THE LAST RESORT.
The whole strength of the Yale baseball squad was to go to Cambridge,
and a great crowd of students went down to the station to give the team
a last cheer and wish it well. The students would start for Boston early
in the morning, going direct to the field, but they wanted to give the
team a great send-off. Full of confidence in its ability to repeat, at
the expense of Harvard, the victories it had won throughout the season,
the Yale students were wild with delight at the reinstatement of Jim
Phillips, which had been briefly announced.
Dick Merriwell had, immediately after they left Parker’s room, gone to a
telephone, and called up Captain Bowen, of Harvard.
“I have a confession that clears Phillips completely and in every
detail,” the Yale coach told the Harvard captain. “I will bring this
with me and show it to you to-morrow morning. Meanwhile, if you will
take my word for it, I’d like to announce that Phillips can play.”
“Go ahead!” cried Bowen joyously. “That’s the best news I’ve heard since
I got my ‘H.’ I would have felt rotten about this series if Phillips
hadn’t been able to play. You don’t need to show me anything, Merriwell.
Your word is all any of us want. We know you and Yale too well not to
accept any statement you can make at its face value.”
And, within an hour, Dick received from Bowen a long telegram, formally
withdrawing Harvard’s protest against Jim Phillips and expressing the
hope that he would be able to play against the crimson in the first game
of the series.
“I certainly like to meet sportsmen like that,” said Dick heartily, when
he showed the telegram to Phillips and Brady. “We fight them hard on the
field, but there’s no hard feeling when the game’s over, and that’s the
way it ought to be among all the colleges.”
So there was a tremendous ovation for Jim Phillips as the train pulled
out. The Yale special car was at the rear end of the train, and as many
of the baseball players as could find room on the observation platform
at the back of the car were there to wave their hands to the
enthusiastic crowd behind.
“Well,” said Jim Phillips, as the train pulled out, “I’m certainly glad
that we’re through with this trouble. All we’ve got to do now is to play
baseball, and, as long as we do our best, it doesn’t make much
difference whether we win or lose. That’s one thing we can do,
anyhow—play baseball.”
There was nothing eventful about the trip to Boston. The train arrived
on time, and the squad went immediately to a great hotel in the Back Bay
section, whence the drive to Cambridge the next morning would be a
comparatively short one, and one easily to be made without any untoward
incident.
“It looks like a good day for the game,” said Jim, to Brady, after they
had unpacked their bags in the room they were to share for the night.
“Not a cloud in the sky—and everything deep blue. If there was a red
sunset, I’d be inclined to imitate Woeful Watson and say that that meant
a Harvard day to-morrow. But I guess we’re safe. Even the omens are
pulling for us to win.”
“I guess we’ll do that, all right,” said Brady. “Let’s take a little
walk downtown. It isn’t bedtime yet—not for an hour, and we can sleep as
late as we like in the morning.”
Jim agreed. He had never been to Boston before, and the old city, so
interesting to every true American as one of the places where
independence was first thought of and first fought for, appealed
strongly to him. They saw the famous library, the Old South Church, and
Faneuil Hall, and, after a good, swinging walk around the shopping
district, prepared to go home. But they had wandered further from their
hotel than they had thought, and Brady, seeing an errant taxicab, whose
chauffeur held his door open invitingly, suggested that they ride back.
“I’ll stand treat,” he said. “And I want to go to a drug store, too.
Cabby, drop me for a minute at some good drug store. I forgot to bring a
toothbrush, and I’ve got to buy one to-night.”
They drove, very slowly, as it seemed to Jim, until they reached a drug
store, and there Brady jumped out and went inside, leaving Jim to wait
for him in the cab. But, even as Brady jumped out at one side, Jim saw
the door on the other side open, and, at the same time, the cab started
away with a burst of speed, and left the drug store far behind.
Jim, amazed and angry, cried out to the chauffeur, but a heavy hand was
pushed over his mouth, and a coarse voice commanded him to keep still.
He knew at once that there were two men in the cab with him, and, though
he struggled for a moment, it was useless. He was overpowered, and he
wisely, fearing some injury to his pitching arm, ceased struggling. Then
a light was flashed in his face and held steady for a moment.
“Yes!” cried one of his captors triumphantly. “It’s him. I guess he
won’t do any pitching for Yale to-morrow.”
Jim, knowing nothing of Boston, could make no guess as to their
destination. He only knew that the cab was traveling very fast, and he
judged, from the time occupied in the trip, that he was being carried
outside of the city. He was almost sure that he had recognized Parker’s
voice when the man had cried out that he knew him, but he could not be
certain.
At last he was lifted out of the taxicab and allowed to stand on his
feet. The roar of surf was in his ears, and he knew that he had been
brought to some point on the seashore, probably twenty miles or more
from Boston. It was very dark, but as he looked around, he could see the
sea, and that he was on a beach. A number of low, squat houses were to
be seen in the neighborhood, but lights were visible in only one or two
of them. It seemed to be a desolate, bleak place, where there was little
chance of finding help.
“If you’re Parker,” said Jim, to one of the men who got out of the cab
with him, “you ought to know that you can only get yourself into more
trouble by doing this.”
The man he addressed, who wore a black mask over his face, laughed
harshly, but made no answer. Evidently he didn’t wish Jim to have
another chance of recognizing his voice.
“Never mind who we are or what will happen to us,” said the other man, a
complete stranger to Jim. “We can look out for ourselves. You’d better
make up your mind to stay here till we let you go. You can’t get away,
and if you keep quiet and don’t bother us, you’ll come to no harm. We’ll
give you a place to sleep and all you need to eat, but if you try to get
away, you’ll be caught and brought back, and we’ll tie you up. That’s a
fair warning. See that you don’t make us do anything we and you would
both regret.”
Jim gave no answer. His eyes were growing accustomed to the darkness,
and a flashing light off in the distance made him think that he might be
able to guess where he was. Jim had never been to Boston before, but he
knew the Massachusetts coast well, from a number of cruises he had made
in those waters, and he thought that the lighthouse would soon give him
a clew. Moreover, a wild suspicion was forming in his mind, and with it
a plan, daring, but still offering a chance to escape, and reach
Cambridge in time to justify Dick Merriwell’s faith in him, and the
hopes of his fellow students at Yale.
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