Free Irish Coffee by Ralph McInerny

emerged as a warm and sentimental woman. No doubt Mary’s enigmatic actions had jarred with what lay behind this shrine of a house, and it was that, her husband’s memory, that was the true measure of her indignation.
    They moved back through the rooms and Stewart thanked her for her time.
    â€œWould you like me to call Mary and tell her you’re coming?”
    â€œNo. I want to stop by a friend’s apartment on the way. Philip Knight.”
    Mrs. Shuster stepped back, her hands lifting in delighted surprise.
    â€œYou know Philip Knight?”
    â€œAnd Roger.”
    â€œWhy didn’t you say so, for heaven’s sake? They are both dear friends of mine.”
    â€œI will give them your regards.”

7
    SOUTH BEND IS RINGED WITH motels, with the greatest concentration to the north and east, particularly the east, where the area around the mall is dotted with motels, inns, and hotels. Their number was explained by the influx of fans for home games, hardly a sufficient basis for yearlong profit, but somehow the number of guests through the year made it a paying proposition. There were condominium apartments as well, which waited empty for the return of alumni and benefactors of the university. The cable company for which Naomi McTear worked had several such apartments and it was in one of these that she was staying. Indeed, her presence for Fred’s funeral was explained by the fact that she had been assigned to a Lady Irish home game.
    â€œLady Irish?” Like most successful women she took a dim view of women, and sometimes she thought that it was only former coaches who took women athletes seriously. Heresy, of course, never to be voiced aloud or indicated in tone or manner. Gender equality was a demanding game, most of whose rules were written ad hoc, and it was dangerously easy to overstep some invisible line and be declared a traitor to her sex.
    Naomi’s interest in sports was entirely theoretical, a matter of knowledge rather than practice. She was an only daughter whose older brother, George, had excelled at every sport he had undertaken. George was now in his forties and paying the belated price for having being banged around on the gridiron in college and the pros. He was wracked with arthritis, had two new knees, moved with great deliberateness using a cane and, finding the pain-control pills inadequate, had sought solace in drink. From time to time he was interviewed and the results now were invariably embarrassing. Her brother Tom was another story entirely, one of the voices of the Chicago Cubs as well as the Bulls. It was Tom on whom she had modeled her life. He was inept at sports but his head was filled with lore that was ever at his fingertips, a great asset in his trade. If George could do it, Tom knew it, and George had always deferred to his young brother in the matter of sports statistics. Knowledge is power. Naomi had vowed to become a female version of Tom.
    And she had. She had written sports in college, had devoted more time to absorbing histories of sports, first the major ones, then all the others. By the time she graduated, she was a walking encyclopedia. When she met Fred Neville it was like attracting like. The first time she sat in on one of his postgame performances with the media she recognized a kindred spirit. She asked a question about pre-Rockne football and he rattled off the answer and looked at her with renewed interest. After the news conference she asked him to dinner.
    â€œI have an expense account,” she explained. “Besides I want to know you better.”
    Directness is the best direction to take with men, as long as it is done in a matter-of-fact, nonthreatening way. Fred accepted, he suggested the Carriage House and as they drove, she was sure he had lost the way. But suddenly, in the middle of nowhere was this excellent restaurant.
    â€œI don’t suppose you drink,” she said.
    â€œDon’t you?”
    â€œThat