“Ha!” exclaimed Mr. Benjamin. “There’s that same lad again!”
“What lad?” quickly demanded Mr. Holdney. “Oh, the one who sent us out this rig. I wonder——”
“Did you want to see any one around the works?” interrupted Mr. Benjamin. “I don’t want to seem impolite, after the service you rendered, but we don’t allow loiterers here.”
A number of thoughts passed rapidly through Joe’s mind. He realized that his father might come out at any moment and be seen by the manager carrying off the valuable patterns. Mr. Matson ought to be warned, for Joe realized that if they were to frustrate the conspiracy it would be best that the men did not know that they were on the verge of discovery.
“I want to take a message to Mr. Matson,” said Joe boldly, for this was the truth. He hadquickly formed a plan in his mind, and he hoped that it would not be discovered that he was Mr. Matson’s son. It was this very trick of quick thinking that afterward became of so much service to Joe in his notable career on the diamond.
“Oh, then it’s all right,” said Mr. Benjamin. “You may go in. You’ll find Mr. Matson in his office, I dare say.” He smiled at Joe in what he doubtless meant to be a friendly fashion, but the young baseball player could not help but see the hypocrisy in it.
Not pausing to exchange any other talk, Joe slipped in through the big iron gate and made his way to his father’s office. He had been there before.
Just as he reached it the heavy whistle blew, announcing closing time, and hundreds of hands began pouring from the various machine and casting shops.
“Hello, Joe!” called Seth Potter, who played left field for the Silver Stars. “What you doing here, looking for a job?” Seth was employed in one of the offices, and was considered a valuable young man.
“Yes, I want to learn how to make a machine so I don’t miss any flies that come my way,” laughed Joe.
“That’s right! Going to play with us Saturday?”
“I hope so,” and then, with a few other pleasant words, Seth hurried on, and Joe sought his father. He found Mr. Matson wrapping up some models.
“Quick dad!” he exclaimed. “Mr. Benjamin and Mr. Holdney are out at the gate. They just drove up. I slipped in to warn you!”
“Good, Joe! I’m glad you did. I wouldn’t want them to see me taking these things away, for it would tell them that their game was discovered, and I want to find out more of what their plans are before they are aware of it.”
“But how you going to get out?” asked his son. “They’re there yet,” he added, for he could look from a window and see the carriage still at the gate.
“Oh, you and I can slip out the back way. It’s lucky you told me. There, I’m ready,” and having locked his desk, Mr. Matson took his package and with Joe went out of a rear exit, going home by a roundabout way so that the conspirators did not see them.
“My! I wish this thing hadn’t happened, or that it was postponed for a while,” said Mr. Matson thoughtfully as he walked along.
“Why, is it likely to be serious, dad?”
“I’m afraid so. You see I have a peculiar arrangement with the harvester concern in regard to things that I might invent. It is too complicated to go into all the details, but I have to trust to their honor to give me my rights in certain matters. If they wanted to they could deprive me of the benefits of my patents and the law could not help me. So I have to be very careful. Up to now I have trusted Mr. Benjamin implicitly, but now—now I will be on my guard. It is a lucky thing you overheard that talk.”
There was an earnest consultation between Mr. and Mrs. Matson that night, to which Joe and his sister were not admitted, for it was business they would not have understood. But at the close they were told to say nothing of what had happened that day.
“I will keep right on at the harvester works as if nothing had occurred,” said Mr. Matson, “and then they will not get suspicious. But I will do the most important and secret work on my invention here at home.”
“Now that it is all settled,” said Clara, “I’m going to say ‘apple sauce’ to you, Joe. What does it mean?”
“Oh, yes,” and the young baseball playerlaughed. “Well I guess you’ve got to join the Dorcas and Sewing societies, mother, to keep me out of a scrape,” and with many funny touches Joe told about his wild throw that day, making an amusing story of it.
“Oh, I would have given anything if some of the girls and I could have been there when you and Tom were blacking the stove!” exclaimed Clara with a laugh.
“I’m glad you weren’t,” declared Joe, “though it’s lucky we didn’t have to mop up the floor. After this I’m going to go a mile away from her house when I want to practice throwing.”
“I should think you would,” agreed Mr. Matson.
“But you’ll join those societies; won’t you mother?” asked Joe.
“Oh, I suppose I’ll have to, in order to keep you out of prison,” she agreed with a laugh. “But please don’t make any more engagements for me, as my time is pretty well occupied.”
It was two days after this when Tom Davis, coming out of school, caught up with Joe who was a little in advance of him.
“Got anything special to do?” asked the substitute first baseman.
“No, why?”
“I thought maybe you’d like to go out in the lot again, and have some more practice.”
“Back of Mrs. Peterkin’s house?” asked Joe with a smile.
“I should say not! But I’ve got a new scheme. I read about it in that baseball book. We’ll have a contest for long distance throwing and accuracy.”
“How do you mean?”
“Why you and I’ll go down in the same lots but we’ll throw in the other direction. Then we can’t hit anything. We’ll see who can throw the farthest. You’ll need to practice that if you are to play centre field.”
“What’s the other contest?”
“For straight aim. I’ll get an old basket, and we’ll see who can land the most balls in it. Want to try?”
“Sure. Anything to improve myself,” said Joe earnestly.
A little later he and his chum were on their way to the vacant lots. As they walked along they met several other lads, some of whom played on the regular team, a few from the High School nine, and some from the Silver Star scrub.
“What’s doing?” demanded Rodney Burke.
“We’re going to see who is the best thrower,” answered Tom.
“Give us a show at it?” requested Ford Wilson.
“Sure,” assented Joe. “The more, the merrier.”
