Free City Living by Will McIntosh Page B

He snapped his fingers. “Dang it.”
    “Due to the emergency.” The newspaper seller pointed at the stadium. “They set up a sixteen-point event instead.”
    Willard and me looked at each other and shrugged.
    “What’s a sixteen-point event?” Willard asked.
    The newspaperman frowned at us, then noticed the steel bracelets we were wearing. “Oh. Never mind. City business.”
    “I wouldn’t mind seeing a sixteen-point event,” I said.
    The newspaperman laughed. “Trust me, you don’t. Anyway, they won’t admit you.” He gestured at the bracelet.
    I looked down at the danged bracelet, then at the gate into Yankee Stadium. “I’ll take one of them newspapers, if you don’t mind.” I pulled a nickel out of my pocket. Then I moved Willard out of range of the newspaper seller’s ears. “I’m gonna see what’s going on in there.”
    “Now why would you want to go and do that? The man just said you’d be sorry if you did.”
    “Never mind.” I clapped him on the shoulder. “I’ll be back in no time.”
    I put the newspaper over my hand to hide my wrist and stepped into line. There was no admission, we just waltzed right in, no tickets or nothing. I wanted a seat up high so I could see everything. Even if there wasn’t gonna be a ballgame, I was still at Yankee Stadium.
    It sure seemed like a game was about to get started—boys were climbing up and down the rows selling hot dogs and sodas from steel boxes strapped around their necks, and music was piping from loudspeakers set all around. “You Oughta Be in Pictures” was giving way to “Moonglow” as I grabbed the railing and headed up.
    I picked a row, scooted sideways past people already sitting, my feet crunching peanut shells on the floor. The whole place smelled like old hot dogs. I hiked up my trousers and took a seat, wondering what this was all about.
    There was a commotion twenty rows below. People were standing and pointing, grabbing their friends by the shoulder. I bent left and right, trying to get a look, and then I saw what the commotion was about, and I plopped down in my seat, my mouth hanging wide open.
    There was no mistaking the man making his way up the stairs. It was the old Bambino himself, now the Yankees’ manager. Babe Ruth was dressed in his pinstripes, smiling and waving, a bigger man than I’d’ve guessed from the pictures I’d seen, with skinny legs but a big middle. Two men in dark suits were with him, and as they made their way up to my level one of them gestured for the Babe to sit, just one row in front of me and a mite to my left.
    “I guess this spot is as good as any,” Babe said. “Seems like I shouldn’t have to come to one of these things. I do enough for this city.” The Babe looked uneasy; there was sweat in his eyebrows, and that bulldog face of his was twitching. Now that I thought about it, a good helping of the crowd looked nervous.
    One of his companions leaned his head close to the Babe’s. “If it wasn’t at the stadium I could’ve gotten you out of it, but for something held here, in place of a game, it would’ve looked bad.”
    The music went out and everyone got real quiet. Babe looked at the man beside him and whispered, “I sure hope your hunch about picking a random seat is right.”
    Now I spotted the New York Yankees ballplayers. They were sitting in the front row along the first-base line, all in a neat line in their crisp white uniforms.
    “Here it comes,” someone said.
    “What?” I asked, looking around. Everyone was looking at the field. I squinted; the dirt between the pitcher’s mound and second base was swirling like there was a little tornado on the field. A dark hole opened up, right there in the field. I stood, wanting to see better.
    “Sit down, you idiot!” someone shouted. “You want to draw its attention this way?”
    I sat. Draw its attention? I shook my head. I was confused as could be, and didn’t want to draw too much attention to my own self. I