pleased with herself for only a few moments. She thought about the next part of her plan: It would either go ahead or be stopped dead in its tracks
now.

The family was in the living room, Mom knitting, Dad and Joey-Mick talking about baseball. Maggie walked in carrying the bills in one hand and the sock in the other. She put them down on the coffee table.

"Everybody," she said. Her voice came out high, almost squeaky. She cleared her throat. "I got something I want to ask."

Mom kept the knitting needles in her hands, but she lowered them to her lap. Joey-Mick stopped
thunking
the ball into his glove. Already they seemed to sense that what she had to say was important.

"This"—she pointed to the neat stack of bills—"is twenty dollars. And this—" She picked up the sock, turned it upside-down, and poured out the dimes. They made a silvery sound as they exited the sock. "This is five dollars in dimes. Twenty-five dollars altogether."

She looked right at Dad. Her next words came out in a steady stream, but not too fast—she wanted to be sure he heard every word. "I want to go to Ebbets Field to see a game, August fourteenth, Dodgers against the Giants, and I want to take the whole family plus some other people. Grandstand tickets are a dollar seventy each and I have enough here for the tickets
and
for bus fare for everybody, and I especially want to take Jim, because he loves baseball and he loves the Giants and maybe seeing a game will help him get better."

Maggie heard Joey-Mick's breath quicken. She
couldn't tell what Mom was thinking; her face didn't change one bit. But what they thought didn't matter.

Only one person mattered.

Dad spread his hands out in front of him. "Maggie-o, it's not the money," he said. "It's never been the money that's the problem."

Maggie was ready for that. "I know. But I had to think of—of some way to show you how much I want this." She clasped her hands and leaned forward a little. "Dad. Most of that is my confirmation money. From
January.
I didn't spend hardly any of it
this whole time.
And I been saving my allowance since then too. I never bought a single Hershey bar or gum—or anything—and the only thing I spent money on was the ice cream soda I got Joey-Mick on his birthday."

Silence.

"I saved enough for Jim's sister and her family, too. If they want to come.
And
George, in case you want another fireman to be there. You know, to make it safer."

More silence, Dad's face as unreadable as Mom's.

"Dad, I didn't do this for my own self. I mean, I always wanted to go to a game, but I—I know what you think about it, and I'd never be asking if it weren't for Jim. He's the reason I want to go. Well, the main reason anyway."