A HIGH board fence enclosed the grounds of the Ellerton Baseball
Association; over one side rose the rude scaffolding of a grandstand,
protected from sun and rain by a covering of tarred planks; a circular
opening by a narrow entrance framed the ticket seller; while around the
base of the fence, located convenient to a small boy's eye, ran a
girdle of unnatural knotholes, highly improved cracks, through which an
occasional fleeting form might be observed, a segment of torn sod, and
the fence opposite.
A shallow flood of spectators, drawn from the various quarters of the
town, converged in a dense stream at the entrance to the Grounds;
troops of girls with brightly-hued ribbands about their vivacious arms,
boisterous or superior squads of young males, alternated with their more
sober elders--shabby and dejected men, out at elbows and work, in search
of the respite of the sun and the play; baseball enthusiasts, rotund
individuals with ruddy countenances, saturnine experts with scorecards.
Anthony observed the throng indifferently as he drew near the scene of
his repeated, past triumphs, the metal plates in his shoes grinding into
the pavement. A small procession followed him, led by a colored youth,
to whose dilapidated garments clung the unmistakable straws and aroma of
the stable, bearing aloft Anthony's glove, and “softing” it vigorously
from a natural source; a boy as round and succulent as a boiled pudding,
with Anthony's cap beneath his arm, leaving behind him a trail of peanut
shells, brought up the rear of this democratic escort.
There was little question in Anthony's mind of his ability to triumph
that afternoon over his opponents from a near-by town; their “battery,”
he told himself, was an open book to him--a slow, dropping ball here, a
speedy one across the fingers of that red-haired fielder who habitually
flinched... and yet he wished that it had not been so hot. He thought
of the game without particular pleasure; he was conscious of a lack of
energy; his thoughts, occupied with Elli's patent contempt, stung him
waspishly.
A throng of players and hangerson filled the contracted dressing
quarters beneath the grandstand, and he was instantly surrounded by
vociferous familiars. The captain of the Ellerton team drew him aside,
and tersely outlined a policy of play, awaiting his opinion. Anthony
nodded gravely: suddenly he found the other's earnestness a little
absurd--the fate of a nation appeared to color his accents, to hang upon
the result of his decision. “Sure,” he said absently, “keep the field
in; they won't hit me.”
The other regarded him with a slight frown. “Hate yourself to-day, don't
you?” he remarked. “Lay that crowd cold on the plate, though,” he added;
“there's a man here from the major league to look you over. Hinkle told
my old man.”
A quickening of interest took possession of Anthony; they had heard of
him then in the cities, they had discovered him worthy of the journey to
Ellerton, of investigation. A vision of his name acclaimed from coast to
coast, his picture in the playing garb of a famous organization filling
the Sunday sheets, occupied his mind as he turned toward the field. The
captain called mysteriously, “Don't get patted up with any purple stuff
handed you before the game.”
The opposing team, widely scattered, were warming; a pitcher, assuming
the attitudes of an agonising cramp, was indulging in a preliminary
practice; the ball sped with a dull, regular thud into the catcher's
mit. A ball was tossed to Anthony, a team mate backed against the fence,
and, raising his hands on high, he apparently overcame all the natural
laws of flight. He was conscious of Hinkle, prosperous proprietor of the
Ellerton Pool Parlor, at his back with a stranger, an ungainly man,
close lipped, keen of vision. There were intimations of approval. “A
fine wing,” the stranger said. “He's got 'em all,” Hinkle declared.
“Hundreds of lads can pitch a good game,” the other told him, “now and
again, they are amatoors. One in a thousand, in ten thousand, can play
ball all the time; they're professionals; they're worth money... I want
to see him act...” they moved away.
The players were called in from the field, the captains bent over a
tossed coin; and, first to bat, the Ellerton team ranged itself on
benches. Then, as the catcher was drawing on his mask, Hinkle and
another familiar town figure, who dedicated his days to speeding weedy
horses in red flannel anklets from a precarious wire vehicle, stepped
forward from the grandstand. “Mr. Anthony Ball!” Hinkle called. A
sudden, tense silence enveloped the spectators, the players stopped
curiously. Anthony turned with mingled reluctance and surprise.
Something shone in Hinkle's hand: he saw that it was a watch. “As a
testimonial from your Ellerton friends,” the other commenced loudly.
Anthony's confused mind lost part of the short oration which followed
“... recognition of your sportsmanship and skill... happy disposition.
The good fame of the Ellerton Baseball team... predict great future on
the national diamond.”
A storm of applause from the grandstand rippled away in opposite
directions along the line sitting by the fence; boys with their mouths
full of fingers whistled incredibly. Hinkle held out the watch, but
Anthony's eyes were fixed upon the ground. He shook the substantial mark
of Ellerton's approval, so that the ornate fob glittered in the sun,
but Anthony's arms remained motionless at his sides. “Take it, you
leatherkop,” a voice whispered fiercely in his ear. 'And with a start,
he awkwardly grasped the gift. “Thank you,” he muttered, his voice
inaudible five yards away. He wished with passionate resentment that the
fiend who was yelling “speech!” would drop dead. He glanced up, and the
sight of all those excited, kindly faces deepened his confusion until
it rose in a lump in his throat, blurred his vision, in an idiotic,
childish manner. “Ah, _call_ the game, can't you,” he urged over his
shoulder.
The first half inning was soon over, without incident; and, as Anthony
walked to the pitcher's “box,” the necessity to surpass all previous
efforts was impressed upon him by the watch, by the presence of that
spectator from a major league who had come to see him “act.” He wished
again, in a passing irritation, that it had not been so hot. Behind the
batter he could see the countenance of “Kag” Lippit staring through the
wires of his mask. “Kag” executed a cabalistic signal with his left arm,
and Anthony pitched. The umpire hoarsely informed the world at large
that it had been a strike. A blast of derisive catcalls arose from the
Ellerton partisans; another strike, shriller catcalls, and the batter
retired after a third ineffectual lunge amid a tempest of banter.