Soon a jolly crowd of youngsters were taking turns at the long distance throwing. After several tries the record lay between Joe and Rodney Burke, and they played off a tie, Joe winning by about seven feet.
“That’s a good throw all right,” complimented the loser.
“A fellow who’s playing centre field needs to have a pretty good heave,” said Joe. “Especially if he’s up against a heavy-hitting team.”
“And that’s been our luck for some time past,” spoke Tom. “Well, now for the basket test.”
This was more difficult than straight throwing for distance and several of the lads dropped out, being disqualified by failures. But Tom, Joe and Rodney remained in, and for a time it was pretty even between them. Finally it narrowed down to Tom and Joe, and they were just ready to throw the deciding round when a new voice called out:
“Any objections to me joining?”
Joe and the others turned, to see the half-mocking face of Sam Morton.
For a moment there was some embarrassment, as Sam was not in the habit of mingling with this crowd of boys. He had his own friends, not very many, to tell the truth, but he was usually with them. The lads did not know exactly how to take his request, but Joe came to the rescue.
“Sure you can come in,” he said heartily. “We’re just seeing who can put the most balls in the basket.”
“What good do you think that does?” asked Sam.
“Well, doesn’t it help a fellow to get a straight aim?” asked Tom, half defiantly.
“Oh, I don’t know,” was the rather sneering answer. “It might, if you kept at it long enough.”
“Let’s see you try it,” suggested Rodney Burke, who did not hold Sam in much awe.
Carelessly the Silver Star pitcher accepted a ball that Joe obligingly held out. He threwquickly and the ball landed squarely in the basket. Then he did the trick again, and there was a little murmur of applause, for only a few of the boys had “two straight” to their credit.
“Joe did three straight a while ago,” said Tom proudly. “He and I are playing off a tie.”
Sam did not answer but threw again, and the ball went wide of the basket by two feet at least. Rodney laughed.
“You’re not such a much, even if you are the pitcher,” he declared.
“Who asked you anything about it?” demanded Sam savagely.
He darted a look of anger at the lad, but as Rodney was well built and had a reputation for “scrappiness” Sam concluded not to tackle him just then.
“I’ll show you how to throw!” he exclaimed the next moment, and two balls went squarely in the basket. “Now, let’s see you and Matson play it off,” commanded Sam to Tom as though he was in the habit of having his wishes complied with.
Whether it was nervousness or not, or whether he wanted to see his chum do well when Sam was present, was not made manifest, but Tom did not come up to his previous record, and Joe easily won. In fact Joe made a much better score than Sam,and there were several curious glances directed at the pitcher.
“Don’t you want to try it some more?” asked Rodney Burke, and there was mockery in his voice.
“No!” half-growled Sam. “I’ve got to save my arm for the next game. We’re going to win that sure. So long,” and with that he turned and strode away.
“As cheerful as a bear with a sore nose,” remarked Rodney.
Ordinarily but little importance would have been attached to the coming game with the Denville Whizzers, but on account of two previous defeats, Darrell Blackney and George Rankin had several conferences concerning it. The captain and manager were plainly worried.
“Do you wish you had some one else to put in the box?” asked Rankin.
“Well, not exactly,” was the answer. “I haven’t lost faith in Sam, but I do wish we could depend more on him. He’ll pitch fine for several innings and then go to pieces. He tries to use too much speed and too many varieties of curves, I think.”
“By the way, what do you think of young Matson?” asked the captain.
“I think a good deal of him. He doesn’t amount to much as yet, but he’s in earnest and he’s got grit. In time I think he’ll make a player.”
“He wants to pitch.”
“I know he does, but it’s out of the question yet. Have you any line on him?”
“Not yet,” answered Rankin, “but I’ll keep my eyes open. He’s a good fielder all right, now that he isn’t so nervous. He wants to play his head off. But Sam—well, we can’t do any better right away, and—well, I guess we’ll win this game.”
“We’ve got to!” insisted the manager earnestly, “if we want the people of Riverside to support us. They won’t come to see a losing home team all the while.”
The game with the Whizzers was to take place on their grounds, and early on that morning the Silver Stars, some substitutes, and a crowd of “rooters” got ready for the trip. Denville was about seven miles from Riverside, back from the stream, and could be reached by trolley. A special car had been engaged for the team.
The game started off well, and the Silver Stars got three runs in their half of the first inning. The home team was blanked and for a time itlooked as if there would be an easy victory for the visitors.
Sam was pitching in good form, and had struck several men out. For three innings the home team did not get a run, and there was only one to their credit in the fourth. There was gloom and despair among their supporters while the “rooters” of the visiting team were happy singing songs and yelling.
Joe played well and had two outs to his credit on long flies, with no errors to mar his record. But he noticed that as the home team came to the bat in their half of the fifth, in which the Silver Stars had made two runs, that Darrell and the captain were in earnest consultation with Sam. They seemed to be remonstrating with him, and Joe heard the manager say:
“Take it easy now; we have the game on ice.”
“Oh, I know how to play ball,” retorted the pitcher.
Then began a series of happenings. With a lead of four runs when the last half of the fifth started it would have seemed that the Stars might have won out. But Sam fell a prey to the applause of the crowd and began to do “grandstand” work. He contorted his body unnecessarily in winding up for a delivery. He hoppedabout before pitching the ball and he failed to study the batters, though he had had plenty of chance to do so.
The result was that he went to pieces through sheer weariness and began giving balls. Then the home team, realizing what was happening, began to pound him, and to steal bases. In their half of the fifth the home team made six runs, putting them two ahead.
“We’ve got to stop that!” said Darrell, with a shake of his head.
“We sure have,” agreed the captain.
There was somewhat of a brace on the part of the Stars and they made one run in their part of the sixth. But the Whizzers kept pace with them. The seventh inning resulted in one run for the visitors and none for the home team and that made only a lead of one for the home nine.
