THE VANISHING BALL
“Don’t get sore and do the baby act,” Dillon admonished. “You’re out,
and there’s no sense howling about it.”
“If you say so, I suppose it goes, Pink,” sneered Lewis; “but it’s a
raw deal or a bum joke. You know the ball wasn’t pitched. This gink
catching flashed another ball, and――”
“Be a sport, Kid, for the love of Mike!” interrupted Torrey, the
catcher. He had taken off his mask, and was busy adjusting the strap.
“Pulling off a string of guff like that don’t get you anywhere.”
Lewis glared at him, and swallowed hard. He seemed about to retort when
Dalton sharply ordered him to cut it out.
“That’ll be about all for you, Kid,” he said. “Quit holding up the
game. Now, Gene, old boy, just put a little something on the ball, and
show these infants what they’re up against.”
Lefty could not help smiling a little as he saw Lewis slouch sourly out
to his place in the infield, scowling and kicking up the dirt for all
the world like a child who has been scolded.
“Too bad for anybody to take these little games seriously,” he remarked
to Pete Grist, beside him.
The veteran of the pitching staff absently cuddled a stiff elbow, and
nodded. “That’s one of Kid’s failings. He certainly is there with the
alibis whenever he goes wrong at bat.”
The unexpected rally on the part of their pitcher heartened the cubs to
such a degree that they hammered out two runs in the first half of the
third, and would have made more only for a bit of swift fielding on the
part of Larry Dalton.
Taking their turn at bat, the Regulars managed to force one man across
the rubber before they, too, were brought up sharply by clever work in
the infield.
“Some kid――that playing third,” remarked Grist approvingly. “What’s his
name?”
“Palsifer――Tap they call him,” Locke explained. “He’s from the Southern
League. It wouldn’t surprise me if Jack was thinking of him for Daly’s
place.”
The old pitcher nodded understandingly. Third base was one of the
positions everybody felt to be weak, and throughout the remainder of
the game Grist kept an eye on this promising youngster.
In the fourth inning Temple slumped distinctly, letting the Yannigans
hit him right and left. Had it not been for the admirable support given
him by the Regulars, the cubs would have sewed the game up in a sack
then and there. As it was, the score stood three to one in their favor,
a rather surprising thing, considering the efforts which were being
made by the older men.
Nels Savage, on the contrary, distinctly improved. Apparently he was
making no greater effort than before, and the insolent indifference
of his manner continued unabated. In spite of all this, there was no
question of his better form. In the last half of the fourth he struck
out two men, the first of whom was Lewis, who again started to raise a
protest that the ball had not been pitched. He was promptly squelched
by Dalton, who was also beginning to show signs of pettishness. As
Lewis passed Lefty, scowling and angry, the southpaw hailed him.
“What sort of a game is that you’re trying to put over, Kid?” he
bantered.
Lewis glared. “It ain’t a game! It’s gospel. Dillon called me out twice
on a third strike when Savage hadn’t made a move to deliver the ball.
They put up a job on me, that’s what they done. What in thunder’s the
matter with Pink I don’t know, but――”
“Say,” interrupted Locke suddenly, “you aren’t really serious? You
sure can’t mean to say you didn’t see that ball come over?”
“Didn’t see it!” repeated Lewis angrily. “How could I see it when there
wasn’t any to see? I tell you, the gink didn’t make a move to――”
“Don’t talk nutty, Kid!” admonished Grist. “Lefty and I saw it as plain
as you could see the ball he just pitched to Douro. What’s the sense in
talking like that?”
Lewis refused to argue further. He turned and departed, leaving Locke,
at least, slightly puzzled by his manner. It seemed impossible that he
could really mean what he said, yet there was a convincing touch of
earnestness in the heat of his temper.
Lefty and Grist were still discussing the question when Kennedy’s voice
sounded behind them:
“Locke, get out there and pitch the last inning. They’ve got Temple
sweating blood, and the rest of the staff are about the worst-bunged-up
lot of cripples I ever saw.”
