CHAPTER XXXA MERITED THRASHING
The effect of Baseball Joe’s sudden entrance was electric. If a thunderbolt had torn its way through the room, the consternation of the conspirators could not have been greater.
Their terror deepened as McRae, O’Brien, Robbie, Lonergan, Reggie, Jim, and Haworth, the lawyer, filed in from the next room.
Then in panic the rascals made a break for the door. But O’Brien was already standing there placidly, his broad back against it.
“Just a minute! Just a minute,” he drawled.
They took just one look at him and dropped back.
“Now, gentlemen,” said Joe, “you’re going to learn that Matson’s arm is not yet ruined nor Mr. Barclay’s either. But first there are some little formalities to be gone through with. I suppose,” he added, as he turned to his companions, “that you all heard Mr. Harrish’s confession?”
They nodded their assent.
“Eight witnesses,” remarked Joe. “I guess that would be enough in any court of law to put you men behind the bars. The jig is up, Harrish. You’re done. You’re through. And that goes for you, too, Tompkinson.”
The rascals cringed visibly at this. Their teeth were chattering.
“That is,” continued Joe, “if we decide to make a charge against you.”
He paused a moment to let this take effect.
“How about that case of Mr. Varley’s, Mr. Haworth?” Joe asked suddenly.
Haworth stepped forward.
“Perfectly clear,” replied the lawyer. “I have absolute proof that Harrish has been matching orders in violation of the code. I have proof that he has been pledging Mr. Varley’s stocks as collateral for a loan greater than he has made on it to Mr. Varley. Another violation of the code. Of course, if Mr. Harrish wants to stand suit—” He stopped and smiled serenely and significantly.
“I don’t think that Mr. Harrish wants to stand suit,” mused Joe. “He doesn’t want to change that well-tailored suit of his for a striped suit. Now if he only had his check book here— Let’s see, what was the value of the stock, Reggie?”
“Ten thousand, five hundred and sixty dollars,” replied Reggie.
“A mere trifle to a man who could pay fifty thousand dollars for throwing baseball games,” mused Joe. “Oh, I see that Mr. Harrish is drawing out his check book. And he has a fountain pen, too. How lucky!”
Harrish wrote out a check for the full amount. Joe scanned it.
“On one of the day and night banks, I see,” he remarked. “It will be open now. Suppose you indorse this, Reggie. Mr. Harrish will O. K. your signature and you can go right over and cash it now.”
The indorsement and O. K. were made and Reggie hurried out to collect his money.
“And now, gentlemen,” said Joe, turning to his friends, “would you mind going outside and waiting for the rest of us? Mr. Barclay and I want to settle a little matter with Mr. Harrish and Mr. Tompkinson in private. It won’t take us long.”
A flash of understanding passed among the group and they went with alacrity, though Harrish started to make a protest which they ignored.
Joe went to the door, closed it after them, locked it, and put the key in his pocket.
“And now, Mr. Tompkinson,” he said, as he threw off his coat, “will you kindly remove your false teeth?”
“What do you mean?” asked Tompkinson, as pale as death.
“I mean,” said Joe, “that you both are going to get the licking of your lives. I could send you both to prison, but I don’t care to raise a scandal in the baseball world. Jim, you take Tompkinson. I licked him once. And now, Harrish, throw off your coat.”
The men, desperate as cornered rats, saw there was no help for it, and the next moment the battle was on. Both the brokers were big and powerful men and they put up a hard battle. But they were no match for the seasoned athletes opposed to them.
Joe and Jim smashed them at will, shaking them from head to feet with body blows and uppercuts. In a few minutes the battle was over and the discomfited scoundrels lay on the floor whimpering with pain and rage and shame.
“I guess that will do, Jim,” said Joe, as he put on his coat. “They’ve found out that the pitching arms they tried to ruin are still in pretty fair shape. Let’s go.”
They stationed a policeman at the apartment to see that Tompkinson and Harrish left without, in their anger, doing some injury to the old scientist or his wife by way of revenge, then the party drove off.
McRae and Robbie dropped off with Joe andJim at their apartment where they found Reggie who had cashed the check, and the roars of laughter that went up from their rooms as the veteran manager and coach learned all that had happened almost scandalized the management.
Only a few days remained until the end of the playing season. The Giants had the pennant safely stowed away. They were so far ahead that if they lost every remaining game while their nearest opponents, the Pirates, won every one of theirs, the Giants still could not be headed.
Nevertheless, Joe drove his men hard, for he was now within an ace of attaining the objects that he had outlined to Jim at the beginning of the season. He led the league in home runs. He led it in his general batting average, having left the redoubtable Mornsby far in the rear. He had more stolen bases to his credit than any player in either league. He had registered more strike-outs than any other pitcher. He stood well ahead of Rance in the matter of percentage of earned runs allowed to opponents, and in the last spurt the Giants had broken the record in the matter of consecutive victories.