Joe brought in a run in the eighth, but as if it had been prearranged the home team duplicated so the score at the beginning of the ninth stood eight to nine in favor of the home team.
“We need two runs to win, if we can serve them goose eggs for lunch,” said the Silver Star captain grimly. “Go to it, boys; beat ’em out.”
“Sure we will,” said Sam airily, and he broughtin one of the needed two runs. Darrell contributed the other, and when the visiting team took the field they were one ahead.
“Don’t let a man get to first!” cried Captain Rankin.
But it was not to be. Sam gave the first man his base on balls and there was a groan of anguish from his fellows and the Riverside crowd. Then the second man whacked out what appeared to be a pretty three bagger, scoring the runner from first. The batter slipped on his way from second to third, however, and was put out when Joe made a magnificent throw in from deep centre.
With one out Sam gathered himself together and struck out the next man. Then came to the bat the mightiest walloper of the rival team.
“Wait for a good one. Make him give you what you want,” advised the coacher to the batter.
And the latter did wait, for when he got what he wanted he “slammed it” away out in centre field.
“A home run! A home run!” yelled the frantic crowd.
“And win the game!” shouted a score of the players’ friends. “Come on, baby-mine!”
Joe was madly racing after the ball, which hadgone away beyond him. He got it and hurled it to second for a relay home, as a quick glance had shown him the man rounding third.
Straight and true the ball went and the baseman had it. Then he sent it to Catcher Ferguson as the runner was racing in. Sam had run from his box and stood watching and expectant near home plate.
The runner dropped and slid and Bart Ferguson, as the ball landed in his mitt, reached over to touch him.
“Safe!” howled the umpire, and it meant the defeat of the Silver Stars.
For a moment there was silence and then Sam, stepping up to the umpire, a lad smaller than himself, said:
“Safe, eh? Not in a thousand years! You don’t know how to umpire a game. Safe! I guess not!” and drawing back his fist Sam sent it crashing into the face of the other lad.
There was an uproar in an instant. Players started for Sam and the unoffending lad whom he had struck. There were savage yells, calling for vengeance. Even Sam’s mates, used as they were to his fits of temper, were not prepared for this. The Whizzer players were wild to get at him, but, instinctively Darrell, Joe, Rankin, and some of the others of the Silver Stars formed a protecting cordon about their pitcher.
“Are you crazy, Sam? What in the world did you do that for?” demanded the manager.
“He made a rank decision, an unfair one!” cried Sam, “and when I called him down he was going to hit me. I got in ahead of him—that’s all.”
“That’s not so!” cried the Whizzer captain. “I saw it all.”
“That’s right!” chimed in some of his mates.
“Farson never raised his hand to him!” declaredanother lad, who had been standing near the umpire. “You’re a big coward to hit a chap smaller than you are!” he called tauntingly to Sam.
“Well, I’m not afraid to hit you!” cried the pitcher, who seemed to have lost control of himself. “And if you want anything you know how to get it.”
“Yes, and I’m willing to take it right now,” yelled the other, stepping up to Sam.
There might have been another fight then and there, for both lads were unreasonable with anger, but Darrell quickly stepped in between them.
“Look here!” burst out the Stars’ manager, in what he tried to make a good-natured and reasoning voice, “this has got to stop. We didn’t come here to fight, we came to play baseball and you trimmed us properly.”
“Then why don’t you fellows take your medicine?” demanded the home captain. “What right has he got to tackle our umpire?”
“No right at all,” admitted Darrell. “Sam was in the wrong and he’ll apologize. He probably thought the man was out.”
“And hewasout!” exploded the unreasonable pitcher. “I’ll not apologize, either.”
“Wipe up the field with ’em!” came in murmursfrom the home players. Several of the lads had grasped their bats.
It was a critical moment and Darrell felt it. He pulled Sam to one side and whispered rapidly and tensely in his ear:
“Sam, you’ve got to apologize, and you’ve got to admit that the runner was safe. There’s no other way out of it.”
“Suppose I won’t?”
There was defiance in Sam’s air. Darrell took a quick decision.
“Then I’ll put you out of the team!” was his instant rejoinder, and it came so promptly that Sam winced.
Now it is one thing to resign, but quite another to be read out of an organization, whether it be a baseball team or a political society. Sam realized this. He might have, in his anger, refused to belong to the Silver Stars and, later on he could boast of having gotten out of his own accord. But to be “fired” carried no glory with it, and Sam was ever on the lookout for glory.
“Do you mean that?” he asked of Darrell. “Won’t you fellows stick up for me?”
He looked a vain appeal to his mates.
“I mean every word of it,” replied the manager firmly. “We fellows would stick up for youif you were in the right, but you’re dead wrong this time. It’s apologize or get out of the team!”
Once more Sam paused. He could hear the angry murmurs of the home players as they watched him, waiting for his decision. Even some of his own mates were regarding him with unfriendly eyes. He must make a virtue of necessity.
“All right—I—I apologize,” said Sam in a low voice. “The runner was safe I guess.”
“You’d better be sure about it,” said the captain of the Whizzers, in a peculiar tone as he looked at Sam.
“Oh, I’m sure all right.”
“And you’re sorry you hit our umpire?” persisted the captain, for Sam’s apology had not been very satisfactory.
“Yes. You needn’t rub it in,” growled the pitcher.
“Then why don’t you shake hands with him, and tell him so like a man?” went on the home captain.
“I won’t shake hands with him!” exclaimed the small umpire. “I don’t shake hands with cowards!”
There was another murmur, and the trouble that had been so nearly adjusted threatened tobreak out again. But Darrell was wise in his day.
