BURNING SPEED
As a pitcher, Jones displayed no needless flourishes. His style of
delivery was simple but effective. Into the swing of his long arm he put
the throwing force of his fine shoulder and sinewy body. Wiley had
exaggerated in boasting of the mute's speed; nevertheless that speed
was something to marvel at. Norris, the clean-up man of the Grays,
who preferred smokers to any other kind, was too slow in striking at
the first two pitched to him by Jones. Norris looked astounded and
incredulous, and the spectators gasped.
"That's his slow one, mates!" cried Wiley. "Pretty soon, when he
gets loosened up, he'll let out a link or two and burn a few across.
The daisies are growing above the only man he ever hit with the ball."
Although Norris was not slow in swinging at the next one, the sphere
took a shoot that deceived him, and the mute had disposed of the first
hitter with three pitched balls.
"And the wiseacres say there are no real heavers left in the bushes!"
whooped Cap'n Wiley.
Locke was thrilled. Could it be that here was a discovery, a find, a
treasure like a diamond in the rough, left around underfoot amid
pebbles? The Big League scouts are the grubstakers, the prospectors,
the treasure hunters of baseball; ceaselessly and tirelessly they scour
the country even to the remote corners and out-of-the-way regions where
the game nourishes in the crude, lured on constantly by the hope of
making a big find. To them the unearthing of a ball player of real
ability and promise is like striking the outcroppings of a Comstock
or a Kimberly; and among the cheering surface leads that they discover,
a hundred peter out into worthlessness, where one develops into a
property of value. More and more the scouts complain that the ground
has been raked over again and again and the prizes are growing fewer
and farther between; yet every now and then, where least expected,
one of them will turn up something rich that has been overlooked by
journeying too far afield. The fancy that Mysterious Jones might be one
of these unnoticed nuggets set Locke's pulses throbbing.
Jones had appeared to be a trifle slender in street clothes, but now
Lefty could see that he was the possessor of fine muscles and whipcord
sinews. There was no ounce of unnecessary flesh upon him anywhere; he
was like an athlete trained to the minute and hardened for an enduring
test by long and continuous work. There seemed little likelihood that
protracted strain would expose a flaw. He had speed and stamina; if
he possessed the required skill and brains, there was every reason to
think that he might "deliver the goods." With the advent of the silent
man upon the mound, Locke's attention became divided between doubts
about himself and interest in the performance of the mute.
Hampton, who followed Norris, was quite as helpless against the dazzling
speed of Jones; he could not even foul the ball. "Great smoke, Locke!"
he exclaimed, pausing on his way to center field. "That man's a terror!
He seems to groove them all, but you can't see them come over."
"Perhaps he can't keep it up," said Lefty.
"I hope not. If he does, we've got to win on the runs we've made
already; there'll be no more scoring for us. It's up to you to hold
them down."
The southpaw held them in the fourth, but he did so by working his
head fully as much as his arm. By this time he had learned something
of the hitting weaknesses of the Wind Jammers, and he played upon
those weaknesses successfully. To his teammates and the spectators the
performance was satisfactory; to him it proved only that his brain,
if not his arm, was still in perfect condition.
Mysterious Jones came back with two strikeouts; in fact, he struck
Sommers, the third man, out also; but the whistling, shooting sphere
went through the catcher, and Sommers raced to first on the error.
This brought Locke up, and he was eager to hit against Jones. He missed
the first one cleanly, but fouled the next two, which was better than any
one else had done. Then the silent man put something more on the ball,
and Lefty failed to touch it.
"Nice little pitcher, don't you think?" inquired Cap'n Wiley blandly.
"He behaves well, very well," admitted the southpaw.
The Grays implored Locke to keep the enemy in hand; the crowd entreated
him. This was the game they desired to win. To them it was a struggle
of vital importance, and the winning or losing of it was the only
question of moment. They did not dream of something a thousand times
more momentous involving Lefty Locke.
Loyal to the team and its supporters, the southpaw could not take
needless chances of losing, no matter how much he longed to be put
upon his mettle and forced to the last notch. Therefore he continued
to work his head while on the slab. Schaeffer fouled out, Jones fanned
indifferently, and Nuccio popped to shortstop.
"Lucky boy!" called Wiley. "But things won't always break so well
for you. You'll have to go your limit before the game is over."
"I hope so," said Lefty.
Hallett caught one of Jones' whistlers on the end of his bat and drove
it straight into the hands of the first baseman.
"Hooray!" laughed Watson. "At least that shows that he can be hit."
"A blind man might hit one in a million if he kept his bat swinging,"
scoffed Wiley. "Let's see you do as much."
Watson could not do as much; he fanned three times. Then Jones pitched
four balls to Tremain, and the doctor placed himself in Watson's class.
