PATTERN GIVES ADVICE
Wayne wanted advice, and it was to Arthur Pattern that he went. A
quarter of an hour after Mr. Farrel’s departure Wayne and Arthur were
sitting on the steps of the State National Bank talking it over. Now
and then the sound of exploding fireworks sounded and occasionally the
sparks of a distant rocket lighted the sky beyond the roofs or red,
white, and blue stars floated high against the purple darkness of the
night, but the celebration was nearly over and the main street was
nearly deserted.
“I remember Chris Farrel,” Arthur Pattern was saying. “That is, I
remember reading about him. He used to be a crackajack catcher some
years ago. Played for a long time with one of the western clubs;
Cincinnati, I think. Then he was with Washington and left them to
manage some team like the Baltimores. Don’t think it was Baltimore,
though. I don’t know much about this Harrisville outfit, but the
Tri-State League’s been going for a good many years. It’s a six-club
league. Harrisville and Doncaster in this state, Paterson and Trenton
in New Jersey, and Utica and some other place in New York State.”
“Damascus, I think he said.”
“Yes, Damascus. Some of those are good baseball towns, and they ought
to make money. Still, I don’t suppose they do much better than split
even after expenses are paid. Saturdays and holidays are about the
only times they draw big attendances, they charge about half what the
big leagues charge for admission, and players’ salaries, travelling
expenses, and so on count up fast. Men like this Mr. Badger own ball
teams more for amusement than anything else, I guess. Some of them go
in for steam yachts, some for trotting horses, and some for ball teams.
I guess they net about the same on the investment,” ended Arthur drily.
“Then you think this Harrisville team isn’t very good?” asked Wayne.
“Better than some, not so good as others. If you’re going in for
professional baseball playing, Wayne, you’ve got to get experience, and
one team’s about the same as another, so long as you get your salary.
You can’t afford to choose and pick, I guess, because it isn’t easy for
a youngster like you to get a try-out. If a chance comes to you, grab
it. After all, it doesn’t make much difference where you start. If
you’re any good you won’t stay long in the bushes. The main question
is: Do you want to be a ball player?”
Wayne considered in silence for a long minute. Then: “Well, it’s like
this, Arthur,” he answered slowly. “I wouldn’t want to play ball all
my life. It isn’t good enough. But there isn’t much I can do--yet. It
isn’t as though I’d been trained for something, like engineering or
keeping books or--or farming. I’m not good for anything at all--yet.
The only thing I can do half-way well is play baseball. So it seems to
me that it’s a sensible thing for me to play ball and make some money
so that I can learn to do something better. If I made some money in the
summer I could go to school or college in the winter, couldn’t I?”
“Yes, you could. What would you like to be?”
“Well,” answered the other, smiling, “I used to think I wanted to be
a locomotive engineer, but I reckon now I’d rather be a veterinary
surgeon.”
“What!” exclaimed Arthur. “A horse doctor?”
Wayne nodded untroubledly. “Yes, that’s what they call them in the
country,” he replied, “just as they call the doctor a ‘sawbones.’ Don’t
you think curing sick animals is just as fine a profession as curing
sick people?”
“Hm. Do you?”
“Finer. Seems to me it takes more skill. A person who is ill can help
the doctor, you see, by telling him where the trouble lies, but an
animal can’t. The doctor has got to depend on his knowledge altogether,
hasn’t he?”
“I suppose so. Still, up where I live we don’t class the vets and the
physicians together, I’m afraid. The vets are generally rather ignorant
old chaps, I guess. I remember hearing my father say once when I was a
kid that old Nancy, the carriage horse, was dying and that he guessed
it was time to call in the vet and let him have the credit for it.”
“Did she die?” asked Wayne.
Arthur thought a minute. Then: “By Jove, I don’t believe she did that
time!” he laughed. “Perhaps old What’s-his-name was some good, after
all!”
“Doctor Kearny--he’s the veterinarian at home--says that the profession
is making faster strides nowadays than any other,” said Wayne. “He says
the day is past when the man who can’t make a living any other way can
become a dentist or a veterinary surgeon. He says treating horses and
cows and dogs and things is a heap harder than giving pills to persons.
I’d rather cure a horse or a dog any day than a human being.”
“It might depend on the human being, mightn’t it?” laughed the other.
“Well, all right, old man, you be a vet if you want to. Perhaps it is
a good deal finer trade than I’d thought. Anyway, what we’ve got to
decide is whether you’re to join the Badgers, isn’t it?”