“That’s all right!” he called, more cheerily than he felt. “You fellows beat us fairly and on the level. We haven’t a kick coming, but we may treat you to a dose of the same medicine when we have a return game; eh, old man?” and he made his way to the opposing captain and the manager and cordially shook hands with them. There was a half cheer from the Whizzers. They liked a good loser.
“Yes, maybe you can turn the tables on us,” admitted the other manager, “but I hope when we do come to Riverside you’ll have a different pitcher,” and he glanced significantly at Sam.
“No telling,” replied Darrell with a laugh. “Come on, fellows. We’ll give three cheers for the team that beat us and then we’ll beat it for home.”
It was rather a silent crowd of the Silver Stars that rode in the special trolley. Following them was another car containing some of the “rooters.” They made up in liveliness what the team members lacked in spirits, for there were a number of girls with the lads, Joe’s sister and Tom’s being among them, and they started some school songs.
And the gloom that seemed to hang over the Stars was not altogether because of their defeat. It was the remembrance of Sam’s unsportsmanlike act, and it rankled deep.
On his part it is doubtful if Sam felt any remorse. He was a hot-tempered lad, used to having his own way, and probably he thought he had done just right in chastising the umpire for what he regarded as a rank decision.
Darrell, Rankin and some of the others tried to be jolly and start a line of talk that would make the lads forget the unpleasant incident, but it is doubtful if they succeeded to any great extent.
The manager was seriously considering the future of the team. Was it wise to go on with such a pitcher as Sam who, though talented, could not be relied upon and who was likely to make “breaks” at unexpected times?
“Yet what can we do?” asked Darrell of the captain. “Is there another man we could put in or get from some other team?”
“I don’t believe any other team would part with a good pitcher at this time of the season,” replied Rankin. “Surely not if he was a real good one, and we want one thatisgood. As for using some of the other fellows in Sam’s place,I don’t know of any one that’s anywhere near as good as he is.”
“How about Percy Parnell? He’s pitched some, hasn’t he?”
“Yes, but you know what happened. He was knocked out of the box and we were whitewashed that game.”
“Say!” exclaimed Darrell. “I just happened to think of it. That new fellow—Joe Matson. He told me he used to pitch in his home town—Bentville I think it was. I wonder if he’d be any good?”
“Hard telling,” replied the captain, somewhat indifferently. “We ought to do something, anyhow.”
“I tell you what I’m going to do,” went on Darrell. “I’m going to write to some one in Bentville. I think I know an old baseball friend there, and I’ll ask him what Matson’s record was. If he made good at all we might give him a tryout.”
“And have Sam get on his ear?”
“I don’t care whether he does or not. Things can’t be much worse; can they?”
“No, I guess not. Go ahead. I’m with you in anything you do. Three straight wallops in three weeks have taken the heart out of me.”
“Same here. Well, we’ll see what we can do.”
Joe reached home that night rather tired and discouraged. He felt the defeat of his team keenly, and the more so as the nine he had played with in Bentville had had a much better record than that of the Silver Stars—at least so far, though the Silver Stars were an older and stronger team.
“I wonder if I’m the hoodoo?” mused Joe. “They lost the first game I saw them play, and the next one I played in they lost, and here’s this one. I hope I’m not a jinx.”
Then he reviewed his own playing in the two games where he had had a chance to show what he could do, and he had no fault to find with his efforts. True, he had made errors; but who had not?
“I’m going to keep on practicing,” mused Joe. “If I can work up in speed and accuracy, and keep what curving power I have already, I may get a chance to pitch. Things are coming to a head with Sam, and, though I don’t wish him any bad luck, if hedoesget out I hope I get a chance to go in.”
Following this plan, Joe went off by himself one afternoon several days later to practice throwing in the empty lot. He used a basket to hold theballs he pitched and he was glad to find that he had not gone back any from the time when he and Tom, with the other lads, had had their contest.
“If I can only keep this up,” mused the lad, “I’ll get there some day. Jove! If ever I should become one of the big league players! Think of taking part in the World’s series! Cracky! I’d rather be in the box, facing the champions, than to be almost anything else I can think of. Forty thousand people watching you as you wind up and send in a swift one like this!”
And with that Joe let fly a ball with all his speed toward the basket. He was not so much intent on accuracy then as he was in letting off some surplus “steam,” and he was not a little surprised when the ball not only wentintothe basket butthroughit, ripping out the bottom.
“Wow!” exclaimed Joe. “I’m throwing faster than I thought I was. That basket is on the fritz. But if I’d been sending a ball over the plate it would have had some speed back of it, and it would have gone to the right spot.”
As Joe went to pick up the ball and examine the broken basket more closely a figure peered out from a little clump of trees on the edge of the field where the lad was practicing. The figurewatched the would-be pitcher closely and then murmured:
“He certainly hasspeedall right. I’d like to be back of the plate and watch him throw them in. I wonder if he has anything in him after all? It’s worth taking a chance on. I’ll wait a bit longer.”
The figure dodged behind the trees again as Joe once more took his position. He had stuffed some grass in the hole in the peach basket he was using, and again he threw in it.
He was just as accurate as before, and, now and then, when he cut loose, he sent the ball with unerring aim and with great force into the receptacle, several times knocking it down off the stake on which it was fastened.
“I don’t know as there’s much use in writing to Bentville to find out about him,” mused the figure hidden by the trees. “If he’s got that speed, and continues to show the control he has to-day, even without any curves he’d be a help to us. I’m going to speak to Rankin about it,” and with that the figure turned away.
Had Joe looked he would have seen Darrell Blackney, manager of the Silver Stars, who had been playing the innocent spy on him.
“Come now, fellows, let’s get into practice. Are all the scrub here?”
Darrell Blackney looked around over the diamond, where about twenty lads were assembled one fine afternoon.
