_Adonis Makes a Deal_
The after theater crowd was trooping into the lobby of the hotel in
laughing, chattering groups and drifting steadily toward the cafe, in
which already gay parties were gathered at the tables. Manager Clancy
and his wife, with Secretary Taber and his daughter, came together and
they stood undecided, the men urging that they go to the restaurant for
a lunch before retiring, and Miss Taber, laughing, declaring that too
much pleasure in one day was bad for them. At that moment Williams, a
little flushed, swaggered across the lobby, and, lifting his hat,
advanced toward the group. The girl smiled pleasantly in response to
his greeting, but as he spoke again she stiffened indignantly and
retired a step involuntarily, as she saw he had been drinking.
"So you prefer that red-headed prison bird to me?" he asked in sneering
tones.
Betty Tabor flushed, then turned pale and facing the handsome, half
drunken fellow, she gazed at him steadily until, in spite of his
swaggering attitude, he grew uneasy and dropped his eyes. Then she
spoke. She spoke just one word, vibrant with all the scorn and anger
in her being.
"Yes."
Without a glance at him she turned and stepped into the waiting car,
leaving Williams staring blankly in the elevator well. The cold scorn
of the girl's single word had stung him more deeply than a volume of
rebuke would have done. Half maddened by jealousy and drink he turned
to cross the lobby, forgetting to replace his hat, and Clancy, whose
attention had been attracted by the pitcher's pursuit of the girl,
grasped him by the shoulder and said sternly:
"Williams, if you take another drink to-night it will cost you a
month's pay."
The manager turned to rejoin his wife, and Williams, seething with what
he considered a double dose of injustice, walked unsteadily across the
lobby. He sat down and meditated over his wrongs. He thought of
Edwards and his offer and rising quickly he walked to the telegraph
office and wrote a message, for which he paid as he handed it to the
night operator. Clancy, who had been talking with friends, was waiting
for an elevator and saw his pitcher writing the message. His forehead
knitted into a worried frown as he turned and slowly walked toward the
elevator again, whistling, as was his habit when he was seriously
disturbed. Clancy determined to watch his left-hander. He did not
speak of the matter to anyone, having decided to await developments.
He watched Williams closely during the remaining games against the
Pilgrims, which the Bears won easily, and during the trip to the city
of the Maroons, where Williams was to pitch the opening game of the
series.
The Bears and Panthers were fighting upon an unchanged basis, only a
fraction of a game separating them in the league standing. With but
eighteen more games remaining on the schedule for the Bears, and
nineteen for the Panthers, the race was becoming more desperate each
day and the nervous strain was commencing to tell upon some of the men.
Clancy was nursing his players, knowing that one disheartening defeat
might mean a break that would lead to a succession of downfalls. The
more he watched Williams the stronger his conviction that something was
amiss. Williams was not acting naturally and his demeanor when with
the other players was a puzzle to Clancy.
He selected Williams as the pitcher in the first game against the
Maroons with the purpose, being determined to find whether or not the
pitcher was in condition, and he sent Wilcox, his best right-handed
pitcher, out to warm up so as to be ready to rescue Williams at the
first sign of distress.
"What's the matter with Adonis?" inquired Manager Clancy, as his
catcher and principal adviser returned to the bench after the second
inning.
"His curve is breaking slow and low and on the inside corner of the
plate to the right-handers," replied Kennedy. "I can't make him keep
it high and out."
"Make him use his fast one or he'll get Kohinoor killed with one of
those line smashes," ordered Clancy quietly. "Watch him closely, and
if he is loafing, signal me."
The third inning and the fourth reeled away without a score, and in the
first half of the fifth a base on balls, a steal by Norton and a
crashing drive by Pardridge gave the Bears a score and the lead.
Caton, one of the heaviest hitters of the Maroons, started their half
of the inning, and as he stepped into position Kennedy crouched and
signaled. Williams shook his head quickly and pitched a curve that
broke on the inside corner of the plate. Caton drove the ball with
terrific force straight at McCarthy, who managed to knock it down and
hold the batter to one base. The next batter sacrificed, and Ellis, a
right-handed slugger, came to bat. Again Kennedy signaled for a fast
sidearm ball, pitched high, and again Williams shook his head and
curved one over the plate. Ellis struck the ball with one hand and
sent a carroming down to Swanson, who failed in a desperate effort to
throw out the runner. With men on first and third the Bears' first and
third baseman came close to the plate to cut off the runner, while the
shortstop and second baseman remained in position to make a double play
or to catch the runner stealing. Burley, the giant first baseman of
the Maroons, was at bat, a man noted for his ability to hit any ball
pitched close to him. Williams sent a strike whizzing over the plate.
Again the catcher ordered a fast ball, and he pitched a curve that
Burley fouled off for the second strike. Kennedy, perplexed and
anxious, ran down to consult with the pitcher. Williams sullenly
assented to the order to pitch high and out and waste two balls.
Instead, he threw a curve, low, close to the batter's knees and barely
twisting. Before Kennedy's cry of anger rose the bat crashed against
the ball, which flashed down the third-base line, struck McCarthy on
the arm, then on the jaw, and he went down like a poled ox, the ball
carroming away toward the stand. Before it was recovered one Maroon
had scored and the others were perched on second and third.
Time was called and players rushed to assist the injured third baseman.
Kennedy threw off his mask and ran to the bench.
"I signaled him and told him to pitch fast and waste two," he said to
Manager Clancy. "He nodded that he would and then crossed me and
lobbed up an easy curve inside the plate."
"Don't say a word," cautioned Clancy, as McCarthy, still dazed, but
recovering, was helped to his feet. "Keep ordering him to pitch fast
and outside. Signal me if he disobeys again."
McCarthy got onto his feet unsteadily, while the trainer worked with
his numb and aching arm. He winced with pain as he tried to throw to
see how badly his arm was damaged. While he was walking slowly back to
the bag, testing his arm anxiously, McCarthy had the second shock. The
cheering in the stands drew his attention, and as he glanced toward the
crowd he saw a girl. She was sitting in one of the field boxes between
two men and she was staring straight at him. McCarthy lifted his cap,
as if acknowledging the tribute to the crowd, but really in salutation
to the girl, who flushed angrily. A wave of resentment stirred
McCarthy. He strove to think that she had failed to recognize him, yet
feeling that the cut was deliberate.
Play had been resumed, but McCarthy's mind was not upon it. A sharp
yell from Swanson aroused him from his reverie just in time to see a
slow, easy bounding ball coming toward him. He leaped forward, fumbled
the ball an instant, recovered and threw wild. Two runners dashed
home, the batter reached second. McCarthy was thoroughly unnerved. A
few moments later he permitted an easy fly ball to fall safe in left
field without touching it. His errors gave the Maroons two more
scores, and, although the Bears rallied desperately late in the game,
it was too late, and they were beaten 5 to 3.
A sullen crowd of players climbed into their 'bus under punishment of
the jeers of the crowd that gathered to see them start back to their
hotel. McCarthy, with his shoulder and head aching, but with his heart
aching worse, sat with his chin drawn down into the upturned collar of
his sweater, refusing to be comforted. The Bears were in second place,
half a game behind the Panthers, and he, McCarthy, had lost the game.
Williams was smiling as if pleased and McCarthy blazed with anger.