One day in July our Rochester club, leader in the Eastern League, had
returned to the hotel after winning a double-header from the Syracuse
club. For some occult reason there was to be a lay-off next day and
then on the following another double-header. These double-headers we
hated next to exhibition games. Still a lay-off for twenty-four hours,
at that stage of the race, was a Godsend, and we received the news with
exclamations of pleasure.
After dinner we were all sitting and smoking comfortably in front of
the hotel when our manager, Merritt, came hurriedly out of the lobby.
It struck me that he appeared a little flustered.
"Say, you fellars," he said brusquely. "Pack your suits and be ready
for the bus at seven-thirty."
For a moment there was a blank, ominous silence, while we assimilated
the meaning of his terse speech.
"I've got a good thing on for tomorrow," continued the manager. "Sixty
per cent gate receipts if we win. That Guelph team is hot stuff,
though."
"Guelph!" exclaimed some of the players suspiciously. "Where's Guelph?"
"It's in Canada. We'll take the night express an' get there tomorrow
in time for the game. An' we'll hev to hustle."
Upon Merritt then rained a multiplicity of excuses. Gillinger was not
well, and ought to have that day's rest. Snead's eyes would profit by
a lay-off. Deerfoot Browning was leading the league in base running,
and as his legs were all bruised and scraped by sliding, a manager who
was not an idiot would have a care of such valuable runmakers for his
team. Lake had "Charley-horse." Hathaway's arm was sore. Bane's
stomach threatened gastritis. Spike Doran's finger needed a chance to
heal. I was stale, and the other players, three pitchers, swore their
arms should be in the hospital.
"Cut it out!" said Merritt, getting exasperated. "You'd all lay down on
me--now, wouldn't you? Well, listen to this: McDougal pitched today;
he doesn't go. Blake works Friday, he doesn't go. But the rest of you
puffed-up, high-salaried stiffs pack your grips quick. See? It'll
cost any fresh fellar fifty for missin' the train."
So that was how eleven of the Rochester team found themselves moodily
boarding a Pullman en route for Buffalo and Canada. We went to bed
early and arose late.
Guelph lay somewhere in the interior of Canada, and we did not expect
to get there until 1 o'clock.
As it turned out, the train was late; we had to dress hurriedly in the
smoking room, pack our citizen clothes in our grips and leave the train
to go direct to the ball grounds without time for lunch.
It was a tired, dusty-eyed, peevish crowd of ball players that climbed
into a waiting bus at the little station.
We had never heard of Guelph; we did not care anything about Rube
baseball teams. Baseball was not play to us; it was the hardest kind
of work, and of all things an exhibition game was an abomination.
The Guelph players, strapping lads, met us with every mark of respect
and courtesy and escorted us to the field with a brass band that was
loud in welcome, if not harmonious in tune.
Some 500 men and boys trotted curiously along with us, for all the
world as if the bus were a circus parade cage filled with striped
tigers. What a rustic, motley crowd massed about in and on that ball
ground. There must have been 10,000.
The audience was strange to us. The Indians, half-breeds,
French-Canadians; the huge, hulking, bearded farmers or traders, or
trappers, whatever they were, were new to our baseball experience.
The players themselves, however, earned the largest share of our
attention. By the time they had practiced a few moments we looked at
Merritt and Merritt looked at us.
These long, powerful, big-handed lads evidently did not know the
difference between lacrosse and baseball; but they were quick as cats
on their feet, and they scooped up the ball in a way wonderful to see.
And throw!--it made a professional's heart swell just to see them line
the ball across the diamond.
"Lord! what whips these lads have!" exclaimed Merritt. "Hope we're not
up against it. If this team should beat us we wouldn't draw a handful
at Toronto. We can't afford to be beaten. Jump around and cinch the
game quick. If we get in a bad place, I'll sneak in the 'rabbit.'"
The "rabbit" was a baseball similar in appearance to the ordinary
league ball; under its horse-hide cover, however, it was remarkably
different.