“Yes. I wish he’d given me some idea what the salary would be. What do
you think, Arthur?”
“Well, I wouldn’t look for more than a hundred a month at first. You
see, Wayne, you aren’t anything remarkable yet. You don’t mind my
talking plain? This man Farrel is banking on you learning the game and
turning out well in a couple of years. He thinks that if they can get
hold of you now and sign you up at a small salary it’ll pay them to do
it on the chance that you’ll be of real use later. I dare say there
are lots of chaps who play just about the same sort of game that you
do right now. Personally, I think you’ll make good. You sort of--sort
of--well, I don’t just know how to say it, but you sort of _look_ good.
There’s a certainty in the way you handle the ball and the way you
handle yourself that’s promising. I guess it struck Farrel the same
way. If he was sure he could come around two years from now and find
you he wouldn’t have made a sound today, but he isn’t. He’s afraid that
someone else will discover you and grab you. But don’t get it into
your head that you’re a marvel, Wayne, because you aren’t. Not yet. If
you do go over to Harrisville, old man, talk small and don’t let your
hat hurt you.”
“I won’t. I don’t think this has swelled my head any. What I’m afraid
of is that this manager man won’t like me when he sees me.”
“That’s possible, too. Better not hope too much. I dare say Farrel
sends a lot of fellows over there who just turn around and go home
again. But his offering to stake you to your fares looks as if he was
pretty fairly certain in your case.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t take that money,” said Wayne earnestly.
“You will if you go. I’ll see that you do. It’s a business proposition,
Wayne. Farrel’s paying you ten dollars for an option on you. If he
takes you he gets his option money back. You mustn’t think, though,
that being a minor league ball player is all roses. It’s no picnic.
You’ll have to practice every morning, whether you get on or not,
you’ll have to beat it around the country for weeks at a time, sleeping
on the train or in punk hotels, you’ll get bawled out when you pull a
boner and no one will say ‘Thank you’ when you make a star play: no
one but the ‘fans,’ and they’ll be the first to hoot you the next day
if you make one miscue. You’ll run up against some rough ones on the
team who will probably make life a perfect misery for you at first, and
you’ll get the short end of a lot of decisions until the umpires see
that you are real. I don’t want you to think that minor league ball
playing is all bread and treacle, Wayne.”
“Maybe it’ll be hard,” was the response, “but any work is hard, isn’t
it? And I’d rather do something hard that I like to do than something
easy that I don’t. And I do like to play ball, Arthur. Besides, a
hundred dollars a month is real money to me. If I stayed on the team
three months I’d have three hundred dollars!”
“Not quite, because you have to live meanwhile. Remember that the club
only pays your bills while you’re travelling, and you’re travelling
only about half the time.”
“It wouldn’t cost me much, though, to live in Harrisville, would it? I
reckon I could find a boarding-house pretty reasonable.”
“I guess so. It’s a pretty big town. Look here, Wayne, suppose I go
around there with you tomorrow and have a talk with Farrel. Maybe I
could get him to promise something definite. Want me to?”
“I wish you would,” said Wayne gratefully. “That is, if I decide to
try it. I’m going to think it over tonight.”
“Well, you want to start thinking pretty soon,” laughed Arthur, yawning
as he arose, “because it’s nearly eleven now and there isn’t much night
left for us slaves. You call me up at the office in the morning and let
me know. Then I’ll take my lunch hour at eleven-thirty and we’ll go
around to the hotel together. Good-night, Wayne.”
It was close on midnight when Wayne left the railroad track and started
across the meadow through the lush grass toward the dim orange glow
from the windows and open door of the car. It suddenly came to him that
he would be sorry to leave this queer retreat of theirs, for it had
been more like a real home than any he had known for several years.
And, with a genuine pang, he remembered the garden he had planted.
He would never see the flowers blossom, never see the little green
pellet, which had mysteriously appeared on one of the tomato plants a
few days ago, grow and ripen! The thought of leaving that garden almost
determined him then and there to think no more of Mr. Farrel’s offer,
but to stay at home with June and be satisfied with his work and the
new friends he had made.
June was still awake when he approached, and hailed him across the
starlit darkness. And Sam barked shrilly, at first with a challenge
and then, as he scuttled to meet Wayne, with delight. The boy picked
him up and snuggled him in his arms, and the dog licked his cheek with
an eager pink tongue. “He done catch him a terrapin today,” announced
June as Wayne seated himself tiredly on the step. “An’ he jus’ act
disgusting he was so proud.”
