WINNING HIS GAME
Bases filled and only one out! Two balls and no strikes on the batsman!
A hit meant two runs across! All this Guy Murtha explained in quick,
troubled words to Dud. And Dud, tired of face but eager-eyed, nodded
quite as though Guy had explained that it was a fine day and that the
weather prediction was for a continuation of present conditions!
Then Guy went back to his place and the Grafton sympathizers stopped
cheering and Dud sped his five balls to Brooks, each one just where he
meant it to go.
Once more the batsman took his place and Dud pitched.
“Str-r-ike!” bawled the umpire, and waved an arm aloft. The batter
thumped the rubber with his bat. Again Dud launched the ball forward.
Again it sped straight and true across the platter and knee-high.
“Str-r-ike two!”
The batsman grew wary. He no longer fidgeted but put his whole mind on
the next delivery. Dud fumbled his cap, took his half wind-up and shot
his arm to the right and around in a swing. The ball flashed to the
plate and the umpire hurled his hand aloft with a mighty gesture.
“_He’s out!_”
Strident protest from the retreating batsman and from the Mount Morris
bench! Cheers wild and triumphant from the Grafton seats and from the
field! And another green-stockinged player faced his fate. A ball, a
strike, another ball. Then a drop that was swung at and never touched.
Two-and-two, and Mount Morris watching her opportunity slip from her
grasp. Then, while Dud swung his arm up, came a quick cry from behind
him:
“_He’s off!_”
The man at third was streaking to the plate! But so was the ball, and
although the batsman swung at it, it lodged safely in Brooks’ mitt and
Brooks, dropping to his knees, blocked the ambitious runner a foot from
the plate!
“Can you keep it up?” asked Mr. Sargent wonderingly as Dud sank to the
bench and Davy Richards flourished a towel in front of his face.
“I think so, sir. I’m going to try awfully hard,” answered Dud.
“Well, go easy on yourself this inning. Let them hit a little if you
like. There’s another inning coming and maybe several.”
“Yes, sir.” Dud’s gaze, straying along the bench, caught sight of
Jimmy, Jimmy dressed for play and with an anxious regard fixed on the
coach. “If you could, sir,” said Dud, “I wish you’d let Logan in. It
wasn’t our fault that we got left, sir; at least, not wholly; and
Jimmy’s crazy to play!”
“Logan? Maybe in the next inning. I’ll see. Here! What’s this?”
This was Star Meyer picking himself up from the water bucket, having
in some way tripped over one of Jimmy’s feet as he passed. Jimmy was
all sympathy and apologies, but Star only muttered. His haughtiness
was wholly lacking and the fellows viewed with real concern the almost
abject manner with which he righted the empty pail and retired into the
far end of the bench. But Jimmy, catching Dud’s eye, winked wickedly.
The eighth passed into history without witnessing a run for either
side. Grafton got Ordway to first on a pass and he went on a base when
Ayer lifted one to left for the second out. Then, while Boynton was
at bat, Hugh was caught napping at second and another chance to score
passed into oblivion.
Mount Morris’ first man got a hit and was thrown out at second on an
attempted steal, Brooks making as pretty a peg to Murtha as one could
hope to see. The next man struck out miserably. Then followed a
scratch hit that came near to being an error for Blake. The next man,
Saylor, flied out to Murtha and ended the eighth.
Boynton started for Grafton in the ninth by beating out a weak hit and
the scarlet pennants waved again. Meyer, bat on shoulder and stepping
to the plate, was recalled.
“Logan batting for Boynton!” called the umpire.
Jimmy swung at the first ball, disdained the next two, had a second
strike called on him, started for the next and changed his mind and
was glad of it and was finally passed when what Saylor had meant for
a strike over the inner corner went wrong. With two on bases, Brooks
was the man of the hour, but Brooks was no hitter and only stood there
while Saylor fooled him on two slow ones that went for strikes, wasted
a wide one on him and then made him bite at a drop that actually dusted
the plate. Although Brooks played the game to the last and sped for his
base the ball was recovered by the catcher and got there well ahead of
him.