An ingenious fan, a friend of Merritt, had removed the covers from a
number of league balls and sewed them on rubber balls of his own
making. They could not be distinguished from the regular article, not
even by an experienced professional--until they were hit. Then! The
fact that after every bounce one of these rubber balls bounded swifter
and higher had given it the name of the "rabbit."
Many a game had the "rabbit" won for us at critical stages. Of course
it was against the rules of the league, and of course every player in
the league knew about it; still, when it was judiciously and cleverly
brought into a close game, the "rabbit" would be in play, and very
probably over the fence, before the opposing captain could learn of it,
let alone appeal to the umpire.
"Fellars, look at that guy who's goin' to pitch," suddenly spoke up one
of the team.
Many as were the country players whom we seasoned and traveled
professionals had run across, this twirler outclassed them for
remarkable appearance. Moreover, what put an entirely different tinge
to our momentary humor was the discovery that he was as wild as a March
hare and could throw a ball so fast that it resembled a pea shot from a
boy's air gun.
Deerfoot led our batting list, and after the first pitched ball, which
he did not see, and the second, which ticked his shirt as it shot past,
he turned to us with an expression that made us groan inwardly.
When Deerfoot looked that way it meant the pitcher was dangerous.
Deerfoot made no effort to swing at the next ball, and was promptly
called out on strikes.
I was second at bat, and went up with some reluctance. I happened to
be leading the league in both long distance and safe hitting, and I
doted on speed. But having stopped many mean in-shoots with various
parts of my anatomy, I was rather squeamish about facing backwoods yaps
who had no control.
When I had watched a couple of his pitches, which the umpire called
strikes, I gave him credit for as much speed as Rusie. These balls
were as straight as a string, singularly without curve, jump, or
variation of any kind. I lined the next one so hard at the shortstop
that it cracked like a pistol as it struck his hands and whirled him
half off his feet. Still he hung to the ball and gave opportunity for
the first crash of applause.
"Boys, he's a trifle wild," I said to my team-mates, "but he has the
most beautiful ball to hit you ever saw. I don't believe he uses a
curve, and when we once time that speed we'll kill it."
Next inning, after old man Hathaway had baffled the Canadians with his
wide, tantalizing curves, my predictions began to be verified. Snead
rapped one high and far to deep right field. To our infinite surprise,
however, the right fielder ran with fleetness that made our own
Deerfoot seem slow, and he got under the ball and caught it.
Doran sent a sizzling grasscutter down toward left. The lanky third
baseman darted over, dived down, and, coming up with the ball,
exhibited the power of a throwing arm that made as all green with envy.
Then, when the catcher chased a foul fly somewhere back in the crowd
and caught it, we began to take notice.
"Lucky stabs!" said Merritt cheerfully. "They can't keep that up.
We'll drive him to the woods next time."
But they did keep it up; moreover, they became more brilliant as the
game progressed. What with Hathaway's heady pitching we soon disposed
of them when at the bat; our turns, however, owing to the wonderful
fielding of these backwoodsmen, were also fruitless.
Merritt, with his mind ever on the slice of gate money coming if we
won, began to fidget and fume and find fault.
"You're a swell lot of champions, now, ain't you?" he observed between
innings.
All baseball players like to bat, and nothing pleases them so much as
base hits; on the other hand, nothing is quite so painful as to send
out hard liners only to see them caught. And it seemed as if every man
on our team connected with that lanky twirler's fast high ball and hit
with the force that made the bat spring only to have one of these rubes
get his big hands upon it.
Considering that we were in no angelic frame of mind before the game
started, and in view of Merritt's persistently increasing ill humor,
this failure of ours to hit a ball safely gradually worked us into a
kind of frenzy. From indifference we passed to determination, and from
that to sheer passionate purpose.
Luck appeared to be turning in the sixth inning. With one out, Lake hit
a beauty to right. Doran beat an infield grounder and reached first.
Hathaway struck out.
With Browning up and me next, the situation looked rather precarious
for the Canadians.
"Say, Deerfoot," whispered Merritt, "dump one down the third-base line.
He's playin' deep. It's a pipe. Then the bases will be full an'
Reddy'll clean up."