The southpaw was glad of a chance to use his arm even for a single
inning. He limbered up a bit, and by the time the last Regular had
flied out to the cub center fielder he was quite ready.
Trusting mainly to his support, Lefty kept down the Yannigans’ score.
With the arrival of the final half of the inning Locke felt a sudden
desire to put his batting skill to the test of Savage’s pitching. Of
course, what Lewis contended was absolutely absurd, but it would be
interesting to see what the fellow had.
As man after man stepped to the plate and left it either for the bench
or in the direction of first, Lefty’s interest in the proceedings
became greater. In a vague way, he felt as if he were waiting for
something unusual which was presently to take place, and even when
another tally was scored that feeling continued unabated.
Two men were out, and there was a runner on second. Lefty had a feeling
that the batter would be put out and the game ended without his going
up. It was Larry Dalton’s voice urging him to hustle, rather than the
crack of leather meeting wood, which brought the realization that he
had not guessed right. He snatched up a bat at random, and hurried to
the plate.
Seen from this particular part of the diamond, Lefty decided that the
sagebrush twirler’s sneering countenance was more disagreeable than
even he had supposed. The uptilt of the lips, the slow, insolent,
heavy-lidded glance, the dragging, maddening deliberation of movement
were all emphasized; and all combined to arouse deep irritation.
Locke felt a sudden desire to plant a fist on those sneering lips.
With difficulty he pulled himself together, realizing with a flush of
chagrin that Savage had put a strike over.
“Careful, old man!” cautioned Dalton. It was Lefty’s carelessness and
inattention which had made that first strike possible. He would see to
it that there was no more of that. He stood waiting, tense and ready,
his gaze fixed keenly on the narrow slits through which gleamed the
Westerner’s strange, baleful eyes.
Savage’s movements were very slow. A ball was put over――another, and
another still. To Locke the time consumed had been so everlasting that
he wondered for a moment if it wasn’t four, and why he did not hear the
order to take his base.
The last delivery had been so wild that it was all Torrey could do to
pull the ball down. The horsehide slipped from his grasp and rolled
toward the rubber, where Locke bent and picked it up. He held it for a
second in his hand before snapping it out to Savage with a force which
was a wordless protest against the busher’s unnecessary slowness; and,
great as was his abstraction, he remembered noticing along one side of
the sphere a streak which was half cut, half scratch, as if the leather
had scraped against a sharp stone.
If this was the method followed by Savage in regular games, he would
be hooted every time he appeared on the field. The fans like snap and
ginger above all else in a player. No umpire would permit it. That
everlasting stare, too, was annoying. Lefty began to wish the busher
would look in another direction, if only for a moment.
Presently he looked down himself to see whether he had inadvertently
stepped too far forward. Before he glanced up again the ball, whizzing
over, buried itself in the catcher’s mitt; and Dillon’s voice, full of
a most unprofessional admonition, announced:
“Two――and three!”
Flushing, Lefty straightened his shoulders and tapped the rubber with
his bat. What could have induced him to be so careless he did not know.
He was quite sure, though, that it wouldn’t occur again.
With eyes unwavering, he waited. Every movement of the pitcher’s
dragging wind-up was impressed vividly on his mind. In the midst
of that movement Savage seemed to pause and remain set, poised and
motionless. Lefty was contemplating demanding judgment on a balk, when
the unmistakable plunk of something hard smashing against the catcher’s
mitt made him catch his breath and whirl round.
“Batter――out!” cried Dalton. Under his breath he growled scathingly:
“Oh――you――big――bonehead!”
Lefty paid no attention to this uncomplimentary remark. In fact, it
is doubtful if he heard it. He was staring unbelievingly at a soiled
baseball lying in the hollow of Torrey’s mitt――a ball which bore on the
uppermost side a long streak――_the_ ball which he had held in his hand
a few minutes before!