“I don’t know about the scrub, but all our fellows are on hand,” replied Rankin. “Is it all arranged about the game Saturday?”
“Yes, we’re to play the Fayetteville Academy lads on their grounds.”
“A trip out of town, eh? That’s two in two weeks.”
“Well it gives our fellows experience in playing on some other diamond than their own.”
“Oh, it doesn’t much matter. The Fayettevilles will be easy fruit for us.”
“Don’t be too sure. They’re a younger team, that’s true, and they haven’t been doing well this season, but neither have we of late.”
“Oh, we’ll beat ’em,” declared the captain confidently.
“I think so myself, but I don’t want you to take too many chances. Here comes Sam. You and he get in for some warm-up work, Bart, and I’ll get the scrub together.”
Darrell went about the diamond, calling to the various members of the “scrub,” or second team.
“We haven’t any pitcher,” remarked Blake Carrington, who acted as captain of the scrub organization.
“What’s the matter with Slater?”
“He hasn’t showed up, and none of the other fellows feel like getting in the box against you boys. You’ll have to find us a pitcher before we can play.”
A sudden idea came to Darrell.
“All right,” he answered. “I guess I can. Wait a minute.”
He ran over to where Rankin was talking to some of his players.
“Can you play Tom Davis in centre field for to-day?” asked the manager.
“Yes, I guess so. Why?”
“I’m going to have Joe Matson pitch on the scrub. It will be a good time to get a line on him,and I’ll see if he shapes up as well as the day he did when I watched him practice.”
“All right; maybe it will be a good idea.”
Joe hardly knew what to say when Darrell, as calmly as if he had done it several times before, asked him to go in the box for the scrub and pitch against the Silver Stars.
“And do your best,” added Darrell. “I don’t care how many of our fellows you strike out. Every one, if you can.”
Joe’s heart gave a bound of delight. It might be the beginning of the very chance he had been waiting for so long. He calmed himself with an effort for he did not want to get “rattled.”
“All right,” he answered as though he had been used to such sudden emergency calls all season. “I’ll see what I can do. I’d like a chance to warm up, though.”
“Sure. You and Jake Bender go over there and practice for five minutes. Then we’ll play a five-inning game.”
The Stars were to bat first, and there was a mocking smile on the face of Sam Morton as he watched his rival go to the box.
“Don’t strike us all out,” called Sam. “We’ve had hard luck enough lately.”
The game began, and it was for “blood” fromthe very start. Joe was a trifle nervous, especially when he had two balls called on his first two efforts. Then he braced himself, and, not trying for speed, sent in a slow, easy ball that completely fooled the batter, who eventually struck out.
“Pretty good for a starter,” complimented Darrell. Sam Morton scowled.
The next batter hit an easy fly which was so promptly gathered in by the shortstop that there was little use in the player starting for first. Then Joe struck out the next lad after he had hit a couple of fouls.
“That’s the stuff!” cried Tom Davis, as he patted his chum on the back. “You’ll be in the box for the Stars yet.”
“Don’t get me all excited,” begged Joe with a smile. Yet he could not help feeling elated.
There was a viciousness in the pitching of Sam when he toed the plate that showed how his feelings had been stirred. He was evidently going to show how much superior he was.
He did strike out two men, and then came Joe’s turn at the bat. Our hero thought he detected a gleam of anger in Sam’s eyes.
“He’d just as soon hit me with a ball as not,” thought Joe, “and if he does it will hurt some. And he may be trying to bluff me so that I won’tstand up to the plate. I’ll see what I can do to him.”
Consequently, instead of waiting for the ball to get to him Joe stepped up and out to meet it before the curve “broke.” He “walked right into it,” as the baseball term has it, and the result was that he whacked out a pretty two-bagger that brought his mates to their feet with yells. Sam bit his lips in anger, but he kept his temper by an effort and struck out the next man so that Joe’s effort resulted in nothing.
The game went on, and when Sam at bat faced Joe, our hero could not help feeling a trifle nervous. He had sized up Sam’s style of batting, however, and was prepared.
“I’m going to give him a slow ball with an in-shoot to it,” decided Joe. “He keeps back from the plate and this will make him get still farther back. I’m going to strike him out.”
And strike him out Joe did, though not until after Sam had hit one foul that was within a shade of being fair. But when on his next two strikes he fanned the wind, there was a look of wonder and gratification on the face of Darrell.
“I believe Joe is going to make good,” he said to Rankin.
“It sure looks so. What about it?”
“You’ll see in a minute. I’m going to give him a chance to pitch part of the game against the Fayetteville Academy nine—that is if you agree to it.”
“Sure, go as far as you like.”
At the close of the game, which was won by the Stars, though by a small margin, Darrell approached Joe.
“Well?” asked the new pitcher diffidently.
“You did first rate. How would you like to pitch part of the game Saturday?”
“Do you mean it?” was the eager question.
“Certainly. I’ll put you in for a few innings toward the end, after we’ve cinched it, for I think it will be easy for us.”
It was not the highest honor that could have come to Joe, but he realized what it meant.
“I’d like it immensely,” he said, “but won’t Sam—what about him?”
“I don’t care anything about him,” said Darrell quickly. “I’m running this team. Will you pitch?”
“I sure will!” and Joe’s heart beat high with hope.
Joe Matson felt as though he was walking in the air when he went home that afternoon following the scrub game. That his ambition was about to be realized, and so soon after joining the team, was almost unbelievable.
“Why, what’s the matter, Joe?” asked Clara, as her brother fairly pranced into the house, caught her around the waist and swung her in the start of a waltz.
“Matter? Plenty’s the matter! I’m going to pitch on the Stars Saturday. Hurray!”