The game had become a pitchers' battle, with one twirler cutting the
batters down with burning speed and shoots, while the other held them
in check through the knowledge he had swiftly acquired regarding their
shortcomings with the stick. In every way the performance of Jones was
the most spectacular, and in the crowd scores of persons were beginning
to tell one another that the mute was the greater pitcher.
The truth was, experience in fast company had taught Lefty Locke to
conserve his energies; like Mathewson, he believed that the eight
players who supported him should shoulder a share of the defensive
work, and it was not his practice to "put everything on the ball,"
with the cushions clean. Only when pinches came did he tighten and burn
them across. Nor was he in that class of pitchers who are continually
getting themselves into holes by warping them wide to lure batters into
reaching; for he had found that a twirler who followed such a method
would be forced to go the limit by cool and heady batters who made a
practice of "waiting it out." Having that prime requisite of all
first-class moundmen, splendid control, he sought out an opponent's
weakest spot and kept the ball there, compelling the man to strike at
the kind from which he was least likely to secure effective drives. This
had led a large number of the fans who fancied themselves wise to
hold fast to their often-expressed belief that the southpaw was lucky,
but they were always looking for the opposition to fall on him and
hammer him all over the lot.
Therefore it was not strange that the crowd, assembled to watch the game
in Fernandon, should soon come to regard the mute, with his blinding
speed and jagged shoots, as the superior slabman. Apparently without
striving for effect, Jones was a spectacular performer; mechanical skill
and superabundant energy were his to the limit. But Locke knew that
something more was needed for a man to make good in the Big League.
Nevertheless, with such a foundation to build upon, unless the fellow
should be flawed by some overshadowing natural weakness that made him
impossible, coaching, training, and experience were the rungs of the
ladder by which he might mount close to the top.
Loyal to the core, Lefty was thinking of the pitching staff of the Blue
Stockings, weakened by deflections to the Federals, possibly by his
own inability to return. For a little time, even Weegman was forgotten.
Anyway, the southpaw had not yet come to regard it as a settled thing
that Bailey Weegman would be permitted to undermine and destroy the
great organization, if such was his culpable design; in some manner
the scoundrel would be blocked and baffled.
The sixth inning saw no break in the run of the game between the Grays
and the Wind Jammers. Bemis, O'Reilley, and Schepps all hit Locke, but
none hit safely, while Jones slaughtered three of the locals by the
strike-out method. As Wiley had stated was the silent man's custom,
he seemed to be seeking revenge on the world for giving him a raw deal.
When Oleson began the seventh with a weak grounder and "got a life"
through an error, Lefty actually felt a throb of satisfaction, for it
seemed that the test might be forced upon him at last. But the Swede
attempted to steal on the first pitch to Rickey, and Sommers threw him
out. Rickey then lifted a high fly just back of first base, and Colby
put him out of his misery. Plum batted an easy one to second.
"There's only one thing for me to do," thought Locke. "I've got to
work the strike-out stuff in the next two innings, just as if men were
on bases, and see if I've got it. The game will be over if I wait any
longer for a real pinch."
When Jones had polished off Gates and Sommers, Locke stepped out to
face the mute the second time. Having watched the man and analyzed his
performance, the southpaw felt that he should be able to obtain a hit.
"If I can't lay the club against that ball," he told himself, "then
that fellow's putting something on it beside speed and curves; he's
using brains also."
Cap'n Wiley jumped up from the bench and did a sailor's hornpipe.
"This is the life!" he cried. "The real thing against the real thing!
Take soundings, Lefty; you're running on shoals. You'll be high and dry
in a minute."
Straight and silent, Jones stood and looked at the Big League player,
both hands holding the ball hidden before him. Wiley ceased his dancing
and shouting and a hush settled on the crowd. To Locke it seemed that
the eyes of the voiceless pitcher were plumbing the depths of his mind
and searching out his hidden thoughts; there came to Lefty a ridiculous
fancy that by some telepathic method the man on the slab could fathom
his purposes and so make ready to defeat them. An uncanny feeling crept
upon him, and he was annoyed. Jones pitched, and the batsman missed a
marvelous drop, which he had not been expecting.
"Perhaps I'll have to revise my theory about him not using brains,"
was the southpaw's mental admission.
The next two pitches were both a trifle wide, and Lefty declined to
bite at either. For the first time, as if he knew that here was a test,
Jones appeared to be trying to "work" the batter. Locke fouled the
following one.
"That's all there is to it," declared Wiley, "and I'm excruciatingly
surprised that there should be even that much. Go 'way back, Mr. Locke!"
Again Jones surveyed Lefty with his piercing eyes, and for the third time
he pitched a shoot that was not quite across. As if he had known it would
not be over, the batsman made not even the slightest move to swing.
"Some guessing match!" confessed the Marine Marvel. "Now, however, let
me give you my plighted word of dishonor that you're going to behold
a specimen of the superfluous speed Jonesy keeps on tap for special
occasions. Hold your breath and see if you can see it go by."
The ball did not go by; Lefty hit it fairly and sent a safety humming
to right.