Willie & Me by Dan Gutman Page B

I was the only person who could do it, and I was in the perfect position.
    But what could I do? What could I do to prevent Thomson from hitting that home run? I thought about my options.
    Maybe I could tamper with Thomson’s bat, I thought. But that would be hard to do, and who knows what might happen if I got caught. It might not matter, either. Bobby could just as easily hit the home run with a different bat if he knew what pitch was coming.
    What if I busted the telescope so the Giants couldn’t use it? No, destroying property is wrong. Two wrongs don’t make a right.
    I looked at the clock on Leo Durocher’s wall. It was ten o’clock now. Time was getting short. Soon the players would start to arrive at the ballpark. I was going to have to get out of Durocher’s office.
    I tried to think of another plan. Maybe I could go buy a ticket, sit in the stands, and wait until the moment Branca was about to throw the pitch. Then I could cause a disturbance of some sort to throw off Thomson’s timing. No, with thousands of people in the stands, I might not even be heard.
    I looked at the telescope again. The eyepiece was a separate section from the rest of it. I turned it, and saw that it was loose enough to unscrew. It was simple. A telescope can’t work without an eyepiece. I could just take it off. Then the game would be played fair and square. Sports should be played on an “even playing field,” as they say. Let the better team win, not the team that cheats.
    Unscrewing the eyepiece wasn’t as bad as busting the telescope. It still might be the wrong thing to do, but it wasn’t quite as wrong. And because I was righting a wrong, it actually could be the right thing to do. It was a good solution. And it was an easy solution. At least that’s what I convinced myself. I took off the eyepiece and slipped it into my pocket. Then I got up to leave.
    That’s when the door opened.
    â€œNot so fast!” somebody shouted.

I wheeled around. There were three guys standing in front of me. Two of them were wearing Giants uniforms, with the words NEW YORK stitched across their chests in black with orange trim. The guy in the middle was wearing a fancy suit with wide lapels and the kind of hat guys used to wear in the old days. None of them was smiling. The player on the left was holding a bat.
    â€œWho are you ?” the guy in the suit asked menacingly.
    â€œI . . . I . . . I . . .”
    I backed against the desk, hard. One of the framed photos toppled over. I could tell right away that the guy in the suit was Leo Durocher, the manager of the Giants. He looked older than the two players. I had seen lots of pictures of him. I knew that under that hat he was balding, and he slicked back what hair he had left. It had to be him. I was in his office.

    Leo Durocher

    â€œWhat are you doing here, kid?” Durocher snarled.
    He was the kind of guy who could barely say a sentence without cursing. He looked like a gangster. His blue eyes were fiery. Veins were sticking out on his neck. I felt my heart beating in my chest. I had messed up, again. Why did I always mess up?
    â€œThe d-door wasn’t locked,” I stammered, trying desperately to think of something to say that would get me out of there. “I just opened it. . . .”
    â€œWant me to bust his face, Leo?” asked the guy with the bat.
    â€œI’ll take care of this, Brat,” said Durocher.
    Brat. The guy with the bat had to be Eddie Stanky.The second baseman. His nickname was “the Brat.” I had read about him in a little paperback book I found at Flip’s store one day. Stanky wasn’t a great player, but he was known for doing anything to get on base, including getting hit by the ball. In the field, Stanky would jump around and wave his arms to distract opposing hitters.

    I had seen a book about Stanky in Flip’s store.

    He was a little guy, not much taller than me. But a