“My! Any one would think you were going to pitch uptothe stars the way you’re going on. Let go of me; you’ll have my hair all mussed up!”
“That’s easily fixed. Yes, I’m going to pitch.”
“Against whom?”
“The Fayetteville Academy, on their grounds. It won’t be much of a game, and I’m not to go in until it’s in the ice box——”
“In the ice box?”
“Yes, the refrigerator you know—safe. ThenI’m to try my hand at putting ’em over. Of course I’d like to go the whole nine innings but I can’t have everything at the start. It’s mighty decent of Darrell to give me this chance. Aren’t you glad, sis?”
“Yes, of course I am. I’d like to see the game, but I’ve used up all of my allowance for this week, and——”
“Here!” and Joe held out a dollar. “Blow yourself, sis.”
“Oh, what horrid slang!”
“I mean go to the game on me. I’ll stand treat. Take a girl if you want to and see yours truly do himself proud.”
Joe hunted up his mother to tell her the good news. He found her in the room which his father had fitted up as a workshop since the suspicious actions of Mr. Benjamin at the harvester factory. Mrs. Matson was looking over some papers, and there was on her face the same worried look Joe had seen there before.
“Has anything happened, mother?” he asked quickly, his own good news fading away as he thought of the trouble that might menace his father.
“No, only the same trouble about the patent,” she said. “There is nothing new, but your fatherthinks from the recent actions of Mr. Benjamin that the manager suspects something. Your father is getting some papers ready to go to Washington, and I was looking them over for him. I used to work in a lawyer’s office when I was a girl,” she went on with a smile, “and I know a little about the patent business so I thought I would help your father if I could.”
“Then there’s nothing wrong?”
“Not exactly, and if all goes right he will soon have his patent granted, and then those men can not harm him. But you look as though you had good news.”
“I have,” and the lad fairly bubbled over in telling his mother of the chance that had so unexpectedly come to him.
Mr. Matson was quite enthusiastic about Joe’s chance when he came home from work, and together they talked about it after supper.
“I wish I could go see the game,” said Mr. Matson, “but I am too busy.”
“How is the patent coming on?” asked Joe.
“Oh, pretty good. Thanks to you I was warned in time. If I had left my drawings, patterns and other things in the shop I’m afraid it wouldn’t be going so well. Mr. Benjamin evidently suspects something. Only to-day he askedme how I was coming on with it, and he wanted to know why I wasn’t working on it any more. I had to put him off with some excuse and he acted very queer. Right after that I heard him calling up Mr. Holdney on the telephone.”
“But your worry will be over when your application is allowed,” suggested Mrs. Matson.
Joe went to his baseball practice with a vim in the days that intervened before the game that was to be so important to him. Tom Davis helped him, and several times cautioned his chum about overdoing himself.
“If your arm gets stiff—it’s good-night for you,” he declared, in his usual blunt way. “You’ve got to take care of yourself, Joe.”
“I know it, but I want to get up more speed.”
“That’s all right. Speed isn’t everything. Practice for control, and that won’t be so hard on you.”
And, as the days went on, Joe realized that he was perfecting himself, though he still had much to learn about the great game.
It was the day before the contest when our hero was to occupy the box for the first time for the Stars. He and Tom had practiced hard and Joe knew that he was “fit.”
Joe wondered how Sam Morton had taken thenews of his rival’s advance, but if Sam knew he said nothing about it, and in the practice with the scrub he was unusually friendly to Joe. For Darrell decided not to have the new pitcher go into the box for the Stars until the last moment. He did not want word of it to get out, and Joe and the catcher did some practice in private with signals.
The last practice had been held on the afternoon prior to the game, and arrangements completed for the team going to Fayetteville. Joe was on his way home on a car with Tom Davis, for Riverside boasted of a trolley system.
“How do you feel?” asked Tom of his chum.
“Fine as a fiddle.”
“Your arm isn’t lame or sore?”
“Not a bit, I can——”
Joe was interrupted by a cry from two ladies who sat in front of them, the only other occupants of the vehicle save themselves. The car was going down hill and had acquired considerable speed—dangerous speed Joe thought—and the motorman did not seem to have it well under control.
But what had caused the cry of alarm was this. Driving along the street, parallel with the tracks, and about three hundred feet ahead of the car, was a boy in an open delivery wagon. He was going in the same direction as was the electric vehicle.
Suddenly his horse stumbled and fell almost on the tracks, the wagon sliding half over the animal while the boy on the seat was hemmed in and pinned down by a number of boxes and baskets that slid forward from the rear of the wagon.
“Put on your brakes! Put on your brakes!” yelled the conductor to the motorman. “You’ll run him down!”
The motorman ground at the handle, and the brake shoes whined as they gripped the wheels, but the car came nearer and nearer the wagon. The conductor on the rear platform was also putting on the brakes there.
Suddenly the horse kicked himself around so that he was free of the tracks, lying alongside them, and far enough to one side so that the car would safely pass him. There was a sigh of relief from the two women passengers, but a moment later it changed to a cry of alarm, for the boy on the seat suddenly fell to one side, and hung there with his head so far over that the car would hit him as it rushed past. The lad was evidently pinned down by the boxes and baskets on his legs.
“Stop! Stop the car!” begged one of the ladies. The other had covered her eyes with her hands.
“I—I can’t!” cried the motorman. “It’s got too much speed! I can’t stop it.”
Joe sprang to his feet and made his way along the seat past Tom, to the running board of the car, for the vehicle was an open one.
“Where are you going?” cried Tom.
“To save that lad! He’ll be killed if the car strikes him!”
“Let the motorman do it!”
“He can’t! He’s grinding on the brakes as hard as he can and so is the conductor. I’ve got to save him—these ladies can’t! I can lean over and pull him aboard the car.”