In a stage like that Browning was a man absolutely to depend upon. He
placed a slow bunt in the grass toward third and sprinted for first.
The third baseman fielded the ball, but, being confused, did not know
where to throw it.
"Stick it in your basket," yelled Merritt, in a delight that showed how
hard he was pulling for the gate money, and his beaming smile as he
turned to me was inspiring. "Now, Reddy, it's up to you! I'm not
worrying about what's happened so far. I know, with you at bat in a
pinch, it's all off!"
Merritt's compliment was pleasing, but it did not augment my purpose,
for that already had reached the highest mark. Love of hitting, if no
other thing, gave me the thrilling fire to arise to the opportunity.
Selecting my light bat, I went up and faced the rustic twirler and
softly said things to him.
He delivered the ball, and I could have yelled aloud, so fast, so
straight, so true it sped toward me. Then I hit it harder than I had
ever hit a ball in my life. The bat sprung, as if it were whalebone.
And the ball took a bullet course between center and left. So
beautiful a hit was it that I watched as I ran.
Out of the tail of my eye I saw the center fielder running. When I
rounded first base I got a good look at this fielder, and though I had
seen the greatest outfielders the game ever produced, I never saw one
that covered ground so swiftly as he.
On the ball soared, and began to drop; on the fielder sped, and began
to disappear over a little hill back of his position. Then he reached
up with a long arm and marvelously caught the ball in one hand. He
went out of sight as I touched second base, and the heterogeneous crowd
knew about a great play to make more noise than a herd of charging
buffalo.
In the next half inning our opponents, by clean drives, scored two runs
and we in our turn again went out ignominiously. When the first of the
eighth came we were desperate and clamored for the "rabbit."
"I've sneaked it in," said Merritt, with a low voice. "Got it to the
umpire on the last passed ball. See, the pitcher's got it now. Boys,
it's all off but the fireworks! Now, break loose!"
A peculiarity about the "rabbit" was the fact that though it felt as
light as the regulation league ball it could not be thrown with the
same speed and to curve it was an impossibility.
Bane hit the first delivery from our hoosier stumbling block. The ball
struck the ground and began to bound toward short. With every bound it
went swifter, longer and higher, and it bounced clear over the
shortstop's head. Lake chopped one in front of the plate, and it
rebounded from the ground straight up so high that both runners were
safe before it came down.
Doran hit to the pitcher. The ball caromed his leg, scooted fiendishly
at the second baseman, and tried to run up all over him like a tame
squirrel. Bases full!
Hathaway got a safe fly over the infield and two runs tallied. The
pitcher, in spite of the help of the umpire, could not locate the plate
for Balknap, and gave him a base on balls. Bases full again!
Deerfoot slammed a hot liner straight at the second baseman, which,
striking squarely in his hands, recoiled as sharply as if it had struck
a wall. Doran scored, and still the bases were filled.
The laboring pitcher began to get rattled; he could not find his usual
speed; he knew it, but evidently could not account for it.
When I came to bat, indications were not wanting that the Canadian team
would soon be up in the air. The long pitcher delivered the "rabbit,"
and got it low down by my knees, which was an unfortunate thing for
him. I swung on that one, and trotted round the bases behind the
runners while the center and left fielders chased the ball.
Gillinger weighed nearly two hundred pounds, and he got all his weight
under the "rabbit." It went so high that we could scarcely see it.
All the infielders rushed in, and after staggering around, with heads
bent back, one of them, the shortstop, managed to get under it. The
"rabbit" bounded forty feet out of his hands!
When Snead's grounder nearly tore the third baseman's leg off; when
Bane's hit proved as elusive as a flitting shadow; when Lake's liner
knocked the pitcher flat, and Doran's fly leaped high out of the center
fielder's glove--then those earnest, simple, country ballplayers
realized something was wrong. But they imagined it was in themselves,
and after a short spell of rattles, they steadied up and tried harder
than ever. The motions they went through trying to stop that jumping
jackrabbit of a ball were ludicrous in the extreme.
Finally, through a foul, a short fly, and a scratch hit to first, they
retired the side and we went into the field with the score 14 to 2 in
our favor.