Six of his objects had been attained. Would he grasp the seventh, closing the season with the highest standing the Giants had ever registered in their history as a team?
On the last day but one of the season the Giants tied that record. Jim was in the box and pitched a masterly game. But the Boston pitcher, Northesk, also outdid himself, and the game was in doubt up to the very last inning.
When that inning opened the Giants had scored three runs and the Bostons two. The visitors came to bat in the ninth determined to do or die. The heaviest batters of the team were to come to the plate, and they started in with determination.
An error by Jackwell at third on a hot grounder permitted the first man to make his base. The error must have been contagious, for Renton also juggled a hit from Bailey, on which the runner reached first while Ellis easily made second.
With two on and nobody out, the Boston coachers got busy and filled the air with a stream of chatter designed to rattle the pitcher.
Joe was playing center and watching the batter and the men on bases with the eye of a hawk. Anderson, the heavy-hitting left fielder, drove out a hit almost on a line over Larry’s head at second base.
Joe sized it up and knew that he could make the catch. The men on bases thought so, too, and hugged the bases closely.
Joe ran in as though to nab the ball. Then he hesitated for a fraction of a second and set himselfas though to catch the ball on the bound.
The moment that this seemed to be his intention the man on first broke for second and the man on second legged it for third.
Then Joe reached for the ball and caught it on the fly, just at his shoe tops, putting out the batter.
Warned by the roar that went up, the runners started back for the bags they had just left under the supposition that the ball was going to be caught on the bound. But they were too late.
Like a shot Joe threw the ball to Larry, who stepped on the bag, putting out Ellis. Then Larry relayed it to Burkett, catching Bailey before he could get back.
It was a triple play, all achieved by the classiest bit of headwork seen on the Polo Grounds that season. If Joe had run in and caught the ball in the ordinary way, only the batter would have been out. But his pretended hesitation had fooled the base runners and he had caught them both.
McRae looked at Robbie. Robbie looked at McRae. For once neither uttered a word. There were no words for such an occasion. But what they told Joe later was plenty.
With that game safely stowed away the record was tied. That in itself was much. But for Joe it was not enough.
In the last game, he himself was in the box.And the kind of ball he played that day made baseball history.
Yet, although he was a veritable wizard in the box and cracked out two home runs in succession, such is the uncertainty of the game that he came within a hair’s breadth of not putting it over.
For Morton, the Boston pitcher, was also determined to wind up his season’s work in a blaze of glory, and the men behind him played like demons, making almost miraculous stops and throws on what would ordinarily have been clean hits.
A momentary case of rattles among the Giants in the seventh let two runs across for the Bostons, and as Joe’s two homers were the only tallies for his side, the teams came to the ninth with the score tied.
The Bostons were promptly disposed of, and the Giants came to the bat. Renton went out on a long fly to center and Burkett sent up a fly that the catcher grabbed.
With two men out, it looked like a case of extra innings when Joe came to the bat.
Morton, with the memory of those two homers still rankling in his mind, promptly passed him to first amid the jeers of the fans who had been hoping for another circuit clout.
Joe took as long a lead as possible. Ralston lined out a single to left.
At the crack of the bat Joe was off for second. Most players would have been satisfied to make the bag, especially on a single to left, where the throw to third was short and easy.
But Joe rounded second and set out for third. Benton, the Boston third baseman, knowing Joe’s daring on the bases had half expected this. He crouched to take the throw from left, ready to jam the ball down on Joe as he slid in to the bag.
But Joe double-crossed him by failing to slide. He saw from Renton’s attitude what he expected to do. So, instead of sliding, he flew by, standing up, just touching the tip of the bag, and started for home.
Plunk! came the ball into Renton’s hands. As he had to face toward left, he could not see what Joe was doing and had no time to look. He had to depend on the sense of touch.
Down went the ball on where Joe’s body ought to have been. But it was not there. Joe was halfway down the stretch toward home, going like the wind.
Dazedly, Renton swept the path about him. Then realizing what had happened he straightened up and threw for home. But Joe had already dented the rubber for the winning run.
He had scored from first on a single! It wasa magnificent play, a fitting wind-up to the most glorious season that the Giants had ever had.
And above all it rounded out the task that Joe had set himself. By unflagging work, by matchless pitching and hitting ability, by the finest kind of headwork he had reached his goal.
And it was a happy Joe who, after the tumult and the shouting had died away, after McRae, Robbie and his comrades had nearly wrung his hands off and pounded him black and blue, sat with Jim and with Mabel, who had arrived in time to see his crowning victory, and talked over the events of the day.
“And you put it over, old boy!” exulted Jim. “Hung up a record in the seven things you said you would.”
“You might have known he would,” said Mabel proudly.
“Didn’t I tell you that seven was a lucky number?” said Joe, with a grin.
THE END