THE PRACTICE GAME WITH THE SCRUB TEAM.
"I RECEIVED this by special messenger not more than half an hour ago,"
remarked the scout master of the Hickory Ridge Troop.
"Was it Felix Wagner, the second baseman of Fairfield, who brought it?"
asked Lil Artha; "because I saw him on his wheel pass our house just
before I came out."
"I believe he did say that was his name," replied Mr. Garrabrant,
"though I didn't bother asking him, and might not even have remembered
it only for your mentioning the same. Hurry along, Landy, if you want to
hear the challenge read."
"Well, I do now, the worst kind, even if I ain't on the regular team,"
replied the fat boy. "Something might happen to one of our fellows, and
then perhaps they'd give me a show. I know I'm a little clumsy, but I'm
improving all the time and can run half a mile now without breathing
_very_ hard."
"Hold your horses, Landy, and give Mr. Garrabrant a show!" called one.
"Yes, we want to hear about the challenge; we can listen to your talk
any old time, Landy. You'll be with us some time yet," added another.
The scout master held up his finger, and instantly every sound ceased.
Even the boys present who did not belong to the regular scouts
understood that Mr. Garrabrant enforced obedience, and were ready to
yield it with the rest. Besides, even if they did not play on the team,
they belonged in good old Hickory Ridge, and the interests of the town
were dear to their boyish hearts.
"MR. RODERIC GARRABRANT, SCOUT MASTER,
"Boy Scouts Troop of Hickory Ridge.
"We, the newly organized Boy Scouts of Fairfield and
Cramertown, having made up a team composed wholly of
the members of our organization, do hereby challenge
you to a game of ball on the afternoon of Monday the
twentieth of August, to settle the question of
championship on the diamond between our different
organizations. No one not a scout in good standing to
participate in this match game. Please settle this
matter at your earliest convenience, and send us a
reply, so that the game may be advertised. It will be
played at three o'clock upon the neutral field of
Basking Ridge, the home nine there having disbanded.
"Signed by the Committee,
"FELIX WAGNER,
"ADRIAN COOK,
"JOHN BASTIAN,
"MATTHEW TUBBS, _Chairman_."
No sooner had Mr. Garrabrant finished reading this communication than a
great uproar broke out. Two dozen tongues wagged at the same time.
Everybody seemed to have something to say on the subject, and while most
of them applauded the tone of the challenge, there were numerous
suggestions in the air.
Again did the scout master hold up his hand.
"Silence!" hissed Lil Artha, with both hands motioning at the same time.
"Mr. Garrabrant says be still, fellows!" called another.
When it was so quiet they could almost have heard a pin drop, the scout
master once more addressed the fifty-odd boys around him.
"Please remember," he said, pointedly, "this is a matter that concerns
only the Boy Scouts. I expect every other fellow to keep the utmost
silence while we talk it over. You are being handsomely treated in being
allowed the privilege of staying here and listening to what we have to
say. Now, scouts, what is your pleasure about this courteous challenge?"
"I move that it be immediately accepted, and the time be set as Monday
next at three in the afternoon, and the game to come off on the Basking
Ridge diamond," suggested Mark.
"Second the motion!" followed Lil Artha, quickly.
"Any remarks before the motion is put?" asked Mr. Garrabrant, smiling as
he looked at the eager faces by which he was surrounded.
"Are we to take it for granted that the Basking Ridge people would allow
us to come over and use their diamond, sir?" asked Elmer.
"That is a point well taken," replied Mr. Garrabrant, "and I will say
for the general information that I asked the messenger about that very
thing. He assured me that the Fairfield people have the written consent
of the owner of the ground at Basking Ridge. And the people of the town
are just wild for the game to come off there. They are starved for good
baseball, since their club broke up early in the season. So that point
is disposed of. Any other question, boys?"
"There is only to be this one game, I understand it, suh?" queried
Chatz.
"Only this one game," replied the gentleman.
"And the club that wins will be known as the champion team of the Boy
Scouts league in this part of the state--is that it, suh?" the Southern
boy went on.
"I so understand it," Mr. Garrabrant answered.
"There isn't anything said about umpires, suh; and we've found in the
past that if we want to have a square deal the umpire should never come
from either of the towns playing in the game," Chatz declared,
positively.
"I took the pains to ask the messenger about that," said Mr. Garrabrant,
smiling, "for I realized that half of our trouble in the past has come
from having a partisan umpire. But the messenger who carried the
challenge said that Home-run Joe Mallon, who belongs to the Tri-State
League, is home in Basking Ridge, waiting for a broken arm to heal, and
that he'd gladly do the umpiring. You know he used to be an umpire long
before he got to playing ball. So that question is fixed, too. Any
more?"
"Question! Question!" shouted a number of the scouts, eagerly.
When the motion, to the effect that the challenge of the Fairfield nine
be unanimously accepted, was put, it met with not a single dissenting
vote, and Mr. Garrabrant called it settled.
"The committee will go with me immediately following the game to-day,
and after we have drafted our answer we'll get it over to Fairfield
to-night, if I have to borrow somebody's car to do it," declared the
scout master.
Then the cheers broke out in earnest. Every boy in all Hickory Ridge
would be circulating the great news before night. Little need there
would be to go to any expense in getting out posters when there was such
a splendid circulating medium close at hand.