“But your arm! You’ll strain your arm and you can’t pitch to-morrow.”
For an instant Joe hesitated, but only for an instant. He realized that what Tom said was true. He saw a vision of himself sitting idly on the bench, unable to twirl the ball because of a sprained arm. Then Joe made up his mind.
“I’m going to save him!” he cried as he hurried to the front end of the running board. Then, clinging to the upright of the car with his left arm, he stretched out his other to save the lad from almost certain death, the conductor and motorman unable to lend aid and the women incapable. There was not room on the running board for Tom to help Joe.
The motorman was grinding away at the brakes but the heavy car continued to slide on, for the hill was steep. The horse lay quiet now, for a man had managed to get to him and sit on his head, so the animal could not kick and thresh about with the consequent danger of getting his legs under the trolley. The car would pass the horse and the wagon by a good margin, but the boy, leaning far over, was sure to be hit unless Joe saved him, and no one in the street seemed to think of the boy’s danger. He said later that he did not realize it himself.
The lad was struggling to free himself but could not, and he did not seem to be able to raise himself to an upright position on the seat, in which case he would have been safe.
“Steady now!” called Joe, and he braced himself for the shock he knew would come.
The next instant, as the car kept on, Joe found himself opposite the lad and reaching forward hisright hand he grasped him by the collar, shoving him away so the car would not strike him. Then, holding on in grim despair Joe pulled the youth toward him, aided by the momentum of the vehicle. His idea was to get him aboard the car to prevent his being struck by it, and in this he succeeded.
There was a ripping sound, for some part of the lad’s clothing was caught on the seat and tore loose. A shower of boxes and baskets followed the body as it slid forward, and a moment later Joe had the lad on the foot board beside him, safe and sound, but very much astonished by his sudden descent from the wagon seat.
Joe felt an excruciating pain shoot through his arm—his pitching arm. It was numb from the shock but even yet he did not dare let go, for the lad was on uncertain footing. The pain increased. It was like being kicked by the back-fire of an auto or motor boat. For a moment there was a dull sensation and then the outraged nerves and muscles seemed to cry out in agony.
“There—there!” murmured Joe between his clenched teeth to the lad he had saved. “You’re all right I guess. Will—will somebody——”
He did not finish, but turned to the conductor, who had rushed toward him on the running board,ready to relieve him of the lad’s weight. But the boy was able to look after himself now, for the vehicle was almost at a standstill, and the motorman had it under control.
“Much—much obliged to you,” the boy stammered his thanks to Joe who was slowly making his way back to where Tom awaited him. Joe did not know whether he could get there or not, passing himself along by clinging with his left hand to the successive car uprights.
“He saved your life all right,” said the conductor, who had hold of the delivery wagon lad.
“That’s what!” chimed in several other men from the street, as they crowded up around the car.
By this time the motorman had succeeded in bringing the vehicle to a full stop and Joe, fearing he might fall, for the pain was very severe, got off. Tom hurried up to him.
“Did it strain you much?” he asked eagerly.
“A little—yes; considerable I guess,” admitted Joe, making a wry face. “But it will be all right—I guess.” His right arm—the arm he hoped to use in the game on the morrow—the first game with him in the box—hung limp at his side.
Tom Davis saw and knew at once that something serious was the matter. He realized whatit meant to Joe, and he lost no time in useless talk.
“You come with me!” he commanded, taking hold of Joe’s left arm.
“Where are you going?” demanded our hero.
“To our old family doctor. That arm of yours will need attention if you’re going to pitch to-morrow.”
“I don’t know that I can pitch, Tom.”
“Yes you can—you’vegotto. Dr. Pickett will give you something to fix it up. You can’t let this chance slip. I was afraid this would happen when I saw what you were going to do.”
“Yes,” said Joe simply, “but I couldn’t let him be hit by the car.”
“No, I suppose not, and yet—well, we’ll see what Dr. Pickett says. Come on,” and Tom quickly improvised a sling from his own and Joe’s handkerchiefs, and was about to lead his chum away.
“Oh, are you hurt? I’m sorry!” exclaimed the lad whom Joe had saved.
“It’s only a strain,” said the pitcher, but he did not add what it might mean to him.
The lad thanked Joe again, earnestly, for his brave act and then hastened to look after his horse, that had been gotten to its feet. The motorman, too, thanked Joe for, though had anaccident resulted it would not have been his fault, yet he was grateful.
“Oh, come on!” exclaimed Tom impatiently as several others crowded up around Joe. “Every minute’s delay makes it worse. Let’s get a move on,” and he almost dragged his chum to the doctor’s office.
Dr. Pickett looked grave when told of the cause of the injury.
“Well, let’s have a look at the arm,” he suggested, and when he saw a slight swelling he shook his head. “I’m afraid you can’t pitch to-morrow,” he said.
“I’vegotto,” replied Joe simply.
“Can’t you give him some liniment to rub on to take the stiffness out, doctor?” asked Joe.
“Hum! Nature is something that doesn’t like to be hurried, young man,” responded the physician. “However, it might be worse, and perhaps if that arm is massaged half the night and up to the time of the game to-morrow, he might pitch a few innings.”
“That’s good!” exclaimed Joe.
“And it’s me for the massage!” cried Tom. “Now give us some stuff to rub on, doctor.”
Dr. Pickett showed Tom how to rub the arm, and how to knead the muscles to take out the soreness,and gave the boys a prescription to get filled at the drug store.
“Come on!” cried Tom again. He seemed to have taken charge of Joe as a trainer might have done. “I must get you home and begin work on you.”
And Tom did. He installed himself as rubber-in-chief in Joe’s room, and for several hours thereafter there was the smell of arnica and pungent liniment throughout the house. Tom was a faithful massage artist, and soon some of the soreness began to get out of the wrenched arm.