But Merritt had not found it possible to get the "rabbit" out of play!
We spent a fatefully anxious few moments squabbling with the umpire and
captain over the "rabbit." At the idea of letting those herculean
railsplitters have a chance to hit the rubber ball we felt our blood
run cold.
"But this ball has a rip in it," blustered Gillinger. He lied
atrociously. A microscope could not have discovered as much as a
scratch in that smooth leather.
"Sure it has," supplemented Merritt, in the suave tones of a stage
villain. "We're used to playing with good balls."
"Why did you ring this one in on us?" asked the captain. "We never
threw out this ball. We want a chance to hit it."
That was just the one thing we did not want them to have. But fate
played against us.
"Get up on your toes, now an' dust," said Merritt. "Take your
medicine, you lazy sit-in-front-of-the-hotel stiffs! Think of pay day!"
Not improbably we all entertained the identical thought that old man
Hathaway was the last pitcher under the sun calculated to be effective
with the "rabbit." He never relied on speed; in fact, Merritt often
scornfully accused him of being unable to break a pane of glass; he
used principally what we called floaters and a change of pace. Both
styles were absolutely impractical with the "rabbit."
"It's comin' to us, all right, all right!" yelled Deerfoot to me,
across the intervening grass. I was of the opinion that it did not
take any genius to make Deerfoot's ominous prophecy.
Old man Hathaway gazed at Merritt on the bench as if he wished the
manager could hear what he was calling him and then at his
fellow-players as if both to warn and beseech them. Then he pitched the
"rabbit."
Crack!
The big lumbering Canadian rapped the ball at Crab Bane. I did not see
it, because it went so fast, but I gathered from Crab's actions that it
must have been hit in his direction. At any rate, one of his legs
flopped out sidewise as if it had been suddenly jerked, and he fell in
a heap. The ball, a veritable "rabbit" in its wild jumps, headed on for
Deerfoot, who contrived to stop it with his knees.
The next batter resembled the first one, and the hit likewise, only it
leaped wickedly at Doran and went through his hands as if they had been
paper. The third man batted up a very high fly to Gillinger. He
clutched at it with his huge shovel hands, but he could not hold it.
The way he pounced upon the ball, dug it out of the grass, and hurled
it at Hathaway, showed his anger.
Obviously Hathaway had to stop the throw, for he could not get out of
the road, and he spoke to his captain in what I knew were no
complimentary terms.
Thus began retribution. Those husky lads continued to hammer the
"rabbit" at the infielders and as it bounced harder at every bounce so
they batted harder at every bat.
Another singular feature about the "rabbit" was the seeming
impossibility for professionals to hold it. Their familiarity with it,
their understanding of its vagaries and inconsistencies, their mortal
dread made fielding it a much more difficult thing than for their
opponents.
By way of variety, the lambasting Canadians commenced to lambast a few
over the hills and far away, which chased Deerfoot and me until our
tongues lolled out.
Every time a run crossed the plate the motley crowd howled, roared,
danced and threw up their hats. The members of the batting team
pranced up and down the side lines, giving a splendid imitation of
cannibals celebrating the occasion of a feast.
Once Snead stooped down to trap the "rabbit," and it slipped through
his legs, for which his comrades jeered him unmercifully. Then a
brawny batter sent up a tremendously high fly between short and third.
"You take it!" yelled Gillinger to Bane.
"You take it!" replied the Crab, and actually walked backward. That
ball went a mile high. The sky was hazy, gray, the most perplexing in
which to judge a fly ball. An ordinary fly gave trouble enough in the
gauging.
Gillinger wandered around under the ball for what seemed an age. It
dropped as swiftly as a rocket shoots upward. Gillinger went forward
in a circle, then sidestepped, and threw up his broad hands. He
misjudged the ball, and it hit him fairly on the head and bounced
almost to where Doran stood at second.
Our big captain wilted. Time was called. But Gillinger, when he came
to, refused to leave the game and went back to third with a lump on his
head as large as a goose egg.
