this one did have color television screens all around it and
machines that went wheepety-boom softly to themselves.
Boley began to feel at home.
He biinked when they handed his uniform to him, but
he put it on. Back in the Steel & Coal League, he had
sometimes worn uniforms that still bore the faded legend
100 Lbs. Best Fortified Gro-Chick, and whatever an
owner gave you to put on was all right with Boley. Still,
he thought to himself, kilts!
It was the first time in Boley's life that he had ever
worn a skirt. But when he was dressed it didn't look too
bad, he thoughtespecially because all the other players
(it looked like fifty of them, anyway) were wearing the
same thing. There is nothing like seeing the same costume
on everybody in view to make it seem reasonable and
right. Haven't the Paris designers been proving that for
years?
He saw a familiar figure come into the dressing room,
wearing a uniform like his own. "Why, Coach Magill,"
said Boley, turning with his hand outstretched. "I did not
expect to meet you here."
The newcomer frowned, until somebody whispered in
his ear. "Oh," he said, "you're Boleslaw."
"Naturally I'm Boleslaw, and naturally you're my pitch-
ing coach, Magill, and why do you look at me that way
when I've seen you every day for three weeks?"
The man shook his head. "You're thinking of Grand-
daddy Jim," he said, and moved on.
Boley stared after him. Granddaddy Jim? But Coach
Magill was no granddaddy, that was for sure. Why, his
eldest was no more than six years old. Boley put his hand
against the wall to steady himself. It touched something
metal and cold. He glanced at it.
It was a bronze plaque, floor to ceiling high, and it was
embossed at the top with the words World Series Honor
Roll. And it listed every team that had ever won the
World Series, from the day Chicago won the first Series of
all in 1906 untiluntil
Boley said something out loud, and quickly looked
around to see if anybody had heard him. It wasn't some-
thing he wanted people to hear. But it was the right time
for a man to say something like that, because what that
- crazy lump of bronze said, down toward the bottom, with
only empty spaces below, was that the most recent team to
win the World Series was the Yokahama Dodgers, and
the year they won it in was1998.
1998.
A time machine, thought Boley wonderingly, I guess
what he meant was a machine that traveled in time.
Now, if you had been picked up in a time machine that
