MORE WORK ON THE DIAMOND.
WHEN Lil Artha showed up on the field that afternoon, clad in his old
baseball suit that showed the wear and tear of many a battle, he had his
camera slung over his shoulder with a strap.
"Want to take the nine in action?" asked Elmer, as he noted this fact,
and paused in his delivery of the ball to the catcher, Mark Cummings.
"Oh, I might, if the signs were right, and they showed that they
deserved all that sort of attention," replied the tall scout, "but I've
made up my mind about one thing, Elmer."
"What might that be?" asked the other, smiling at his friend's
seriousness.
"I'm going to carry this little box around with me day and night, that's
what. Just the time you want it most you haven't got it along," declared
Lil Artha, with a look of sheer disgust.
"Well, I always heard that a fellow could see all sorts of game when he
didn't happen to have a gun," laughed Elmer; "and I suppose the same
thing goes with a camera. But I can guess what's ailing you now, my
boy."
"Of course you can," grinned the other. "Say, just think what it would
mean to you and me if we only had a picture of Toby Jones kicking the
air up in that old tree, and learning to swim! Wow, no chance of us ever
getting the blues while we had that to look at! It would have been the
funniest ever. And to think it's all lost to us, just because I was
silly enough to leave my box at home. Shucks!"
"Don't suppose Toby would pose it over again, do you?" suggested Larry
Billings, who was passing a ball with Matty Eggleston, the leader of the
Beaver Patrol, and one of the reliables in the nine.
"Well, hardly," Lil Artha replied. "I reckon Toby got enough of hanging
that time to last him right along. Is he here this afternoon?"
"Sure he is, and as chipper as ever. Only grins when anybody tries to
josh him about flying. Nothing ever feases that feller. He comes up
again after every knockdown, as fresh as a daisy. Says he's going to
give the old town a sensation some day before long. And he means it,
too," remarked one of the other boys near by.
Elmer and Lil Artha exchanged meaning glances, and presently the latter
managed to whisper to his companion of the morning:
"Did you do it, Elmer?"
"I asked my father what I ought to do, and he sent me over to tell Mr.
Jones the whole story, because all sorts of yarns were going around, and
he said Toby's mother might hear something awful had happened, and be
frightened."
"And what did Mr. Jones say?" continued Lil Artha.
"He laughed a little," replied Elmer, then looked serious like. "I
rather expect he'll put a crimp in Toby's flying business after this,
though up to now he's rather encouraged the boy, thinking it was smart
in him. Now he sees the danger. But get out in the field, and throw in a
few from first, old fellow."
The scene was an animated one, with boys in uniform and without, banging
out high flies, passing balls, and exercising generally. It really
seemed as though every one in the town who could get off must be there
that afternoon to see how the Hickory Ridge team gave promise of playing
when up against the strong Fairfield nine.
Girls had come down in flocks, and not a few men were present, among
whom Elmer noticed his old friend, Colonel Hitchins.
This fact caused him to remember something, and the sight of his
catcher, Mark Cummings, fitted right in with his thoughts. Apparently
Mark had also noticed the presence of the Colonel, for after throwing up
his hand as a signal that he had had enough of practice for the time
being, he advanced toward Elmer, and was presently speaking in a low
tone to him.
"See who's here, Elmer?" he asked.
"Well, I notice a lot of mighty pretty girls for one thing," smiled the
other.
"You know I don't mean them, or any particular girl," replied the
catcher, who was a singularly modest lad as well as a handsome one.
"Over yonder in that bunch--the old colonel!"
"Oh, yes, I noticed him a bit ago," remarked Elmer. "But that isn't
surprising. He's always taken a heap of interest in boys' sports, and
used to play baseball many years ago, he says, when it was a new game.
He told me he was in a nine that played the old Cincinnati Reds the
first year they ever had a league. And that was a long time ago, Mark."
"You're right, it was, Elmer; but when I saw the colonel it reminded me
that so far I haven't done anything about finding out how that lost cap
of mine happened to be picked up under his peach trees, when I dropped
it a mile away, over on the bank of the Sunflower."
"I heard that two men had been arrested, charged with stealing those
peaches," Elmer remarked.
"Yes, that's so, for they were silly enough to sell the fruit to Phil
Dongari, the man who keeps the biggest fruit store in town. Colonel
Hitchins could tell his prize peaches anywhere, so he went and bought
them back again; and getting a line on the men, had them put in the town
cooler, where they are yet."
"Just so, Mark; that's ancient history," smiled Elmer; "but as you say
it doesn't do the first thing along the line of explaining how your cap
got under those same trees, does it?"
"But, Elmer, I'm relying on you to get a move on and find out something
before the trail gets cold," argued Mark.
"That sounds pretty fine, my boy," observed Elmer; "but what makes you
believe I can do anything to help out? You've got all the advantages I
have."
"That's so," admitted Mark; "only I'm a greenhorn about following a
trail, and you know heaps. Besides, something in your manner seems to
tell me you've already got a hunch on about this thing."
"Oh, that's the way you look at it, eh?" mocked Elmer.
"Yes, I haven't been going with you all this time not to know how to
read your face and actions," replied Mark, boldly. "And it's my honest
opinion right now that if you chose you could put your finger on the
culprit."
"Thank you for your confidence, my boy; but I'm not quite so dead sure
as you make out," returned Elmer.