The second batter hit a feeble fly negligently attached by the third
baseman, who “put it over to first” in the exuberance of his contempt.
The third Anthony disposed of with equal brevity.
He next faced the pitcher, and, succumbing to the pressure of
extraordinary events, he swung the bat with a tremendous effort, and the
flattened ball described a wide arc into the ready palms of the right
fielder. “You're _Out!_” the umpire vociferated. The uncritical portion
of the spectators voiced their pleasure in the homeric length of the
hit, but the captain was contemptuously cold as Anthony returned to the
bench. “The highschool hero,” he remarked; “little Willie the Wallop. If
you don't bat to the game,” he added in a different tone, “if you were
Eddie Plank I'd bench you.”
That inning the Ellerton team scored a run: a youth hurtling headlong
through the dust pressed his cheek affectionately upon the dingy square
of marble dignified by the title of home, while a second hammered him
violently in the groin with the ball; one chorus shrieked, “out by
a block!” another, “safe! safe!” he was “safe as safe!” the girls
declared. The umpire's voice rose authoritatively above the tumult.
“Play ball! he's safe!”
Anthony pitched that inning faultlessly; never had ball obeyed him so
absolutely; it dropped, swung to the right, to the left, revolved or
sped dead. The batters faded away like ice cream at a church supper. As
he came in from the “box” the close-lipped stranger strode forward and
grasped his shoulder. “I want to see you after the game,” he declared;
“don't sign up with no one else. I'm from--” he whispered his persuasive
source in Anthony's ear. The captain commended him pithily. “He's got
'em all,” Hinkle proclaimed to the assembled throng.
When Anthony batted next it was with calculated nicety; he drove the
ball between shortstop and second base, and, by dint of hard running,
achieved a rapturously acclaimed “two bagger.” The captain then merely
tapped the ball--breathlessly it was described as a “sacrifice”--and
Anthony moved to the third base, and a succeeding hit sent him “home.”
Another run was added to the Ellerton score, it now stood three to
nothing in their favor, before Anthony returned to the dusty depression
from which he pitched.
He was suddenly and unaccountably tired; the cursed heat was worse than
ever, he thought, wiping a wet palm on his grimy leg; above him the sky
was an unbroken, blazing expanse of blue; short, sharp shadows shifted
under the feet of the tense players; in the shade of the grandstand the
dresses, mostly white, showed here and there a vivid note of yellow
and violet, the crisp note of crimson. The throbbing song of a
thrush floated from a far hedge... it stirred him with a new unrest,
dissatisfaction... “Kag” looked like a damned fool grimacing at him
through the wire mask--exactly like a monkey in a cage. The umpire in
his inflated protector, crouching in a position of rigorous attention,
resembled a turtle. He pitched, and a spurt of dust rose a yard before
the plate. “Ball one!” That wouldn't do, he told himself, recalling the
substantially expressed confidence, esteem, of Ellerton. The captain's
sibilant “steady” was like the flick of a whip. With an effort which
taxed his every resource he marshalled his relaxed muscles into an
aching endeavor, centred his unstable thoughts upon the exigencies of
the play, and retired the batter before him. But he struck the next
upon the arm, sending him, nursing the bruise, to first base. He saw
the captain grimly wave the outfielders farther back; and, determined,
resentful, he struck out in machinelike order the remaining batters. But
he was unconscionably weary; his arm felt as though he had been pitching
for a week, a month; and he dropped limp and surly upon the sod at a
distance from the players' bench.
He batted once more, but a third “out” on the bases saved him from the
fluke which, he had been certain, must inevitably follow. As he stood
with the ball in his hand, facing the batter, he was conscious of an air
of uncertainty spreading like a contagion through the Ellerton team;
he recognized that it radiated from himself--his lack of confidence
magnified to a promised panic. The centre fielder fumbled a fly directly
in his hands; there was a shout from Ellerton's opponents, silence in
the ranks of Ellerton.
Anthony pitched with a tremendous effort, his arm felt brittle; it felt
as though it was made of glass, and would break off. He could put no
speed into the ball, his fingers seemed swollen, he was unable to grip
it properly, control its direction. The red-haired player whom he had
despised faced him, he who habitually flinched, and Anthony essayed to
drive the ball across his fingers. The bat swung with a vicious crack
upon the leather sphere, a fielder ran vainly back, back....
The runner passed first base, and, wildly urged by a small but
adequately vocal group of wellwishers, scorned second base, repudiated
third, from which another player tallied a run, and loafed magnificently
“home.”
From the fence some one called to Anthony, “what time is it?” and
achieved a huge success among the opposition. His captain besought him
desperately to “come back. Where's your pep' went? you're pitching like
a dead man!” Confusion fell upon the team in the field, and, in its
train, a series of blunders which cost five runs. After the inning
Anthony stood with a lowered, moody countenance. “You're out of this
game,” the captain shot at him; “go home and play with mother and the
girls.”
He left the field under a dropping fire of witticisms, feebly stemmed by
half-hearted applause; Hinkle frowned heavily at him; the man from the
major league had gone. Anthony proceeded directly through the gate
and over the street toward home. The taste of profound Humiliation, of
failure, was bitter in his mouth, that failure which seemed to lie at
the heart of everything he attempted, which seemed to follow him like
his shadow, like the malicious influence of a powerful spite, an enmity
personal and unrelenting. The sun centred its heat upon his bared head
with an especial fervor; the watch, thrust hastily in a pocket, swung
against his leg mockingly; the abrupt departure of that keeneyed
spectator added its hurt to his self pride.