“Hey, Fidel,” said Rose, “I hear Lou Gehrig’s in there taking batting practice. If you can move your fat Cuban ass outta there, you can pitch to him today. Wouldn’t that be something, striking out Gehrig?”

There was a rustle from the back of the bus, and then Castro’s head appeared out the top half of one cracked window. “Gehrig? Is this true?”

“Swear to god, Fidel. Swear to god. The Iron Horse himself. And in his prime.”

Fidel looked at Comiskey, who simply nodded. It was true. And so, a few minutes later the President for Life and the Black Sox owner walked side by side toward the clubhouse through the dusty parking lot. Castro’s expensive Italian shoes left a perfect outline in the dust, aimed toward the ballpark and a chance to pitch to the Iron Horse. And next to them, filling in quickly even in the lightest of breezes, were other prints, narrower prints, almost round ones, like hoofprints with a sharp indentation.

Above, in the stands, Connie Mack watched them open the clubhouse door and walk through. He sighed. So, he thought, it was time.

He looked out across the field, seeing stately old Shibe Park with its double-decked stands out in left field and the deep, deep center field and the long high wall in right. Bobo Newsome was throwing batting practice pitches to Stan Musial. Walter Johnson was warming up in the home-team bullpen. Roberto Clemente had just arrived and was trotting out to join Ted Williams in the outfield.

Mack looked up. The dark clouds still swirled by, but he knew the rain would hold off for as long as he needed to get the game in. Otherwise, the setting was perfect.

There was a long, low rumble of thunder, and Mack looked down to see Charlie Comiskey, fat and grunting and sweating, climbing the concrete steps toward him. No, Mack saw. Comiskey was heading for the Babe. By the time Mack got back to the box-littered with peanut shells and hot-dog wrappers— Comiskey had peeled off his woolen jacket and was sitting next to the Babe, laughing and wheezing away.

Mack took a seat behind them.

“Why, Cornelius McGillicuddy, as I live and breathe!” Comiskey said, with mock good cheer. “The Babe tells me you won’t let him manage your team.”

“And you won’t allow him to manage yours, either, will you Charles?” Mack replied.

“Well,” Comiskey drew out the word tantalizingly. “I don’t exactly know about that. You do well on the field, Babe, get the rest of my men to look up to you, maybe I’ll step aside and let you take over as manager.”

Mack gave his rival a wintry smile. “But not for today’s game.”

Comiskey scowled and squinted at Mack. “No, that’s right. I’ve got to be manager for today. That’s in the agreement we signed.” Then he added, almost growling, “In blood.”

“That,” said Mack, “was your idea, Charles. Not mine.”

“I did all the playin’ I intend to do,” Ruth said, looking around for more hot dogs. “There’s nothing left for me to do on a ball field that I ain’t already done. But they never let me manage a club. I coulda’ been a good manager. You know, if things had worked out better in ‘35. . .”

Comiskey reached into the jacket he had tossed over the back of the empty seat next to him and pulled out a hot dog. It looked cold and soggy, flecked with lint here and there, but the Babe took it and munched away hungrily.

“Don’t they have any more beer around here?” he asked, through a mouthful of hot dog.

“Down in the visitors’ clubhouse,” Comiskey answered quickly. “We brought barrels of beer. Good stuff, too.”

“Well, then,” said the Babe, putting his hands on the rail in front of his seat to help pull his bulk up and out of the tight fit of the chair.

“George. Here,” said Mack, miraculously producing another bottle of Knickerbocker and handing it to Ruth.

“Why, thanks, Mr. Mack, thanks very much,” said the Babe, taking a long swig and then turning away from both managers to look at the field.

“Say, look at those guys coming out of the visitors’ dugout,” he said suddenly, pointing with the brown bottle of Knickerbocker toward the first-base line.

“Say!” he said, again, excited, rising from his seat. “Why, that’s Ty Cobb, and poor old Joe Jackson, and Why, there’s a whole team full of ‘em. Look at that.” And he slumped back into his seat, stunned by what he was seeing.