"Now let's start play!" called Chatz, impatient to see whether Elmer
would put in that tantalizing slow ball such as always proved such a
tempting bait to the ordinary batter, causing him to swipe the air
fiercely, besides losing confidence in himself meanwhile.
In a short time the scrub game began. Johnny Kline was on the firing
line for the scrub, and he certainly had some speed along with him that
day, for he sent them in "scorching hot," as Lil Artha declared.
However, it seemed as though Elmer and his chums just lived on speed,
for they nearly every one fattened their average of batted balls that
eluded the vigilant fielders.
Of course, with everything favoring the regular team, they soon began to
pile up runs, while sensational fielding on their part cut the
hard-working scrub team out of several tallies.
After the game had run through seven innings it was called because the
hour was getting on toward six.
"And we have a meeting to-night at which the committee will report,"
said Mr. Garrabrant.
"How does the score stand now?" asked an outsider who had been away most
of the time after the fourth inning, and only just returned when they
came in off the field.
"Seven to one, in favor of the scouts," some one replied.
"It would have been a shut out only for Ty Collins out in center letting
that swift fly pass him, that Johnny Kline made his home run on,"
replied another.
"All the same it was a hard-fought game, fellows," remarked the genial
scout master, who knew the outsiders felt very sore over their inability
to hit Elmer, and whose nature it was to soften hard blows for the under
dog.
"If it had been any other pitcher we'd have knocked the stuffing out of
him, and that's no lie," asserted the captain of the scrub nine,
defiantly. "My team had their batting eyes along, but that balloon ball
fooled us every time. It's sure the finest ever, and I see poor old
Fairfield's finish if ever she gets up against Elmer this year."
"I see you found your old mouse-colored cap again, Mark," remarked Lil
Artha. "Glad you went back after it this morning. Was beginning to be
afraid you might put in a claim against me for a new lid, because I was
the cause of your losing that one."
Several others heard what was said, and, of course, boy-like demanded to
know what Lil Artha meant; so he simply said Mark lost his cap while
scuffling near the bank of the Sunflower River, while they were on their
way home from fishing on the preceding evening at dusk.
Both Mark and Elmer had arranged it between them to keep on the watch
and see if anyone appeared to be any ways surprised at Mark wearing the
familiar gray cap. But so far as they were able to notice the matter
caused only a slight passing ripple, and was then apparently forgotten.
If the party who had found the cap, and later on deliberately left it
under the prize peach trees of Colonel Hitchins, in order to get Mark in
bad odor with that gentleman, were present, he had the shrewdness to
avoid showing any feeling of astonishment that would naturally come to
him on seeing the owner of the cap wearing it again, with the utmost
indifference.
"Nothing doing, Elmer," whispered Mark to his chum, in rather a
disgusted tone, when they found themselves apart from the rest of the
homeward-bound players and spectators.
"If you mean with regard to finding out who had your cap, I guess you
hit the nail on the head," chuckled the other. "Either the fellow wasn't
there, or else he was smart enough to keep a straight face, and take no
interest in your old cap."
"Then I don't wear it again, I tell you," remarked the other. "It's
pretty punk anyhow, and whoever had it, started to tear the lining out.
Just see how it's torn, would you?"
Elmer took the cap and glanced at the badly used interior.
"It is, for a fact," he remarked, as a look of intelligence flashed
across his face, only to vanish again. "Looks like it had been through
the war. Are you sure the lining wasn't torn that way when you lost it,
Mark?"
"Not one bit, I give you my word. But enough of that. The thing haunts
me if I happen to wake up in the night. D'ye know I just see before me
that one question: 'Who found Mark Cummings's cap?' But never an answer
comes, and I keep groping in the dark. Perhaps some day I may happen on
the answer, Elmer, or you may, for you're always so smart at solving
riddles."
"Perhaps I may, Mark, and if I do you can just bank on it I'll be
telling you the first thing," laughed the other.
"Well, I should guess you would," declared Mark.
Then others joined them, and the conversation became general; of course,
pretty much all of the talk being in connection with the coming battle
with the strong Fairfield team that had given them so hard a tussle two
years ago.
"But we're twice as strong now as then, boys," said Mark. "We didn't
have our prize pitcher then, and some of us have improved a heap in that
time."
"So has Matt Tubbs and several of his nine," declared Ty Collins, who
played center. "They beat the Rochesters early in the season, when the
regulars were practicing. Don't you believe for one minute we're going
to have a walkover. The Fairfield team's a hustling lot, they tell me,
and always working for runs. They're bigger than our men every way."
"They can be as tall as the housetops," chuckled Lil Artha, "and that
won't help one bit to meet up against Elmer's benders, or engage that
balloon ball he has learned to throw just as good as Christy Matthewson
ever did."
"Oh, what rotten stuff!" mocked Elmer, though of course he could not
help feeling satisfied with the confidence which his teammates seemed to
repose in him.
A short time later they reached the borders of the town, where they
divided up in smaller groups, according to where their homes chanced to
lie.
"Remember the meeting to-night, boys!" had been the last words of Mr.
Garrabrant, and a number who did not belong to the scouts wished they
had the nerve to put in an application right away, for they did seem to
have such glorious times.
When Elmer parted from his chum, and walked on to his own home, he was
nodding and muttering to himself somewhat in this style:
"Yes, perhaps I _may_ have some news for Mark about that blessed old cap
before a great while goes by, because I've got my suspicions. But now
it's mum as an oyster for me."