94 Days to Opening Day 2008

Opening Day 2008 for the Timber Rattlers is April 3. That is 94 days from today. This off-season, the countdown will be based on books. Each day between now and Opening Day 2008, I will pick a random book out of my library and excerpt a passage off the page number corresponding with the number of days remaining to the first pitch of the new season. I will try not to repeat a book during the countdown.

Today’s excerpt is from Welcome, Chaos by Kate Wilhelm.

August Ranier had come and gone and Lasater had been stripped of his army with a single word spoken very quietly. “Do I continue?” he had asked.

“No.”

Ranier had handed Milton Follett and Lasater their termination checks – they had been hired as consultants – and he had left in his dawn gray Seville.

“Let’s get out of here,” Follett said.

“Aren’t you willing to wait to pick up your bug up in the house?”

“Yeah. I’m driving the camper up there. That little baby cost me sixty-three bucks. Let’s go.”

“Milt, hold it a minute. Listen, I know that old man’s alive and well somewhere and the kid’s going home to him one of these days. I know it just like I know the back of my hand. Now that Forbisher’s out of it, we could double the price when we get the stuff. You and I, Milt, just the two of us. A million, two million…”

Milt turned the key and jerked the camper away from its parking spot. He did not even bother to look at Lasater.

“Milt!” Lasater said softly. “Remember Karen?”

The camper shuddered to a stop and Milton Follett started up from behind the driver’s seat. His hands were clenched.

“Would you like another Karen?” Lasater asked, whispering the words.

Put today’s excerpt in a baseball context.