“Why, I guess you two are going to have a game today, aren’t ya. And it’s gonna be a helluva game, too, I can tell you that. A hell of game. That’s some of the best fellows out there that has ever played hardball. I mean it, the best.”

“Yes, George,” said Mack, kindly. “Yes, it is going to be a very fine game, played by some of the best the game has ever produced.”

“And my team is going to win it, McGillicuddy,” snarled Comiskey. “You can bet on it.” And he chuckled. “As if you’d ever bet on anything.”

Mack just looked at Comiskey, shook his head slightly, then turned to speak to Ruth.

“George, you just relax here for now, all right?” and he handed the Babe a few more hot dogs and another beer. “Enjoy the game. And if you ever decide you’d like to play, for one team or the other, you just let us know, all right?”

“Sure, Mr. Mack. Sure. I’ll let the two of you know, right away,” said the Babe. “But y’know, I’m not sure this is enough beer,” and he turned to face the two men to request a bit more, figuring one of them would come through, for sure.

But they were gone. Both of them. And when the Babe turned back to look at the field, Sandy Koufax was warming up on the mound, Pete Rose was at the plate, leading off, and the game was about to begin.

It was a battle, right from the outset. Koufax was blazing fast, and his curve looked as if it was dropping off a table. But Ty Cobb chopped one of those curves into the dirt along the third-base line and beat it out for a single. Then Rogers Hornsby slapped a Texas Leaguer that dropped between Gehrig, Geh ringer, and Aaron for a double while Cobb raced home with the first run. Koufax then fanned Ducky Medwick and Bill Terry, to end the inning with Hornsby stranded on second.

As the players trooped in from the dugout, Gehrig saw the Babe sitting alone and forlorn in the box seat. He waved to his old teammate, then ducked into the shadow of the dugout and sat next to Connie Mack.

“What’s this all about, Mr. Mack?” he asked, as he sat next to the frail-looking old man.

“What do you mean, Louis?”

Phil Rizzuto led off for Mack’s team. Carl Mays scowled at the diminutive shortstop, then threw a wicked underhand fastball at the Scooter’s head. Rizzuto hit the dirt as Bill Klem calmly called ball one.

“This game, the guys here.” Gehrig’s handsome face was truly troubled. “I mean, I died, Mr. Mack. There was a lot of pain, and I was in the hospital, and my wife was crying and . . . all of a sudden, I’m here.”

“I died, too, Louis,” said Mack, as Rizzuto danced away from another fastball aimed at his ear. “Everyone dies.”

Gehrig stared at him. “Then. . . where are we?”

Mack smiled gently. “That all depends, Louis. It all depends on this game. And that big fellow sitting up there in the stands.”

“The Babe?”

Mack nodded as Rizzuto slapped weakly at a curve and popped it toward Eddie Stanky at second base. The Scooter trudged halfway down the base path, then turned toward the dugout, looking glad to be out of range of Mays’ bean balls Gehrig scanned the infield. “Wait a minute, where’s Hornsby? Who’s that little fellow out at second?”

Connie Mack sighed unhappily. “The other team has a certain amount of flexibility in the rules,” he said.

“They can take players in and out of the lineup whenever they want to?”

With an even deeper sigh, Mack admitted, “That was just one of the provisions that Mr. Comiskey insisted upon, Louis. There are others changes, too. Now and again you’ll see them playing on an artificial surface, a kind of fake grass. It helps the singles hitters immensely. You’ll see their Rose fellow take special advantage of that, I suspect. And if this threatening weather actually turns to rain, they’ll play indoors, in a ballpark with a roof over it.”

Gehrig gaped at the thought.

“And they even have what they call a designated hitter, Louis, a fellow who just steps up to the plate and hits for the pitcher. He never has to play any defense.”

“Free substitution?” Gehrig shook his head in surprise. “Fake grass? A roof, for God’s sake? Full-time hitters? That just doesn’t seem like baseball to me, Mr. Mack.”

“There are a lot of us who feel that way, Louis, but those are today’s rules.”

“And we can’t get our own roof, or use a permanent hitter if we want?”