American Boy. Larry Watson
others developed a few skills just from playing over the years, but Dr. Dunbar was indisputably the best player. Born and raised in northern Michigan, he attended the University of Michigan on a hockey scholarship, and though he had an opportunity to play junior-league hockey after graduation, by then he had decided on a career in medicine.
Every time he laced up his skates, though, his talent and skill returned, and his superiority to every other player was apparent. He skated backward faster than most of us could move forward, and he handled the puck as dexterously as the rest of us might flip a coin and pass it from hand to hand. On the ice he had agility and grace that would have been astonishing if you only saw him sitting behind his desk in a suit. And if you were lucky enough to be on his team, your game improved instantly. He’d pass the puck to you in such a way that it didn’t even seem as if you had to catch it; it would simply land on your stick at exactly the instant when it had to be there. And with what seemed to be little more than a flick of the wrist, his shots on goal flew from his stick as if the puck were rocket propelled.
One Sunday a few weeks after that Thanksgiving Day when Louisa Lindahl was brought to the doctor’s clinic, we gathered for a game. There was no wind at all, and snow was falling at a rate of over an inch an hour, covering the drifts that had been on the ground since Thanksgiving. The flakes fell straight down like a heavy veil, but Dr. Dunbar was not to be deterred. He and a few other men brought out snow shovels, cleared the ice, and the game was on. A few wives, girlfriends, younger brothers and sisters were on hand as spectators, the snow gathering on their coats and hats faster than they could brush it away. They clapped as much to keep warm as to cheer us on. And Janet and Julia skipped from one side of the ice to the other, shouting encouragement to their father, Johnny, or me, their allegiance dictated by who was closest to the puck.
Johnny and his father played on the same team that afternoon, with the Burrows brothers on the opposite team for the sake of competitive balance. I was on the Burrows’ team, but I didn’t contribute much. My hockey skills were limited to getting up and down the ice in a hurry, so long as I could travel in a straight line.
Our games usually started slowly, as we all adjusted to being on skates and the older players allowed their joints to thaw. That day the heavy snow made all of us even more tentative in our first few trips up and down the ice. Soon, however, we were at full speed, though the pace varied considerably from player to player, and it was interrupted frequently that afternoon in any case, in order to clear the ice of snow.
Shortly after one of those breaks, Johnny was skating up the side of the rink with the puck. I had a clear shot at him, and when I hit him with a shoulder check, he flew off the ice and into a snow pile with a thump. The hit was legal, but the collision was more violent than I expected it to be, perhaps because I caught Johnny completely by surprise, the contact coming before he could do a thing to prepare himself.
But other than having the wind knocked out of him and getting some snow down his collar, Johnny was unhurt, and he waved off my apology. Back on the ice, he skated alongside me, and said with a smile, “I hope that’s just a phase you’re going through.”
It was a private joke. In sixth grade our teacher had been the soft-hearted Miss Dell, and she never scolded her students with anything stronger than that phrase. Johnny and I adopted it as our slogan, and any punch in the arm, failed joke, or clumsy mistake would likely provide an occasion for one of us to recite Miss Dell’s words.
After I slammed into Johnny, however, something in the game changed. Only a couple minutes later, the doctor and I tangled behind the goal—chicken wire stretched between two steel pipes—and while we were scrambling for the puck, he jabbed me hard in the ribs with the butt end of his stick. Only a few minutes later, he hip-checked me so hard he knocked me off my skates. I landed hard and slid into the knees of another player who almost fell on top of me.
I had no doubt that the doctor was singling me out for this treatment, and though it made me mad, there was nothing I could do to get back at him. If I tried to skate into him, he’d spin away and make me miss, perhaps with another check to hurry me on my way.
But anger and adrenaline now fueled my game, and I soon intercepted a pass and broke away with a clear path to the goal. Bent low and moving fast down the center of the rink with the puck out in front of me, I had only the goalie to contend with, the wide-bodied but slow-handed Dennis McMaster.
Then something rapped my ankle. At first I thought I had kicked myself with my own skate as I sprinted down the ice. Another bump came, and this time I knew I hadn’t done it to myself. Then, before I knew exactly what had happened, I was off my skates and sliding along on my chest, the puck wobbling ineffectually out in front of me and my stick trailing off in another direction.
I could do nothing to control the direction or speed of my slide, and I realized too late that I was heading for one of the pipes. My mittened hand and wrist kept my head from taking the full force of the impact, but the blow came hard enough. And just as it did, it occurred to me that it was Dr. Dunbar who had tripped me up.
The doctor skated up quickly, joining Dennis McMaster beside the goal. “You okay, Matt?” Dennis asked.
“Yeah.” The answer was reflexive. I hadn’t had time yet to access my injuries.
I tried to pull myself to my feet, using for support the same pipe I’d banged into. A skate slid out from under me, but before I fell again Johnny was there, his arm under my armpit, steadying and lifting me.
“Doesn’t count,” he said with a smile, “if your head goes into the net. It’s got to be the puck.”
“Head. Puck. I get those mixed up.” I tasted blood, and began to probe carefully with my tongue to determine if I’d lost any teeth. They were all there, but blood filled my mouth and I spit, streaking the snow.
My cheek. I had bit my cheek.
“Goddamn, Matt,” Dennis said, a comment I initially thought was prompted by my bloody expectoration.
Dr. Dunbar dropped his stick, thrust his hand under his arm to pull off his glove, and reached toward me. “Better let me look at that, Matthew.”
I assumed he was referring to the hole in my cheek, but when I opened my mouth and tilted my head a curtain of red fell over one eye.
Either the ice or the steel pipe had opened a gash over my eye, and that was the injury that concerned Dr. Dunbar. I tried to wipe away the blood, but a red fog immediately clouded my vision.
Dr. Dunbar gently pushed my hand out of the way and inspected my injury. His fingers were warm on my forehead. After gently prodding the split skin around my eyebrow, he said, “Let’s go inside, Matthew. We need to take care of that cut.”
As the doctor and I walked off the ice, he made no apologies for having played a part in my fall. But I knew instinctively what he’d done. I’d underestimated how protective he felt toward Johnny, and how far a father would be willing to go in order to seek retribution for an injury to his son.
The people standing around the rink parted to allow the doctor and me to pass. The twins hurried over to check out my injury. Julia turned away at the sight of my blood, while Janet tried to get closer and said, “Ooh, Matt, your eye!”
“He’ll be all right,” said the doctor. “We’ll just take him inside and put a Band-Aid on it.”
It seemed clear that he was minimizing my injury for the sake of his daughters’ peace of mind, but the doctor’s words still calmed me.
Dr. Dunbar and I stopped on the porch to take off our skates. He removed his first, then squatted down to unlace mine, enabling me to tilt my head back and keep the heel of my hand pressed to my eye.
“You wait here, Matt,” Dr. Dunbar said. “I’ll go find a towel or something so we can walk through the house without you bleeding on Mrs. Dunbar’s carpet. And if you feel thirsty, help yourself.” He pointed to a galvanized washtub packed with snow and bottles of Miller High Life and Coca Cola, the after-hockey refreshments he always provided. “But even if you don’t want anything to drink,” he added, “grab a handful