Every one of his teammates was sorry, yet every one howled in glee. To
be hit on the head was the unpardonable sin for a professional.
Old man Hathaway gradually lost what little speed he had, and with it
his nerve. Every time he pitched the "rabbit" he dodged. That was
about the funniest and strangest thing ever seen on a ball field. Yet
it had an element of tragedy.
Hathaway's expert contortions saved his head and body on divers
occasions, but presently a low bounder glanced off the grass and
manifested an affinity for his leg.
We all knew from the crack and the way the pitcher went down that the
"rabbit" had put him out of the game. The umpire called time, and
Merritt came running on the diamond.
"Hard luck, old man," said the manager. "That'll make a green and
yellow spot all right. Boys, we're still two runs to the good. There's
one out, an' we can win yet. Deerfoot, you're as badly crippled as
Hathaway. The bench for yours. Hooker will go to center, an' I'll
pitch."
Merritt's idea did not strike us as a bad one. He could pitch, and he
always kept his arm in prime condition. We welcomed him into the fray
for two reasons--because he might win the game, and because he might be
overtaken by the baseball Nemesis.
While Merritt was putting on Hathaway's baseball shoes, some of us
endeavored to get the "rabbit" away from the umpire, but he was too
wise.
Merritt received the innocent-looking ball with a look of mingled
disgust and fear, and he summarily ordered us to our positions.
Not far had we gone, however, when we were electrified by the umpire's
sharp words:
"Naw! Naw, you don't. I saw you change the ball I gave you fer one in
your pocket! Naw! You don't come enny of your American dodges on us!
Gimmee thet ball, an' you use the other, or I'll stop the game."
Wherewith the shrewd umpire took the ball from Merritt's hand and
fished the "rabbit" from his pocket. Our thwarted manager stuttered
his wrath. "Y-you be-be-wh-whiskered y-yap! I'll g-g-give----"
What dire threat he had in mind never materialized, for he became
speechless. He glowered upon the cool little umpire, and then turned
grandly toward the plate.
It may have been imagination, yet I made sure Merritt seemed to shrink
and grow smaller before he pitched a ball. For one thing the plate was
uphill from the pitcher's box, and then the fellow standing there
loomed up like a hill and swung a bat that would have served as a wagon
tongue. No wonder Merritt evinced nervousness. Presently he whirled
and delivered the ball.
Bing!
A dark streak and a white puff of dust over second base showed how safe
that hit was. By dint of manful body work, Hooker contrived to stop
the "rabbit" in mid-center. Another run scored. Human nature was
proof against this temptation, and Merritt's players tendered him
manifold congratulations and dissertations.
"Grand, you old skinflint, grand!"
"There was a two-dollar bill stickin' on thet hit. Why didn't you stop
it?"
"Say, Merritt, what little brains you've got will presently be ridin'
on the 'rabbit.'"
"You will chase up these exhibition games!"
"Take your medicine now. Ha! Ha! Ha!"
After these merciless taunts, and particularly after the next slashing
hit that tied the score, Merritt looked appreciably smaller and humbler.
He threw up another ball, and actually shied as it neared the plate.
The giant who was waiting to slug it evidently thought better of his
eagerness as far as that pitch was concerned, for he let it go by.
Merritt got the next ball higher. With a mighty swing, the batsman hit
a terrific liner right at the pitcher.
Quick as lightning, Merritt wheeled, and the ball struck him with the
sound of two boards brought heavily together with a smack.
Merritt did not fall; he melted to the ground and writhed while the
runners scored with more tallies than they needed to win.
What did we care! Justice had been done us, and we were unutterably
happy. Crabe Bane stood on his head; Gillinger began a war dance; old
man Hathaway hobbled out to the side lines and whooped like an Indian;
Snead rolled over and over in the grass. All of us broke out into
typical expressions of baseball frenzy, and individual ones
illustrating our particular moods.
Merritt got up and made a dive for the ball. With face positively
flaming he flung it far beyond the merry crowd, over into a swamp.
Then he limped for the bench. Which throw ended the most memorable
game ever recorded to the credit of the "rabbit."