The Fourth Hand

Doris might have informed me! Wallingford was thinking, but when he looked at Doris, her face was hidden in the hood. It was only by the ferocity of her grip on his hand that he knew for certain she'd accepted him. To Patrick's astonishment, they all had.

There was a moment of silence before the game, which Wallingford assumed was for the 217 dead on EgyptAir 990, but he hadn't been paying attention. The moment of silence was for Walter Payton, who'd died of complications from liver disease at the age of forty-five. Payton had run for the most yards in NFL history.

The temperature was forty-five degrees at kickoff. The night sky was clear. The wind was from the west at seventeen miles per hour, with gusts to thirty. Maybe it was the gusts that got to Favre. In the first half, he threw two interceptions; by the end of the game, he'd thrown four. "I told you he'd be trying too hard," Doris would say four times, all the while hiding under her hood.

During the pregame introductions, the crowd at Lambeau had cheered the Packers' former coach, Mike Holmgren. Favre and Holmgren had embraced on the field. (Even Patrick Wallingford had noticed that Lambeau Field was located at the intersection of Mike Holmgren Way and Vince Lombardi Avenue.)

Holmgren had come home prepared. In addition to the interceptions, Favre lost two fumbles. There were even some boos--a rarity at Lambeau.

"Green Bay fans don't usually boo," Donny Clausen said, making it clear that he didn't boo. Donny leaned close to Patrick; his yellow-and-green face added an extra dementia to his already demented reputation as an eagle-killer. "We all want Doris to be happy," he whispered menacingly in Wallingford's ear, which was warm under Otto's old hat.

"So do I," Patrick told him.

But what if Otto had killed himself because he couldn't make Mrs. Clausen happy? What if she'd driven him to do it, had even suggested it in some way? Was it just a case of the bridal jitters that gave Wallingford these terrible thoughts? There was no question that Doris Clausen could drive Patrick Wallingford to kill himself if he ever disappointed her.

Patrick wrapped his right arm around Doris's small shoulders, pulling her closer to him; with his right hand, he eased the hood of her parka slightly away from her face. He meant only to kiss her cheek, but she turned and kissed him on the lips. He could feel the tears on her cold face before she hid herself in the hood again.

Favre was pulled from the game, in favor of backup quarterback Matt Hasselbeck, with a little more than six minutes remaining in the fourth quarter. Mrs. Clausen faced Wallingford and said, "We're leaving. I'm not staying to watch the rookie."

Some of the Clausens grumbled at their going, but the grumbles were good-natured; even Donny's crazily painted face revealed a smile.

Doris led Patrick by his right hand. They climbed back up to the press box again; someone a little overfriendly let them in. He was a young-looking guy with an athletic build--sturdy enough to be one of the players, or a former player. Doris paid no attention to him, other than to point back in the young man's direction after she and Wallingford had left him standing at the side door to the press box. They were almost at the elevator when Mrs. Clausen asked, "Did you see that guy?"

"Yes," Patrick said. The young man was still smiling at them in his overfriendly fashion, although Mrs. Clausen had not once turned to look at him herself.

"Well, that's the guy I shouldn't have slept with," Doris told Wallingford. "Now you know everything about me."

The elevator was packed with sportswriters, mostly guys. The sports hacks always left the game a little early, to assure themselves of prime spots at the postgame press conference. Most of them knew Mrs. Clausen; although she worked principally in sales, Doris was often the one who issued the press passes. The hacks instantly made room for her. She'd pulled the hood back on her parka because it was warm and close in the elevator.

The sportswriters were spouting stats and cliches about the game. "Costly fumbles ... Holmgren has Favre's number ... Dotson getting thrown out didn't help ... only the second Green Bay loss in the last thirty-six games at Lambeau ... the fewest points the Packers have scored in a game since that twenty-one-to-six loss in Dallas in '96 ..."

"So what did that game matter?" Mrs. Clausen asked. "That was the year we won the Super Bowl!"

"Are you coming to the press conference, Doris?" one of the hacks asked.

"Not tonight," she said. "I've got a date."

The sportswriters ooohed and aaahed; someone whistled. With his missing hand hidden in the sleeve of his topcoat, and still wearing Otto Clausen's hat, Patrick Wallingford felt confident that he was unrecognizable. But old Stubby Farrell, the ancient sports hack from the all-news network, recognized him.

"Hey, lion guy!" Stubby said. Wallingford nodded, at last taking off Otto's hat. "Did you get the ax or what?"

Suddenly it was quiet; all the sportswriters wanted to know. Mrs. Clausen squeezed his hand again, and Patrick repeated what he'd told the Clausen family. "I just didn't want to miss the game."

The hacks loved the line, Stubby especially, although Wallingford wasn't able to duck the question.

"Was it Wharton, that fuck?" Stubby Farrell asked.

"It was Mary Shanahan," Wallingford told Stubby, thus telling them all. "She wanted my job." Mrs. Clausen was smiling at him; she let him know that she knew what Mary had really wanted.

Wallingford was thinking that he might hear one of them (maybe Stubby) say that he was a good guy or a nice guy, or a good journalist, but all he caught of their conversation was more sports talk and the familiar nicknames that would follow him to his grave.

Then the elevator opened and the sports hacks trotted around the side of the stadium; they had to go out in the cold to get to either the home-team or the visiting-team locker rooms. Doris led Patrick out from under the stadium pillars and into the parking lot. The temperature had fallen, but the cold air felt good on Wallingford's bare head and ears as he walked to the car holding Mrs. Clausen's hand. The temperature might have been in the thirties, near freezing, but probably it was just the wind that made it fee

l that cold.

Doris turned the car radio on; from her comments, Patrick wondered why she wanted to hear the end of the game. The seven turnovers were the most by the Packers since they had committed seven against the Atlanta Falcons eleven years before. "Even Levens fumbled," Mrs. Clausen said in disbelief. "And Freeman--what did he catch? Maybe two passes all night. He might have got all of ten yards!"

Matt Hasselbeck, the Packers' rookie quarterback, completed his first NFL pass--he finished 2-of-6 for 32 yards. "Wow!" shouted Mrs. Clausen, derisively. "Holy cow!" The final score was Seattle 27, Green Bay 7.