“Let me try to throw a ball across the room,” the pitcher begged of Tom about nine o’clock. “I want to see if I can move it.”
“Not a move!” sternly forbade the nurse. “You just keep quiet. If you can pitch in the morning you’ll be lucky.”
At intervals until nearly midnight Tom rubbed the arm and then, knowing that Joe must have rest, he installed himself on a couch in his chum’s room, and let Joe go to sleep, with his arm wrapped in hot towels saturated with witch hazel, a warm flat iron keeping the heat up.
“Well, how goes it?” Joe heard some one say, as he opened his eyes to find the sun streaming in his room. The young pitcher tried to raise hisarm but could not. It seemed as heavy as lead and a look of alarm came over his face.
“That’s all right,” explained Tom. “Wait until I get off some of the towels. It looks like an Egyptian mummy now.”
Tom loosed the wrappings and then, to Joe’s delight, he found that he could move his arm with only a little pain resulting. He was about to swing it, as he did when pitching, but Tom called out:
“Hold on now! Wait until I rub it a bit and get up the circulation.” The rubbing did good, and Joe found that he had nearly full control of the hand and arm. They were a bit stiff to be sure, but much better.
“Now for a good breakfast, some more rubbing, then some more, and a little light practice,” decided Tom, and Joe smiled, but he gave in and ate a hearty meal.
Once more faithful Tom massaged the arm, and rubbed in a salve designed to make the sore muscles and tendons limber. Not until then would he allow Joe to go down in the yard and throw a few balls.
The delivery of the first one brought a look of agony on the pitcher’s face, but he kept at it until he was nearly himself again. Then came morerubbing and another application of salve and liniment, until Joe declared that there wouldn’t be any skin left on his arm, and that he’d smell like a walking drug store for a week.
“Don’t you care, as long as you can pitch,” said Clara. “I’m going to the game and I’m going to take Mabel Davis and Helen Rutherford. They both want to see you pitch, Joe.”
“That’s good,” said her brother with a smile.
“Now we’ll take another trip to the doctor’s and see what he says,” was Tom’s next order. The physician looked gratified when he saw the arm.
“Either it wasn’t as badly strained as I thought it,” he said, “or that medicine worked wonders.”
“It was my rubbing,” explained Tom, puffing out his chest in pretended pride.
“Well, that certainly completed the cure,” admitted the physician.
“And I can pitch?” asked Joe anxiously.
“Yes, a few innings. Have your arm rubbed at intervals in the game, and wear a wrist strap. Good luck and I hope you’ll win,” and with a smile he dismissed them.
Wearing a wrist strap helped greatly, and when it was nearly time to leave for Fayetteville Joe found that his arm was much better.
“I don’t know how long I can last,” he said to Darrell, “and maybe I’ll be batted out of the box.”
“It’s too bad, of course,” replied the manager, when the accident had been explained to him, “but we won’t work you very hard. I want you to get your chance, though.”
And Joe felt his heart beat faster as he thought how nearly he had lost his chance. Yet he could not have done otherwise, he reflected.
“I don’t see what’s keeping Sam Morton,” mused Captain Rankin, as the team prepared to take the special trolley car. “He met me a little while ago and said he’d be on hand.”
“It’s early yet,” commented the manager. “I guess he’ll be on hand. I told him Joe was going to pitch a few innings.”
“What did he say?”
“Well, he didn’t cut up nearly as much as I thought he would. He said it was only fair to give him a show, but I know Sam is jealous and he won’t take any chances on not being there.”
All of the players, save the regular pitcher, were on hand now and they were anxiously waiting for Sam. One of the inspectors of the trolley line came up to where the boys stood about the special car that was on a siding.
“Say,” began the inspector, “I’ll have to send you boys on your way now.”
“But our special isn’t due to leave for half an hour,” complained Darrell. “We’re waiting for Sam Morton.”
“Can’t help that. I’ve got to start you off sooner than I expected. There’s been a change in the schedule that I didn’t expect, and if I don’t get you off now I can’t for another hour, as the line to Fayetteville will be blocked.”
“That means we’ll be half an hour later than we expected,” said Darrell. “Well, I suppose we’d better go on. Sam can come by the regular trolley, I guess.”
“Sure, he’ll be in Fayetteville in plenty of time,” suggested the inspector. “I’ll be here and tell him about it.”
There was no other way out of it, and soon the team and the substitutes, with the exception of Sam, were on their way. There was quite a crowd already gathered on the Academy grounds when they arrived and they were noisily greeted by their opponents as well as by some of their own “rooters.” The Academy lads were at practice.
“They’re a snappy lot of youngsters,” commented Darrell, as he watched them.
“Yes, we won’t have any walk-over,” said the captain.
The Silver Star lads lost no time in getting into their uniforms. Tom gave Joe’s arm a good rubbing and then he caught for him for a while until Joe announced that, aside from a little soreness, he was all right.
“Try it with Ferguson now,” ordered Darrell, motioning to the regular catcher, and Joe did so, receiving compliments from the backstop for his accuracy.
“A little more speed and you’ll have ’em guessing,” said the catcher genially. “But don’t strain yourself.”
The minutes ticked on. Several of the regular cars had come in from Riverside but there was no sign of Sam Morton. Darrell and Captain Rankin held an earnest conversation.
“What do you suppose is keeping him?” asked the manager.
“I can’t imagine. Unless he is deliberately staying away to throw the game.”
“Oh, Sam wouldn’t do that. He’s too anxious to pitch. We’ll wait a few more cars.”
“And if he doesn’t come?”
Darrell shrugged his shoulders and looked over to where Joe was practicing with Bart Ferguson.