Dud had as much hope of hitting safely as he had of knocking out a
home-run. And he knew very well that he would be doing only what was
expected of him if he struck out as badly as Brooks. But he wanted very
much to do something a little better than that. As he dug his toes and
faced Saylor, he recalled Ben Myatt’s remark that a pitcher who could
hit was pretty useful. And Dud wanted to make himself just that! And
so he tried as hard as he knew how to keep his eyes on the pitcher and
study him and then on the ball, and study that, and so see if――
“One ball!” said the umpire.
Dud took a breath. All right so far. It had been too high and he had
known it. He wondered if Saylor would try it again or――
“Str-r-r-ike!”
Well, that had certainly fooled him! He thought surely it was going
wide. Saylor had some curve on that one! Dud glued his eyes to the ball
once more, swung and missed.
“Str-r-rike two!”
That was awful! He was as good as gone now! Unless――
“Two balls!”
Perhaps Saylor would miss it this time. Then it would be three balls
and two strikes and Saylor would have to pitch! Just why Dud offered
at the next delivery he didn’t know then and couldn’t have explained
later. It had all the ear-marks of a fast one on the outside of the
plate, but for some reason Dud let go at it, and the ball, curving
inward, met his bat fairly and screeched off into short center,
low enough to have been speared by second-baseman had he been two
yards nearer its path and long enough to send Boynton and Jimmy
hustling home. Jimmy beat out that throw by inches only, but beat it
nevertheless, while Dud, seeing his chance, streaked to second. And
Grafton went fairly delirious with joy!
Nick hit safely and advanced Dud, Winslow fouled out to the catcher
and Hugh Ordway, putting all his strength into a terrific swing, sent
a screeching fly far into right field but not far enough to be out
of reach of the guardian of that territory. A long hard run and a
brilliant catch and the half-inning was over.
Mount Morris tried hard enough in that last period to catch up, but
she had little chance. Dud had no trouble in striking out the first
batsman. The next hit safely through second base territory. The third
went out, Winslow to Ayer, and the fourth, Mount Morris’ last hope,
swung at a high one, was fooled by a drop that he didn’t like and that
was labeled a strike, fouled off another and at last, just as the
shadow of the grandstand had reached the edge of the plate, slammed a
straight, fast one directly at the pitcher’s box. Dud couldn’t make the
catch; it was going too hard for that; but he knocked it down, found
it leisurely enough and tossed to Ayer. And as the big first-baseman
nestled the ball in his glove the stands flowed onto the field and the
game was over!
Half an hour later, tired and very, very happy, Grafton was returning
home. Dud, hero of the hour, but a very retiring, modest――even
uncomfortable――hero, was wedged between Jimmy and a car window. There
was much talk, much laughter, much noise, and James Townsend Logan
was accountable for fully his share of it. Jimmy had just finished
recounting the history of their hand-car adventure and the subsequent
heart-breaking hike to Greenbank to as many fellows as could cluster
within hearing. Blake, sitting on the arm of the seat, one hand
fondling Jimmy’s damp locks, put a question.
“Where,” he asked, “is Star now, Jimmy?”
Jimmy grinned, felt carefully of a large lump under his left eye and
made answer solemnly.
“He’s coming by the next train. He was――er――delayed.”
“I hope,” said Nick gently, “that you didn’t――didn’t damage him, Jimmy.”
Jimmy turned and smiled broadly up at the questioner.
“You wait till you see him!” he said in a deep, ecstatic whisper.
Mr. Crowley, pushing his way along the aisle, paused to thrust a hand
over Jimmy’s shoulder.
“Baker, that was playing ball, my boy,” he said happily. “Shake hands!
You pitched a fine three innings and, what’s more, you won your own
game, boy!”
Dud murmured his thanks, aware of the kindly smiling looks from the
clustered faces, and turned his own face to the window. It occurred
to him just then that Mr. Crowley’s expression was capable of two
meanings. Yes, he told himself contentedly, he had at last won his game!
* * * * *
Transcriber’s Notes:
――Text in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_).
――Except for the frontispiece, illustrations have been moved to
follow the text that they illustrate.
――Punctuation and spelling inaccuracies were silently corrected.
――Archaic and variable spelling has been preserved.
――Variations in hyphenation and compound words have been preserved.