"But you _think_ you know?" protested Mark.
"I believe I've got a good clew; I admit that, Mark."
"Were you over there again?" demanded the other.
"Now you're referring to where you lost your old cap, I take it?" Elmer
said in a noncommittal way.
"That's just what I mean--over on the bank of the Sunflower, where Lil
Artha began kidding me, and in consequence my cap fell off. You rode
over on your wheel, didn't you, Elmer?"
"Well, yes, I did," the other admitted; "but not like you, to look for
the cap, because at the time I went I happened to know it had been
found, and you had it at home."
"Then why should you bother going all that way over a rough path? Hold
on, let me change that question, because I see why you wanted to look
over the ground. Did you find anything there to tell you who picked that
cap up?" and Mark looked directly in the face of his chum.
"If I did you needn't expect that I'm going to tell you about it till
I'm good and ready," laughed Elmer. "And that will be inside of
twenty-four hours, perhaps. This is Saturday, and by Monday night I hope
I'll be in a position to show you something interesting. Just bottle up
till then, my boy. And now there's the scrub team going out, so we have
lost the toss and must take our first turn at bat."
Mark knew that it would be useless trying to urge his chum to relent.
Elmer no doubt had some good reason for holding off longer. So, although
he was very anxious to learn the solution of the mystery connected with
his cap, Mark put the matter out of his mind for the time being and
prepared to play ball.
The game was, as before, hotly contested.
Johnny Kline, as captain of the scrub, bent every energy to beating the
regulars, and pitched as he had never done before. But Elmer was also in
fine fettle on this bright Saturday afternoon. His speed was better than
ever; and when in pinches he floated the ball up in one of those
tantalizing drops, he had the heaviest slugger guessing and beating the
air in a vain attempt to connect.
The crowd numbered several hundreds, and they were as ready to applaud
any clever work on the part of the scrub players as Lil Artha's team.
And with such a host of pretty high-school girls present every fellow
strove to do his best in order to merit the hand clapping that followed
every bit of fine play.
For five innings the score stood at nothing to nothing. Elmer was equal
to each and every crisis, and somehow the boys back of him did not seem
able to solve the puzzling delivery of Johnny Kline any better than the
scrub team did that of the scout pitcher.
In the sixth there came a break. Lil Artha led off with a rousing two
bagger, and the next man up, who happened to be Chatz Maxfield, sent him
to third with a clever sacrifice, for which he was noted.
Then along came Red, who was equal to the emergency, and whipped out a
tremendous fly which the fielder caught handsomely, but tumbled all over
himself in so doing; and of course the long-legged first baseman had no
difficulty in getting home before the ball could be returned to the
diamond. Indeed, Lil Artha was such a remarkable runner that once he got
his base his club counted on a tally three times out of four.
That broke the ice, and in the innings that followed the boys took sweet
revenge on Johnny's benders, smashing them to all parts of the field
until the spectators were roaring with laughter and a halt had to be
called to let the overworked fellow in center come in to get a reviving
drink of water.
The result of the game was a score of eleven to two, and neither of
these runs for the scrub were earned, but presented to them on errors in
the field.
"It looks good to me," remarked Red Huggins, as he and several others of
the scouts plodded homeward after the conclusion of the game. "If we can
do as clever work on Monday as we did this afternoon, those Fairfield
giants won't have a show for their money."
"And that's what we're going to do, just you make your mind up to it,"
declared Lil Artha. "And to think what a great catch our Toby made when
he had to run and jump into the air for that liner. Shows he's all to
the good, no matter if he did get such a bounce this morning. We'd miss
him if he took a notion to fly away between now and Monday P.M.," and
the speaker cast a side glance toward the right fielder, who was limping
along, talking over the game with Ty Collins.
"Oh, there are several good fellows just waiting for a chance to break
in!" declared Red; "Larry Billings, for instance, who can hit 'em some;
Jack Armitage, who is nearly as swift as Lil Artha on the bases; and
George Robbins, who knows how to rattle a pitcher to beat the band. I
guess we don't need to worry, since we've got plenty of good material
handy in case of accidents."
"But Toby isn't going to fail us," asserted Elmer. "He's too good a
scout not to know his duty in this crisis. For we've just got to beat
that Fairfield crowd this time, or we'll never hear the end of it."
"Don't worry, fellows; if we play like we did to-day we'll have their
number, all right. Wait till you see how Elmer teases their heavy
batters with that drop of his! There'll be need of a lot of dope after
the game, for the arms that swing nearly out of joint swiping the air.
Wow, don't I wish to-morrow was Monday, though!" and Lil Artha gave
further emphasis to his wrought-up feelings by a certain gesture that
was one of his peculiarities.
"I've heard lots of people say Hickory Ridge never had so fast a nine
before," remarked Matty.
"Thspare our blushes, pleath!" laughed Ted Burgoyne, who could never
conquer that hissing habit that caused him to lisp, though no one ever
heard him admit the fact, which he always vigorously denied.
It was a jolly and well-satisfied party of athletes that journeyed back
to town from the field where the game was played. Even the members of
the badly beaten scrub could not but feel a certain pride in the work of
the regulars, and declared that if the boys could only do as well in the
game with Fairfield there need be no fear of the result.
And luckily Sunday would come as a day of rest before the match game at
Basking Ridge was to take place.