Free Murder at Ebbets Field by Troy Soos Page B

move, hitting the glove twice with his right fist. It was the sign for a squeeze play.
    It didn’t make sense—we needed six runs, not one. I should be swinging away. Then I realized: McGraw figures the game is lost, so he wants to cost Sutherland his shutout and salvage some kind of victory. Well, it doesn’t matter what makes sense; all that counts is that McGraw wants me to lay down a bunt, so that’s what I have to do.
    And I did. On Sutherland’s first pitch, Merkle broke for the plate and I laid a perfect bunt up the first base line. I beat out the throw for a single and an RBI. And from the stands came a deafening roar of boos that could be heard in Hoboken. The Dodger fans had wanted Sutherland to get the shutout, and I became the most hated man in Flatbush.
    I took only a token lead off first base. No way was I going to try to steal a base now. I wouldn’t get out of the ballpark alive if I did.
    When Jeff Tesreau got up to the plate, Sutherland went into his stretch. Then he whirled and caught me by surprise with a pickoff throw—not to the base but at my head. I ducked and it grazed my shoulder as it flew into foul territory.
    I was too stunned to take off for second base right away. I recovered and started running but too late. Casey Stengel fielded the overthrow and threw me out at second base to end the game.
    Sloppy Sutherland didn’t trot off the field with the out. He stayed on the mound and followed me with his eyes as I ran to the Giants’ dugout. The look in his eyes told me that he hadn’t settled with me yet.
    The marble rotunda of Ebbets Field was known for two things: its ornate design and the bottleneck it created for fans entering or leaving the ballpark. To avoid encountering any of them, I kept Landfors waiting there for almost an hour before meeting him.
    He was standing in the center of the round floor, staring up at a huge chandelier that hung from the domed ceiling. The room was about 80 feet across, with a dozen ticket windows and turnstiles around it in a semicircle. The floor was tiled in white, with some red tiles laid in to look like the stitches of a baseball. The light fixture Landfors was admiring was ringed by oversized baseball bats, each supporting a baseball-shaped globe.
    “Sorry I took so long,” I said.
    “Quite all right,” he answered, and it sounded like he meant it. Maybe a day at the ballpark had done his disposition some good.
    “How’d you like the game?”
    “It wasn’t bad, really. As a matter of fact, once I started pulling for the Dodgers, it was almost enjoyable. They really beat you bad.”
    I shot him a look. He comes to see me at ballgame and then roots against me? Well, I had to give him some credit—at least he didn’t root for the umpires.
    Landfors wanted to find a saloon near Ebbets Field where we could sit down and talk. I didn’t want to risk going into a Brooklyn bar. I might be recognized as the guy who cost Sloppy Sutherland his shutout, and Landfors wouldn’t be much help in a barroom brawl. I did agree on a bar, though. I could use a postgame beer, and Landfors was easier to be around after a few brews.
    I wasn’t going to feel comfortable until we crossed the East River back into civilization, so we left the park and hopped a trolley to Manhattan.
    As we stood on the packed trolley, grasping onto leather straps, Landfors filled me in on the autopsy results. We talked into each other’s ears, not to be secretive but because we were pressed so close together.
    “It’s official,” Landfors said. “Florence Hampton drowned. Period. No evidence of foul play.”
    From past experience, I knew that “official” doesn’t necessarily mean correct. “Do you think the report is right?”
    Landfors thought a minute. “There doesn’t seem to be anything to indicate that her death is anything but an accidental drowning. Some abrasions on the skin, but that’s from the sand scraping her when she was washed up on the shore. No