GONE WRONG
Locke muttered a single word of disgust as he rose from the bench and
walked toward the pitcher’s slab. On the way he stopped suddenly,
staring for an instant toward some teams and automobiles down beyond
the far end of the third-base bleachers. Then he walked onward, but
some of the flush was gone from his face.
Hutchinson, sitting silent on the bench, had done little toward
directing his players. Should the game go against Kingsbridge, as he
believed it would, he was prepared to answer criticism by saying that
Henry Cope’s interference had made it impossible for him to rely on his
own judgment and generalship.
Long before Crandall named the Bancroft pitcher, Hutch was wise to the
man. He had likewise observed that Locke did not seem as efficient as
usual, although good support had prevented the Bullies from hammering
out runs.
“When the break comes,” thought the rascally manager, “it’s dollars to
doughnuts they’ll get his goat for fair.”
The Kingsbridge pitcher looked ill as he found the slab at the
beginning of the fifth; his face was pale and set, and there was
something like a glare in his eyes. He seemed to be in haste to hand
Pat McGovern a pass, pitching one ball after another without pausing to
steady down, though both Oulds and Stark begged him to take more time;
and not one of the four he threw for Pat even grazed a corner.
Following this, he bored Bernsteine in the ribs, and two men were on
the sacks, with no one down. Remembering the first game Locke had
pitched on that field, the Kingsbridge crowd declined to be frightened.
“He’ll steady down in a moment,” they said. “Just watch him.”
But in a moment McGovern and Bernsteine each moved up a sack on a
weirdly wild pitch to Lisotte.
Hutchinson turned quickly to Ringling.
“Shake the kinks out of your arm, Ring,” he directed. “Hurry up about
it.”
Oulds had called Locke, meeting him a few steps in front of the pan.
“What’s biting you now, son?” he growled, heedless of the howling
Bancrofters, who were demanding that the umpire should keep the game
going. “You’ve got the wabbles; I don’t believe you can see the rubber.”
He wondered at the look in Tom’s eyes. Locke moistened his dry lips.
“Yes, yes, Oulds,” he said huskily; “I’m all right now.”
“Well, you don’t look it,” retorted Hunchy. “Be you havin’ a fit, or
what? You’ve got to stop heavin’ the ball as fast as you can git holt
of it. Take your time, now. Don’t let Lisotte bunt; prob’ly he’ll try
it. If they start scorin’, they’re li’ble to win the game right here.”
“I tell you I’m all right now,” declared Locke savagely. “Give me the
ball.”
“He’s havin’ a reg’ler fit,” muttered the catcher, surrendering the
sphere and backing toward his position behind the pan.
Lisotte squared himself again; the coachers talked excitedly, the
Bancroft crowd rooted for runs; Kingsbridge was silent. Bernsteine took
a long lead off second, and McGovern danced back and forth at third.
Locke was taking time at last, apparently trying hard to throw off the
feverish wildness that had put him into “a hole.”
Swift, high, and close came the ball to Lisotte, difficult indeed to
bunt safely. But the little Canuck did not try to bunt; instead, as
if he knew just what was due, he met the sphere with a snappy swing,
driving it humming into the field between center and right.
McGovern danced gayly to the scoring station, Bernsteine following with
a rush. There was a wild riot on the Bancroft bleachers, men leaping
up and down, flinging their hats into the air and yelling themselves
purple in the face; for, with two runs scored, no one out, Locke
apparently all to the bad, and Pinwheel Murtel in Big League form, it
seemed that the game had been clinched for the Bullies.
Since coming on the field, Tom Locke had been looking for Janet
Harting; somehow he was confident she would attend this game. It is
likely that thoughts of her had disturbed him and prevented him from
concentrating upon the work of pitching, although he had not been aware
of it.
Walking out to take his position at the beginning of the fifth,
however, his searching eyes discovered her blue parasol, and, beneath
it, Janet, sitting at the side of Benton King in the same carriage
in which he had first beheld her. As Locke looked, King seemed to be
returning his gaze. The pitcher saw Bent lean toward the girl and say
something, whereupon both laughed. For the time being Tom lost his
head, greatly to the advantage of the rejoicing Bancrofters.
He knew it; no one on that field knew it better. And nothing could
have served better to sober him and bring him to his senses than that
wicked, timely line drive by Lisotte. He saw Ringling warming up and
Hutchinson talking to Henry Cope, who plainly was not feeling right. Of
course, the manager was asking permission――or demanding it――to remove
him immediately from the game.
“I’m a fool!” thought Tom. “I have played right into that rascal’s
hand.”