“I reckon the terrapin was just a plain, everyday mud turtle,” laughed
Wayne. “Did you see it?”
“Yes, sir, he brung it home an’ put it on its back so’s it couldn’t get
away, an’ I ’most trod on it. What’s the diff’ence between a terrapin,
Mas’ Wayne, an’ a mud turkle?”
“About seventy-five cents, June.”
“Say there is?” June was silent a minute. Then: “What done ’come o’ you
this evenin’? I was waitin’ an’ waitin’ for you.”
“I’m sorry, June. I wanted to see Arthur Pattern about something and
we got to talking. I--I’m thinking about leaving here, June.” Then,
sitting there in the star-sprinkled gloom, and fighting mosquitoes,
Wayne told of Mr. Farrel and his proposition and of his talk with
Arthur Pattern; and when he had finished June gave a joyous “Yip!” that
startled Sam into barking.
“Ain’ I always tol’ you, Mas’ Wayne, that you goin’ make you-all’s
fortune up here? Ain’ I?” Wayne couldn’t recall having been told
anything of the sort, but he didn’t say so. “Reckon we’s goin’ to be
mighty ’portant folkses now!” the darkey went on. “How much money he
goin’ to pay you?”
“I don’t know yet. And I don’t know that I’ll go, June. Maybe Mr.
Farrel isn’t really in earnest. I don’t see how he can be. I can’t play
ball much, June. If I----”
“Say you can’? Let me tell you, Mas’ Wayne, sir, you plays ball
better’n any of those other gen’lemen, a heap better!”
“But playing on a real league team is different, June. Suppose this
manager doesn’t like me when I get there?”
“He’s goin’ to like you! How far is this yere place, Mas’ Wayne?”
“Harrisville? About eighty miles, I think. It’s a pretty big place,
June, and maybe I wouldn’t like it as well as Medfield. I--I’ve got
sort of fond of this place. If I do go, I want you to look after the
garden, June. If you don’t I’m going to tan your hide for you.”
“What you mean look after your garden, Mas’ Wayne? Ain’ I goin’ with
you?”
“Why, I don’t see how you can,” answered Wayne troubledly. “Maybe
after I get ahead a little----”
“Now look yere, Mas’ Wayne! My mammy done tell me to watch out for you,
ain’ she? How you ’spects I’m goin’ watch out for you if I ain’ with
you? No, sir, Mas’ Wayne, if you goes, I goes, an’ that’s all there is
to it, sir!”
“Well, we’ll see,” evaded Wayne. “I dare say I’ll be back by the end of
the week, anyway. If I’m not, and you want to come, I’ll send you some
money and you and Sam can follow.”
“You don’ have to send no money,” said Wayne. “I got me ’most fifty
dollars right now. How much you got, sir?”
“Not a great deal,” owned Wayne ruefully. “I’ve had to buy so many
things that I’ve been spending it about as fast as I’ve got it, June.”
“Ain’ boughten anythin’ you ain’ needed, I reckon.” June stepped down
and disappeared around the side of the car and when he came back he
held a tin can in his hand. He rattled it proudly. “Reckon you better
take this along with you,” he said, offering it to Wayne. “Jus’ you
drap it in your pocket right now, sir, so’s you won’ forget it.”
“Get out! I’m not going to take your money,” answered the other firmly.
“I don’t need it, anyway. I’ve got twelve dollars, pretty near; and
Mr. Farrel is going to pay my fare both ways.”
“I know that, Mas’ Wayne, but ’twon’ do for you to walk in on them ball
players over to this yere place with no little ol’ picayune twelve
dollars in your pocket, no, sir! You got to put on a heap o’ dog, Mas’
Wayne, ’cause if you don’t they’s goin’ to think you don’ amoun’ to
nothin’ ’tall. Please, sir, you take it.”
“No,” said Wayne firmly. “I’m much obliged, June, but I don’t need it.
If they give me the position I’ll have money of my own, you see.”
“Then you take half of it, Mas’ Wayne,” pleaded June.
But Wayne was adamant and June had to hide his treasure again, and
after a while they went to bed, June to slumber and Wayne to lie awake
until the sky began to brighten in the east. It was only when the stars
paled that sleep came to him.